Third Example of the "Americanization" Danger

In 2001 Dr. Carol L. Schmid wrote an article entitled Educational achievement language-minority students, and the new second generation. In this article she notes some disturbing research findings.

For example she mentions that Rumberger (1995) found that second-generation Mexican-Americans were less likely to drop out of school than were their third-generation counterparts, even though their SES (Socioeconomic status), on average, was lower. Driscoll's (1999) study of immigrant and native Latino youth found that U.S.-born students of U.S.-born parents were more than twice as likely to drop out of high school as were U.S.-born students with foreign-born parents. Furthermore, the third-generation sophomores in her sample were almost three times as likely to drop out as were the immigrant sophomores.

Although the exact cause (s) for this is unknown, Suarez-Orozco and Suarez-Orozco (1995) can provide some insight from what they found in the analysis of their comparison between recent Mexican immigrants and U.S-born Mexican Americans. They found from their primarily qualitative data that recent immigrants often have a "dual frame of reference." Such a frame of reference enabled the immigrants to believe their lives in the United States were markedly better than the lives they left behind. U.S.-born Mexican Americans who didn't have this dual frame of reference saw themselves as marginalized from the dominant culture so they strived to identify with the "dominant American paradigm of adolescent ambivalence." This resulted in recent Mexican immigrants being more achievement oriented than U.S.-born Mexican Americans.

In other words, striving to become "Americanized" resulted in lower academic achievement.

What Are They Thinking?!?

Even though a recent audit shows that over the last seven years schools were given $460 million by the Utah legislature to reduce class size, class sizes in Utah have not been lowered. Now a new bill has passed committee this year to give schools another $26 million to reduce class size in K-3.

Why would legislation be supported that gives more money towards something in a way that has so far been an unsuccessful effort? Has the situation miraculously changed?

The seriousness of this decision becomes more acute when we are told that even though the audit found that districts were likely using the previous $46 million correctly, most didn't specifically track where the dollars went. This is appalling.

This bill is extremely flawed for the following reasons:

Reason #1: Before giving money to schools, each school should have a comprehensive strategic plan on how it is going to improve academic achievement, especially for those students in greatest need. The plan needs to be based on research. It also needs to include the funds that will be needed to implement each part of the plan giving a rationale as to why this particular implementation would be the most cost effective.

Reason #2: An evaluation component needs to be required to show that resources are achieving the desired outcome which must be student achievement. For example, if class size reduction was part of the plan, the effectiveness of the plan wouldn't be determined by the class size reduction in the school but by the academic achievement of the students. In other words, the end goal, not the means to the end is what is most important.

Not only is this bill putting the cart before the horse--giving money before there is a plan--but it has made class size reduction, not student achievement, the ultimate goal.

What's Our Common Ultimate Goal?

Some comments were made in my BYU Ed Leadership law class last night in regards to multicultural education, specifically in regards to our Hispanic learners that have caused me to do some reflecting. I was reminded how important it is to keep in mind the goal we want to achieve for that goal or that vision should then influence all our decisions.

I'm beginning to sense that the reason we can't all agree upon what to do to improve the academic achievement of our Hispanic learners in particular is because we don't have a vision or if we do, we don't have a common one. That is the first hurdle we need to overcome.

If our goal is to improve the academic achievement of Hispanic learners then:

• It's not a "crutch" to provide Hispanic learners with bilingual education and other effective strategies and methods that research has proven works for them. (See NOTE below)
• It's not wrong for educators to focus on how best to teach groups of children as well as individual children. That is the role of an educator.
• It's important to focus on what students need to learn to realize the American dream and to have the skills and knowledge to be a contributing member of America's democratic society.

While improving the academic achievement of Hispanic learners is a worthy goal it is important to never forget the ultimate goal of education which is to build character. Academic achievement will be of little use to our Hispanic learners as well as all learners if all the knowledge and credentials accumulated don't make them better people.

NOTE:

Four studies published in the last two years. Number 4 is from the US government report.

1. Slavin, R. and Cheung, A. 2005. A synthesis ofresearch of reading instruction for English languagelearners, Review of Educational Research 75(2):247-284.

2. Rolstad, K., Mahoney, K., & Glass, G. 2005. The bigpicture: A meta-analysis of program effectivenessresearch on English language learners. EducationalPolicy 19(4): 572-594.

3. Genesse, F., Lindolm-Leary, K., Saunders, W., andChristian, D. 2005. English Language Learners in U.S.Schools: An Overview of Research. Journal ofEducation for Students Placed at Risk, 10(4), 363–385.

4. Francis, D., Lesaux, N., & August, D. 2006.Language of instruction, In D. August & T. Shanahan,(Eds.) Developing literacy in second-languagelearners, pp. 365-413. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum.

Religion and Academic Achievement

Dr. Jeynes has recently published his work on the influence of intact families and religion on academic achievement. As indicated below, he has also written a book on this topic.

Non-Resident Fellow, Education
California State University, Long Beach
Department of Teacher Education
(562) 985-4506(562) 985-5733 (Fax)
Phone: 562-985-5619Email: wjeynes@csulb.edu

News
Dr. Jeynes is one of the nation's leading researchers on the influence of religiosity and attending religious schools. He has conducted the only meta-analysis ever undertaken examining these issues in a series of journal articles and in his book, Religion, Education, and Academic Success. He has also written dozens of academic journal articles, which have divulged among other things that when African American and Latino students are religious and from intact families, the achievement gap with white students disappears.William Jeynes is also the Chair of the Religion and Education group of the American Education Research Association.

Effects of Religious Commitment on Academic Achievement

I just read this morning a primary research paper called, The Effects of Religious Commitment on the Academic Achievement of Urban and Other Children, by Willliam H. Jeynes. For those of us interested in better serving our diverse learners, the findings from this research can definitely give us some food for thought.

Reference: Education and Urban Society 2003; 36; 44