Drawing on research in Oakland, California over a twenty-year period, Noguera considers how poverty and racial isolation have contributed to the problems confronted by schools in that district and other inner-city communities around the state. He illuminates the factors that hinder the development of social capital in low-income communities, and, in doing so, demonstrates why local control does not make it easier for school systems to address the academic needs of poor students. The wide variation in the ability of different communities to generate revenue and other support for schools at the local level creates inequalities in the learning conditions and opportunities that schools provide students. The design of the state’s public education system exacerbates these inequities. Specifically, the state’s current approaches to local control make it possible for advantaged parents and communities with a vested interest in the affairs of public schools to monitor conditions in their schools. However, this form of local control is inadequate as a mechanism for holding schools accountable in high poverty areas. Noguera concludes that in order to improve reform efforts and policy implementation, the state must enact measures to mitigate the effects of poverty and racial isolation. Rather than presuming that all schools can be treated the same, the state must develop strategies to build the social capital of parents and cultivate the civic capacity of communities in low-income areas. Without such measures, local control will remain little more than a guise through which the State can shirk its responsibility for insuring that all students have access to quality education.

This study was undertaken to assist a group of educators in assessing the factors influencing the academic achievement of Latino students in the Lockwood Unified School District (LUSD) and to prescribe a strategy for intervention. Utilizing an inductive approach to the research and a variety of qualitative data collection methods, this study also attempts to test the relevance and validity of existing theory and to explore new ways of conceptualizing the issues influencing school performance. Our goal in this paper is to use Lockwood as a case study for analyzing issues related to the academic performance of Latino students in California and throughout the United States, where patterns of underachievement continue to prevail as the norm.

Note: This paper was originally published in 1994 by the Chicano Latino Policy Project, which evolved into the Center for Latino Policy Research, one of the centers of the Institute for the Study of Societal Issues

A substantial body of evidence has shown that past reforms have largely failed to improve schools in urban areas. After reviewing some of the major reforms that have been undertaken over the last 20 to 30 years the authors conclude that prior efforts failed to address the numerous ways in which poverty influences student academic outcomes and school performance (Coleman et al., 1966; Rothstein, 2004). As a contrast to the decontextualized approach to school improvement that has characterized national reforms, a new strategy to school improvement that is underway in Newark, New Jersey is presented as an alternative model. Conceived as a demonstration model for the Broader and Bolder Approach,2 the Newark strategy follows an approach that has been pursued by the Harlem Children’s Zone, the Children’s Aid Society, and a small number of similar efforts. These initiatives are based on the premise that educational reforms must be designed to counter and mitigate the effects of social and economic conditions in the local environment. The case of Newark is presented as a model for what it might take to enable a greater number of schools in distressed neighborhoods to experience success.

School policing practices disproportionately affects Black students across U.S. public schools. Less visible is the way these persistent racial inequalities have transformed the landscape of America’s neighborhoods. In response to calls for policy reform, districts have clarified the roles of school police officers aimed at preventing the use of citations and arrests, namely for minor offenses of the law that would more appropriately be handled by the school administration. This dissertation examines how discipline policy reform interacts with race and geographical place to influence student arrest patterns and disciplinary infractions. Also important are the challenges that the seeming intractability of reform pose, yet with so little change in racial disparities, present to Black students and entire neighborhoods. In this dissertation, a multilevel root-cause theoretical framework is applied to clarify extant understandings of the structural conditions, political economic processes, and bioecological factors underlying racial disparities in school policing at the neighborhood level. This study reveals neighborhood contextual contradictions between school police officers’ enforcement of the law (with respect to school safety) and the unique, multifaceted responsibilities of working in educational settings with students. Drawing on school police student data in the years after the reform, combined with in-depth interviews conducted with 120 Black students, this study finds that school policing of students is more often concentrated in urban neighborhoods in Los Angeles that are characterized by poverty and social disadvantage. Qualitative findings help explain these patterns by describing students’ (indirect and direct) contact with school police officers’ citation and arrest-driven enforcement methods, and the routine nature of school policing as counter to not only reform, but also to larger goals of building community, instilling safety, and maximizing students' academic engagement. Participation in community-based, social justice organizations helps to buffer these effects for some Black students. My analysis suggests contention within the efficacy of LASPD policy reform, framing a contest that takes place not just across a racial divide, but literally across the modernization of urban space in Los Angeles.

