Poster #50 - Historically Marginalized Students’ Social Emotional and Academic Development in Rural Midwestern Contexts

• In Event: Poster Session 14

Abstract

Early learners’ social-emotional learning, temperament, and academic achievement affect their long-term success (Sealy, et. al., 2021; Blair, et. al., 2004). However, historically marginalized students (i.e.Black, Indigenous, and People of Color; BIPOC), within the United States experience heightened and systematic inequalities starting from an early age that affect their schooling experiences (Levinson, & Kumasi, 2011; Duncan, 2002; Delgado & Stefancic, 2000). Current research suggests that marginalized students are disproportionately chastised by teachers and characterized as negatively reacting to classroom climate compared to their white peers (Sanders-Phillips., Settles-Reaves, Walker, & Brownlow, 2009). Other research suggests that this disproportionality intersects with gender as well as other social constructions, such as the cultural milieu of the geographic area (e.g. Black male students in rural settings suffer from various injustice discriminatory circumstances: Gallagheret et. at., 2013).
The purpose of this critical study is to examine the learning environment of historically marginalized kindergarten students through the perceptions of their white female teachers in a rural Midwestern geographic context where white Americans are the super-majority (Panos, 2021; Census, 2020). This study draws from a larger grant funded project, INSIGHTS Nebraska. INSIGHTS is a ten-week intervention that teaches social emotional skills to young children, their teachers, and their parents to promote long-term positive effects (Sealy, et.al., 2021; McCormick et. al., 2018; 2015; McClowry, 2014; 2003; 2002; O’Connor et. al., 2014). It is implemented in kindergarten and first grade classrooms with puppets that teach students about their individual temperaments and how to cope with day-to-day issues that occur in the classroom.
To understand systematic patterns in teacher perceptions’ over time in this study, we consider teacher perceptions through survey responses of students’ academic achievement (ACES), temperament (T-Sati), and social-emotional learning (STRS) longitudinally across kindergarten and first grade. This poster will present descriptive and other quantitative analyses from three time points of the study ( figure 1, table 1). To be sensitive to the small sample of historically marginalized students within this study, we discuss these students’ scores in comparison to the overall class average (which includes their scores). We chose to compare marginalized students to the class average rather than to their white peers so as not to compare students’ based on race and ethnicity (which would imply white superiority or that the marginalized students should strive to be like white peers), but still determine if marginalized students are above, below, or with the entire class scores on average. We also compare temperament and control groups to account for the longitudinal effects of the intervention from the larger study (table 1).
Results suggest that although teachers perceive strong relationships with their marginalized students (closeness/conflict), these students are systematically perceived to receive lower achievement scores and higher negative behavior scores. Figure 1 represents all variables with three time points. Although the gap between student-teacher relationships is narrow, the achievement score gap is evident at all time points. We will continue to quantitatively examine these results for trends, slope, standard deviations, etc.

Authors

• Martinique Sealy, Virginia Commonwealth University
  Presenting Author

• Jungwon Eum, University of Nebraska - Lincoln

• Kathleen Moritz Rudasill, Virginia Commonwealth University

• Yuenjung Joo, University of Nebraska - Lincoln

• Jentry Stoneman Barrett, University of Nebraska-Lincoln

• Angela Hinrichs, University of Nebraska - Lincoln