Swimming Against the Tide: Students of Color in White Suburban High Schools

• In Event: Where Do We Place Our Children? Students of Color in Predominately White High School Settings

Abstract

Overview/ Significance

Students of color in predominately white suburban high schools, with legacies of racial tensions, face substantial social and institutional barriers that prevent them from fully accessing the resources and social capital in their learning environments. To address the ongoing racialized contexts of suburban schools, and continue the dialogue for racial equity in education, the author demonstrates various manifestations of unchallenged racism, which limit opportunities to learn for students of color.

Theoretical Framework
A critical race analysis of schools and schooling highlights of how race and racism continue as pervasive barriers to equitable schooling for students of color. The concepts of colorblindness, interest-convergence, racial realism, and white privilege are used to explain how federal mandates and common school policies and practices, such as tracking, traditional curricula, teacher classroom practices, and student surveillance sustain a racially hostile environment for students of color in majority white suburban schools. The racial contexts of suburban schools are interrogated in three ways: 1. The historical underpinnings of race that continue to impact schools, 2. The role(s) of race in current education policies, 3. Manifestations of race and racism in majority white suburban high school settings.

Methods/ Data Sources
The study took place in four predominantly white suburbs that share borders with a Midwest metropolitan area. Researchers conducted 22 focus group interviews with 97 high school students of color, from six schools in four districts. The participants’ ages ranged from 14-19. Two thirds of the participants were girls. Students from all racial categories, except white, were solicited for interviews. The racial breakdown of the students included African American (74), Latin@ (5), and Asian American (4), bi-racial (10), Native American (2), multi-racial (2) students. The students interviewed hailed from across the urban center with a few living in the suburban cities.
Data were collected through single session, 1-1/2 hour long, audio-taped, focus group interviews with 5-7 high school students and one of the five members of the research team during the school day at each high school site. The semi-structured interviews focused on three categories: general questions about their high school, adult relationships, and academics. The team: 1) read and marked the interviews with marginal remarks; 2) made external notes on areas of frequency, omission, and declaration; 3) used their individual notes to make initial taxonomies as a team; 4) created a visual matrix of these initial taxonomies; 5) used the matrix to identify sub-categories and patterns as a team; and 6) assembled structures as a team.

Results/ Findings
The author shares four primary themes: 1. The role of academic tracking in maintaining inequitable schooling experiences, 2. Students being viewed as ‘racial authorities’ in the classroom, 3. School policy and protocol double standards, 4. No meaningful discussions of race and racism that promote racial understanding.

The author asserts the need to revisit critical multicultural education as professional development for teachers and administrators to assist educators with building safe and inclusive school contexts where children can take advantage of all opportunities to learn.

Author

• Thandeka K. Chapman, University of California - San Diego