Two-Way Dual Language Bilingual Education as Vehicle for Equitable Integrated Schooling: Challenges and Possibilities

• In Event: Exploring Successful Integration for Equitable Teaching and Learning in Two-Way Bilingual Education (TWBE) Contexts

Abstract

Objectives
Two-way (TW) DLBE programs integrate students from different linguistic backgrounds to cultivate a learning environment in which students serve as “language models” for one another. Such programs also frequently integrate students from different racial, ethnic, and class backgrounds. Yet, while scholars have critiqued the ways these programs perpetuate inequities (e.g., Palmer, 2009; Chaparro, 2019; Valdés et al., 2021), limited research has attended to how TW-DLBE schools can meaningfully integrate students, particularly in ways that decenter whiteness, English, and class privilege. In response, this study explores how one TW-DLBE school with explicit social justice goals navigated equity concerns and commitments.

Theoretical Framework
This study draws from critical consciousness (Dorner et al., 2022) and culturally sustaining pedagogy (Paris & Alim, 2017) to theorize educational equity. Critical consciousness is “a decolonizing and humanizing framework” (Cervantes et al., 2017, p. 421) that engages students, families, and educators in critical examination of positioning and privilege to work toward social change. Culturally sustaining pedagogy seeks to transform schools into places where minoritized students’ linguistic and cultural practices are not merely accepted but strengthened. Together, these lenses understand equity as a multifaceted construct that involves critiquing and working to combat power imbalances to advance societal transformation.

Methods, Data Sources, and Analysis
This qualitative case study of a two-way DLBE school in the U.S. midwest explores how teachers and leaders at a TW-DLBE school conceptualize equity, how their program operationalizes equity goals, and their challenges in cultivating equitable schooling. Data collection occurred across two academic years and involved focus groups and interviews with school leaders and teachers, classroom observations, and review of school artifacts (e.g., newsletters, website). All audio data was transcribed and iteratively coded using an analysis approach that merges deductive and inductive procedures (Miles et al., 2014), with a deductive codebook developed using the seven principles of critical consciousness (Dorner et al., 2023).

Findings
Findings revealed that achieving equity in/through TW-DLBE is a complex process requiring ongoing collaboration, cultural affirmation, critical (self-)reflection, and political action. Teachers emphasized the importance of centering minoritized languages and cultures, including through testimonios of lived experiences. Leaders highlighted the need to move beyond “symbolic acts of support” toward “real acts of support” for the Latinx community, such as chartering a bus so that students and teachers could participate in a nearby protest march. While the school facilitated equity in many ways, there were still ongoing challenges, including high-stakes assessment pressures to increase English instruction, curricular mandates narrowing cultural responsiveness, and persistent English hegemony, within and outside of classrooms (e.g., PTO meetings).

Scholarly Significance
TW-DLBE programs, through their integrative design and centering of minoritized students, offer a vision of schooling as a vehicle for learning across (and through) difference. For programs to achieve that vision, however, we must better understand what it means to equitably integrate students. This study provides insights into the processes through which TW-DLBE leaders and educators can maintain equity-oriented, integrative learning spaces for language-minoritized students, while also revealing challenges and possible solutions

Author

• Laura Hamman-Ortiz, University of Rhode Island