At 40.4 million strong (14% of the U.S. population; U.S. Bureau of the Census 2005), Latinas/os are the largest and fastest growing U.S. ethnic minority group. In the last 15 years, since the Los Angeles riots of 1992, Anglo perceptions that the Latina/o population is too large, growing too fast, and too illegal have both continued and perpetuated…

Being that educational disparities, manifested through socioeconomic instability, were a major contributing factor to the Los Angeles riots, it is important to examine how public high schools are now shaping the postsecondary opportunities of underrepresented students. Using opportunity-to-learn (OTL) and bounded rationality as frames, this…

The Equity Scorecard, a nationally recognized and widely used organizational learning process designed to foster institutional change through the identification and elimination of racial disparities among college students, is described in this chapter. The effectiveness of this process and its potential impact are also discussed.

This study uses data from the Fragile Families and Child Wellbeing Study [Reichman, N., Teitler, J., Garfinkel, I., & McLanahan, S. (2001). The fragile families and child wellbeing study: Sample and design. "Children and Youth Services Review, 23", 303-326] to describe primary child care arrangements of employed, predominantly low-income mothers…

The overarching pedagogical goal of this formative experiment was to facilitate engaged reading and writing in a language arts classroom of seventh- and eighth-grade native Spanish speakers who were assigned to a team composed solely of second-language learners for the entire school year. Fourteen students participated in the study. An…

The Florida Comprehensive Assessment Test (FCAT) is a high-stakes test that public school students must pass to be eligible for graduation from high school. Previous research suggests that high-stakes tests have a differential effect on students by race and ethnicity. This study finds that in one Florida school district African American and…

The purpose of this study was to examine the effect of a supplemental peer-mediated reading program on reading achievement of first graders (N = 76) in a two-way bilingual immersion (TWBI) program. Nearly 80% of students were Hispanic; of these, 24 were identified as English language learners (ELLs). Classrooms were randomly assigned to…

Two case studies of adult GED (General Education Diploma) students and their kindergarten-aged children are presented. The construct of "capital," as described by Pierre Bourdieu (1986), is applied specifically to the children's and adults' reading practices. These case studies are analyzed in terms of various forms of official…

This study presents descriptive qualitative data about Latino parenting practices in an urban context. Focus groups were conducted with Dominican and Puerto Rican mother-adolescent pairs in the Bronx borough of New York City. When parenting style typologies are integrated with the Latino cultural components "familismo,"…

In Colorado, school discipline measures vary from classroom to classroom, school to school, and district to district. Another area of concern is the disproportionate number of ethnic minority students who are expelled in Colorado. While Latinos accounted for 17 percent of Colorado's students, they represented one-third of expelled students.…

The pool of candidates for urban superintendencies is dwindling, and those who take the jobs are likely to serve for only 2 or 3 years. This book explores contemporary conditions surrounding the urban superintendency and looks at the lives of 17 superintendents who were in office in large cities at the start of 1993. All were members of the…

This booklet was designed in conjunction with a Festival of American Folklife focusing on New Mexico, but can be used when teaching lessons on the culture of New Mexico. It introduces young children to activities adapting Santa Clara Pueblo pottery designs, adobe model making, Rio Grande blanket designs, tinwork picture frames, and ramilletes de…

In compiling this collection, the editor posed the question of the meaning of race and ethnicity in the United States at the threshold of the 21st century. The answers provided by the diverse authors as they wrote on issues of education, health, and employment are revealing and disturbing. Their contributions emphasize that race continues to exert…

A survey was conducted to determine by what methods schools classify students' race and ethnicity, the categories they use, and how they report the information to the federal government. The survey was conducted through the Fast Response Survey System, a system designed for small amounts of data and rapid surveys. Brief questionnaires were sent to…

When the Chicago School Reform Act was first passed, many worried that the legislation would usher adversarial politics into the school building. This paper describes parent and community involvement in school decision making at Sprague Elementary school, which serves 1,500 Latino students. The case study chronicles the school's development…