Racially-Mixed Classrooms

Examples of Racially-Mixed Classrooms in the following topics:

• Coleman's Study of Between-School Effects in American Education

  • Sociologist James Coleman found in later research in 1975 that desegregation busing programs had led to white flight from the higher-class mixed race school districts.
  • Although Coleman found that, on average, black schools were funded on a nearly equal basis by the 1960s, he also found that socially-disadvantaged black students profited from schooling in racially-mixed classrooms.
  • This latter finding was a catalyst for the implementation of desegregated busing systems, which bused black students from racially segregated neighborhoods to integrated schools.
  • Following up on this conclusion, Coleman found in later research in 1975, that desegregated busing programs had led to white flight from the higher-class, mixed-race school districts.
  • Thus, the mass busing system had failed: Black students would only benefit from integrated schooling if there was a majority of white students in the classroom .

• Gender Bias in the Classroom

  • Gender-based achievement gaps suggest the existence of gender bias in the classroom.
  • Gender-based achievement gaps (especially in math and science) suggest the existence of gender bias in the classroom.
  • Of course, few teachers would admit to bringing gender bias into the classroom, and much of their influence may be unintentional.
  • One proposed solution to gender bias in the classroom is to separate boys and girls in single-sex classrooms.
  • However, empirical studies give mixed evidence as to the efficacy of single-sex schooling, and critics worry that it constitutes a separate-but-equal form of discrimination.

• Bureaucratization of Schools

  • Micro-level aggression can be subtler than outright discrimination like racial slurs.
  • In the American classroom of a bureaucratized school, teachers might discriminate against this student by interacting with the student as if he/she were less capable than his/her peers of learning course material.
  • Another example could be a child raised on cultural values of silence and obedience who enters a course dependent on argumentative and talkative students for classroom discussions.
  • The teacher and the child's peers might discriminate against the child in micro-level interactions based on assumptions that the child does not have anything intelligent to contribute or does not want to actively participate in classroom learning.
  • Even after desegregation, black students faced intense racism in mixed schools, and minority students continue to face institutional racism and discrimination on the level of micro-interactions.

• Racial Groups

  • The United States is a diverse country, racially and ethnically.
  • In the Americas, the immigrant populations began to mix among themselves and with the indigenous inhabitants of the continent, as well as the enslaved Africans.
  • In the twentieth century, efforts to sort the increasingly mixed population of the United States into discrete categories generated many difficulties for the U.S. government (Spickard, 1992).
  • By the standards used in past censuses, many millions of mixed-race children born in the United States have been classified as of a different race than one of their biological parents.
  • Efforts to track mixing between groups led to a proliferation of categories (such as "mulatto" and "octoroon") and so-called "blood quantum" distinctions, which refers to the degree of ancestry for an individual of a specific racial or ethnic group (e.g., saying someone is "1/4 Omaha tribe").

• Racism

  • Children develop an awareness of race and racial stereotypes quite young and these racial stereotypes affect behavior.
  • Another illustration of individual-level racism in society is the resistance of Americans to classify mixed-race individuals as white if they have even "one-drop" of black ancestry.
  • One response to racial disparity in the U.S. has been Affirmative Action.
  • Another type of racism is racial profiling.
  • Two examples of racial profiling in the United States are often discussed.

• Social Construct or Biological Lineage?

  • Significant in terms of the economics of slavery, the mixed-race child of a slave mother also would be a slave, adding to the wealth of the slaveowner.
  • Pardo or Brown (42.3%): usually a Multiracial Brazilian of mixed-race features who considers himself or herself to be "Pardo".
  • In practice, most of the "Pardo" people are of mixed European and African (mulatos), but this category also includes people of mixed European and Amerindian (caboclos) and Amerindian and African (cafusos) genetic ancestry.
  • For instance, self-described African Americans tend to have a mix of West African and European ancestry.
  • Likewise, many white Americans have mixed European and African ancestry; ~30% of whites have less than 90% European ancestry.

• Tracking Systems

  • Parents and peers may influence academic choices even more than guidance counselors by encouraging students with similar backgrounds (academic, vocational, ethnic, religious, or racial) to stay together.
  • However, average and low achieving students may benefit more from being in a mixed ability classroom.

• Racial Stratification

  • Communities made up predominantly of racial minorities are significantly more likely to be polluted and to house factories and business that pollute extensively.
  • These laws were referred to as miscegenation laws (miscegenation means "mixing races").
  • Bazile, told the Lovings during their trial for miscegenation that, 'if God had meant for whites and blacks to mix, he would have not placed them on different continents. ' He also seemed to take pride in telling the Lovings, "as long as you live you will be known as a felon. " The Lovings eventually contacted the American Civil Liberties Union, who took their case to the Supreme Court in 1967, resulting in Loving v.

• Segregation

  • Racial segregation has appeared in all parts of the world where there are multiracial communities.
  • Even where racial mixing has occurred on a large scale, as in Hawaii and Brazil, various forms of social discrimination have persisted despite the absence of official segregationist laws.
  • Racial segregation or separation can lead to social, economic and political tensions.
  • Blacks, whites, Hispanics and other racial groups inhabit different neighborhoods of vastly different quality.
  • Identify at least three key moments in the history of racial segregation in the U.S.

• Savage Inequalities

  • The book is based on Kozol's observations of classrooms in the public school systems of East St.
  • Kozol argues that property taxes are an unjust funding basis for schools, one that fails to challenge the status quo of racial-based inequality.
  • He argues that racial segregation is still alive and well in the American educational system; this is due to the gross inequalities that result from unequal distribution of funds collected through both property taxes and funds distributed by the state in an attempt to "equalize" the expenditures of schools.
  • The book is based on Kozol's observations of classrooms in the public school systems of East St.