Race, Rigor, and Selectivity in U. S. Engineering by
Despite the educational and professional advances made by minorities in recent decades, African Americans remain woefully underrepresented in the fields of science, technology, mathematics, and engineering. Even at its peak, in 2000, African American representation in engineering careers reached only 5.7 percent, while blacks made up 15 percent of the U.S. population. Some forty-five years after the Civil Rights Act sought to eliminate racial differences in education and employment, what do we make of an occupational pattern that perpetually follows the lines of race? Race, Rigor, and Selectivity in U.S. Engineering pursues this question and its ramifications through historical case studies. Focusing on engineering programs in three settings--in Maryland, Illinois, and Texas, from the 1940s through the 1990s--Amy E. Slaton examines efforts to expand black opportunities in engineering as well as obstacles to those reforms. Her study reveals aspects of admissions criteria and curricular emphases that work against proportionate black involvement in many engineering programs. Slaton exposes the negative impact of conservative ideologies in engineering, and of specific institutional processes--ideas and practices that are as limiting for the field of engineering as they are for the goal of greater racial parity in the profession.
On the Same Track by
A public school principal's account of the courageous leaders who have dismantled the tracking systems in their schools in order to desegregate classrooms What would happen if a school eliminated the "tracks" that rank students based on their perceived intellectual abilities? Would low-achieving students fall behind and become frustrated? Would their higher-achieving peers suffer from a "watered-down" curriculum? Or is tracking itself the problem? A growing body of research shows that tracking doesn't increase learning for the minority and low-income students who are overrepresented in low-track classrooms. This de facto segregation has led many civil rights advocates to argue that tracking is turning back the clock on equal education. As a principal at a New York high school, Carol Corbett Burris believed that the curriculum for the best students was the best curriculum for all. She helped lead a bold plan to eliminate tracking from her school, and the results couldn't have been further from the doom-and-gloom scenarios of tracking proponents. Instead, there was a dramatic improvement in the achievement of allstudents, across racial and socioeconomic divisions, and a near elimination of the achievement gap. Today, due to those efforts, International Baccalaureate English is the twelfth-grade curriculum for South Side students, and all students take the same challenging courses, together, to prepare them for college. In On the Same Track, Burris draws on her own experience, on the experiences of other schools, and on the latest research to make an impassioned case for detracking. Not only does the practice of tracking fail to benefit lower-tracked students, as Burris shows, but it also results in the resegregation of classrooms. Furthermore, she argues that many of today's popular reforms emanate from the same "sort and select" mentality that reinforces social stratification based on race and class. On the Same Trackis a rousing, controversial, and yet optimistic account of how we need to change our assumptions and policies if we are to live up to the promise of democratic public education. Only by holding all students to the same high standards can we ensure that all have the same opportunity to live up to their full potential.
Inequality for All by
Inequality for All makes an important contribution to current debates about economic inequalities and the growing achievement gap, particularly in mathematics and science education. The authors argue that the greatest source of variation in opportunity to learn is not between local communities, or even schools, but between classrooms. They zero in on one of the core elements of schooling--coverage of subject-matter content--and examine how such opportunities are distributed across the millions of school children in the United States. Drawing on data from the third TIMMS international study of curriculum and achievement, as well as a 61-district study in the United States, they point to Common Core State Standards as being a key step in creating a more level playing field for all students.
The Price They Paid by
In this compelling book, the authors put a human face on desegregation practices in the South. Focusing on an African American community in Alabama, they document not only the gains but also the significant losses experienced by students when their community school was closed and they were forced to attend a White desegregated school across town. This in-depth volume includes: A letter by Dr. William Hooper Councill and speeches by George Washington Trenholm--two African American leaders who worked with communities to provide quality schooling for African American children during segregation. An insider's view of what life was like inside a segregated African American school--including interviews with graduates who discuss how it felt to be in a caring and nurturing school that provided an atmosphere much like that of a family. Actual events that demonstrate the profound negative impact of using skin color and race as a basis for preferential treatment--including testimonials from parents and students who experienced racial discrimination in their new school. A valuable look at the unmet promises of school desegregation that can help us provide a quality education for all children in the 21st century.
More may be found under these subjects:
The Education Trust. Why Only Race-Conscious Policies Can Fix Racism in Higher Education
More information:
NPR (National Public Radio). Effective Anti-Racist Education Requires More Diverse Teachers, More Training
Tell Them We are Rising by
Black colleges and universities are a haven for Black intellectuals, artists and revolutionaries and have educated the architects of freedom movements and cultivated leaders in every field. Examines the impact these institutions have had on American history, culture, and national identity.
Crisis : behind a presidential commitment
Having earned John F. Kennedy's trust with his 1960 campaign-trail film Primary, cinéma vérité documentarian Robert Drew expressed his desire to document a president in crisis. When African American college students Vivian Malone and James Hood prepared to enroll at the all-white University of Alabama in June 1963, governor George Wallace defied a federal court order and vowed to prevent the students' enrollment. Kennedy granted unprecedented access to Drew and his unobtrusive four-team crew, who used handheld cameras to cover both sides of the conflict: Wallace self-righteously clings to segregation, while a flurry of phone calls between the president, attorney general Robert F. Kennedy, and deputy attorney general Nicholas Katzenback reveal a tightly coordinated plan to dismiss Wallace (in Robert Kennedy's words) as "a second-rate figure." Special feature: Drew's short film Faces of November provides an examination of the meaning of John F. Kennedy's death to those at his funeral.