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The Skin They’re In
The Skin They’re In
An In-Depth Analysis of African American Students from Irving Independent School District
By
Dr. Mack T. Hines III
“Many of Irving ISD’s African American Students
can eloquently explain and exude pride in Black America’s history of overcoming struggles for racial equality. But they have yet to experience the evidence needed to come over to believing that they are racially equal human beings.”
Dr. Mack T. Hines III
Table of Contents
Section / Topic / Pagei. / Executive Summary / 4
ii. / Introduction / 10
I. / The Skin They’re In-Student Findings / 12
II. / The Skin They’re In
Disciplined and Undisciplined African American Students / 53
III. / The Skin They’re In-Teacher Findings / 64
IV. / Implications / 79
V. / Summary/Conclusions / 89
Executive Summary
The purpose of report is to provide findings from my investigation of African American students’ schooling experiences in Irving Independent School District. Specifically, I sought to investigate African American students’ perceptions, beliefs, and attitudes about their enrollment in secondary schools in Irving Independent School District. I also investigated Irving Independent School District’s teachers’ perceptions, views, attitudes, and concerns about African American students.
I conducted 44 focused group sessions with 143 African American students from 4 high schools and 7 middle schools. The students were group in accordance to African American students who did not have behavioral issues in school and African American students who had behavioral issues in schools. The outcomes from the discussions were as follows:
1. African American students took pride in their race and possessed a clear understanding being Black in America. However, they believed that Caucasian American people enjoy privileges that are not available to African American people. In effect, they believe that the Caucasian American people are the standards of economical, political, and industrial advantages in society, particularly Irving, Texas.
2. African American students indicated that they experience the following forms of racism and discrimination in schools:
A. Student to Student Racism-Some students spoke about racial tension with Caucasian American students and Hispanic American students. The students and students from other ethnicities often exchanged racial jokes with each other. However, at a certain point, African American students and the other students began to use racial jokes to demean each other.
B. Teacher to Student Racism-Many of the students perceived that teachers treated African American students different in comparison to Caucasian American students, as well as Hispanic American students (on a few campuses). Majority of the racial tensions revolved around African American students and Caucasian American teachers.
3. Some African American students possessed a clear understanding of the meaning of racism. Some African American students did not have a true understanding of the meaning of racism.
4. Perceptions of racism appeared to have a more negative impact on African American students with behavior problems than African American students who did not have behavior problems in school.
As a follow up to the student activities, I also interacted with 198 teachers from 4 high schools and 7 middle schools. First, I used a survey to collect information about the teachers. Through the use of the survey, I identified factors that contributed the most to their identities as individuals and teachers. I found that occupation and education were the strongest influences on the teachers’ identities as people. Social class and race held the least influence on the teachers’ identities as people. The overall rankings for teacher identity development showed that occupation and education held the strongest influences on the teachers’ identities as teachers. Social class and marital status held the least influence on the teachers’ identities as teachers.
I also found that for Caucasian American teachers, occupation and education was the strongest influences on their identities as people. Race was the least significant influence on their identities as people. For African American teachers, education and race were the strongest influences on their identities as people. Parenthood was the least significant influence on their identities as people. As people, Hispanic American teachers appeared to be mostly influenced by education and occupation. The least significant influence for these teachers was gender.
Occupation and education appeared to be the strongest influences on how all of the teachers viewed their identities as teachers. Whereas parenthood was the least significant influence on Hispanic American teachers’ teacher identities, marital status appeared to bear little to no importance on the teacher identities of Caucasian American teachers and African American teachers.
In addition to establishing correlations between teaching and identity, I analyzed the racial differences for the teachers’ beliefs regarding other teachers’ high expectations for African American students. My findings showed that Caucasian American teachers and Hispanic American teachers believed that other teachers held high expectations for African American students. African American teachers, however, only somewhat believed that other teachers held high expectations for African American students. Other comparable findings were that a statistically significant difference existed between the teachers’ recognition of the racial differences among students. African American teachers were slightly more likely than Caucasian American teachers and Hispanic American teachers to see the racial differences among students.
In addition to surveying teachers, I also engaged them in focus group discussions about African American students. Ms. Dianna Hopper would facilitate the discussions by informing teachers of my purpose for working with Irving Independent School District. I would then ask teachers to identity any specific academic characteristics and behavioral characteristics about their African American student population.
On many campuses, some of teacher responses could be characterized as:
1. Beliefs in that African American students were bright individuals with the potential to become successful individuals.
2. Concerns about African American students’ lack of commitment or focus on academics. According to the teachers, some African American students either failed or refused to apply themselves in the classroom.
3. Anxiety regarding African American students’ tendency to show defiant and disrespectful behavior towards the authority of adults, particularly Caucasian American teachers.
Yet many of the responses to my inquiry varied by campus, group dynamics and race. On some campuses, either all or majority of the teachers gave open and honest accounts of their perceptions about African American students. On other campuses, either all or majority of the teachers defined African American students as the same as other students.
Within some campuses, some focused group participants were more revealing about their perceptions of African American students than participants from other focused groups. In most instances, race influenced the responses from focused group participants’ perceptions of African American students. Specifically, with the exception of one African American teacher, the African American teachers were able to discuss specific academic characteristics and behavioral characteristics of African American students. Along those same lines, Hispanic teachers, for the most part, could describe their perceptions of the unique academic and behavioral characteristics of African American students.
