Chapter 7 & 8: Race and Ethnicity

Question 1

How is the academic achievement of black people compared to white people? Is it based on IQ differences?

Answer 1

In the Toronto District School board, black students are twice as likely to drop out than white students
- 22.8% of black students vs 12% of white students
30% of white students did not apply to post-secondary, compared to 47.3% of black students
Differences can not be accounted for by IQ, there is no up to date research to support this

Question 2

How does John Ogbu differentiate two types of minorities?

Answer 2

Voluntary minorities: immigrants who came to Canada voluntarily with the knowledge they would be a racial minority

Involuntary minorities: individuals who did not choose to be a minority
ex. first nations, slaves

Question 3

What problems do involuntary minorities face? What are the educational responses?

Answer 3

• entrenched, historical differences
• disparate worlds and resistance
• burden of “acting White”
• loss of ethnic/cultural identity
• questionable pay-off after school
• continued experiences of institutional racism
  ex. teacher attitudes, discrimination in hiring, etc.

Educational responses:

• multiculturalism
• anti-racist pedagogy

pedagogy: the method and practice of teaching

Question 4

What did Carl James find in the TDSB report on race in education? Specifically on academic and applied stream placement.

Answer 4

The report focused on the impact of differential treatment of black students in schools
Found there’s an unequal segregation and streaming of black students, unequal treatments for behaviour, and a lack of Black mentors and role models
- 35% of students are white and 12% black; meaning a considerable amount of black students
- 39% of black students are in applied, compared to 19% of whites; they are over-represented in applied streams
- 40% of black students in academic, compared to 81% of whites; they are underrepresented in academic stream

In interviews, James found that as soon as Black students show difficulty they are placed in the applied stream; teachers report having black students in their applied courses that don’t belong there but never see students from other ethnicities who do not belong.

Question 5

What did the TDSB report find in relation to black students academic achievement compared to whites?

Answer 5

Black students are twice as likely to drop out compared to White or other racialized students
Black students are half (or less than half) as likely to go to university and far more likely not to continue to post-secondary education
Black students are more than twice as likely to get suspended; in relative terms, their rate of suspension is more than ten times higher than for white students

Question 6

What were the recommendations made by James in the report?

Answer 6

Improve data: collect race data (this has been seen as controversial in past)
Deal with racial discrimination in school discipline
Adjust curriculum to reflect non-European knowledge
Develop race equity plans in school board and schools
Diversify teaching workforce
ex. more Black teachers and teachers from other ethnic minority groups
Include critical race theory in teacher training
Develop systems to engage Black parents and support Black communities

Question 7

What did George Sefa Dei find in the experience of Canadian-African students?

Answer 7

African-Canadian students experience:

• no African history
• no African literature
• no Black teachers as role models
• no Black administrators as role models

Note: all these arguments can be made for the First Nations as well

Question 8

What are some responses to the experiences of Canadian-African students?

Answer 8

a. Multicultural education
- representation & curriculum changes with a celebration of differences
- this is not enough!
b. Anti-racist education
- focus on power differences and their roots/causes
c. Ethnocentric education
- changes cultural frame of reference
d. Race segregation (controversial)

Question 9

What does Blackwell say is the problem of multicultural and anti-racist pedagogy?

Answer 9

Non-white students are exploited for the anti-racist awareness of white students.

“Whenever there is an ‘aha’ by a white person, it almost always is at the expense of people of color, almost always. They [people of color] are having to share things that white people don’t have to share in order to be understood … It is at the expense of my personal stories and at the expense of my pain that white people get to ‘get it’ [the impact of racism].”

Question 10

What are the advantages of segregated schools?

Answer 10

Advantages:

• respect differences
• correct inequities
• provide leadership opportunities
• creates safer and more comfortable environments
• pride

Question 11

What are the challenges of segregated schools?

Answer 11

Challenges:
- ethnic stereotypes perpetuated or increased
- inequalities outside schools
- limits gender/race dialogues
- transition back to non-segregated situations made more difficult
ex. post-secondary, work
There are similar concerns for single-sex schooling

Question 12

What are the EQAO results for segregated schools?

Answer 12

Children who attend the africentric schooling are performing at the same level as children who attend regular public schools.

Question 13

What were residential schools?

Answer 13

Residential schools ran from 1883 to 1996. It was a total institution with the intention of changing completely changing who you are and completely controlling who you are, comparable to prisons. There was no contact with families, and no contact with aboriginal culture. The purpose was to socialize aboriginal youth into an English and French Canada.

• 150,000+ children in residential school
• 80,000 former students still living today

Question 14

What were the outcomes of residential schools?

Answer 14

• Abuse (emotional, physical, sexual)
• Death
• Alienation
• Long-lasting problems in communities
• Negative perceptions about schools and education
• Educational attainment-related

Question 15

What is the Truth and Reconciliation Commission?

Answer 15

Government commission to study the residential school legacy and recommend ways to move forward. They claim residential schools were a cultural genocide.
There has been some developments such as lawsuits, compensation, and more local control over First Nation education.
However, First Nations schooling funding is well below the national average and they lack infrastructure, such as buildings, equipment and teachers.

