To posit the title as a question, how should we rather define this vitality and who will contribute to this vitality? Robert Ibarra in Beyond Affirmative Action (2001) provides a critical theoretical contribution to the importance of diversity in the professoriate. Ibarra explains that multicontextuality is an ability to think and function in multiple languages and literacies, contexts or cognitive styles, in order to respond to current trends in economic, civic, and personal spheres. Ibarra further links the need for a diverse professoriate by explaining that those with greater multicontextuality better navigate the complexities of a diverse society. Tara Yosso (2005) in “Whose Culture has Capital? A Critical Race Theory Discussion of Community Cultural Wealth,” reframes social and cultural capital theory by further acknowledging that linguistic, aspirational, navigational, resistance and familial capitals also lead to greater opportunities. As a member of the professoriate in educational leadership and policy, and with a critical consciousness of multicontextuality and community cultural wealth, I believe that these two theoretical contributions explain why programs like the Barbara L. Jackson Scholars and the David L. Clark Graduate Student Seminars are crucial to the vitality of our growth for the field of educational leadership and policy.
To further elaborate, currently in the state of education politics we face numerous deficit thinking based movements. For example, the U.S. Supreme Court this fall will hear the case of Fischer v. Texas, a revisit to the use of Affirmative Action, where since Grutter v. Bollinger (2003) the use of race is allowable only as an equally valued criterion among other criteria. Fischer v. Texas will challenge the use of race in any dimension in the admissions process, which may also influence the use of race applied to various school desegregation efforts. Furthermore, the state of education politics is currently being overrun in some states, like that of my home state of New Mexico, by what some are calling the Techno-Scholastic Complex. It is this reality that worry many of us in educational leadership where the use of student tests become a much greater tool for profit at the expense of good educators and ultimately a quality educational opportunity for all children. In New Mexico, The Land of Enchantment, or perhaps now disenchantment, Governor Susana Martinez on April 11, 2012 through executive order is now mandating the implementation of evaluating all licensed school personnel using student test scores to inform 50% of their annual evaluation beginning this coming school year. The explanation in the Governor's executive order is that current evaluation statute does not work and is over-simplistic, and more importantly, this is a response to the NCLB Waiver requirements by the Obama Administration. As a side note, the evaluation system that was in place before was deliberatively developed with practitioners, elected officials, and scholars, along with some representing UCEA in the evaluation system of school principals. In context, in a state where slightly over 2/3 of the K-12 student population is ethnically diverse, and the state constitution requires educators to speak both English and Spanish, and in a state where the growth of dual-language programs continue to highlight their success with linguistically diverse students, the new leap into a greater testing environment is unacceptable and ultimately regrettable. Ultimately, listening to the tenets of multicontextuality and community cultural wealth, and in the words of Terry Orr, I believe that “connecting the dots” through the realities and experiences of our children, policy, and our work, our incoming generation of diverse scholars are part of the necessary response to the complexities and realities of the education system.
Nonetheless, given the current state of education politics, and the growing demand to critically prepare educators for the growing education policy complexities that may be devastating for educational opportunity for all children, it is essential for our field to consider and recognize how multicontextuality and community cultural wealth speak to us about the importance of our diverse graduate student recruitment into the professoriate. Time and time again as I visit with our student’s research at events through the David L. Clark Graduate Student Seminars and the Barbara L. Jackson Scholars Program, I recognize that our graduate students, their creativity, their new energy (vitality), are the pulse of educational leadership and policy.
With that said, I look forward to continue to see growing support from our UCEA member institutions by nominating and financially supporting their diverse graduate students for the Barbara L. Jackson Scholars Program and David L. Clark Graduate Student Seminars and attendance for both the UCEA Conventions and AERA Meetings. UCEA will soon be accepting nominations for Jackson Scholars and Nominations for the 2012-2014 Cohort through June 22, 2012 via an online form. Please see your PSRs, Chairs or Deans for details and for nominating support.
Respectfully,
-Cristóbal Rodríguez, UCEA Associate Director of Graduate Student Development
Thursday, May 24, 2012 at 7:11AM