Impact of Institutional Racism and Implicit bias on Education Why are minority students not performing on the same level as their white counterparts? This is a question that has been posed over the last four decades. Some believe that this poor performance is a result of institutional racism; others believe that students of color underperform due to lack of intelligence or cultural differences. So, which is it? If as a nation we believe that institutional racism is not an issue, then how do we explain the achievement gap between suburban areas and the inner city? Those who believe that institutional racism is the issue argue that implicit bias effects the way many teachers interact with children of color. They also believe that in order to …show more content…
A new study by John Hopkins found that when evaluating the same black students that white teachers expect less academic achievement than black teachers. The study also found that white teachers are 30% less likely to predict whether or not a black student will attend a four-year college and 40% less likely to expect them to graduate from high school(Race Biases). These numbers compared to black teachers indicate that white teachers have implicit bias when it comes to their black students. The results also show that white students fair better with white teachers and black students with black teachers. One theory as to why this is happening is “stereotype threat”. Stereotype threat, a theory introduced by social psychologist Claude M. Steele, suggests that students may perceive a situation differently based upon their ability in regards to their race. This means that students go into classrooms with implicit bias as well. Why is this? Many minority students have become aware of how differently they are treated in comparison to white students within classrooms. According to The White House Initiative on Educational Excellence for African Americans, 16% of the nation’s public school system is comprised of black students but only 9% are enrolled in gifted …show more content…
If black students perform better with black teachers and white students with white teachers, then why not segregate schools again? The missing piece to this logic is institutional racism. If as a society we acknowledge that the education system was built on racist ideals, then we can change it. It begins with confronting the reality that we all interact with some sort of bias. Most of the time this bias stems from our subconscious. In order to prevent this from happening we must be introspective and actively decide to ignore these biases and not let them affect our actions and attitudes. This means we must retrain
perpetuate in different social groups. Stereotype threat, as defined by Steele, is “being at risk of
Aronson, Joshua. (2004, November). Closing the Achievement Gap: The Threat of Stereotype. Educational Leadership 62 (3).
The second is the concern over segregation and the effect it has on society. Mr. Kozol provides his own socially conscious and very informative view of the issues facing the children and educators in this poverty ravaged neighborhood. Those forces controlling public schools, Kozol points out, are the same ones perpetuating inequity and suffering elsewhere; pedagogic styles and shapes may change, but the basic parameters and purposes remain the same: desensitization, selective information, predetermined "options," indoctrination. In theory, the decision should have meant the end of school segregation, but in fact its legacy has proven far more muddled. While the principle of affirmative action under the trendy code word ''diversity'' has brought unparalleled integration into higher education, the military and corporate America, the sort of local school districts that Brown supposedly addressed have rarely become meaningfully integrated. In some respects, the black poor are more hopelessly concentrated in failing urban schools than ever, cut off not only from whites but from the flourishing black middle class. Kozol describes schools run almost like factories or prisons in grim detail. According to Kozol, US Schools are quite quickly becoming functionally segregated. Kozol lists the demographics of a slew of public schools in the states, named after prominent civil rights activists, whose classrooms are upwards of 97% black and Hispanic — in some cases despite being in neighborhoods that are predominantly white. It has been over 50 years since Brown vs. Board of Education. It is sad to read about the state of things today.
Next, Institutional or systemic racism refers to the laws, policies, practices, rules and procedures that operate within organisations, societal structures and the broader community to the advantage of the dominant group or groups and to the detriment and disadvantage of other groups. Institutional racism may be intentional or unintentional. Jim Crowe is a great example of institutional racism. Jim Crow laws were the name of the racist caste system put in place to segregate African Americans, Hispanics and any ethnic minority. Theses laws made it so non whites could not integrate with minorities. These laws applied to hospitals, buses, toilets and drinking fountains and restaurants. For example Buses: All passenger stations in this state operated
Eduardo Bonilla-Silva and Sue both demonstrate from their research that Whites do not comprehend the impact of their unconscious biases. These biases towards students of colour in a white-based post-secondary school environment can result in stress and weak interracial relationships. This is an issue since the significance of these everyday actions is not fully recognized and acknowledged. I will elaborate on a variety of examples, specifically the influence of the peers, and faculty.
Race as a factor in inequity. Ladson-Billings and Tate (1995) posit that race continues to be a significant factor in determining inequity in the United States. Race matters in society. If we look at high school drop out, suspension, and incarceration rates of men of color in America we see a disproportionate amount of men of color marginalized and profiled by society. This is further compounded by the perception that male faculty of color cannot be educators or at least are not often conceptually visualized in that capacity (Bryan and Browder, 2013).
