The State of Education: Equity Considerations for Asian American, Immigrant, American Indian, and Dis/abled Students (original) (raw)
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Asian American and Pacific Islander Students: Equity and the Achievement Gap
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Schools and the Culturally Diverse Exceptional Student: Promising Practices and Future Directions
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Chapter 6 reports the results of a series of studies on the identification and placement of LEP Hispanic students conducted by the Handicapped Minority Research Institute on Language Proficiency at the University of Texas at Austin. Alba Ortiz and James Yates review research findings related to the referral, assessment, and placement of LEP students in programs for the learning disabled, mentally retarded, and speech and/or language handicapped. Policy and practice implications related to special education and regular education are discussed. In Chapter 7, George Sugai emphasizes the need for schools to recognize and understand the impact of culture on student academic and social success. Classroom-based assessment and evaluation strategies for use with culturally diverse, behaviorally disordered students are reviewed and discussed. An interventionist approach to assessment and evaluation is suggested to reduce biases and improve educational decision making. 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Ron Phillips and Ford Cranwell (Chapter 12) provide an instructive discussion of Native Band-Operated schools in Manitoba, Canada, and their special education program needs. The model for community-based special education program development and ensuing discussion of future funding and policy directions are timely in view of the movement throughout North America of greater Native involvement and control of Indian education. vi CHAPTER 1 Demography As It Affects Special Education James IL Yates One of the most powerful forces affecting education in general, and special education specifically, is demography. While changes in demography are exceedingly important to educator;, it is almost botany beyond the control of educators to alter or change the directions of demography. Therefore, educators must familiarize themselves with demographic characteristics in order to formulate appropriate responses by the educational enterprise. DEMOGRAPHIC VARIABLES Age This country's population continues to grow older. The median age has increased to approximately 32 years for White citizens, and there are more than 30,000 people in the United States who are over 100 years of age. Every week, 210 Americans celebrate their 100th birthday. We have more than 2.2 million people over 85 years of age; significantly, more than half of them voted in the 1980 presidential election. Between 1980 and the year 2000, the number of 85-year-olds in this country will have increased 123% (Longino, 1986). By the year 2000, 75% of all heads of household will be over 45 years of age (Exter, 1986). Obviously, this is a powerful and increasingly politically active group of citizens. One need only look at the effe't of having a majority of voters that DO NOT have children in school to understand the effects of this large older population upon resources and programs of schools. Ethnicity Not only is the U.S. population becoming older, but it is becoming less White. The numbers of Black, brown, and Asian citizens are dramatically increasing, with Hispanics representing the fastest growing population in this country (Austin American Statesman,1986). The Census Bureau reported that as of March, 1985, the Hispanic population in the United States had increased some 16% in a little over 5 years, compared to the national population increase of 3.3%. Hispanics now represent 16.9 million people in the United States, an increase of approximately 2.3 million since the 1980 census. Reich (1986) projects that, by the year 2080, the Hispanic population in the United States, now representing 7% of the population, will have increased to 19%. Currently there are approximately 247 Black mayors in the United States, and almost 6,000 Black elected officials. In 1986, there were 3,202 elected Hispanic officials (Lim, 1986)an amazing statistic since 65% of the Hispanic population are too young to vote, and some 14% are legally ineligible to vote. The political power and influence of minorities is undeniable in a nation which, by the year 2000, will have 260 million people, one of every three of whom will be either Black, Hispanic, or Asian-American. Language Minorities A dramatic and clearly defined increase in the number of language minorities has occurred in this country (Omark & Erickson, 1983). In 1980, there were 14 or 15 major language groups with almost 2,400,000 students between the ages of 5 and 14, and this number of language minority students is projected to increase by approximately one-third by the year 2000. By far, the largest language minority group is Spanish-speaking, with more than two-thirds of the entire language minority population being represented by Spanish f;peakers. The number of Spanish speakers in this country is projected to increase some 48% between 1980 and the year 2000, numbering more than 22 million persons by the year 2000 (Macias, 1985). Youth Not only is the population growing older and becoming less White, but the odds are significantly greater that its youth will be members of ethnic minority groups. Taken together as a group, it is a more frequent phenomenon for ethnic minorities to comprise the majority of public school students. For example, in the state of Thxas, 51% of kindergarten students are Hispanic, with the majority of elementary age students being members of minority groups. Before one hastens to associate these demographic shifts with a specific geographic area such as the Southwest, one must remember that Chicago represents the third largest Hispanic population center in the United States (La Familia en Marcha, 1984). It should also be noted that even today more than 50% of the population of the United States resides east of the Mississippi River. Large city school populations are overwhelmingly minority: Miami, 71%; Philadelphia, 73%; Baltimore, 80%; and so forth (McNett, 1983). These shifts in the ethnic membership of public school populations are not a temporary bubble in the population stream, but rather the emerging future. As mentioned previously, the typical White person in this country is 32 years of age. The American Black is typically 25; the American Hispanic is 22 years of age. It is a rather simple task to determine who will have the most children within the next 15 years. The White population is basically leveling off in terms of women of child-bearing age, while the population of Hispanic women of child-bearing age is increasing dramatically. In addition, Hispanic women have the highest fertility rate of American women, 107 per 1,000 (Schwartz, 1986). A new baby boom will occur, but this time it will be Hispanic (Hodgkinson, 1985a). Environmental Factors Major changes have also taken place in terms of the social environment for children born in this country. For every 100 children born today, 12 are born out of wedlock, 40 are born to parents who divorce before the child is 18, 5 are born to parents who separate, 2 are born to parents one of whom will die before the child reaches 18, and 41 reach age 18 having been raised in a "normal" family environment. Of children born out of wedlock, 50% are born to teenage mothers. Almost unbelievably, very young mothers-13 and 14 years of ageexist. In fact, every day in America, 40 teenage girls give birth to their third child. In 1979 dollars, each child born to a teenager eventually costs taxpayers $18,710 (Burt, 1986). Menage mothers tend to give birth to children who are premature, of low birth weight, with a significantly higher incidence of major health problems, and in turn, with dramatically increased likelihood of having major handicaps. This group of high risk children is entering the educational system in rapidly increasing numbers. Socioeconomic status remains a consistent correlate of school learning and learning problems. The Congressional Budget Office (1984) notes that approximately 22% of children under 17 years of age live in poverty and that this number is increasing. Given the corresponding increase in the number of minority children of school age, the known disparity in income levels for minorities and Whites, and continued differentiation and representation of minorities in professional and other high-income-earning activities, it can be conclusively 2 10 .., projected that the number...
