This paper, presented at the 1994 Meeting of the American Anthropological Association, considers how the process of creating a student-driven, multicultural curriculum can help address issues of difference and be part of meaningful school reform. Within the context of charter programs at Philadelphia high schools, the authors identify three tasks essential to school reform: building community, generating knowledge about change, and reinventing curriculum. They conclude that authentic curricular and instructional change requires a dynamic environment where teachers and students seek connections between students’ lives, where teachers use classroom inquiry in a dialectical relation to their professional knowledge, and where a critical mass of students risks an invested stance toward their own education.
The Real Multicultural Curriculum: What Happens When Students Contest Community and Curriculum
Date: January 1994
Related Publications
Publication
Examining the Impact, Implementation, and Cost Effectiveness of Completion Coaching in a Statewide College Promise Program
This study examines the effectiveness, implementation, and cost-efficiency of tnAchieves’ completion coaching program, which is designed to support Tennessee Promise students from low-income backgrounds. This program offers proactive coaching, which involves frequent, personalized contact initiated…
Publication
Children’s Literacy Initiative’s Blueprint for Early Learning: Evaluation Report
In partnership with Children’s Literacy Initiative (CLI), Research for Action conducted a year-long study of the impact and implementation of CLI’s Pre-K Intervention. Thirty-five district-operated and community-based Pre-K programs from Broward County Public Schools and…
Publication
Virtual Approaches Hold Promise for Expanding Afterschool Art Programming
Four Boys & Girls Clubs implementing high-quality art skill development classes for tweens and teens experimented with five different virtual approaches that hold promise for expanding programming. This brief describes three approaches that reach young…
Publication
Small but Mighty: Lessons from Black Teachers’ Experiences in Allegheny County
RFA studied why Black teachers were leaving their jobs more than White teachers in Allegheny County from 2014 to 2020. RFA analyses have found that the number of Black teachers in the area was consistently…
Publication
Allegheny County Teacher and Student Demographics: 2022-23 Update
This ACER brief updates RFA’s prior analyses of teacher and student race and ethnicity in Allegheny County public schools with data current through the 2022-23 school year. We found that in 2022-23, teachers of color (TOCs)…
Publication
Top 5 Insights from RFA’s Community Research Partnership: Becoming a Community-Engaged Research Organization
We at Research for Action are committed to becoming a community-engaged research institution, with the goal of having our work be grounded in principles of community empowerment, collaboration, and social change within K-12 education. We’re…
Publication
Exploring the Diversity and Supports for School District of Philadelphia English Learners as they Prepare to Transition to High School
In Philadelphia, the School District (SDP) is home to a diverse community of English Learners (ELs) hailing from various ethnic backgrounds, cultures, and languages. ELs are students identified through the WIDA English proficiency screener, marked…
Publication
Setting the Stage: Practical Ideas for Implementing High-Quality Afterschool Arts Programs
Youth benefit from involvement in the arts but youth in historically marginalized communities and under resourced communities often have fewer opportunities to engage in high-quality arts programming due to cuts in arts education that disproportionately…
Publication
Pennsylvania School Funding and School Staffing Disparities
Pennsylvania operates one of the most inequitable public school systems in the nation, with among the largest disparities in school funding, educational opportunities, and student achievement. In this brief, RFA examines the relationship between school…
Publication
State Funding to Support Out-of-School Time Programming in Pennsylvania
Out-of-school-time (OST) refers to programs that offer students activities after school and/or during the summer. Despite evidence of significant benefits and a clear demand from families, Pennsylvania has no dedicated state funding to provide OST…
Publication
“Worn & Weary” Black Teachers’ Storied Experiences and Recommendations around their Attrition and Retention in Philadelphia Schools
The benefits of a diverse teaching staff are well-established in research literature. Yet in Philadelphia, and many of the nation’s largest school systems, the number and share of Black teachers has been declining for at…
Publication
Changing the Finish Line: Implications of new graduation requirements in the School District of Philadelphia
PERC research is produced through collaboration between researchers from Research for Action and the School District of Philadelphia’s Office of Research and Evaluation. For more information, please visit phledresearch.org. New graduation requirements, enacted in 2018…