Stereotypes are everywhere and can often create problems for people, however they become even more detrimental to teens, especially at schools. Writer and science correspondent for the NRA, Shankar Vedantam, in his article, “How a Self-Fulfilling Stereotype Can Drag Down Performance,” explains that stereotypes can hurt the performance of the person that it is associated with. He supports his claim by first explaining that how well people do on tests are determined by who administers the questions, then he explains that studies show that when people take tests and they are reminded of negative stereotypes that associate with them, then they don’t do as well, and finally he states that the studies are being widely ignored by all the people who should take heed of the findings, such as test makers and college acceptance people. Vedantam’s purpose is to tell you about the research conducted by Huang in order to inform you that stereotypes can affect performance on tests. In my 9th grade class at Point Loma High School, we were given questions about stereotypes from our teacher to interview two students.
In the article “Implicit racial bias often begins as early as preschool, a study finds” that black students are discriminated against by their teachers. Teachers don't expect as much from
In the article “Disguised Racism in Public Schools,” Samuel Brodbelt goes into great detail about how institutionalized racism is seen in many public schools today. He also further explains how the effects of institutionalized racism may cause segregation between the races. Brodbelt states “today, the public schools serves as an example of the extent of institutional racism” (Brodbelt 699). In public schools, students are subjected to acts of institutional racism that may change how they interact with other students. In the short story “Drinking Coffee Elsewhere” by Packer, readers are allowed to view firsthand how institutionalized racism effects Dina who is the main character in the story. Packer states “As a person of color, you shouldn’t have to fit in any white, patriarchal system” (Drinking Coffee Elsewhere 117). The article “Disguised Racism in Public Schools” Brodbelt states “first, the attitudes of teachers toward minority group pupils” (Brodbelt 699). Like the ideas in the article “Disguised Racism in Public Schools” Dina encounters institutionalized oppression on orientation day at Yale. Because the counselor sees that Dina is an African American student in an all prominent white school, she assumes that she cannot fit into the white patriarchal system which includes playing “frustrating games for smart people” (Drinking Coffee Elsewhere 117). The counselor assumes that
The preconceived notions we tend to burden can have a snowball effect, ingraining the same potentially damaging ideas into our children, grandchildren, and so on, especially because there is likely no recognition of an issue present in the first place. The white guy habit we carry in our mind, generally unbeknownst to us, impairs the learning environment and too easily discredits qualified professionals that are women or of color. The bias we have towards white men in the classroom only contributes to the structural gender disparity that is apparent in the world, and particularly in the United States. Messner points out that nonwhite male professors are not only judged by students comparatively worse, but that judgements of white male professors are simultaneously boosted up in the student’s mind without their awareness.
Institutional racism is defined in the National Association of Social Workers (NASW) as “the manifestation of racism in social systems and institutions. It is the social, economic, educational, and political forces or policies that operate to foster discriminatory outcomes. It is the combination of policies, practices, or procedures embedded in bureaucratic structure that systematically lead to unequal outcomes for groups of people”(2007). In other words, policy and practices intentionally or unintentionally favor one group or put a racial group at a
She suggests that this occurs as a result institutional policies and cultural messages that place white people at an advantage and people of color at a disadvantage. Therefore, it is not that people wake up and decide to discriminate against those from other racial groups. The problem occurs as a result of an institutionalized system that combines prejudice and power to provide privileges to whites. Prejudice occurs as a result of inflexible notions that are often based on limited information. The notions are usually associated with stereotypes, omissions, and distortions.
Published in American Educational Research Journal, this paper gives insight into how racial diversity stretches beyond educational engagement and social composition. The significant difference made by diversity-related efforts, such as hybridized racial interactions and policies is fully explored. The findings of the study presented can be generalized to the argument of institutional racism as this piece presents rationale against it. The limitations of paper is the insufficient detail regarding educational context needed to illustrate the steps institutions can take to apply diversity.
The National Center for Education Statistics (NCES, 2004) reported that Black students continue to trail White students with respect to educational access, achievement and attainment. Research on the effectiveness of teachers of Black students emphasizes that the teachers’ belief about the Black students’ potential greatly impacts their learning. Teachers tend to teach black students from a deficit perspective (King, 1994; Ladson-Billings, 1994; Mitchell, 1998). White teachers often aim at compensating for what they assume is missing from a Black student’s background (Foorman, Francis & Fletcher, 1998). The deficit model of instruction attempts to force students into the existing system of teaching and learning and doesn’t build on strengths of cultural characteristics or preferences in learning (Lewis, Hancock...
These judgments are made with minimal or unknown information. In school, most of the stereotypes are based on race. In an interview that I conducted, a 55-year-old white male stated "our race defines how we perform in school". A teacher’s ignorance can be a significant impact on students’ education. Some teachers do not understand the fact that every student is different and they can improve as much as they want.