Globally, over the last two decades, attention to culturally responsive, multicultural approaches to teaching have largely been supplanted by standardized curricula and pedagogy that derive from neoliberal business models of school reform. In this essay, I discuss three factors that contribute to the marginalization of culturally responsive pedagogy: (a) a persistence of faulty and simplistic conceptions of what culturally responsive pedagogy is, (b) too little research connecting its use with student achievement, and (c) elite and white fear of losing national and global hegemony. After discussing these factors, recommendations are offered.

This article uses three tenets of critical race theory to critique the common pattern of teacher education focusing on preparing predominantly White cohorts of teacher candidates for racially and ethnically diverse students. The tenet of interest convergence asks how White interests are served through incremental steps. The tenet of color blindness prompts asking how structures that seem neutral, such as teacher testing, reinforce Whiteness and White interests. The tenet of experiential knowledge prompts asking whose voices are being heard. The article argues that much about teacher education can be changed, offering suggestions that derive from these tenets.

This article reviews data-based research studies on preservice teacher preparation for multicultural schools, particularly schools that serve historically underserved communities. In this article, the author reviews 80 studies of effects of various preservice teacher education strategies, including recruiting and selecting students, cross-cultural immersion experiences, multicultural education coursework, and program restructuring. Although there is a large quantity of research, very little of it actually examines which strategies prepare strong teachers. Most of the research focuses on addressing the attitudes and lack of knowledge of White preservice students. This review argues that although this is a very important problem that does need to be addressed, it is not the same as figuring out how to populate the teaching profession with excellent multicultural and culturally responsive teachers.

The phrase "multicultural education" is used by a wide variety of educators and researchers in an equally wide variety of ways. In this article, Christine Sleeter and Carl Grant review literature which claims "multicultural education" as its subject; they argue that much of the existing literature addresses only limited aspects of multicultural education. The authors have developed a taxonomy by which to define the term, examine how it is used, and criticize various approaches for their shortcomings and oversights. This framework is particularly helpful for educators who are concerned with articulating issues of multicultural education,whether their concerns focus on advocacy for, or implementation of, education that is truly"multicultural."

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