There is research evidence to show that social justice isn't always exercised by teachers. As it has been seen that a main issue facing ethnic minority students is racial stereotyping. This causes teachers to label student which means they are likely to hold little expectations of the student especially for black male students. Sewell 1997 found that teachers often interpreted black males in schools as being aggressive and troublesome due to the stereotypes they had viewed were black males were macho and hyper-heterosexual. This is said to be rooted in “historical racist representations of blackness” – (Hooks 1992) (Mama 1995.) East Asian pupils have also being subjected to stereotyping, which is viewed as positive stereotyping. They are seen as over achievers, passive and successes which is take a more positive guise.
British Education research journal
The White British- Black Caribbean achievement gap: tests, tiers and teacher expectations. – Steve Strand
The main feature of this journal is British-Black Caribbean’s underachievement. Recent analysis of the longitudinal study of young people in England (LSYPE) indicates a White, British-Black Caribbean achievement gap by the age of 14, which isn't accounted for by socio-economic factors. This is interesting as it shows that Black males underachieve for reasons other than external factors such as capital. This finding show that both working class and middle class black males underachieve compared to their socio-economic ‘equals.’
Teacher expectations also play a significant role in the underachievement of Black Caribbean student this has become apparent with the introduction of tiered papers. The LSYPE shows that black Caribbean students are extremely underrepresented in the entry of high tiered papers in relation to their white British peers. This mean that black Caribbean students are bound to achieving lesser grades to their white peers. This is because low tiers have low grade boundaries and in some papers the highest possible grade you can achieve is a C. Even in English literature for example if your paper is outstanding you can only achieve the maximum grade. This differential entry to test tiers provides a clear view of the teacher’s expectations, which contribute the achievement gap.
Strand finds that the teacher’s tiers are a multi-dimensional assessment, measuring not only students’ academic knowledge but also teacher’s judgements of their effort, participation, attendance and behaviour. Other factors include the extent to which parents are involved with the school.
DATA COLLECTION
The study I carried out was based on a questionnaire I had created using the basic format of the OFSTED student review, I created my own. This questionnaire provides data that can be standardised to create averages, outliers and numerical and visual representations. The comment boxes provided allowed me to assess any anomalous results. For example many students may believe they face difficulties interacting with their subject teacher whereas as one student may have solely positive experiences and the reason for this could be identified in the comment boxes provided below. For this reason I have also implemented many strategies of organising the collected data averages can sometimes ignore certain responses so standard deviation* is used to make sure the wildest of results get recognised. Using this questionnaire it allowed me to gather original information needed for my project. Surprisingly I had gathered more qualitative data than I had expected, which turned out to be a very helpful aspect of my research as now my findings can be backed up by the written reviews of the students. It has also allowed me to get information on the black male students personal account on their experiences in secondary school in a way that can be formulated both into quantitative and qualitative data. The data in this study has been drawn from 20 year 11 male students.
Before proceed to further research methods, the way in which I distributed my questionnaire is important to discuss. Upon contacting the Pastoral leader of the school to grant me permission to proceed with my research, I had formulated the plan to hand out at least 50 questionnaires to black male students. I distributed my questionnaire during the final 20 minutes of the school day, which is known as tutor time. During this time they part take in reading, discussion and overall social but academic activities. I had previously decided to only administrate the questionnaires to black male students, but upon arrival I realised that in doing that the aim of my project may have become apparent to the students as well as teachers. I did not want students performing “demand characteristics” for the sake of my project or teachers being suspicious of the opinions given which may also affect the way in which the student answer. Gladly the tutor group I assessed was predominately black male. Having given all the students a questionnaire and collecting them in a strategically way in which I could divide females entirely and then boys of different ethnicity's. I ended up with only 20 of my questionnaires being from black males which I believe now to a sufficient amount. Thomas (1996, p.770) , points out, qualitative methods enable the researcher to investigate, meaning, human value, social processes and the perceptions and traditions of social groups. I do believe that my questionnaire allow my project to be successful in understanding black males educational experiences. Perhaps unstructured interviews would be best to generate the meaning of the participants meaning of their social life both internal and external to school. An interview was considered earlier on in my project during the planning review, but due my time constraints I had found hard to organise interviews with so many students, which may have benefit my project but would have tapered the time I had to complete other extracurricular activities. The primary research deadline I set for myself was the 10th of December this meant that I had enough time to analyse produce graphs and charts. I carried out my questionnaire on Monday of national bullying week and during that time I was still completing the challenge, which meant my time was limited.
