Three African American Students Defy a Racist School Culture to Develop Confidence as Mathematics Learners

• In Event: Learning From Underrepresented Students’ Perspectives: Investigations by Female Mathematics Education Scholars From STEM Backgrounds

Abstract

Purpose
Public media and scholarly studies often portray students’ mathematics achievements strictly by evidence of test scores gains. Students of color are often disproportionately assigned to the lower tracks within limited opportunities for access to learn mathematics conceptually (Oakes, 2005). In this presentation, we hear from three low-track African American students—one female and two male—who are bolstered by their African American female mathematics teacher to disprove the low expectations for their mathematics achievements embedded in an overtly racist school culture.

Theoretical Framework
Using Critical Race Theory in education (Dixson & Rousseau, 2005, Lynn & Parker, 2005), this study unveils counternarratives of young African American students who live outside the dominant White ethnic culture of their school and surrounding neighborhood (Leonard, 2009). This work challenges the common stereotype of the racial hierarchy of mathematics ability and achievement (Martin, 2009).

Methods
A blend of narrative inquiry and portraiture (Clandinin & Rosiek, 2007; Lawrence-Lightfoot & Davis, 1997; Riessman, 2008) is used to feature stories of the three young people, Parker, Tanya and Duayne (pseudonyms). Qualitative analysis culled from interview transcripts, videotaped lessons, and classroom observations (Roth, 2005; Saldaña, 2009).

Data sources
The researcher videotaped eighteen classroom lessons during the last months of the students’ 7th grade year. At the end of the year, she conducted individual interviews with ten students. This presentation’s data are from interviews with three African American students.

Results
Each of the students described how they began to believe in themselves as capable mathematics learners. They responded to Ms. Henry’s (teacher pseudonym) broad support for their mathematics learning different from other teachers (Gresalfi & Cobb, 2011). Ms. Henry taught them to overcome naysayers and “not to let anyone say you will not amount to anything.”. Tanya likened these watchwords to her mother’s words of encouragement: “if this is where your mind is at, then you should be able to do it”. Tanya entered 7th grade fearing she might fail mathematics. She now understood herself to be “a shy person who is good at math”.
The two male students added how previously they were not interested in mathematics or did not think they could “do math” until they were introduced to more challenging work. Students’ statements of increased self-confidence are triangulated with classroom observations and interviews with Ms. Henry who asserts: “I teach like they are all gifted.”

Scholarly Significance
This work counters stereotypes that low track students cannot be motivated toward excellence in mathematics. The teacher encouraged students to believe in themselves, and they internalized the mathematics identities needed to work toward higher mathematics achievements.
The presenter had been an activist as a young adult and left a lengthy career in the technology industries to teach. Her child’s teachers in this same urban district provided the impetus to change. As a mathematics teacher, she was outraged by inequities she witnessed in a -tracked secondary school. When she had an unusual opportunity to pursue doctoral studies, she committed her life’s work as a researcher in our urban schools.

Author

• Della R. Leavitt, LIS Curriculum Research Consulting