Madora Soutter

Investigating Adolescents’ Critical Consciousness Development through a Character Framework

Brazilian philosopher-educator Paulo Freire defined critical consciousness as the ability to engage in reflection and action upon the world in order to transform it. A growing body of research has found that critical consciousness is predictive of a number of important academic and civic outcomes in adolescents from oppressed groups. The present mixed methods study considered the critical consciousness development of 335 adolescents (57% female, 92% African American or Latinx) attending urban secondary schools that sought to foster their students’ critical consciousness, but featured five different pedagogical approaches. We hypothesized that considering these adolescents’ critical consciousness development through a character lens would highlight ways in which different schooling models contribute differentially to their students’ development of the intellectual, performance, and civic dimensions of critical consciousness. Longitudinal analyses revealed significant differences in the critical consciousness development of adolescents attending different schooling models along these dimensions. Interviews with adolescents and field work conducted at their schools offered insight into the programming and practices that may have contributed to these differences in students’ critical consciousness development.

Critical consciousness: A key to student achievement

Research has suggested that critical consciousness — the ability to recognize and analyze systems of inequality and the commitment to take action against these systems — can be a gateway to academic motivation and achievement for marginalized students. To explore this approach, the authors studied six urban schools that include critical consciousness development in their mission. Three strategies emerged as promising practices that schools can use to develop black students’ critical consciousness and harness the connection between critical consciousness and student achievement. They include teaching students the language of inequality, creating space to interrogate racism, and teaching students how to take action.

Developing sociopolitical consciousness of race and social class inequality in adolescents attending progressive and no excuses urban secondary schools

ABSTRACT Sociopolitical consciousness refers to an individual’s ability to critically analyze the political, economic, and social forces shaping society and one’s status in it. A growing body of scholarship reports that high levels of sociopolitical consciousness are predictive in marginalized adolescents of a number of key outcomes including resilience and civic engagement. The present study explored the role that urban secondary schools can play in fostering adolescents’ sociopolitical consciousness through a longitudinal, mixed methods investigation of more than 400 adolescents attending “progressive” and “no excuses” charter high schools. Analyses revealed that, on average, students attending progressive high schools demonstrated sizeable shifts in their sociopolitical consciousness of racial inequality, and students attending no excuses high schools demonstrated sizeable shifts in their sociopolitical consciousness of social class inequality. Qualitative interviews with participating students offered insight into the curriculum, programming, and practices that these youth perceived as contributing to these differences in their sociopolitical consciousness.

College Access, Student Success, and the "New" Character Education.

Abstract Over the past several years, there has been a resurgence of interest in-and reconceptualizing of- character education in primary and secondary schools across the United States. An important question, then, is how this new emphasis on character development at the K-12 level impacts the work of university faculty and student affairs professionals. Are graduates of these primary and secondary schools with an intensive character focus arriving at their respective universities with heightened levels of grit and social intelligence? Are such qualities facilitating their ability to thrive at the postsecondary level? Are university faculty and staff coordinating with their K-12 counterparts to support the continued development of these qualities in newly matriculated students? The authors pose these questions in interviews with four different university stakeholders who can speak to the effects at the university level of the new character education emphasis in many American primary and secondary schools.

Teaching civic literacy projects: student engagement with social problems

Shira Eve Epstein’s Teaching Civic Literacy Projects provides educators with a well-researched and practical guide for conceptualizing and implementing comprehensive civic literacy projects aimed at social engagement and social justice. Grounding her research in concrete examples, Epstein presents four projects, weaving in reallife cases throughout the book to emphasize key points: In the social justice writing assignment each member of an 8th grade class selected a topic of social concern and created various texts to present these issues to their peers. The safe sex health project depicted a group of 9th graders who organized and ran a day-long safe sex health fair for their entire grade. The race awareness after-school program included 4th and 5th graders from de facto segregated schools who worked together to create a public service announcement on issues related to school inequality and racism. The park project involved 7th graders who worked to protest budget cuts for the local park by researching budgets and writing letters to a local assemblyperson. These project reports provide a solid foundation for Epstein’s overall purpose of demonstrating ‘how to enact robust forms of civic education in today’s schools’ (p. ix). Each case study furnishes the reader with familiar touchstones to heighten understanding of the topics being introduced. Epstein supplements her examples with notable work in the field as well as with specific pedagogical suggestions. Three points in particular distinguish Epstein’s book: its structural organization and usability, its exemplary merging of theory and practice and its numerous examples throughout attesting to a synergistic relationship between literacy and civics. First, the overall structure of Epstein’s book is purposeful and thoughtfully planned. Chapter one conceptualizes civic literacy projects as falling into three phases: problem identification, problem exploration and action. Chapters two through four describe each of these three phases in turn. Chapter five wisely addresses the tensions teachers may face when taking on civic literacy projects. Finally, Chapter six concludes with resources teachers can use when designing such units. Using precise, deliberate language throughout, each idea, term, and broad concept is clearly defined, outlined and mapped out. Suggestions are followed up with sound examples and specific strategies that teachers can employ. This attention to detail and clarity of language makes a potentially daunting task feel easy to follow and immediately accessible. Second, connecting theory to practice is often a rhetorical concept, but not so for Epstein. Her work provides explicit examples of how civic engagement can actually take form in a classroom. Striking just the right balance between correspondent theory and down-to-earth strategies, Epstein candidly refers to these kinds of projects as ‘do-able yet never simple’ (p. xi). She acknowledges potential challenges at every step of the process, but then pre-emptively works through them with the reader and gives suggestions for how to tackle each roadblock. cross-cultural moral reasoning research: whether to prioritize depth and limit study to a specific context, or collect broader information on more contexts. This book presents both approaches and invites the reader to explore and engage.

A Critically Conscious Approach to Fostering the Success of College Students from Underrepresented Groups

Abstract Over the past decade, many student affairs professionals have turned their attention to non-cognitive factors that can play a role in supporting students from underrepresented groups in making it to and through college. The work in this area that has gotten the most attention in recent years has focused on students’ sense of belonging and efficacy. In this article, the authors begin by acknowledging the numerous strengths of belonging-centered and efficacy-centered approaches to fostering college student success but also argue that these approaches are incomplete. They posit that a more critically conscious approach to fostering college-going success can deepen participating college students’ sense of purpose and, in so doing, increase their likelihood of successful college completion.

The moral work of teaching and teacher education: Preparing and supporting practitioners

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