This study examined the experiences of 30 alumni of color (AOCs) who attended predominantly-white independent secondary schools (PWISs) on their overall educational and socio-emotional experiences. Utilizing the lens of colorblind ideology (CBI) and culturally responsive pedagogy (CRP), this study analyzed participant experiences of teachers’ instructional practices as related to students’ racial or ethnic identity as well as sense of belonging and classroom engagement. The data comprises of in-depth interviews with 30 AOCs who represent Asian, Black, and Latinx perspectives. Of the participants, 15 self-identified within the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, and Queer spectrum. The findings point to the “non-neutrality” of CBI exhibited by PWIS educators. Participants indicated significant cultural disconnect with their school in three major areas: public versus independent school culture, socioeconomic differences, and feeling disconnected with white culture. Moreover, participants indicated experiencing colorblind or tokenized multicultural perspectives in their school curricula, feeling hyper-visible during race-related conversations and invisible otherwise, as well as frequent encounters with unaddressed racial microaggressions in the classroom. The colorblind culture of PWISs posed obstacles for AOCs in navigating the social hierarchy (race and wealth-based) in their school culture. All of this had a significantly negative socioemotional impact on the participants, with many indicating acute awareness of their race and some showing signs of internalized racism. The findings also underscored the importance of educators’ active engagement in creating a racially inclusive space for students of color at PWISs. The data revealed how teachers’ non-verbal (or indirect) messages can exhibit powerful signs of caring or uncaring for students of color, particularly under the backdrop of CBI culture. As well, AOCs indicated a strong inclination for CRP, with many showing increased engagement or confidence when classroom discussions veered from white-centered perspectives. Successful classroom discussions were described as providing adequate class time to delve into deeper issues, connecting conversations to student experiences, and encouraging critical thinking. AOC interviews and recommendations also pointed to several effective facilitation skills, such as norm setting, encouraging student self-reflections through targeted questions, modeling vulnerability, or an emphasis on systemic (versus) individual racism at the initial point of conversation.

Historically, traditional public schools have been microcosms of the broader neighborhoods in which they are embedded. These schools reflect the race, class and cultural backgrounds of the local community where they are situated. However, over the past three decades, traditional public schools have been implicated in the rise of educational privatization and market-based approaches to education reform and urban restructuring. In order to respond to threats posed by privatization, teachers and administrators, especially those serving students of color and low-income students, must understand and be able to respond to the contextual idiosyncrasies and nuances that manifest inside the school building. Neighborhood conditions do profoundly impact the teaching and learning environment of schools. Educators attempting to transform those schools should take into account those conditions and seek to connect school change strategies to those conditions.

Utilizing the scholarship on community engagement in urban contexts as an empirical and intellectual springboard, this qualitative case study seeks to first understand the social, political and cultural dynamics that have shaped the neighborhood and schooling contexts through the perspectives of multiple stakeholder groups. To do so, this study explores the perceptions of educators – teachers, administrators, and staff—in one urban high school regarding the out-of-school factors that impact the teaching and learning environment and explore how they engage the community in their approach to school reform that is linked to those factors.

Drawing from critical race theory and critical urban theory, this study demonstrates how educators contend with the out-of-school factors of poverty, student and family homelessness and market forces to embark on school reform that is directly connected to these challenges and engages local community residents in the process.

