A common theme that resonates in a high poverty school is the demographic make-up, always having high concentrations of African Americans and Hispanic students. With this common theme come challenges, including but not limited to low student achievement, unequal distribution of resources, and low expectations of student outcomes. All of these challenges provide a disadvantage for children who grow up in a neighborhood where there are racial disparities. According to Castañeda (2013), black and Latino students perform at a lower rate than their white peers in both reading and math (p. 57). This statistic is no surprise for most educators who are deeply involved in educating students in this setting. It is still alarming that with all of …show more content…
The students in my school are not free from oppression because the community they live in tells them that they do not need a high school diploma to be successful and that college is definitely out of reach. In schools, Tatum (2013) expresses that the impact of racism begins at an early age and “we are exposed to misinformation about people different from ourselves” (p. 65). This information is often engrained in student’s heads and some students of color internalize these differences and begin to believe it to be true. It is my belief that this false sense of self is often created not only in society but also in schools and students begin to perform the way they are expected to