Elementary charter schools increasingly serve students who are at-risk for reading challenges, giving them a critical role in establishing literacy for young children. This article examines the complexities of starting early childhood literacy programs in charter schools. Specifically, the first year of K-3 literacy programs in a new and a…

Charter schools have substantial bipartisan support for their expansion. Yet, the bulk of charter school research ascertains that the majority of students in charter schools do not significantly outscore their traditional school peers on measurable indicators of academic performance. Additionally, students in charter schools do not have comparable…

As the gulfs between low-income and more affluent youth widen, researchers and practitioners continue to search for effective means of closing gaps in academic achievement, digital participation, and civic engagement. This article examines how youth organizing offers a bridge across these divides. We consider how one youth organizing group, The…

The school-to-prison pipeline refers to the disturbing national trend in which children are funneled out of public schools and into juvenile and criminal justice systems. The purpose of this article is to theorize how this pipeline fulfills societal commitments to black male over-incarceration. First, the author reviews the troublesome perceptions…

This article identifies college as the logical space for the articulation of civil rights through the complete integration of students with incarceration histories into the intellectual and social fabric of the institution. Academic institutions provide a fertile ground where possibilities for personal and social change are realized, networks are…

Academic tracking has been shown to limit the quality of student instructional opportunities, decrease students' perceptions of their abilities, and negatively influence student achievement. These factors associated with academic tracking also may influence students in lower tracks to learn less and ultimately to drop out of high school. Few…

This article presents a case study of one high performing high poverty campus serving students of color in South Central Texas. The researchers utilized the criteria for 90/90/90 schools established by Douglas Reeves (2004). In order to meet these criteria, schools had to have the following characteristics: 90% or more of the student body had to…

This essay outlines how the book, "Paths to Discovery: Autobiographies from Chicanas with Careers in Science, Mathematics, and Engineering" (Cantu, 2008) came about. I then use "testimonio" theory to analyze the narratives in this book as the data of a qualitative study, and I describe the general themes that the analysis highlights. I scrutinize…

This analog study presented 173 practicing school counselors with one of four case scenarios depicting a student new to their school. Each scenario manipulated one of two levels of the independent variables, which were perceived poverty and academic achievement. Main effects indicate that participants rated students as more attractive counseling…

Despite the educational challenges African American males face, there is a sizeable population successfully finishing high school and entering college. This study provides an overview of how a national sample of black male freshmen embodied the cognitive, social, and institutional factors related to college access between 1971 and 2004. Data…

In an attempt to reduce the educational achievement gap of Hispanic students in a professional degree program, two courses grounded in the Keller method were implemented at a pharmacy school. The Keller method is characterized by breaking course content into modules, then allowing students to test and repeatedly remediate and retest until…

Immigration in the U.S. continues to increase and to become increasingly diverse. About 20% of U.S. students are children of immigrants. This phenomenon is occurring as schools are racially and ethnically resegregating even as race-based decision making for K-12 schooling has been severely limited. This study examines school segregation for…

This Foucauldian case study examines the academic conflicts of Mexican American women and girls, how they negotiate those conflicts, and the identity effects of their negotiations. It extends Gloria Anzaldua's (1999) work and builds upon those who have studied the schooling experiences of Mexican American women and girls. Similar conflicts for…

Drawing on data collected in a qualitative study of racially minoritized faculty members, this article examines the challenges these faculty members faced in bringing different aspects of their spirituality into their scholarly work as graduate students. This article explores the questions: How do racially minoritized graduate students negotiate…

When they graduate I want them to feel, "I went through a real thing, not an approximation of college, but I went through college and that means something!" (Adjunct Instructor) This article explores the complexity of providing an academically rigorous college education to adult students enrolled in a union-supported worker education program…