During the 20-year period from 1934 – 1954 the Roosevelt, Truman, and Eisenhower administrations created federal housing policies that made it easier for white middle-class families to secure home owner loans. These policies expanded the suburbs and simultaneously created segregated African American neighborhoods in urban areas, such as Syracuse, N.Y. Housing segregation gave birth to segregated schools. These segregated public schools created negative learning outcomes for African American students for several decades. During the 1960s Syracuse closed two of the three predominantly African American schools to force integration. Although African American parents fought to keep Dr. King open and demanded the school district integrate the student population, Dr. King School remained segregated due to the lack of cooperation from white middle-class parents, who refused to allow their children to be bused there. The unsuccessful attempts to integrate Dr. King School aren’t the only failures tethered to it. It has secured a position on New York State’s “Failing Schools” list for more than 10 consecutive years during this century. The schools placed on this list have consistently failed to prepare more than 10 percent of their students to demonstrate proficiency in Math and English Language Arts on state exams.

It is well known that a significant number of California students are of Mexican heritage. What is less apparent to educators is that increasing numbers of these students are children and youth from Indigenous communities of that region. Effects of globalization and free market forces have not only caused the displacement and migration of Indigenous peoples to large cities within Mexico, but also to several parts of the United States, in search of work. Indigenous students from Mexico differ considerably from their mestizo peers, both culturally and linguistically (V�squez, 2012). For California educators, this means that within the group known homogeneously as “Latino,” is in part made up of students from families who may speak an Indigenous language at home, and who may observe Indigenous cultural traditions and ways of life (L�pez, 2009; Ochoa and Ochoa, 2005). A growing body of literature is shining a light on the challenges Indigenous students encounter as they navigate the educational system - in Mexico and here in the US. There are between 100,000 and 200,000 Zapotec immigrants who now live in greater Los Angeles, and the number of Indigenous children and youth from communities in Mexico are attending California public schools is increasing. Due to their unique background, Zapotec students may present educators with additional considerations as they plan for their instruction and support. The work presented here chronicles a year-long case study which sought to explore the schooling experiences of Oaxacan youth at an urban high school in Southern California. During the course of the investigation, multiple factors within the school environment were analyzed, including instructional practices, school and district procedures and perceptions of staff, students, and parents with regard to Oaxacan students. It is the hope that the findings of this investigation, which delves into an area that has been the focus of precious few studies within the extant literature, will generate further conversation and inquiry about the layers of complexity that exist for Indigenous Oaxacan students attending school in LA. Perhaps the discussion contained within the pages of this work will begin to pave the way to greater awareness among educators and can be an impetus for informed decision- making which with have a positive impact on Oaxacan students in US public schools, and on otherIndigenous students from Latin America.

Keywords: Zapotecs in Los Angeles, displacement of Indigenous peoples, Mexican migration, Indigenous education, Oaxacan students, Oaxacalifornia, transnational spaces, translocality

The purpose of my research was to understand LAUSD counselors’ perceptions related to professional development around crisis response before and during COVID. The goal of this project was to learn how we can best support prevention efforts for students. I learned about counselors’ understanding of the suicide preventative measures the district endorses, if they felt comfortable implementing those strategies, and if they perceived those strategies to impact the student needs we see in schools. I was particularly interested in suicide prevention from an academic counselor’s perspective. While there are supplemental counselors, I was particularly interested in the role of the norm-generated counselor. Thus, I learned learn what supports counselors’ need to implement suicide prevention appropriately and with confidence in their skills to do so. This information informs next steps for the district in suicide prevention.

America owes an 'educational debt' to African American students and students of color due to the historical legacy of inequities found within its public-school system (Ladson-Billings, 2006). To reclaim the cultural integrity of African American students and students of color in general, who are at the margins of curriculum and pedagogical approaches, centering Hip Hop music and culture through its application in an urban classroom is the goal of this work. Driven by the theoretical and pedagogical approaches of both Culturally Relevant and Culturally Sustaining Pedagogy, this work examines one Los Angeles urban classroom based on Hip Hop music and culture. Using qualitative methods and an emphasis on participant observations, I first explore how the Hip Hop classroom provided students with an emotionally and physically safe space. Second, I examine how the curriculum impacted students' critical thinking skills. Finally, I observed how students were assigned and assessed on tasks within the Hip Hop classroom that helped support students' sense of competence. The findings of this study suggest that Hip Hop can be used as a focal point and basis for curricular content, the development of positive student-teacher relationships, the cultivation of both political and social awareness, and to positively influence students' overall engagement in class.