The University Council on Teacher Education
And
The Delaware Center for Teacher Education
Invite You to Join Us
Monday, May 7, 2012
5:00-7:00 p.m.
Trabant University Center
Multipurpose Room A/B
Former ASPIRE president, Taria Pritchett, was honored on March 27th at a ceremony held in Arlington, VA by the Mid-Eastern Association of Educational Opportunity Program Personnel as a Trio Achiever of the Year. Taria was nominated for the award by the UD SSSP program, and Cheryl Davis-Robinson beamed as Taria accepted the award and made very moving remarks about her plans to teach and continue to give back to the community so that other deserving students can follow her pathway to college and success.
“Recruiting Teachers and Administrators Who Value
Diversity, Inclusion and High Achievement for ALL Students”
To register for the event, please email your name and e-mail address to Erika Dawson
at the University of Pennsylvania: edawson@gse.upenn.edu or call 215-573-5511.
Teachers and administrators of color who are interested in exploring career opportunities with any or all of these districts are encouraged to attend. Opportunities will be provided to network with staff of color who are currently working in the Consortium districts. Mini-sessions will be provided throughout the day for attendees to enhance their resumes and navigate the application process in our suburban districts.
Bring multiple copies of your resume and/or professional portfolio, and meet with Human Resources representatives from our Consortium.
Founded in 2004, the Consortium is a network of 26 well-respected suburban school districts, a county intermediate unit, and an education association, located throughout southeastern Pennsylvania, southern New Jersey and northern Delaware that are committed to enhancing the achievement of all students, and most specifically, to increasing the academic performance, engagement, and future success of their students of color. For further information about the Delaware Valley Minority Student Achievement Consortium please visit www.gse.upenn.edu/dvmsac
EQUITY EXPRESS FAST FACT
Study shows that teacher expectations affect student potential
A new study in Teachers College Record finds that African-American students get lower grades than they are capable of, whereas the opposite is true among white students. The study concludes that teacher perception of the student is the most important factor contributing to whether the student fulfills his or her academic potential, regardless of the student’s behaviors and attitudes. What does this mean? That teacher beliefs and expectations can bolster or undermine student success.
Background/Context: The fulfillment of academic potential is an underdeveloped area of inquiry as it relates to explaining racial differences in academic outcomes. Examining this issue is important for addressing not only differences in the typical outcomes for African American and White students but also the severe underrepresentation of African American students among the highest achieving students. Whereas other studies have operationalized lost academic potential as unfulfilled expectations for educational attainment, this study takes a different approach, measuring whether students earn higher or lower grades than the grades predicted by earlier tests of academic skills. Students whose grades are equal to or exceed those predicted by their earlier test scores are said to have fulfilled their academic potential, whereas those whose grades are lower than predicted have not realized their potential.
Purpose/Objective/Research Question/Focus of Study: This study finds that African American high school students are less likely than their White peers to realize their academic potential. The analyses test several explanations for the racial gap in the realization of academic potential, focusing on the students themselves, their teachers, and their schools.
Research Design: This study uses hierarchical linear modeling to analyze data from the Education Longitudinal Study of 2002.
Conclusions/Recommendations: The results suggest that teachers perceive African American students as exerting less classroom effort than White students, which accounts for a substantial proportion of the racial gap in unrealized academic potential, even with several student characteristics held constant. At the school level, there are larger racial gaps in unrealized academic potential in segregated schools and schools with strict disciplinary climates. Strikingly, the negative effect of strict disciplinary climate exists net of students’ own receipt of disciplinary actions. That is, the negative association between strict disciplinary climate and the realization of academic potential for African American students applies to African American students regardless of whether they themselves have been in trouble at school. This study reveals that characteristics of schools that lack immediately obvious racial implications, such as a school’s approach to student discipline, may be just as harmful as overtly racialized inequality within and between schools.
Cite This Article as: Teachers College Record Volume 114 Number 7, 2012, p. –
http://www.tcrecord.org/library ID Number: 16469, Date Accessed: 3/2/2012 9:59:39 AM