Considerable variation existed within Caucasian American teachers. Whereas some Caucasian American teachers were willing to discuss the characteristics of African American students, some of these teachers were resistant to partaking in this activity.
However, during some parts of the focused group discussions, I did talk with these and African American teachers and Hispanic American teachers about accusations of racism. Many of the Caucasian American teachers wanted to gain a better understanding of African American students’ rationale for making and how to address accusations of being racist teachers.
In response, I would suggest that the teachers ask African American students to define racism. The teachers should then engage the students in discussing their definitions of racism and the extent to which the teachers’ actions were indicative of racism. They should then insist that these students refrain from accusing them of being racist. Although the Caucasian American teachers, as well as other teachers from the focused group, were responsive to these suggestions, I am unsure of the extent to which they translated into strategies for their classrooms.
Notwithstanding, the findings from this investigation implicate the need for a racially relevant approach to addressing the needs of African American students. The most important stakeholders in this process are parents, teachers, and principals. I am proposing that African American parents apply a race-conscious approach towards raising African American children. That is, parents must teach their children how to use the positive and negative racial implications of being an African American to develop a strong academic identity.
Teachers must play a critical role in the development of a strong African American student academic identity by self assessing their racial worldview. Specifically, teachers must examine how race has impacted their lives and views of people from other cultures and ethnicities. They must investigate how race influenced them during their formative years, preservice years, and inservice years.
Principals must set the agenda for empowering African American students. They can best accomplish this goal by facilitating African American students’ full inclusion into the school community. To accomplish this goal, principals must engage in activities that include but are not limited to:
· Guiding teachers’ commitment to forming meaningful academic and nonacademic relationships with African American students.
· Soliciting parental support in strongly encouraging African American students to enroll in advanced classes.
· Empowering guidance counselors to facilitate African American students’ ability to affirm their racial identity in ethnically relevant school “spaces.”
· Forming ad hoc committees to investigate the connection between Black racial identity development and achievement among African American students, especially students with behavioral issues in school.
· Engaging all school personnel in race-based discussions on how to prevent the structural and classroom perpetuation of racial inequities in schools.
· Translating school wide race-based discussions into new and improved academic and social practices for creating equitable learning experiences for African American students.
These strategies will arouse and sustain strong relationships between African American homes and schools. The strategies would also create a home-to-school and school-to-home support system that acknowledges, embraces, and addresses the race, culture, and heritage of African American students in Irving Independent School District.
ii. Introduction
One of the most pressing issues in schools today is African American students. Much research has focused on the educational trajectory of African American students. The findings continue to show that African American students lag behind Caucasian American students, Hispanic American students, and Asian Americans in academic achievement. In addition, the findings continually reveal that African American students are twice as likely to be suspended and expelled from school as students from other ethnic groups.
These findings implicate the importance of investigating possible causes of African American students’ unsuccessful school experiences. Thus, the purpose
of this report is to present the findings from my investigation into African American students’ schooling experiences in Irving Independent School District. Hence the Title “The Skin They’re In: An In-Depth Analysis of African American Students from Irving Independent School District.”
Using student voice as a guide, I provide insightful and realistic findings about African American students’ perceptions regarding their feelings about being a Black student in Irving Independent School District’s secondary schools. This report is divided into four sections. The first section-“The Skin They’re In: African American Student Findings”-denotes African American students’ perceptions of being apart of the African American race and how these feelings are manifested in their daily school experiences. The second section- “The Skin They’re In: Comparing Disciplined & Undisciplined African American Students”-provides findings regarding the differences in perceptions of race, racism, and school between African American students without behavioral problems and African American students with behavioral problems in Irving Independent School District schools. The third section-“The Skin They’re In: Teacher Findings”-provides insight about teachers’ perceptions of African American students. In this section, I provide quantitative and qualitative data that illuminate the determinants of teachers’ approaches to working with African American students.
The final sections provide implications for how parents, teachers, and principals can enhance their commitment to empowering African American students in Irving Independent School District. Overall, the findings from this report should serve as a foundation for understanding and teaching to the academic and behavioral needs of African American students in Irving Independent School District.
I. The Skin They’re In
Student Findings
I conducted 44 focused group sessions with 143 African American students from 4 high schools and 7 middle schools. The students were divided into two groups: African American students who did not have behavioral issues in school and African American students who had behavioral issues in schools.
I began each session by introducing myself to the students. I would then explain my purpose for meeting with them. I would also provide the students with the option to remain in the session or leave the session if they did not want to participate in the activities. After exchanging pleasantries with the students, I would then ask the students to give their names and share at least one positive thing about themselves.
Some students struggled with describing a positive characteristic about themselves. In these instances, I would describe a positive characteristic about these students. The students were then able to use my feedback to describe other positive characteristics about themselves.
Afterwards, I would engage the students in a series of activities and discussions about race. The purpose of these activities was to gain insight on the students’ internal purview and external purview about race. For the purposes of this report, I define internal purview as personal feelings and perceptions about being apart of the African American race. External purview is the perceptions of and feelings about other people’s views of the African American race. What follows is a description of findings from the activities and discussions related to these purviews.
Internal purview
I engaged the African American students in a few activities to determine their perceptions of being Black. I provided the students with two writing prompts. The first writing prompt was entitled “Being Black.” The second prompt was entitled “Black is Beautiful.” Both prompts were used to determine how African American students constructed their meanings of being apart of the African American race.