Essay On Racial Discrimination

This essay seeks to examine modern day manifestations of both racism and classism within a school setting. As investigation has shown, racial, ethnic, cultural, and socioeconomic discrimination may lead to negative mental health effects. This is alarming as such discrimination continues to linger among school systems ranging from elementary aged students all the way to college aged students. This essay also evaluates several methods of diminishing racial injustices outlined by various authors. It is in the hands of our current school administrators, teachers, and lastly students, to enact real change in hopes of achieving true racial equality.

Why Bullies Should Not Be Prosecuted If people ask someone about their childhood memories, stories related to school will also emerge with high probability, because everybody spends a significant part of their lives in these institutions. Since school years are influential, it would be important that children have positive memories about this period, but reality does not always correspond to expectations . Bullying is one of the factors which ruin school experience, and it is gaining prominence. According to Olweus, "A student is being bullied or victimized when he or she is exposed, repeatedly and over time, to negative actions on the part of one or more other students" (Dake 173).

The phenomenon coined ‘white flight’ in turn creates the problem they are avoiding within their efforts of

Special Needs Paper Social Needs Description of the School to Prison Pipeline Unfair punishments and policies in a school setting ultimately disenfranchise minority youth of their civil rights and liberties. In the case of the “school to prison pipeline”, minority youths’ right to an education is being violated, creating a social need for developing healthy and fair discipline procedures (Porter, 2015). This social need can be addressed by properly assessing minority youth who display unacceptable behavior. Instead of using extreme punishment, such as expulsion and out of school suspensions to deflect inappropriate behavior, other methods can be set in place such as counseling sessions or after school programs geared towards encouraging appropriate behavior.

Racial tension in classrooms has a negative impact to the teaching and learning practices, teaching and learning becomes ineffective and this issue might go beyond the classroom premises and happen in the school, community or the society at large. Once the issue is solved our learners will then know how to respect and support one another regardless of the race that one comes from and by so doing they will find their meaning in life. This issue of racial tension affects our education practices in a way that it brings arise of unnecessary conflicts among our learners, because they of different skin colour. In this essay I will further discuss ways in which I would use to alleviate this racial tension in the classroom as an educator using the philosophical perspectives of African Philosophy which is all about understanding humane and Critical Rationalism which is about cross-examining everything.

An example of that disheartening is the lack of quality education for poverty areas. Another example is when test questions are inadvertently worded so that majority group members will understand them easier/better. United States schools are “insensitive to the distinctive culture of a minority population” (A/T). This is an example of institutionalized discrimination because it isn’t just single discriminatory acts it is an entire system (the school system) working against a minority group to discourage

They say that labelling occurs through three distinct steps, being speculation, elaboration, stabilisation, which then allow teachers to interpret behaviour of the student in terms of label and may feel they know what makes the student ‘tick’. Teachers may find labelling useful to ‘pigeon hole’ types of students and form a sense of their class, however, labels are not always a good thing and can lead to serious consequences. Once a label is attached it can be ‘sticky’ and difficult to loose, as teachers screen out behaviour that does not match their expectations of that particular student, which intern may impact the experiences children have within the institutions such as, being allowed on school trips and assignation to lower exam tiers or sets. The a problem then arises where students then start to believe the label and internalise it as part of their identity, creating a self- fulfilling

Schools can be a difficult environment for students of the LGBTQ youth. There is a lack of practices and policies that supports LGBTQ youths. LGBTQ students face bullying in schools which results into putting their education at risk. A school is were students should feel safe and welcomed but schools lack protections from discrimination because of their sexual identity. Schools ignore their needs and fail to ensure they get the same academic and extracurricular benefits as non- transgender students.

Bullying is defined as repeated oppression, physical or psychological of a less powerful individual by a more powerful individual, people or group. It consists of three main types of abuse which are physical, verbal and emotional. Bullying in schools is a common and worldwide spread problem that can have critical and negative implications on the general school climate as well as on the right of students to study in a safe and secure environment without fear. Many people believe that bullying is part of life, happens in all schools and so it’s not an issue to worry about and that it lets individuals know what life is all about as it toughens them but in reality bullying is a detrimental problem that affects most school going children and teenagers physically, emotionally and socially.

Imagine a classroom where students a caned for getting grades lower than a certain mark and after the exams are caned for falling below the pass mark. It is important to realize that this kind of environment would create fear within the children. Consequently, in this kind of environment where one is punished for not doing well in his or her academics, the student would not be comfortable in making mistakes which are all part of the process of learning. The studies done by Arif and Rafi similarly backs this up. In their research it can be concluded that the pupils who experience corporal punishment do not actually get better, but do worse than those who do not experience it

Parents are one of the dominant influences children have when still young. This causing parents to inadvertently teach their children about different races. Along with diversity, or lack thereof, in culture and areas children’s last chance to learn about diversity is through schooling which many times does a poor job of correctly teaching children the facts about diversity and race. I am not the first to recognize that this racial injustice is taking place. Many others have preformed studies trying to decipher the cause of and how to fix racial and diversity ignorance in the youth of these non-diverse parts of America.

It creates an obsession with test scores as a chief “accountably” metric for students, educators and schools. This system has led to the exams becoming an end instead of a means to an end. For instance, according the Joh Holt, within the learning environment “the air practically vibrates with suspicion and anxiety, the child learns to live in a daze, saving his energies for those small parts of his life that are too trivial for the adults to bother with, and thus remain his.” (E) This represents the crucial and harsh environment students experience when facing tests. It puts unnecessary stress on the minds of students and degrades their self worth into nothing.

Prejudice and bigotry are learned behaviors, or habits that people begin to form when they are in an environment where others do the same. The adults in the young American’s live are the examples that the young children see and learn from, and when a parent or other significant other displays racist behavior the child is likely to learn at a young age that other races are not equal to his or her own race. Also as kids grow up and are in school they could feel not as equal as other students just because of the color of their skin. When being discriminated for their culture, students begin to make themselves fit the mainstream culture. As a result, they abandon their parental and cultural values just to avoid prejudice.

Contributions to a Cold-hearted Society “ No one is born hating another person because of the colour of his skin, or his background or his religion. People learn to hate, they can be taught to love, for love comes naturally to the human heart than its opposite “ - Nelson Mandela. This quote from Nelson Mandela shows that racial prejudice is taught, because no one is born with hating another person from a different culture or race. Many people are affected by this on a daily basis due to stereotypes we hear about other cultures while growing up. Due to this, racial prejudice, judgement, and violence are reasons why people should accept others who are different from themselves.

Racial Bias is a form of implicit bias; it is the unspoken prejudice that is embedded within our attitudes and opinions, causing us to conduct unconscious judgements or behaviours that are discriminative towards others. It is can be claimed that “people are either born into their prejudice or form their beliefs at an early age. Once they are formed, nothing will change them.” However, I will argue that this statement is incorrect, and how consequently, that implicit racial bias can be reduced with experience. It is key to recognise that unconscious stereotypes don’t remain forever, through experience, individuals can be taught to unlearn the implicit racial bias from our minds so that we may not discriminate towards anyone in the future.