Mixed Student Resources » Journal Article

Understanding Youth Culture

Ani Orantes — Thu, 26 Apr 2007 05:26:58 +0000

The target audiences for this article are teachers and counselors in the k-12 educational system, especially those working with younger children.

This is a really basic article that introduces the idea that multicultural education fails to recognize biracial and multicultural students. I had never thought about this myself, but the arguments that the author introduces are interesting. Wardel asserts that the idea of multicultural education is to teach students about different cultures and to emphasizes having pride in ones (monoracial/monoethnic) culture. What he believes is the problem is the assumption that teachers and counselors make that children will have only one culture to be proud of. As a result students of mixed heritages become invisible within the context of multicultural education. The article calls for educational administrators to change teacher training and curriculum to incorporate more training about issues unique to this emerging population.

While the focus of this article is on the k-12 educational environment, I think there are some things that higher education can take away from it as well. I think that as higher ed. administrators, teachers, and counselors, we all need to look at our own assumptions and see if we too are delivering a multicultural education that emphasizes monoracial or monoethnic ideals to the exclusion of different combinations of race and ethnic heritage and experience.

Full Article: Understanding Youth Culture – Journal of Educational Leadership, Dec 1999 – Jan 2000, V 57, No 4, Pg 68-72

Experiences and Processes affecting Racial Identity Development

Ani Orantes — Tue, 23 Jan 2007 06:38:14 +0000

No review available yet.

One box isn’t enough.

Ani Orantes — Wed, 08 Nov 2006 23:59:11 +0000

One box isn’t enough: An analysis of how US Colleges and Universities classify Mixed Heritage Students. Alfred Padilla with Matt Kelley. November 2005; Mavin Foundation.

One Box Isn’t Enough

Understanding the Identities of Mixed-Race College Students

Ani Orantes — Wed, 08 Nov 2006 23:58:41 +0000

http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qa3752/is_200305/ai_n9287701

Diversity in College Settings: Directives for Helping Professionals

Ani Orantes — Wed, 01 Nov 2006 00:13:20 +0000

I have some mixed feelings about this article. In one respect it is wonderful that the biracial student has been included in this book. On the other hand, the one case study they decided to put in might leave someone who has had little contact with mixed race students with a very narrow view of the issues that mixed race students may face.

The Biracial Identity Development Model: A Needed Addition

Ani Orantes — Wed, 01 Nov 2006 00:00:56 +0000

This is a very good article for counseling professionals as well as student development professionals. While this piece was written in 1990 it compares the identity development theories that were on the books at the time to the experiences of mixed race students and gives us a view of how those theories do not quite fit with the experiences. One of the issues he brings to the front is the fact that until that point racial identity theories required that for a person to successfully achieve a healthy racial identity that they would identify with one racial/cultural group. However the inherent nature of the mixed race student is that they are a part of two (often times) distinct races or cultures (the more different, the more difficult it is to reconcile and transition between them).