FINDINGS
My research demonstrates that a significant amount of young black boys communicate negative experiences of school, and many agreeing with the statement “my teachers do not…” My findings show that the young men from my research felt unfairly treated by their school system with many agreeing that they didn't believe teachers paid enough attention to them in lessons. This is a key feature in the essay and will be my first theme as the students didn't feel as if these teachers were responding to their needs correctly. Interactionists sociologist believe student and teacher interaction is the foundation of attainment within school and education. On chart b I decided to put the other completed questionnaires to use rather than to dispose of them. As you can see I found that East Asian males, the 4 that I received questionnaires from believe teachers believed in their ability to succeed in education. One even noted: “Ms X gives me more challenging work so I always have something to do.” He mentioned this in the something I like column. Whereas black male students believed that teachers didn't believe in their ability to achieve good grades. This leads me on to my second theme of institutional racism. I do not suspect teachers of the school to be racist per say but there may be underlying reasons for these trends. Maybe because the curriculum is considered to euro-centric and oppressive to black culture. Also it could be due to the East Asians having a strong community within the school, having clubs separate to those of other ethnicities. In my attempt to stop students thinking that my research was specifically race orientated I only provided a box for their country of origin, which was optional. Gladly many did fill this in but four did not and when I collected them into male and female I found that the four who didn't fill in their names turned out to be girls, which wasn't necessary to my study. So I was presented with the clear distinction between black Caribbean and those who were black African as you can see in chart a, which proceeds to my third theme of black Caribbean’s. My fourth and final theme is IQ. When analysing my finding it was clear those who perceived that teachers believed in their academic success also believed that teachers respond to their needs and give them help when needed. This again points to the East Asians having a high level of positive response. I have devised an assessment unit that will decide whether the students hold a positive view of their school. With the score scale being 1-5. 1 being disagree strongly and 5 being strongly agree it was very easy to tally the scores, as all the question followed a particular structure: my school... or the teachers at my school... followed by a statement they could essentially rate true, false or indifferently. I asked the students 10 questions as I thought it could provide a reliable mean. A score less than or equal to16 means that the student has a positive view of their school. A score less than or equal to 26 would infer that they feel indifferently about their education at their school. Anything above 26 would mean they have a negative relationship with school but anything above 42 would mean that their relationship with school is a burden to their education, as this may affect the way in which they perform academically. 55% of the males had a score of 42 or over. 35% had a score of 26 or over. 10% scored less than 16.
Teacher and student interaction
Ethnicity can have a major affect on your achievement but other things like- social class perhaps, but we are only assessing internal factors.
Success or failure can be influenced by what happens within the school and classroom. If teachers have low expectations of an ethnic minority it may affect the actual progress of a pupil. Teachers have the power to manipulate students with their words until they become what they first perceived them to be.
If a teacher perceives the child as misbehaved it is likely that they will put them in a lower set. They possess power now due to the introduction of setting. This means students get put in groups based on their ability. Not only do they respond to their label accordingly, they are also placed into lower sets and streams which make it difficult for them to resist these labels, as achieving high grades may be difficult at the class teaching level. Also what a teacher may class as deviant may seem normal to a student. For example black Caribbean’s may find work difficult but due to their independent nature they may resist asking the teacher for help in which they may believe to be work avoidance. Such as having a learning difficulty such as dyslexia. I f this is ignored a student will struggle to do well in education.
It is difficult to assess the extent to which teachers may hold stereotypical views and, if they do, the extent to which such views are carried over into classroom practice. Educational achievements of ethnic minorities has been researched extensively and point in the direction of the existence of some conscious and considerable subconscious racism.
Thus in Cecile Wright's research in primary schools (1992) it is suggested that teachers often failed to involve Asian pupils sufficiently in class discussion because of an inaccurate assumption that these students had poor language skills and that they also undervalued Asian culture in some respects. However, teachers also had higher expectations of Asian origin than of Afro-Caribbean origin pupils.
