Inequality of Education- perceptions

"Yet research has shown that there are inequities within schools that are just as significant as inequities between schools. Not only do students of low SES tend to go to lower quality schools, but within those schools, they can receive a lower quality education than that of high-SES students in the same schools" (Wenglinsky, 1998, p. 271).
     We have talked about excuses, now I would like to talk about perceptions. Can the perceptions a teacher has for the student change the way the student is interacted with and taught? Are expectations different for students who are known to come from a "poor" family than those who come from a "rich" home? If there is a difference, are the children treated differently because they are perceived as inferior and less capable of learning? I think it is important to hold expectations high for all and not to let empathy change to something beyond and lower expectations from kids who have less.
     As for the difference between schools I never really thought much about it until last week. I teach in one of the three lowest SES elementary schools in the Meridian School District. I know my kids have hard lives but I try to hold them all to the same expectations. I recently accompanied my husband to his school. He just got a job there and had his leg in a brace so I chauffeured him to the school for a tour by one of the other fifth grade teachers. It is a magnet school whose fifth grade is capped at 27 (she believed). There were 33 kids in each of our fifth grades last year. As she is giving the tour I did not have much to say as I drooled over all of the die cuts, copy machines, endless amounts of paper and things we do not have access to just a block away. Oh, and don't forget they have Subway delivered every Friday. My eyes were opened and I must confess I did not like what I saw. How can  larger class sizes be justified for kids who need smaller class sizes? What makes it okay for some schools to have things but other schools cannot because they cannot afford it?

Wenglinsky, H. (1998). Finance Equalization and Withi-School Equity: The Relationship  Between Education Spending and the Social Distribution of Achievement. Educational Evaluation and Policy Analysis , 269-283.

Problem: Teachers' beliefs about students who have low SES

"[T]eachers who play a role in transforming the academic plight of low-income students are not sympathetic in their orientation, but are instead empathetic, in that they understand the challenges that poverty poses for many students, but they do not become paralyzed by this understanding in their teaching orientation, and instead communicate to their students a firm belief in their ability to be successful." (p. 49)
Howard, T. C. 2010.  Why Race and Culture Matter in Schools.  New York:  Teachers College Press.

Last fall I went to the Association for Middle Level Education in Portland.  Dr. Stanley Trent from the University of Virginia gave a presentation dealing with self-efficacy and equity.  One feature of the presentation was a contrast between teachers who one could say were sympathetic to teachers who were empathetic.  The link below is a video that we watched showing a teacher with an empathetic orientation.

When you open the link, click on #24--Audrey, Year One.
http://www.learner.org/resources/series21.html#


Perhaps we can identify some of Audrey's statements and actions that make her empathetic rather than sympathetic, or perhaps we can question if she is empathetic?

Initial Questions

In order to get us started I thought we could look at some basic questions regarding socioeconomic status.

• How do we define socioeconomic status?
• How does socioeconomic status impact education?
• What are the impacts on the individual?
• What are the impacts on the community?

What is a Knowledge-building Discourse Community?

I copied this from the syllabus for ease of reference.

      Knowledge-building Discourse Communities (KBDC) (20 pts.)—A KBDC has certain characteristics as defined by Scardamalia and Bereiter (1994):

o   Focused on problems, not topics

o   Decentralized, open knowledge building, with a focus on collective knowledge—through constructive social interactions with others engaged in similar or related problems

o   More knowledgeable members are engaged in the knowledge-building process, but do not delineate the limits of investigation

o   Less knowledgeable members’ participation is valued as it determines the gaps, inadequacies, difficulties in the knowledge being created that can demand a clarification of ideas by the ‘experts.’

o   Engages a broader knowledge community than that involved in the current local problem, bringing in views from the outside

o   Makes for a ‘second order environment’ (one where the one’s adaption to the environment changes the environment itself) where one’s contributions can determine what contributions will follow, thus changing the direction of the discourse and the knowledge constructed.

As an inquiry-oriented activity, this project will be worked on throughout the term of the course.  KBDCs will be created in the first week around common questions generated and problems identified by you and your colleagues.  Similar concerns/questions will collectively be grouped together, and essential questions identified.   Your KBDC will create a BLOG site using Blogger.com.  Once your site has been created, you will share the URL with me (I will create links directly to these from the Blackboard site).  From there, your KBDC will investigate, redefine, create, discuss, reflect, and engage in the iterative process of this form of study.  There will be “check points” throughout the term that should enable you to manage your work efforts productively