Race and Contemporary Education of African American Children: Identity and Socialization in Independent Schools

• In Event: Toward Black Educational Choice

Abstract

Schools exist alongside the home and neighborhood as important contexts of socialization for youth. The current presentation focuses on race, identity and socialization in school contexts particularly as they relate to educational and social experiences of Black youth. It will highlight how Black youth negotiate identity, race and racism with a focus on the independent school setting. Independent schools, often predominantly White and economically advantaged school settings, provide a unique context of socialization for Black students. Findings from the Success of African American Students (SAAS) in independent schools project will be presented to illustrate the relationship between race, context, identity and socialization.

SAAS was a longitudinal, mixed-method, collaborative research project between a university research team and several independent elite schools in the mid-Atlantic region. Student, parent, faculty and staff and alumni perspectives were obtained using qualitative and quantitative research methods over the course of approximately five years. Students were interviewed individually and also completed survey questionnaires that assessed variables including: students’ sense of self, connection to the school community, racial identity, encounters with racism, and experience of distress and anger.

The focus of the presentation will be on the data garnered from individual interviews with 54 Black students in grades six to twelve that were conducted over a two-year period and survey questionnaires collected from students over multiple years. The first year of quantitative data collection, where 108 students completed surveys that assessed areas such as perceived racism and psychological sense of school membership, will be reported in this presentation. Results from surveys and interviews will be discussed with the goal of highlighting the student’s voices as they provide perspective on being Black in predominantly White school environments. The experiences of Black youth in independent schools will be compared and contrasted to those youth attending charter and public school settings as detailed by other contributors in Black Educational Choice.

Author

• Edith G. Arrington, OMG Center for Collaborative Learning