Crisis, Individual Responsibility, and Race Evasion: How Media Framed a District's New Grade Retention Policy

• In Event: Discipline, Disparities, and Community Engagement

Abstract

States and districts nationwide are enacting promotion/retention policies that retain elementary students based on literacy test scores, even as research questions the effectiveness of grade retention and documents the disproportionate impact of these policies on Black students and students living in poverty. This case study explores how local media framed one such policy in Shelby County Schools, a large urban district in Memphis, Tennessee. Drawing on theoretical lenses of critical race theory, critical consciousness, and crisis narratives, we found local media used unsupported casual language and perpetuated race-evasive discourses of individual responsibility while ignoring institutional and systemic factors. Our findings make visible how crisis narratives in local media evade discussions of racism and capitalism while blaming students and families.

Authors

• Aixa D. Marchand, Rhodes College

• Laura A Taylor, Rhodes College

• Isabella Fraser, Rhodes College