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Racial Variations In Education

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Explaining Racial Variations in Education
Introduction
Racism still exists within educational institutions, and the socioeconomic gap between social classes is a key factor for the ongoing racial divide for students. In this essay I will demonstrate the reasons for the racial educational inequalities and variations that exist within school systems.
The article “Explaining racial variations in Education” gives a persuasive argument as to why there are still racial variations that concern a student’s education. For example, the author, Caroline Hodges Persell, claims that race is not an individual attribute, rather it is a socially constructed system that involves individuals who have advantages over another group of individuals. Blacks, Hispanics, …show more content…

They are in a sense still segregated due to the areas of where they live, the intersectionality and stratification of their parents within America’s society. Students that are minorities face more hurdles and obstacles than a student that is white, living in a predominately white suburban neighborhood and has a higher socioeconomic status. In addition, minority students are clumped together in classes and there is usually less qualified teachers and instructors that can properly teach these students. In some schools, teachers will use the tracking system to track the students’ abilities and place them in certain groups that they believe will benefit the student and the system, however, this can not only help a student but it can also harm them. If the tracking system is not directed properly, it can lead to many students that are minorities and of low income families being put in lower academic groups even when they do not belong within a lower …show more content…

The first is the structural explanation. This argument claims that systematic advantages occur for one specific group and not another, instead the lower group is at a disadvantage. These groups are based on racial differences, and a student that is a minority is at the lower end of the groups. The next explanation is the socioeconomic description, this is the divide between social classes and since most minorities are of a lower class, they get less when it comes to schooling and programs that upper class children are privy to. The last explanation is the stigmatization that minorities and lower class students are inferior compared to the other students of higher class. Although some recent studies show that the racial gap has been getting smaller, the social class gap is still growing bigger. In addition, since so many minorities live in an urban lower class society that is full of social disorganization, it can therefore be true that it is still a racial

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