Understanding culture, disproportional representation in school services focus of panel discussion
CEEP Policy Chat features state legislator, deputy director of civil rights commission
Monday, December 3, 2007
The need for teachers to understand the cultures of their students and how to address the overrepresentation of students of color receiving special services and in the juvenile justice system is the focus of this week’s CEEP Policy Chat. The panel discussion is Wednesday, at 1:30 p.m. in the Dogwood Room of the Indiana Memorial Union, sponsored by the Center for Evaluation and Education Policy (CEEP) and the Indiana University School of Education.Panelists include Indiana State Representative Greg Porter, D—Indianapolis, Christine CdeBaca (pronounced sed-eh-bah-ka), the Deputy Director of the Indiana Civil Rights commission, Clara Anderson, Executive Vice President of Children’s Bureau, Inc., in Indianapolis, and Barbara Korth, associate professor in the IU School of Education and coordinator of undergraduate Multicultural Education. “I think there’s a disconnect from some educators understanding the student whom they are trying to teach,” said Porter, who authored the 2004 cultural competency law. Cultural competency refers to the ability to function in cross-cultural settings and to interact with people from other cultures and races.
Porter said it’s a problem across Indiana he’ll seek to remedy in part by enhancing the legislation passed three years ago. “Everyone needs to understand what types of students they’re dealing with and how to motivate those students to do better in school,” Porter said. “Professional development is a key, but also when those educators come out (of professional development classes), that they have mentors that stick with them over a year or two or three years to help them understand how to become good educators.”
CdeBaca agrees that more legislation is needed to address the issues, which she says are intertwined. "Cultural differences between teachers and students are a reality in our school systems,” she said. “Teachers should become culturally competent so they don't misinterpret cultural differences as a problem for which they refer a student for special education services or as a problem for which they suspend a student of color, when they would not suspend a student from the dominant culture for the same behavior.”
Anderson chairs the Indiana Disproportionality Committee which promoted a new commission to address the problem. Legislation passed in the last session of the General Assembly created a 33-member commission now being formed through appointments by the governor, speaker of the Indiana House of Representatives, and the president pro tempore of the Indiana State Senate.
“That group is to work on trying to come up with a master plan,” Anderson said. “It is to address education, child welfare, juvenile correction, and mental health for youth. All of those systems seem to have children of color overrepresented in the state of Indiana.”
National studies regarding incidents of child abuse indicate no difference in the rates of abuse by race, Anderson said. “Is this also true in Indiana,” she said. “We’ve got to look at it.”
Wednesday’s panel discussion is free and open to the public. CEEP promotes and supports rigorous program evaluation and policy research primarily, but not exclusively, for education, human services and non-profit organizations. Its research uses both quantitative and qualitative methodologies. To learn more about CEEP, go to http://ceep.indiana.edu.
Interview Excerpts
Rep. Porter says more and continuing training for teachers in regards to cultural competency is necessary: (Listen to this sound bite)
“Just because you’re an educator of color doesn’t mean that you’re culturally competent, okay, first and foremost, everyone needs to understand what types of students they’re dealing with and how to motivate those students to do better in school. So professional development is also a key, but also when those educators come out, that they have mentors that stick with them over a year or two or three years to help them understand how to become good educators.”
While children of color might be referred to services more often, Anderson says data indicates it might not be warranted: (Listen to this sound bite)
“When there have been the national incident studies on this issue, it has shown that there is no discrepancy based on race of the incidents of abuse of kids by race. So when you see that, is this also true in Indiana? We’ve got to look at it. We’ve got to begin to bring numbers to demonstrate for us is outcomes are different for different populations.”