"Asian Americans and Education"
Chang, B. (2017). Asian Americans and education. In G. W. Noblit (Ed.), The Oxford research encyclopedia of education (pp. 1-39). Oxford University. https://doi.org/10.1093/acrefore/9780190264093.013.102, 2017
(full version) A review article on the state of educational research concerning communities that are included under the Asian American umbrella category. Abstract and Contents The communities that constitute the racialized category of Asian Americans consist of approximately 20 million people in the United States, or about 5% of the total population. About 20% or 4 million are of primary or secondary school age, and over 1.1 million are in higher education. Both in popular and academic discourse, “Asian American” generally refers to people who have ethnic backgrounds in South Asia (e.g., Bangladesh, India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka), Southeast Asia (e.g., Cambodia, the Philippines, Thailand, Vietnam), and East Asia (e.g., China, Japan, Korea, Taiwan). As “Asian American” is an umbrella term used to categorize a very diverse, heterogeneous, and transnational set of populations, Asian Americans as a group present various challenges to education and research in and about the United States. These challenges can concern paradigms of achievement, citizenship, family involvement, access (e.g., higher education, bilingual education), language and culture, race and ethnicity, and school community. In order to address these paradigmatic challenges, a great deal of scholarship has called for a disaggregation of the data on populations that fall under the pan-ethnic “Asian America” umbrella term, to gain a more nuanced and dynamic understanding of the many diverse populations and their historical, cultural, economic, and political experiences. To further address the problematic framing of Asian Americans in education and related fields, scholars have applied critical lenses to key tensions within conceptualization, policy, curriculum, and pedagogy. More recently, the notions of intersectionality and transnationalism have been generative in the study of Asian Americans, within not only educational research but also Asian American studies, which generally falls under the field of ethnic studies in the U.S. context, but has also been categorized under American studies, cultural studies, or Asian studies. While characterizations of Asian Americans as “the Model Minority” or “the Oppressed Minority” persist, the relevance of such static binaries has increasingly been challenged as the Asian American populations and migrations continue to diversify and increase. Contents: I. Introduction II. Demographics and Naming of Asian America (Key Demographics, History and Politics of Naming) III. Key Tensions within Education (Existing Conceptualizations, Intersectionality and Transnationalism) IV. Moving Forward (Current Issues, Next Steps and Pedagogies) V. Further Reading
2019
state testing achievement gaps, and little attention has been given to examining gaps in student rigor and gifted education. If we do not pull back the layers to examine all possible educational inequities, we will do little to change the status quo. National Relevance When administrators, politicians, and journalists give attention to the achievement gap, they generally speak of data on standardized achievement tests. Students of color fail to meet minimum graduation standards on mandated testing (MDE, 2014 Minnesota School Report card; Howard, 2010). Students of color are overrepresented in special education and remedial courses (Darling-Hammond, 2010). Though some targeted efforts have resulted in improvement since Darling-Hammond's 2010 publication, all states continue to have measurable racial and ethnic disparities in special education (U.S. Department of Education, 2016). These concerns are real, significant, and worthy of national attention. Educational policy has specifically targeted discrimination and achievement gaps since the 2002 update to the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA). The latest update, the 2015 Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA), states specific achievement goals for all subgroups in reading and math (Minnesota Department of Education, 2018). Unfortunately, most solutions target remediation. Most solutions examine ways schools can get underperforming students up to the standard benchmark. These solutions stop at the minimal grade level benchmark. Policies have failed to examine the higher achievement gap. Closer examination reveals a disturbing pattern of segregation in high schools (Darling-Hammond, 2010). African-American, Hispanic, and American Indian