Spiral of Decline or “Beacon of Hope:” Stories of School Choice in a Dual Language School.

Abstract

Public schools in some areas of the U.S. are as segregated as they were prior to courtordered busing, in part due to school choice policies that appear to exacerbate extant segregation. In particular, Latina/o students are increasingly isolated in schools characterized as being in cycles of decline. Our case study of one such school is based on a reanalysis of interview, focus group, and survey data from three research and evaluation projects. We constructed accounts of parents' decisions to leave and remain at Martinez Elementary, a segregated dual language school experiencing increases in Latina/o and low socioeconomic student enrollment and decreasing statewide standardized test scores. Interpreting Latina/o and White parents' accounts through LatCrit theory, we sought to understand their choices to attend this school as counterstories that illustrate conflicting forces influencing Martinez, including high parent satisfaction and interest epaa aape

“So, Is Gentrification Good or Bad?”: One Teacher’s Implementation of the Fourth Goal in Her TWBE Classroom

“…I highlight the following studies to demonstrate how TWBE contexts can be impacted as a result of demographic shifts and gentrification processes. Pearson et al (2015) documented a TWBE program in Colorado that experienced a shift in perception due to agentic voices from the white English dominant community. They were catalysts in framing a typically low performing TWBE school as a beacon of hope and, in turn, a shift in the school’s perception from a bad (brown/Latinx) school into a promising (white) school of additive bilingualism.…”

Combating Inequalities in Two-Way Language Immersion Programs: Toward Critical Consciousness in Bilingual Education Spaces

“…Research has also explored the privileging of dominant group interests in the framing and support of TWI from administrative (M. M. López, 2013; Paciotto & Delany-Barmann, 2011; Peña, 1998) and parent (Muro, 2016; Pearson, Wolgemuth, & Colomer, 2015) perspectives. In the Midwestern case described above, opportunities to learn about the new TWI program were more easily accessed by White, English-speaking families; the district made few efforts to recruit and explain the program to Spanish-speaking families (Dorner, 2011b).…”

“…In a rural Midwestern town experiencing a recent influx of Spanish-speaking immigrant students, a new TWI program was initially rejected by White English-speaking parents, until it was framed in enrichment terms, as “beneficial for future job opportunities” (Paciotto & Delany-Barmann, 2011, p. 234). Interest convergence also materialized in one Colorado district that implemented TWI to “save” a segregated school with steadily increasing low-income Spanish-speaking students and decreasing standardized test scores (Pearson et al, 2015). White parents, opting into TWI for language enrichment, delighted in being “part of a school community that benefits Latina/o students” (p. 18).…”

Selling and resisting English-medium schooling on Milwaukee’s multilingual Near South Side: A typology of choice schools’ marketing strategies

“…Shannon & Milian, 2002;Whiting & Feinauer, 2011). Pearson et al (2015) document the case of a public two-way dual language school in Colorado, and suggest that Latinx and white parents selected the school because of the administration's parent education efforts and middle-class interest convergence around bilingual education. Analyzing data from a three-year ethnographic study in the U.S. Midwest, Dorner (2012) describes the life courses, family composition, and historical circumstances that influenced Mexican immigrant families' decisions to enroll their children in a school district's two-way immersion program.…”