Issues in Education

I had many points of contention with some of these readings. I generally struggle with over-generalizations, and while there obviously is a place for it in academic research, I have trouble with arguments such as that of “cultural inequality” (p. 217), which argues that cultural deficiencies lead to economic failure. It reminds me of a conversation I had with a colleague recently who argued that the failure of our low income students and students of color is a result of “bad parenting.” Honestly, at what point will we stop to blame parents and cultures and start to look at how our school structures, cultures, and policies track students to success or failure?
This problem arose again for me in the Lareau chapter, in which Lareau argues that Black middle-class families have a particular set of values that low income Black families lack, which is passed down to the children and prepares them for academic success. While I am not denying the impact of socioeconomic status on student achievement, I think that it is short-sighted and detrimental to say that economically underprivileged families lack the “right values,” and therefore fail their students academically. To be perfectly honest, it seems to me that little Alex Williams is being trained to be spoiled, immediately gratified, and, for lack of a better term, obnoxious. Let’s take the car ride example in which he states, “I don’t want hot dogs tonight.” His mother responds that she will, “fix something else and save the hot dogs for tomorrow night.” But this is not enough for our Alex. He continues, “But I don’t want any pork chops either.” Whereas my mother’s response would have been, “Oh well. We don’t always get what we want,” Alex’s mother’s response is, “Well, Alexander, we need to eat something” (p. 249). Lareau generalizes that this “general pattern of reasoning and accommodating is common” (p. 249) in middle-class families. Not only is this not directly linked to academic achievement, but it also purports that negotiating with an 8-10 year old is an admirable value that should be replicated. If anything, it seems to reinforce the notion that those with money have a power and privilege that those without monetary wealth do not, as not every family has the option to simply forego the pork chops and hot dogs in order to accommodate Alex’s cravings.
Another issue that I had was in the comparison between the U.S. and countries such as Germany, Sweden, and Japan. While Blossfeld and Shavit do recognize the economic and educational disparities between the countries, at no point do they account for race as a factor in the educational differences and statistics between the countries. They seem to focus on class as an independent entity that can be examined separately from issues of ethnic and racial identity. While they do discuss gender within education (p. 225), they do not explore other forms of identity. The absence of such a discussion makes me question the results of the studies and reminds me of the “Did You Know 3.0” video and the recent talk about educational competition between countries. People often talk about how much better students in places such as India and China are doing in comparison to our students in the Unites States. However, they rarely discuss the fact that not all youth in China and India are even in schools. Whereas many other countries educate their youth until a certain (younger) age and then send them to work or go into higher education, our country mandates that all students attend school at least until the age of 16. There are 16 year olds in India who have already been working for years. So what and who are we really comparing when we make these comparisons?
While the statistics in the Orfield and Lee chapter on segregation were frightening, they contradict the findings in Catherine Prendergast’s book, Literacy and Racial Justice, in which she argues that Brown V. Board of Education actually harmed African Americans students’ education more than it helped. I also would have liked to see a discussion of the de facto segregation that occurs within particular schools. For example, why are the Advanced Placement and Honors classes significantly whiter and wealthier than the Special Education, Regular, and Remedial classes?
Finally, I struggled with Orfield and Lee’s recommendation that we “Explain to Americans that white children gain substantially from integrated experiences” (p. 176). While I completely agree that this is true, I have trouble with the appeal to White people to be involved in community efforts because they, too, are affected. I recently read an article describing the call to White communities to fight violence against women because it is not only a problem in communities of color (Crenshaw, 1991). I find it problematic that the only way we can appeal to a large population of our country to support and advocate for basic human rights is to prove to them that it will personally and adversely affect them if they do not. I understand this strategy, and I would not say that it is unwise to appeal to a population in this way. But it saddens me that this type of appeal is necessary.