Performance & Achievement of Minority Students

I came across an interesting article title "Key factors in the performance and achievement of minority students at the University of Alaska, Fairbanks" by Peggy Wilson that was published in the American Indian Quarterly, Vol. 21, No. 3. (Summer, 1997), pp. 535-544.

The points identified, explained, and contextualized by her in her article just hit home with me because I had experienced them and I know that others had too.

She looked into the failing students since native students has the highest dropout rate compared to others. However, the main point that I wanted to point out from her findings are:

1. Minority students learned best in projects or small group discussions
2. Minority students do not learn from abstract conceptualization compared to white
3. Minority students learn through active experimentation
4. Minority students identified the importance of teacher and student's relationships
5. Accessibility, approachability and availability are important to minority students
6. Genuineness and caring from the teacher
7. Importance of making connections between the teacher and students

These were the important points identified in the research and many others like this. One has to wonder, why are teachers, educators, district leaders, and Policymakers are not using research to change, improve and facilitate the increase in academic achievements of minority students by changing the teacher's pedagogy as it is clearly shown in this research? Are educators really serious about increasing academic achievements of minority? We spend billions of dollars in this country trying to raise academic achievements and seems to have very little to show for it. It is no wonder researcher's like Hanushek asked tough, insightful and provocative questions. Some of which are "does money matter?" and "throwing money at school?" and much more.

I hope that these points illustrated here and many more can help us to tailor our teaching pedagogy to increase learning of all students, especially minority students who seems to be lagging behind. If we do this, our country can move forward economically, culturally, and perhaps learn to use our resources carefully, effectively, and efficiently.