Background/Context: Brown v Board of Education fundamentally changed our nation's schools, yet we know surprisingly little about how and whether they provide equality of educational opportunity. Although substantial evidence suggests that African American and Latino students who attend these schools face fewer learning opportunities than their…

Background/Context: Although frequently associated with the United States, affirmative action is not a uniquely American social policy. Indeed, 2003 witnessed review and revision of affirmative action policies affecting higher education institutions in both France and the United States. Using critical race theory (CRT) as a theoretical lens, this…

Background/Context: Recent sociocultural studies of detracking describe the ways in which notions of ability--local understandings of students' intellectual capacities--are at play in these settings, shaping both the politics and the practice of the reform. This study extends this examination into the classrooms of detracking schools. Purpose:…

Background: Educational research shows differences in experience, access, and outcomes across racial groups with some groups advantaged and others disadvantaged. One of the concepts used to explain racial differences, racialization, is a taken-for-granted term that is yet to be fully defined in the context of the school. We differentiate the term…

Background: Scholars are bringing much-needed attention to the persistent problem of academic underachievement among African American children in the United States, who continue to lag behind White school children in all socioeconomic groups. This is especially true of impoverished African Americans. Although some link these outcomes to poor…

Using five different data sets, this study explores the bidirectional relationship between standardized tests and various indicators of success. Examining student success on a variety of indicators such as cumulative grade point average and graduation rates, the study demonstrates the limited usefulness of such tests, particularly when the data…

Qualitative research describing and theorizing about the emerging civic identities of diverse youth is scarce. This study provides a textured view of how civic identity is constructed and negotiated by racially and socioeconomically diverse adolescents, based on interviews and in-class discussions conducted with students in four public secondary…

A revolution in genetics is occurring, but when looking ahead, we must not romanticize the past. The social history of genetics, and American education's association with eugenics, make it necessary that we understand that both education and science are informed by social attitudes. (MT)

Examines racial disparities in education, focusing on those that might be attributable to discrimination. The paper reviews what is known about determinants of achievement and the magnitude of racial discrepancies in such achievement, discusses the most likely sources of discriminatory behaviors by teachers and by school district personnel,…

After introducing identity and discussing how it has been used in multicultural education, the paper notes general challenges to this paradigm and uses data from an ethnographic study of a multiracial South African high school to critique multicultural education's treatment of identity, suggesting alternate theoretical paradigms, research…

This article argues for a decolonizing multicultural education pedagogy, which engages the interstices in-between, hybrid spaces that emerge at the intersections of different cultures, histories, and locations. It also examines how those who work for social transformation are implicated in the very systems and structures they are attempting to…

The national demographic transformation that has become more evident in the last decade was easily foreseen at least 10 years ago. Our future student growth is as predictable: In a mere 35 years, White students will be a minority in every category of public education as we know it today, and non-English-proficient students will grow significantly.…

Surveyed Arizona teachers to investigate how personal traits influenced their attitudes toward charter schools and school vouchers, also examining school- and district-level variables shaping charter school teachers' views about choice. White, experienced, unionized, democratic educators and those working in positive school environments were less…

Throughout the educational history of American society, the entrance of a new group was extremely threatening to the established traditionalists already in power at educational institutions. An analysis is done of the advent of various groups onto the American educational scene. Implications are made for modern comparisons. (JN)

Background: This longitudinal study examines the long-term effects on the achievement of students at a diverse suburban high school after all students were given accelerated mathematics in a detracked middle school as well as ninth-grade "high-track" curriculum in all subjects in heterogeneously grouped classes. Despite considerable…