Question 16

What abuse has been documented from residential schools?

Answer 16

6000 documented deaths while being in residential schools from neglect, starvation, disease, and suicide. Over 35,000 cases of abuse have been brought forward and assessed. Compensation nearing 3 billion.
Odds of dying in residential school: 1 in 25
Odds of dying for Canadians serving in WWI: 1 in 26

Question 17

What is one issue that Canada considers a “success story”?

Answer 17

Immigration. Canada is one of the most diverse countries in the world, it has strong commitment to multiculturalism. Canada is a desirable destination for immigrants.
Shift of “source” countries starting in the late 1960s, there’s a point system which determines eligibility. This leads to highly educated immigrants being permitted entry.

Question 18

Where do most of Canada’s immigrants come from?

Answer 18

Prior to 1971, they were mainly from Europe. Since 1971, most have came from Asia (including the Middle East).

Question 19

How does immigrants education get treated?

Answer 19

We have a brain gain in Canada, many immigrants are very highly educated, even at a high rate than Canadians, but it is wasted because of social closure.
In 1970, 33% of immigrants had less than high school education and 22% were university educated. By the 1990s, 20% had less than high school education and 44% had a university education.
There are a large number of immigrants with bachelor’s degrees who drive taxis; we do not see this with Canadian born citizens. We fail to recognize immigrants credentials here.

Question 20

What are the downsides of the immigration success in Canada?

Answer 20

• higher rates of poverty amongst immigrants
• high unemployment amongst recent immigrant
• problem of recognizing foreign credentials
• racial discrimination in hiring practices

Question 21

What did Taylor et al. find when studying education and career aspirations for racialized immigrant youth?

Answer 21

• hopes for social mobility drives immigration
• greater racial diversity in immigrant population
• high levels of formal education from home countries

Question 22

What did Taylor et al. find when studying immigrants experiences and challenges?

Answer 22

Cultural capital: devaluing of home culture and experiences (also linguistic capital); differences by origin and religion and racial identity

Human capital: devaluing/non-recognition of credentials earned in home country; but also creates ambition

Social capital: importance of family support and networks, especially for social mobility

Question 23

What did Gordon and White find when studying Indigenous educational attainment?

Answer 23

Post-secondary attendance for Indigenous has increased, but is nowhere near rates of non-Indigenous population attendance; 42% of Indigenous vs. 62% of non-Indigenous attended post-secondary in 2011

• the gap of attainment between Indigenous and non-Indigenous is increasing, and there is no reason for this besides the restrictions we place on them.
• there is no gap for apprenticeships, trades and colleges.

High levels of high-school dropout remain; 35% of Indigenous vs. 15% of non-Indigenous dropped-out of high school in 2011

Income for First Nations remains significantly lower than non-First Nations, and child poverty remains significantly high

Question 24

Define racialization.

Answer 24

The act or process of imbuing a person with a consciousness of race distinctions or of giving a racial character to something or making it serve racist ends.

Question 25

What does Putnam describe as bonding and bridging?

Answer 25

Bonding capital is inward looking and supports exclusive identities and group homogeneity.
Bridging capital is outward looking and encompasses people across diverse social divisions.

Question 26

What is one main struggle for immigrants in finding employment in Canada?

Answer 26

Inadequate English language proficiency.

Question 27

Define familial social capital, ethnic capital, emotional capital, and aspirational capital.

Answer 27

Familial social capital in immigrant families can provide necessary supports and networks for youth who may lack sources of social capital.

Ethnic capital is seen as transmitted from adults in families to childhood through norms and norms enforcement.

Emotional capital describes a set of emotional competencies that is essential for an individual’s effective use of social and human capitals.

Aspirational capital is presented as an extension of cultural and social capital in families where it already exists and as a substitute for them in minority ethnic families where it does not. An important aspect is the desire for upward social mobility.

Question 28

What is the Indian Control of Indian education?

Answer 28

The stated demand of Indigenous peoples to have sovereign control over the educational systems established for their peoples. This demand, put forth in the “Red Paper” by the National Indian Brotherhood in the 1970s, is seen as a cornerstone of policy to close the gap in educational attainment and protect Indigenous cultures.

Question 29

How does geographic location affect Indigenous education attainment?

Answer 29

The federal government of Canada has jurisdiction over Indigenous. Seven provinces have a high proportion of PSE attainment than “less than highschool” level of education. However, the rest of the provinces and territories have the opposite finding.
For example, in Nunavut, 73% of Indigenous have less than a high school education and 15% have PSE.

Question 30

Besides geographic location, what other factor affects education attainment?

Answer 30

Identity group, Status, and being on or off reserve.
For Metis, off reserve, non-Status, and First Nations peoples high school non-completion is dropping and post-secondary attainment is rising. This is not the case of for Status Indians, Inuit peoples and Indigenous living on reserves.

Question 31

What does Gordon and White argue that needs to be done to improve the educational attainment of Indigenous populations?

Answer 31

1. Emphasis on high school completion
   - improving curriculum to reflect First Nations peoples in a historically proper light
2. Proper funding
   - investments that are not at the cost of the Indigenous communities
3. Indigenous control of a properly funded system
4. Providing mentors and role models