Internal differences in ethnic achievement

5 Internal factors of ethnic differences

1. Labelling & teacher racism

2. Pupil responses and subcultures

3. The ethnocentric curriculum

4. Institutionalised racism

5. Selection and segregation

Gullborn and Youdell impact of labelling

They found teachers were quicker to discipline black students based on ‘racialised expectations’. Additionally, they analysed statistics on banding and streaming by ethnicity. They found that Black-Caribbean students were less likely to be put in higher sets even if they had the ability to be there.

What was Fullers study on black girls in year 11

She studied a group of ‘untypical’ black girls. They were unlike their stereotypes and were overachieving. They did not only seek academic validation from teachers who would reject their success, nor did they only hang out with other academically ahead individuals. They did not show gratitude to their school but rather their academics.

This study highlighted 2 main points:

1. Pupils do not need to conform to their labels to succeed

2. Negative labels do not always lead to failure/ self fulfilling prophecy. It can be used as a fuel for difference.

What were 3 types of teacher racism Mirza identified?

• The Colour-Blind: Teachers who believe all students are equal but fail to challenge racism, effectively ignoring it.

• Liberal Chauvinists: Teachers who believe black pupils are culturally deprived and, therefore, have low expectations of them.

• Overt Racists: Teachers who believe black pupils are inferior and actively discriminate against them

4 ways in which ethnic boys would respond to labelling according to Swell:

Many teachers would label them as ‘black machismo’ - rebellious.

1. Rebels: reject school goals and means,

   1. conforms to their stereotype of ‘black macho lads’. Masculinity equates to sexual experiences. This was a minority group

2. Conformists: accept school goals and means.

   1. This was the largest group. They were not apart of any subculture and were most likely to succeed.

3. Retreatist: Rejected by black subcultures and disconnected from school

4. Innovators: Pro education but anti-school

   1. They were the second largest group.

Sewell’s evaluation of labelling and pupil response

Strengths:

• Rather then blaming the child’s home background, as culturally deprived theory does, labelling theory shows how teachers’ stereotypes can cause failure

Limitations

• Ignores the reason of academic failure of reasons outside the school such as the media, family, role models and other influences

• Not everyone who gets labelled conforms to it

Mac an Ghail on anti-school subcultures

Mac an Ghail was a teacher in two inner city colleges. He looked at three subcultures – the Asian Warriors, the African- Caribbean Rasta Heads and the Black Sisters. He used mainly participant observation both in the school and through befriending the students and socialising with them outside of the school.

What he found was that ethnic community’s experienced the world in very different ways to white people due to institutional racism in the college and he argued that any anti-school attitudes were reactions against this racism. He mainly blamed the school rather than the students for this.