Sixth Grade Teachers’ Perceptions of the College Bound Student

• In Event: 487 - Section on Teaching and Learning Roundtable Session
  In Refereed Roundtable: Table 04. Efforts in Professionalization

Abstract

College access research suggests that college-bound students are often exposed to rigorous academic trajectories and have a high SES status. However, the majority of college students in the United States do not experience these factors associated with college bound students, particularly children of immigrants and working class families, as well as Latino and African American students. In this body of work, it has become evident that teacher relationships in early education can blunt the effects of early academic trajectories. Yet, teachers have also been identified as gatekeepers who can act in accordance to the dominant metanarratives of education and perpetuate a narrowly constructed college pathway for only some students. With little insight into how teachers’ form perceptions or expectations of their students, this paper seeks to inform the dialogue on college access by documenting teachers’ predictions of the likelihood their students will enroll in college and how teachers define the factors they perceive are necessarily to be a college-student. Through identifying which college-bound traits teachers’ use to predict their students’ college attendance, we argue that these expectations influence teachers’ interactions with students and their instructional approach in the classroom. Also, we posit that teachers’ views of traits associated with being a college student can negatively impact teachers’ expectations of their students. This study gives insight into how dominant perspectives concerning the prototypical college going student permeate the classroom through teachers’ perceptions and expectations while potentially limiting college access.

Authors

• Jolene McCall, University of California-Irvine

• Maria Estela Zarate, California State University-Fullerton