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Vol. 19, No. 2 - Winter 2003
Sharing personal experience Research on issues of diversity in the college
Children
The Center for Early Education and Development is just completing a
study for the state aimed at exploring a perceived
under-representation of linguistically, culturally, and racially
diverse children ages birth to three within the early intervention
system in Minnesota.
Baby’s Space started two and a half years ago when the
college, through the
Harris Center, initiated a community collaborative to establish a
center for early child care, education, and families, designed for
infants and toddlers whose mothers were mandated to work. Baby’s Space
is in the Little Earth Neighborhood Early Learning Center in the
Phillips neighborhood of south Minneapolis and serves 30 families,
primarily American Indian, who reside in the adjacent subsidized
housing development and surrounding neighborhood. The Harris Center/Center for Early Education and Development
“Questions About Kids” are one-page flyers for parents and
professionals filled with information related to infants and toddlers.
They are
provided in Spanish, Hmong, and Somali, and are available at www.harristrainingcenter.org, throughout the Children’s Hospital
system in Minneapolis and St. Paul, and from the Health Partners
system. Rebecca Tisdel Rapport, a
lecturer in curriculum and instruction, has been serving as the
scholar/discussion leader for Prime Time, a
family literacy program
developed by the Louisiana Humanities Commission and jointly conducted
in the Twin Cities by the Minnesota Humanities Commission and the
Hennepin County Libraries. The program just completed was for Hispanic
families with six- to 10-year-old children. Each week they read and
discussed two or three books (at least one related to Hispanic
culture) on humanities themes,
listened to a storyteller, and shared dinner together. School
Richard Beach, professor of
literacy, and Tim Lensmire, associate professor of literacy, along
with literacy education doctoral candidates, Amanda Haertling and
Daryl Parks, have completed a study on high school students’ responses
to multicultural literature. Through discussions and writing students
explored their own beliefs and attitudes about race, class, and
gender. Daria Courtney, lecturer in
educational psychology, is the principal investigator for
“Strengthening Skills for School Success: Promising Interventions for
Underachieving African-American Students,” a project studying the
effects of specific class-wide teaching approaches on reading progress
and social skill development in African-American elementary students
identified as
potential candidates for
special education referral. Geoff Maruyama, professor of educational psychology, and
Chi Keung
Chan, graduate
student in educational
psychology, are working in collaboration with the
St. Paul Public Housing Agency and the St. Paul Public Schools to look
at the academic performance of
students living in public housing. Analyses looked at relations of
housing types and concentration of neighborhood poverty with academic
achievement of students from diverse backgrounds. The National Center on Educational Outcomes is
conducting research to look at the feasibility and
desirability of allowing
simplified English language dictionaries as accommodations on
standardized reading tests for Hmong students who are limited English
proficient. Higher education
William Ammentorp, professor in educational policy and administration,
has been involved with the Tribal College Initiative, begun three
years ago by the Leadership Academy, a
collaborative doctoral program offered by the college and the College
of Education and Human Services at the University of Minnesota, Duluth
(UMD). Recruitment efforts were focused on tribal colleges in
Minnesota and Wisconsin and nine American Indian scholars were
enrolled. In September 2002, a second cohort of 12 American Indian
scholars was enrolled in the Academy. Jean Ness, researcher with the
Institute on Community Integration, is
working on three demonstration projects with the 11 Minnesota American
Indian reservations and communities to support the successful
transition of American Indian students from high school to
postsecondary education and careers. A fourth project, in
collaboration with Fond du Lac Tribal and Community College, aims to
strengthen the tribal college institution by development of an AA/AS
degree in business/ finance, a professional area in which American
Indians are underrepresented. Community
Brian Abery, researcher with the
Institute on Community Integration,
working with members of the American Indian, Mexican-American, and
African-American
communities, is leading a study that compares and
contrasts the meaning, value, and achievement of “self-determination”
and the manner in which it is expressed by persons with and without
disabilities
within those communities. Nydia De Alba-Johnson, a
graduate student in the
psychological foundations program, has created a
document, “Youth Development Practices and the Latino Community: Best
Practices for Latino Youth Development,” based on her internship at La
Escuelita, a Minneapolis nonprofit youth leadership development
program. It catalogues the efforts of successful Latino youth serving
organizations from around the country and is organized to make them
accessible to other youth serving organizations. Michael Goh, assistant professor of counseling and student personnel
psychology, is
looking at ways to remove barriers and improve access to mental health
services for refugees and new immigrant populations. One study
concerns promoting language access to mental health
services by using interpreters in mental health counseling; another is
determining best practices in the delivery of mental health services
to the Hmong. He also is involved in an interdisciplinary and
culture-centered civic engagement psychosocial health project with a
Hmong clan. Tim Lensmire, associate
professor of literacy, investigates race and education, reparations
for slavery, and the souls of white folk, with particular emphasis on
four main topics: accounts of
slavery and reconstruction in elementary and secondary school
textbooks; the Tulsa race riot and Duluth
lynchings in the 1920s;
representations of blacks and whites during the civil rights movement,
in the media
and popular culture; and Thomas Jefferson, as poet of democracy, owner
of slaves, and contested figure in
U.S. history. Leo McAvoy, professor of
kinesiology, is involved in two diversity-related research projects.
“Outcomes of Outdoor Adventure Programs for Families that Include
Children with Disabilities” focuses on programs offered by Wilderness
Inquiry, Inc., a nonprofit organization based in Minneapolis. Data
comes from parents and children who participate in these trips.
Another study focuses on American Indian outdoor recreation uses of
national forests, their place attachment to areas in the forests, and
conflicts encountered when they try to use those areas. Data comes
from American Indian members of the Flathead Reservation who use
national forests in Montana.
Michael Rodriguez, assistant professor of educational
psychology, is examining interpretations of several youth-development
inventories from Latino youth, looking for interpretive differences as
compared to the interpretations of non-Latino youth. Initial results
indicate that Latino youth approach their responses from a more
inclusive and family oriented framework whereas non-Latino youth tend
to rely on an interpersonal framework. For instance, one developmental
marker for youth is gaining independence from family. But for Latino
youth, the developmental trajectory is to realize interdependence with
family—the individual is defined by membership in family. This changes
the interpretation of responses to youth development inventories and
alters the way we draw meaning from similar tools used to evaluate
youth programs. Rodriguez also is working with principals, teachers, and staff in the
Long Prairie-Grey Eagle school district as they meet the needs of
recent Mexican immigrant youth and their families. He began there
three years ago when about 60–70 youth were in the schools, only eight
in the high school. At that time, no Mexican immigrant student had
graduated in the history of the school. Currently more than 220
Mexican immigrant students attend the schools with nearly 40 in the
high school. This service work involves intervening in harassment
issues, presenting ideas and program plans to staff and school board,
providing workshop opportunities on human rights and equality,
initiation of a local Spanish radio show (the only one in the region)
that is run by a Mexican high school student, and an annual trip with
students to the Morris campus of the University for a college visit
day. Lori Sedlezky, Lynda Anderson, and Amy Hewitt, all researchers in the
Institute on Community Integration, have conducted focus groups with
employers and recent immigrants to the United States who provide
direct support to people with
disabilities. They have
developed a research-based curriculum called The Power of Diversity to
help
employers better train and support immigrant workers. Related
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