Promoting Academic Achievement and Identity Development Among Diverse High School Students

Abstract

This paper describes how a university outreach program promotes academic achievement and identity development among culturally diverse tenth-grade students. The primary goal of the outreach program is to advance students' engagement and competency in mathematics and science learning. A secondary goal of the program is to promote the development of students' academic and cultural identities. This paper describes how a university outreach program meets both goals of advancing participants' engagement and competence in mathematics and science while promoting the development of their academic identity and cultural awareness through the implementation of culturally responsive teaching practices. Qualitative data collected through student interviews will be examined to illuminate the program's effectiveness in promoting identity development and achievement in math and science. In addition, outcome data from the program's first four years (1998-2001) are presented to demonstrate its effectiveness at enhancing participants' academic competencies.

The role of professional identity in graduate school success for under‐represented minority students

“…In addition, future research should consider ways in which student intervention programs address how to promote science identity among URM students. Such programs could directly affirm the value of ethnic and racial identities with science identities, along with a program of social acceptance on graduate student development [25,26].…”

The Theory and Practice of Culturally Relevant Education

“…This increased engagement suggests opportunity for academic achievement. Rodriguez et al (2004) described a program at San Diego State University designed to help underrepresented 10th-grade students increase their competency in math and science. Over the course of 4 years, 193 students (around 50 per year) attended the program.…”

Individual and school factors affecting students’ participation and success in higher education

“…In the short term, however, the outreach activities should focus on increasing the number of the eligible students-not only through increasing student achievements in school but also by establishing constructive collaborations between schools and tertiary institutions (Jones et al 2002;Outreach Task Force 1997). Whether these programmes achieve their goals is not known, particularly in New Zealand (Ringold 2005); however reports from USA indicate that outreach programmes operated by universities do increase student achievements and their enrolment in higher education (Quigley 2002;Rodriguez et al 2004).…”