Culture and Diversity

Tags: Latino ELL Students;

Target Population: All

Research Questions the Report Poses:

• What is the state of well-being among Latino children?
• What trends exist within this population subset and how do they affect equal opportunity and supports at a national, state, regional, and local level?

Findings:

• The conditions and situations of Latino children vary state-by-state, regionally, and generationally.
• Despite a hardworking population, the majority of Latino children live in poor and low-income families, and in high poverty neighborhoods which are more isolated from more affluent communities
• Most Latino children are U.S citizens yet many live in immigrant families resulting in barriers to services and potential separation of parents from children.
• Latino children are disadvantaged in the educational system (e.g., only 55% graduate with a high school diploma)

Policy Recommendations:

• There needs to be more research into the regional and other variations among the Latino population
• There is a need for clear targeted policies on health, education, juvenile justice, and poverty reduction.
• Need to use a holistic approach to assessing the present and future well-being of Latino children.

• Read The Full Report

Foxen, P., & Mather, M. (2010). America's Future: Latino Child Well-Being in Numbers and Trends. Washington, DC: National Council of La Raza.

Tags: Intervention; Motivation; Parent Involvement and Outreach / PTA; Transfer of Literacy Skills;

Target Population: Post-secondary

Research Questions the Report Poses: What are the promising practices for transferring students from two-year to four-year institutions?

Findings:
A Structured Academic Pathway:

• Institutional Articulation Agreements
• Dual Enrollment
• Developmental coursework initiatives
• Active learning

• Customer service forums
• Trio Student Support Services (SSS)
• Specialized advising
• Flexible scheduling
• First-year Seminar
• Learning communities
• Student engagement in campus life

• Staff and faculty role modeling
• Strategic planning
• Outreach

• Read the Full Report

Smith, C.T., Miller, A., & Bermeo, C.A. (2009). Bridging the Gaps to Success-Promising Practices for Promoting Transfer Among Low-Income and First-Generation Students. The Pell Institute. Retrieved January 10, 2011 from: http://www.pellinstitute.org/pdf/COE_Pell_Report_layout_3.pdf

Tags: Parent Involvement and Outreach / PTA; Rights, Parents; Rights, Students;

Target Population: All

Research Questions the Report Poses: What are the consequences of losing a Lawful Immigrant Parent to deportation? How can these experiences affect future reform and prevent further separation of loved ones?

Findings:
We estimate that more than 100,000 children have been affected by LPR parental deportation between 1997 and 2007, and that at least 88,000 of impacted children were U.S. citizens. Moreover, our analysis estimates that approximately 44,000 children were under the age of 5 when their parent was deported. In addition to these children, this analysis estimates that more than 217,000 others experienced the deportation of an immediate family member who was an LPR.

• Read the Full Report

In the Child’s Best Interest? The Consequences of Losing a Lawful Immigrant Parent to Deportation. (2010). University of California, Berkeley. Retrieved January 13, 2011 from: http://www.law.berkeley.edu/files/Human_Rights_report.pdf

Tags: Latino ELL Students; Parent Involvement and Outreach / PTA;

Target Population: Preschool, Elementary, Middle, and High School

Findings:

Cultural assets include:

• Newborns of Latino immigrants are remarkably healthy.
• Most Latino children, about 80%, grow up in two-parent families (particularly Mexican and Cuban and to a lesser extent Puerto Rican families).
• Mexican-American kindergarteners display robust social skills (self-control and aggression) in comparison to African-American and White children.
• Immigrant Latina mothers have low risk of giving birth to unhealthy infants, in spite of typically low income status. This may be attributed to healthier prenatal practices (more fruits and vegetables, less smoking and alcohol consumption) than Americans.
• Latino children have strong social skills and emotional confidence upon entering school.
• Math scores are strong in first-generation elementary students.
• Robust effort and engagement of first-generation Latino students is demonstrated by academic achievement in high school even when test scores are lower.

Risk factors include:

• Mexican-American mothers tend to have a limited educational background.
• Cognitive growth (including indices of preschool abilities and high school completion) fades in second- and third- generation children.
• Math scores decline for second- and third-generation students.
• Latino adolescents' strong obligation to their family can impact school performance.

Policy Recommendations:

• What factors drive the immigrant paradox?
• What does the diversity of Latino students tell us about differing cultural origins and contemporary communities?
• Do public policies build from these family strengths, or inadvertently erode cultural assets?

• Read the Full Report

Coll, C.G., Fuligni, A., Galindo, C., Hernandez, D., & Tienda, M. (n.d.). The cultural strengths of Latino families: Firm scaffolds for children and youth. New Journalism on Latino Children. Retrieved from: http://www.ewa.org/site/DocServer/NJLC_CulturalStrengths_WEB.pdf?docID=641

Tags: Bilingualism / Biliteracy; Fluency; Language of Instruction; Language Proficiency; Phonics; Phonological Awareness; Transfer of Literacy Skills; Vocabulary;

Target Population: All

Research Questions the Report Poses:

VOLUME I:

• What are the reigning theories of human development, cognition, culture, and the relationship between them?
• How does identity development intersect with achievement motivation?
• What is intelligence?
• How can our knowledge of human development inform our work as educators working with an increasingly diverse student population?
• What is known about how to work successfully with families from non-dominant cultural groups?

VOLUME II:

• What is language proficiency and how does it interact with culture, human development, learning, and schooling?
• How can teachers best support English language learners (ELLs) and speakers of different English dialects?
• What are the current views of literacy acquisition and best approaches to literacy instruction?
• How can assessments eliminate bias based on language?

Findings:

• Most important to the process of addressing the needs of learners from a wide range of backgrounds is a positive, ongoing process of exploration and constructive conversation among the professionals who serve such students and between professionals and students' families.
• Meaningful approaches to human development and learning have become increasingly multi-disciplinary.
• Language indexes culture; language symbolizes culture; culture is partially created by language.

Policy Recommendations:
Teacher's Guide to Diversity includes a third volume, "The Presenter's Manual," which provides support for preparing for and conducting classes or workshops. The manual contains activities and suggested homework assignments, organized by the volume with which they are associated.

• Read the Full Report

Trumbull, E., Pacheco, M. (2005). The Teacher’s Guide to Diversity: Building a Knowledge Base. Providence, RI: The Education Alliance at Brown University. Retrieved from http://www.alliance.brown.edu/pubs/teach_guide_diversity/.