The Maple Hills Elementary School

Mrs. Alice McLoughlin-Doro is a Special Education teacher at Downers Grove South High School in Downers Grove, Illinois. The community is known for its excellent school districts. According to the 2010 census there were 47, 833 people living in Downers Grove with approximately 19,000 households and 13,000 families. The racial makeup of the school was reported to be 88% White, 3% African American, 5% Hispanic, 0.2% American Indian or Alaskan Native, 5% Asian, and 1.6% from two or more races. About 1.7% of families were below the poverty line. The school district report card reports the following racial/ethnic background for the school: 68.1% White, 10.3 African American, 11% Hispanic, 7.3% Asian, 0.2% American Indian, and 3.2% two or more races. The elementary schools, middle schools, and high school all perform very well academically receiving above state average scores on standardized tests. She has been working there for 10 years and is currently a Case Manager of 17 students, all with an IEP, all with different needs and goals in the LD department. She co-teaches two general education classes in English intervention, all freshman. Although she is a Special Education teacher, she works with all the students. She also teaches a READ 180, Tier 3 reading and english intervention. This is where we will be focusing on for this

America now is a very culturally diverse nation; most of the minority and immigrant population lives in cities, which indicates that the public school classrooms in urban areas are full of versatile cultural identities. According to the 2000 Census record, minority and immigrant populations has grown in increasing numbers, and most of those people live in urban areas and attend public high schools; also, the level of residential segregation still remains as high as in 1990, which proposes new problems for immigrants and minorities. Monocultural schools are very rare and the global society is very multicultural; it is very logical to prepare students in schools to enter this diverse society (Le Roux 48). Teachers are largely responsible

For many years the United States minority population mostly consisted of African Americans. In 2003, the statistic changed to Hispanics becoming the largest minority population in the United Sates (Parrado & Kandel, 2010). With the increase of the Hispanic population, education concerns of this population have started to arise. In some cases, Hispanics are being over referred to special education programs. This phenomenon is linked to the presence of a language barrier as well as other characteristics of the children in this population (Guiberson, 2009). Although the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) specify that language barriers should be ruled out, it seems that this phenomena continues, but could be

Miss Kane’s first grade class at Lutie Lewis Coates Elementary School (also known as Coates Elementary) has twenty students and seventeen of them are considered English Language Learners (ELL) (E. Kane, Personal Communication, October 4, 2016). This is very frustrating for both Miss. Kane and her students because it is very difficult to communicate with many of her ELLs. Out of Miss Kane’s twenty students eight students are Hispanic, five Indian, five Black, and three White. Miss Kane’s class is very diverse and this allows students to feel more accepted because not all students are similar. Coates Elementary as a whole is very diverse: Asian 28.86%, Black 18.26%, Hispanic 37.32%, and White 12.08% (Fairfax County Public Schools, 2015). Miss Kane’s classroom reflects similar diversity as Coates Elementary does. Both Miss. Kane and the Coates staff really show their appreciation for diversity and attempt to treat all children equally giving all students equal opportunity. Coates Elementary is a Title I school; about fifty percent of students receive free and reduced lunch (Fairfax County Public Schools, 2015). This school was placed in the center of poverty and many of these students who participate in the free and reduced lunch program are English Language Learners.

Growing up, I perceived myself as a minority in a predominantly Hispanic and to a lesser extent Asian area based solely on the restaurants in the area and how often I would see Spanish and an East or Southeast Asian script on the sign for a store. The latter is seen in the fact 55.9% of the population spoke Spanish or Spanish Creole and 87% of this group spoke English “less than well,” indicating it may be at least a second language for them. Asian and Pacific Island language speakers makeup 5.2% of the population, however, a greater degree of assimilation was seen in this group with only 64.4% of this group indicating they spoke English “less than well.” Another factor in this is that over 60 percent of the population (61.3%) is foreign born with the vast majority (90.8%) speaking Spanish or Spanish Creole at home. A quarter mile from my house there was an entire plaza of Southeast Asian stores and restaurants and a half mile away was another, larger plaza with mostly Mexican and other Central American businesses and spaces. In spite of this economic activity, the two thirds of residents rented rather than owned their homes and nearly 80% of the total population lived in these units. Additionally, 82.1% of the Spanish speaking population over the age of 25 have earned less than a highschool diploma. Such data are emblematic of the relationship between being a person of color in this country and the barriers to

Gateway Charter Academy Middle/High School is a charter secondary school on 1015 E. Wheatland Rd Dallas, TX 75241, in the Gateway Charter Academy school district. As of the 2015-2016 school years, it had 343 students. The school received an accountability rating of “improvement required.” 98% (336) of the student body is African American, 1.2% is Hispanics, and 0.6% is white/Caucasians, and Asians make up the last 0.3% of the student body. Texas Association of School Board states that the local school board shall rely on the school district professional staff to select and acquire instructional resources that “represent many ethnic, religious, and cultural groups and their contributions to the national heritage and world community” (Texas

While immigrant youth may gain useful knowledge and skills, they miss out significantly on culture resources because they become Americanized. Subtracting schooling occurs in a variety of ways. Classifying ESL (English as a second language) are labeled “limited English proficient rather than as Spanish dominant” (p. 173), faculty and staff linguistically butcher names through mispronunciations, materials such as the school handbook that does not even mention the ELS program are not provided in English, and information is withheld from capable youth which can result in failure. This chapter also addresses the divisions among youth such as Latina female friends, religious immigrant males, immigrant females in trouble, ESL students, mixed generation groups, and U.S. born

(1990) cites a few reasons why immigrant children may struggle in school such as living a life of poverty, cultural and linguistic differences, and lack of self-esteem or appreciation for home culture. To perform well in school, students must be familiar with American culture and the American education system. It is the responsibility of the teacher to explain this to the student. The teacher’s role “consists primarily of facilitating the transmission of cultural values needed by students to become motivated to learn” (Trueba et al. 1990).

