Learning to Recognise and Minimise Racism and Gender Bias
...the project, but limited the project to in-depth attitude surveys. Taking on Board the Participatory Teacher Researchers In November 1996, an introductory letter incorporating the information sheet (University of Williamstown Ethics Committee, 1997, p. 24) along with a consent form was sent to each of the teachers of Year-9 classes in the three target schools. Six volunteer teacher researchers were enlisted from Henderson High School and six from J Williamson High. Five were enlisted from the Jonesborough High School. The group comprised Art, Biology, Chemistry, English, General Business, Geography, History and Typing teachers. Ms. Parton took and distributed notes of the initial and subsequent plenary meetings of the project group: comprising the 17 participating teachers, herself, Mr. Williams, and Mr. Jones. She also agreed to circulate papers about participatory action research and research-as-praxis. The teachers set up sub-meetings at their individual schools, to be held the week before plenary meetings. Literature Review The teachers acquainted themselves with the leads from the literature reviews begun by Mr. Williams and Ms. Parton, and built upon it as they worked out their own main streams of action and reflection. Books, journal articles, and conference papers were explored, including some relating to educational groups other than secondary school. It was considered that looking at tried research designs and methodologies relevant to minority group issues would be beneficial, regardless of the particular educational context. Some of the literature they found insightful and helpful in their planning is listed below: emancipatory research (Ball, 1992; Duncan, 1997; Fittler, 1996; James, 1993; Roth, 1994) grounded theory (Brine, 1994; Cocklin, 1996; Harchar & Hyle, 1996; Magnotto, 1996; Mercer, 1997; Oathout, 1995; Mann, 1993; Yacci, 1994) leadership (Dunn & Dunn, 1983) race and gender equity (American Association of University Women, 1997; Arnow, 1995; Bebermeyer & Edmond, 1995; Bonilla & Goss, 1997; Daniel & Benton, 1995; Dilworth, 1992; Eubanks & Parish, 1992; Griffiths & Troyna, 1995; Grossman, 1995; Hollingsworth & Miller, 1992; Kleinfeld & Yerian, 1995; Lomotey, 1997; McCormick, 1994; Monclair State University, 1996; Oklahoma State Dept of Vocational and Technical Education, 1993; Scottish Council for Research in Education, 1992; Siraj-Blatchford, 1993; Smith, 1998; Tozer, Anderson, & Armburster, 1990; Trentacosta & Kenny, 1997; Williams, 1989) parents' contributions to student achievement (Slaughter & Epps, 1987) participatory action research (Eisenhart & Borko; Sanguinetti, 1993) participatory research design (Lather, 1991a) postmodernism (Banks & Banks, 1993; Carlson, 1992; Maxcy, 1994; Smith & Wexler, 1995) poststructuralism (Apple, 1996; Capper, 1992 February, April a & b, & 1994; Capper & Jamison, 1992; Deever, 1993 April & Spring; Grogan, 1994; Martino, 1995; Mazzei, 1997; McCarthy & Crichlow, 1993; Pendergast, 1991; Van-Galen, 1992; Van Galen, 1992, Summer; Vare, 1997; Weedon, 1987) power structures (Badejo, 1990; Creighton & Kivel, 1992; Foucault, 1972 & 1980) praxis research (Kemmis & Di-Chiro, 1987; Wilson, 1992) research methods (Burns, 1997; Ely, Anzul, Friedman, & Garner, 1991; Glaser & Strauss, 1967; Graziano & Raulin, 1993; Hospers, 1990; Lather, 1991b; Maxwell, 1990; Miles, 1984; Reinharz, 1992; Strauss & Corbin, 1990) role of media (Baker, 1996) role of texts (Van Houten, 1997) staff development (Kailin, 1994; Sleeter, 1992) student attitudes (Gleason, 1991) student performance (Hofman, 1994; Simon, 1991). teacher attitudes (Bailey, 1997; Cole, Conlon, Jackson, & Welch, 1994; Dilworth, 1998; Dunn, 1994; Foster, 1990; Gaies & Beebe, 1991; Guffey & Rampp, 1997; Lyter-Mickelberg & Connor-Kuntz, 1995; Shulman, 1992; Svanum, 1982) teacher expectations of students (Jewett, 1996; Lee, 1995; Lindley & Keithley, 1991; Mann, 1994) teacher-student relationship (Byrnes & Kiger, 1992; Grayson, 1992; Patthey-Chavez & Ferris, 1997) theory-practice relationship (McWhinney, 1997) These yielded early fruit in the form of the participatory teacher researchers building upon the name Action Research Extended. After many invigorating plenary meetings they devised the acronym: ARE WE...? standing for Action Research Extended: What Encourages...? What encourages 1. recognition and minimisation of racist tendencies? 2. recognition and minimisation of gender bias? 3. recognition and minimisation of harmful assumptions? 4. real free choice of subject offerings? Are we 1. exhibiting racist tendencies? 2. gender biased in our curriculum offerings? 3. discouraging students from taking classes, by our assumptions regarding the subject taught? 4. making assumptions that are harming or creating barriers to student opportunities? 5. preparing all students for their choice of career lives in an unbiased way? While the main aim of the project remained reducing racism and gender bias at the three target schools, the major research question to emerge was: What do we as teachers think about racism and gender bias issues? Further 1. What do researchers think about racism and gender bias issues? 2. What do our students think about racism and gender bias issues? 