Opportunity to Learn What? Access to Advanced Placement U.S. History and Equity for Multilingual Immigrant Students

• In Event: Immigrants, Language, and Educational (In)Justice

Abstract

When institutional ecology constrains teacher practice, it draws into question equity initiatives for secondary multilingual immigrant youth aimed only at increasing opportunity to learn, for instance through access to advanced placement classes. Here, Thompson’s (2013) Positive Equality and Negative Equality and Giddens’ (1984) Theory of Structuration are applied to one teacher’s ideals and enactments of support for immigrant youth in his 11th grade US History classes – one mainstream, one AP. Interviews and observations reveal a fragmented application of positive and negative equalities within this teacher’s practice. These discrepancies are exacerbated by institutional policy and result in contrasting student accounts of learning experiences. One implication is that schoolwide and classroom equity approaches should integrate both negative and positive forms of equality.

Author

• Brian Tauzel, University of Washington - Seattle