Heidi Mirza's 1997 study of black and white secondary school pupils aged 15-19 suggested that although there was evidence of teacher racism and negative labelling this did not undermine the self-esteem of the pupils. There were also many white teachers who genuinely wanted to help their black students but this help was sometimes misguided and the students actually received more effective help from black teachers. In some cases although the pupils were keen to do well, Mirza believed that they were held back because of poor relationships even with well meaning white teachers.
- Institutional racism
Race is a word socially constructed which is used to categorise people based on distinct physical characteristics. “Black” British males the focus of this essay these are citizens of the United Kingdom who have total or a significant partial ancestry from any of the native populations of Sub-Saharan Africa/ Caribbean. Black British are no longer considered ethnic group because the members are unlikely to share a language and culture. Though they may all share common ancestry. As overall black students perform much more poorly compared to any other race there are still differences between those of the same race (ethnic differences.)
On average, Black students perform far worse than other racial groups within the British education system. Institutional racism is often used to explain why this “achievement gap” exists, and if it can ever be closed. "Institutional racism" gave a name to a process of differentiation and discrimination, but removed individual motive and responsibility from consideration. This is a very precise definition of present day racism. It is covert which means is hard to identify and is sometimes said to be unintentional. For example there have been many incidences in school were teachers have claimed to treat every child equally regardless of race (colour blind) but without knowledge they do.
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Due to the achievement gap beginning at such an early age, this evidence leads us to conclude that there are other major factors impacting student success, most significantly: socioeconomic status, societal expectations, and living environment. The gap in net worth/income forces many Black students to grow up hostile, impoverished environments. Simultaneously, a long history of educational failure has left society with low expectations for Black students. That is one argument but the one that I would offer is that Nursery teachers may also hold negative beliefs about children from certain ethnicity's and treating them differently. The language barrier between ethnic minorities and their nursery teachers may make it very difficult to communicate with them and develop some sort proximity with them. From a young age these children's may bond with those who can understand their language and seem understanding. For this reason teachers may believe students are being hostile or purposely anti social.
The relatively low expectations of achievement of Black students causes them to perform worse in school. Black students that do not get the 3 A-levels a*-c’s generate (on average) less income throughout their lifetimes, beginning the vicious process over again. The racial gap within educational institutions is one of many factors that contributes to the complexly interrelated system preventing Black Caribbean students from receiving qualification similar to black Africans and them collectively gaining similar qualifications to their white peers or performing as well as students from other racial groups.
A complex history of racism within the United Kingdom has created a system that promotes the unequal distribution of opportunities between racial groups. The inherently inferior living conditions and low expectations that many Black students face cause them to perform worse in school, creating a vicious cycle of underachievement. Although most educational institutions do not have the intent of being racist, the disparity in achievement between Black students and other students would categorise the majority of them as institutionally racists. Factors including teacher and student relationships again the changes in education such as the introduction of tiers have made it easier for schools and teachers to implement their views of race/ethnicity and achievement on their students. Proof of this is that a ‘third of the most capable black Caribbean pupils are not entered to take the hardest papers in tests at 14-17.’
- Black Caribbean’s
The theme of black Caribbean boys is one I would like to solely concentrate on between the ages 15 and 16 year old as I believe the final year of secondary school is the harshest and as GCSE’s are around the corner teacher’s expectations really do take a devastating toll on the achievement of these students. Throughout this study the term West Indian, Black and African-Caribbean will be used interchangeably to discuss children who are descendant of the migrants from the Caribbean islands and Guyana.
My research would be considered Micro-level sociology as it looks at small scale interactions between individuals, such as conversation between teachers and students or group dynamics in sub cultures.
