White Fatigue: Naming the Challenge in Moving from an Individual to a Systemic Understanding of Racism

This article introduces the notion White fatigue. White fatigue occurs for White students who have grown tired of learning and discussing race and racism, despite an understanding of the moral imperative of anti-racist and anti-oppressive practices. The article differentiates White fatigue from ideas like White resistance, White guilt, or White fragility, arguing that each of these phenomenon occur at different stages of White Racial Identity Development. Distinction is also drawn among White fatigue and other forms of racially based fatigue, specifically racial battle fatigue and White people fatigue syndrome. Further drawing on the notion of stereotype threat, the article considers the challenges for White students learning about race and racism while simultaneously resisting being labeled a racist. This struggle is elemental to the manifestation of White fatigue. Ultimately, the author argues that educators must be more accurate in how they define the range of responses from White students, consistently humanize all students in the process of understanding race and racism, and encourage further research for understanding a condition that is happening to a growing number of students.     

Factor structure evidence for developmental levels of perceptual processing on the developmental test of visual-motor integration

Beery's Developmental Test of Visual-Motor Integration was individually administered to 193 school-age children. Test protocols were factor analyzed by a principal component solution. Four factors were obtained, indicating that the test does not measure a unitary dimension of perceptual-motor development, but rather four distinct levels or stages for the age range of children investigated. The structural features of the designs that make up the test were used to define the factors. It is argued that a more useful interpretation of performance on this test would be one that designates visualmotor processing in terms of levels, not age equivalents.     

Brain Health Knowledge in Community-Dwelling Older Adults

Aging and its effects on a person's quality of life are a growing health concern and burden for many Americans. Recently, studies have shown that adopting certain healthy behaviors may help maintain and or prevent age-related health issues such as cognitive decline. However, many people are unaware of these newfound facts. Furthermore, there is insufficient research evidence to understand how older adults view brain health and the differences between diverse groups of older adults. This study examines brain health knowledge and behaviors among Caucasian and African-American community-dwelling older adults in North Carolina. Findings were significant for level of education and total brain health knowledge scores, though there were no significant differences between races. In addition, there was a significant association between total number of health conditions and total brain health knowledge scores that warrants further study.     

K–12 and University Educators Working Together Toward Change: Initiating a Conversation About Practice

This case study of a joint school/university professional development opportunity explored how 12 practitioners came together to examine change in light of discrepancies between current practice in local schools and promising practices recommended in the literature for students identified as having significant disabilities. The group met monthly over the course of one school year to study action research and to examine aspects of individual practice and their emerging identity as a community of learners. Participants explored perceptions about promising practice relative to actual practice engaged in by K–12 teachers, the impact of ongoing structured conversation on individual practice, and the impact of group membership for both individual participants and school/university partnerships. After one academic year, participants reported that the impact of this structured conversation was highly meaningful with respect to positive change in individual practice, the creation of a new support network for participants, and the development of new understandings between university and K–12 practitioners. Findings are discussed in light of implications for researchers, teacher educators, and K–12 practitioners in their various roles as agents of social change.