As someone who is planning on getting licensed to teach two different, yet often marginalized, groups in a school setting, it is very important to consider how to make a school welcoming to all of its students. There is a lot of information available on making a classroom inclusive for students with special needs, but this sort of information is harder to come by for immigrant students who speak a language other than English at home. For this paper, I am looking into the question of how can a school be fundamentally welcoming to students from an immigrant background. I will be doing this by analyzing the experiences of students at a school in Bayview, California, the topic of Made in America: Immigrant Students in our Public Schools, a famous book by Laurie Olsen (1997). Her purpose was to study, “Through their encounters[, …] an illuminated version of the American system of stratification and exclusion through language, cultural, and racial relations” (p. 36). However, by analyzing and describing the school, Olsen has made it possible to assess any number of concerns that immigrant and English Language Learners (ELLs) face. Using the legwork she has already done, I have identified three characteristics a welcoming school should strive towards in order to help immigrant students.

My data analysis of racial demographics in the school district shows that the area is uniquely isolated – surrounded by communities that don’t look similar. At Palos Verdes Peninsula High, there are two primary ethnic groups that attend school – white students and Asian students. Combined, they make up over 75% of the high school population, while white students represent the largest overall at just over 40%. The third largest ethnic group represented is Hispanic or Latino students, of which there are only 262. This equals about one-tenth of the high school. The district overall has even higher percentages of white students, totaling almost 48%. Only 12% of the district’s students identify as either Hispanic or

With the completion of Wilburton Elementary School, enrollment numbers will significantly decrease at the elementary schools in the northwest corridor of Bellevue. Although Wilburton will provide relief for certain schools in Bellevue, it isn’t a viable long-term solution for another highly populated region, Somerset. The regions surrounding Somerset has one of the largest populations under 18 at 24.27%, and a potential to rise even higher, hence the high enrollment numbers in the south corridor of Bellevue. The proposed elementary school* would be able to reduce enrollment numbers in Newport Heights, Woodridge, Somerset, Eastgate, Lake Hills and Spiritridge. The proposed plan would mean a significant reduction in attendance area at the schools listed above, as a result boundary lines will have to be redistricted to incorporate the proposed plan. The proposed boundary shifts also integrates regions with very different ethnic backgrounds, each original region will be well represented in the new school with dominant races such as Hispanic, White and Asian mixed together. The proposed school would also incorporate students of varying academic proficiency, with three original elementary schools ranking in the top 5 of Bellevue, while one representing the lower half of the spectrum based on SBAC test scores. The mix of student proficiencies and cultures would be highly rewarding for students as they converge together with different cultures and study backgrounds, which is

This research investigates the efficacy of a program designed to reduce racial, ethnic and economic isolation at two public elementary schools in the State of Connecticut. The two schools are Madison Elementary School (MES) in Bridgeport, Connecticut, and Daniels Farm Elementary School (DFES) in Trumbull, Connecticut. During the 2015-16 academic year, 85% of the students at MES were Minority, 18% were classified as English Language Learners, and 100% were eligible for free or reduced price meals. During the 2015-16 academic year, 78% of the students at DFES were White, 2.8% were classified as English Language Learners, and 5.7% were eligible for free or reduced price meals. According to Google Maps, the two schools are 6.4 miles

In Columbus, fiscal resources and man power are limited. Left alone, the schools in Deming have somewhat honored their commitment to a cross-border responsibility by educating students from Mexico. “The school district has done a good job in its honest desire to acknowledge the realities of a regional border life that this practice has continued” (Frase & Poston, 2000) . But this is only a small part of cross-border education, one that in isolation too easily causes other crucial needs that can more richly promote bi-national cavity to developing a strong program of dual language learning. In fact, New Mexico has established a bilingual multicultural education Act in Article 23 of the state’s constitution. This has fostered institutionalizes appreciation for linguistic and cultural variety in the state and in Columbus school districts. The serious commitment to dual language learning in the state has created educational environments that actively honor the bicultural character of the students and their families and launched bilingual and English learning programs with schools in Columbus and across New Mexico. Therefore, schools such as the ones in the Deming district will require many strong leaders for dual language learning that can bring equity issue to the table. “It will take know-how, moxie, and some shaking up in a community that has its own tempo and style of making cross-border educational changes but New Mexico has done a great job on understanding their own border identity and cross border commitments” ( Flores & Murillo,

The school is only equipped with one fullt time Mexican worker who admits that he sees racism all around him in the school setting. “He estimated that 85 percent of the teachers make prejudicial comments about the Mexican American students” (Baker, 1995, p. 253). He has taught at the school for a significant amount of years but he still feels as an outcast when he attends teachers’ social events. The school does not support the needs of the Mexicans to their best ability, and they simply do not care. Studies indicate that individuals who do not speak English need at least 7 years of training in English, the grade school only provides three years (Baker, 1995, p. 254). This displays racism in the rural area of Idaho although these events have

During the late 1960’s, America had entered into a period of cultural definition especially with the emergence of the Civil Rights Movement. Although the term “multicultural education” had not come into play yet, the idea that the U.S needed to reexamine their efforts of educating diverse groups was emerging. During this time inequality especially among minority groups in comparison to the white dominant culture became a social issue (Banks 1999). Before the arrival of this reform multicultural education was displayed in the classroom as having minorities adapt to the predominant culture. Teachers during this time felt it would be more beneficial for minorities to adapt. However, many parents of these minorities begin to argue that the