Before my in depth study of Black Caribbean boys I thought of all the reasons for their possible for their lack of success in education. Some of the theories I generated were: maybe particularised standards inside the home hindered the chances for their success. For instance in black Caribbean homes the parents tend to be lower class workers and the jobs they have don't require high qualifications so perhaps their children see that you don't have to have qualifications to get a job. Another idea I had was that Black Caribbean families tend to lone parent headed by the female, so boys don't have a male role model in which they wish to follow their example. Then I considered that Caribbean’s tend to be have the least income in London and many of them receive free school meals. Contradicting this theory I found that 68% of white British student on free school meals received less than 5 a-c’s compared to those which were Caribbean where 60% didn't achieve 5a-cs. However those which are Caribbean and not on free school meals received the lowest achievement rate of all ethnic groups as almost half of them did not receive 5 A*-C’s. Black Africans and White British students who weren't on free school meals, received similar GCSE exam results, there was hardly any distinction (National pupil database). The results were that approximately 65% of white British and African students received 5 or more A*-C’s. So I decided to abandon most of the external factors when considering the underachievement of Afro Caribbean boys.
When a child underachieves in school it means that he/she is not achieving at the level that is expected of children at a particular age. This means that the child has not met test standards in Cognitive Abilities Tests (CATs), Standard Assessment Techniques (SATs), GCSEs or A-level assessments as measured by these test scores (QCA 2010 and DfES 2010). Children are classified as failing because they have not achieved the desired scores, and in this respect African-Caribbean boys are being categorised as underachieving in secondary education. Travis (2010) quotes DCSF statistics that show black Caribbean boys performing well below average in terms of 5 A*-C grades at GCSE.
Qualifications are interrelated and so without good GCSE’s it’s unlikely you will get into a good College/Sixth form. And without A-C’S in A- levels it is very unlikely you will get into a respectable university. With the exclusion rate for Afro Caribbean males being so high it is unlikely that many of them will achieve suitable grades get into the colleges and the sixth forms that are admired by the top universities. As a result top universities such as Oxbridge and the Russel Group have a under representation Afro Caribbean males. So not having these black Caribbean role models then has a knock on effect causing them to feel as if they cannot do so, so there is no point in trying. The low expectations they have for themselves may be intensified by teacher stereotypes.
The term ‘underachievement‘, it is essential to provide a definition of the term. The Oxford Dictionary (1999) provides a perfect definition: someone whose actual performance consistently fails to reach the level predicted by intelligence tests or other measures of ability. This definition refutes the argument of IQ as it shows that black Caribbean aren't less intelligent than any other ethnicity but there is some forces stopping them from achieving the grades they should be receiving.
My thoughts are perhaps implementing more African history into school which isn’t oppressive such as slavery and colonisation will increase their self-belief. Also there is a lot of African American History in the curriculum, Caribbean students may not identify with that as much as African students which may be a reason for the apparent difference in the academic achievement.
CONCLUSION
Whilst conducting my research I wish I could find a way to interact with all the necessary participants including the black boys obviously but also their parents, the teachers and even the pastoral leader to obtain the most sufficient data. If I could collate the data in such a way I could be provided with a deeper comprehensive understanding of my participant’s perception of the experience in secondary school education for a black male. Even having done a brief less in depth study consistencies can be drawn from many of the texts analysed. It is obvious that my results in the graphs/ charts point to a pattern of low achieving and teacher attention, this is possibly due to teacher labelling becoming the self fulfilling prophecy. Specifically I am referring to teachers possibly being offended by the black male’s dress code or appearance, the teacher then labels the student and acts upon that label ignoring the student. The student acknowledges that label and prophesises it allowing the label to become his master status. I believe teacher and pupil relationship is the most important factor affecting the academic achievement of black males as the factors that have been most compelling and have a great deal of research and evidence to support its theories tend to be internal factors - referring to the occurrences in school. IQ is definitely an outdated argument and the reason for Afro Caribbean major underachievement is still beyond my knowledge. The following quote sums up my conclusion to why many black males underachieve in education “My teacher doesn't care about me, so why should I care”
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- http://www.csus.edu/indiv/o/obriene/art7/readings/benetton.htm
Carmichael and Hamilton 1967 Black Power
Stephen Lawrence Enquiry 1999 p.28
8. MacPherson Report 1999
http://www.theguardian.com/education/2008/sep/05/raceineducation.raceinschools
My questionnaire responses
‘Self fulfilling prophecy’ (Rosenthal and Jacobson, 1968).