3. What do the students' parents think about racism and gender bias issues? And more precisely, what do we (and these groups) say we think, as a starting point for discussion, awareness, and educational and social change. The Design The outline calendar for the three-year ARE WE...? project, targeting (in three area schools) Year-9 Students, their teachers, and their parents became: 1995 Applications and Proposals By the Three Core Researchers 1996 Project Group: Meeting and Planning 1. Recruiting Participatory Teacher Researchers 2. Plenary Meetings of Project Group 3. Feedback to Project Group4 4. Sub-meetings of Individual School Groups 5. Input of Individual School Groups to Plenary Project Group 1997 Student and Parent: Survey Instruments 1. Continuing Individual School Group and Plenary Project Group Meetings 2. Recruiting Student and Parent Volunteers 3. Ongoing Computer Data Entry, NUD*IST (Sample working report attached, p. 30) 4. Student Questionnaires 5. Feedback to Students on Questionnaires5 6. Parent Interviews 7. Feedback to Parents on Interviews 8. Feedback to Project Group 1998 Follow-up and Reports 1. Continuing Individual School Group and Project Group Meetings 2. Ongoing Computer Analysis: NUDIST, Inspiration and Decision Explorer 3. Regular issue of Feedback Bulletin to all involved 4. Final Reports to University of Williamstown and ARC 5. Discussion of Final Reports with Project Plenary Group Methodology The teacher researchers considered the opinions of both students and parents as relevant to the concerns of the project. The teachers wished to portray student and parent views on racism and bias issues, and ultimately to circulate these along with their own views and views of the three core researchers in order to activate awareness of, and thinking about, racism and bias issues.6 Survey instruments used to explore what teachers, students and parents hold regarding racism and gender bias were: 1. Transcripts of Meetings for Participatory Teacher Researchers and the Three Core Researchers 2. Questionnaires for Students 3. Interviews for Parents In the first term of 1997, introductory letters about the project along with consent forms and copies of the initial student questionnaire and initial parent interview questions (copies attached, pp. 25-29) were sent to all Year-9 students taught by participating teachers in the three target schools. The same introduction package was sent separately to the students' parents. The Ethics Committee at the University of Williamstown waived the need for parental consent of Year 9 students in this case, and they were able to sign, regarding their own involvement in the project, on their own behalf.7 Consenting to be involved in the project were 35 students and 46 parents. While the initial questionnaire and the initial interview questions were not piloted ahead of time with a sample of students and parents "to discuss and collaborate on survey instruments couched in appropriate terms" (Lather, 1991b, p.57), students responded to four one-page questionnaires, each subsequent questionnaire building on answers to the previous questionnaire. Likewise, each parent attended three 15-minute interviews8, each interview building on answers to previous interviews. Validity, Control of Error, and Control for Bias "The job of validation is, not to support an interpretation, but to find out what might be wrong with it...." (Cronbach quoted in Lather, 1991b, p. 65) In order to control for bias in the analysis and interpretation of questionnaire and interview data, the three core researchers engaged each other to play devils advocate and critically question coding and analysis. (Burns, 1997, p. 341) Additionally, they searched for negative instances of the codes and analysis results they did ascertain. (Ibid.) To a certain degree, the teacher researchers in this study are looking for the hypothetical constructs of racism and gender bias. Here construct validity (Burns, 1997, p. 276) comes into play. Lather contends that "construct validity must be dealt with in ways that recognize its roots in theory-construction." (1991b, p. 66) In other words, our three core researchers and participatory teacher researchers have had to ask themselves whether these constructs are actually occurring or mere inventions of their own perspective. Therefore they have built into the study systematized feedback, in order to take into account the experiences of the students and parents in their daily lives "to guard against theoretical imposition." (Lather, 1991b, p. 67) Kidder, as paraphrased by Lather "contends that although it has been treated lightly and dismissed, face validity is relatively complex and inextricably tied to construct validity." This study has adopted a high face validity, as discussed by Burns (1997, p. 278). Nothing was hidden about what was being tested, and emerging data (with which teacher researchers were involved) were fed back to students and parents. Control of error, however, remains problematical in that there are still phenomena such as high demand characteristics, for example the Hawthorne effect (Burns, 1997, p. 143). Also, "the possibility of encountering 'false consciousness'...creates a limit on how useful 'member checks' (Guba and Lincoln, 1981) can be in establishing the trustworthiness of data." (Lather, 1991b, p.68) Critical was the use of triangulation, both to improve internal validity (Burns, 1997, pp. 324-325), and to include multiple theoretical schemes (Lather, 1991b, pp. 66-67). Perhaps most importantly to praxis-oriented research, the three core researchers judged the study in terms of ...the less well-known notion of catalytic validity [original emphasis] (Reason and Rowan, 1981: 240; Brown and Tandom, 1978). Catalytic validity represents the degree to which the research process re-orients, focuses and energizes participants toward knowing reality in order to transform it, a process Freire (1973) terms conscientization. (Lather, 1991b, p. 68). This type of validity was explored in order to acknowledge the "reality-altering impact of the research process" (Ibid.) and further to "consciously channel this impact so that respondents gain self-understanding and, ultimately, self-determination through research participation." (Ibid.) Advantages and Disadvantages Action Research Extended, rather than involving a non-participant observer who "stands aloof from the case being investigated and eschews group membership" (Burns, 1997, p. 373), imbibes participation to the point of creating the scenario one is working on. This has advantages and disadvantages. Advantages 1. Opens educational spaces which are potentially ongoing 2. Inclusive 3. Positive rather than negative action 4. Model building (with the target schools as models) 5. Does not claim one truth but focuses on improvement for all 6. Uses triangulation: multi-si...