"They'll Get Cs and Ds; That's Good Enough": Teachers Positioning Black Students as Academic Afterthoughts

• In Event: Smoke, Mirrors, and Education Practices: "Access" as Gatekeeping for Students and Communities of Color

Abstract

Objectives/Purposes:

As the conference’s call for submissions says, it is certain that “education improvement is about public perceptions”. With this in mind, the author examines how teachers at a high-performing, predominantly Black urban high school understand their responsibilities in fostering Black student academic success (Ladson-Billings, 2005). To this end, the author examines: “What contradictions arise when teachers foster Black student academic success at a high-performing urban school?”

Theoretical Framework:

To examine the symposium’s objective, the researcher applies a critical race in education theoretical framework (CRT) and its analytical lens of expansive and restrictive views of equality. An expansive view of equality strives to combat the material conditions Blacks faced and concentrated on “equality as a result” (Crenshaw, 1988). However, the restrictive view adheres to equality as a process.

Methods, techniques, or modes of inquiry:

The researcher utilized a year-long ethnographic (Emerson et al, 2011) study of a predominantly African-American high school in an urban, Midwestern city. The school has a long-established, revered International Baccalaureate-diploma program and has been consistently ranked as one of the best high schools statewide and nationally.

Data sources, evidence, objects or materials:

For this empirical paper, the researcher relied on: in-depth interviews, classroom observations of four (4) teachers, and archived minutes from local School Board meetings.

Results and/or substantiated conclusions or warrants for argument/point of view:

In interrogating contradictions that arose when the author focused on how teachers fostered Black student academic success, document analysis and teacher interviews reveal public perception of Saginaw high school among parents of Black students to be overwhelmingly positive. “Black parents know Saginaw is better than the district’s other school because we’re testing kids to get in” (Transcript). At the same time, a contradiction was that teachers viewed positive perception as justification to create academic afterthoughts of (some) Black students. The process of creating academic afterthoughts was marked by: (un)knowingly neglecting (some) Black students’ educational needs. One teacher articulated the connection between public perception and the process of creating academic afterthoughts—“There’s a core group [of Black students] that’s outsiders in the building. They’re nice kids; they’ll get Cs and Ds and that’s good enough. They’re not going to complain and their parents aren’t going to complain” (Transcript) because Saginaw was better than local neighborhood schools. For these participants, access to Saginaw was “good enough.”

Scientific or scholarly significance of the study of the work:

The author pinpointed ways teachers’ perceptions of a high-performing, predominantly Black urban school informed the process of creating academic afterthoughts. The author contributes to scholarly conversations about Black student success by arguing that positive public perceptions and binaries of “academically successful versus unsuccessful” obscure ways teachers create academic afterthoughts of (some) Black children. Through empirical research, the author reveals that Black student success is predicated upon Black student failure and vice versa. Therefore, the author suggests viewing Black student academic success as a symbiotic relationship.

Author

• Shameka Nija Powell, Tufts University