CEC conference workshop sessions

Time: November 7-8
Place: Verona, NY
Discussion led by: Various presenters
Amount of hours: 3 hours

This past weekend, I attended the New York State CEC Conference in Verona, NY, where an array of valuable workshops and information were available. Two of my favorite ones that reflected some of the things we've been talking about with regards to social justice education were: "Knowledge, Attitude, and Behaviors of African Americans Towards ADHD" by Satasha Green and Holly Quicksey, and a poster session including a poster by Susan J. Salmon and Sherry Schwartz, both of SUNY Geneseo entitled "Education Candidates, Communities and Social Justice: More Data."

The first workshop about ADHD focused on the possible reasons why there is an overrepresentation of African American students in the E/BD category and an underrepresentation in the OHI (including ADHD) category (28% to 16%). Both categories have "similar behavioral characteristics, such as hyperactivity, inability to build interpersonal relationships, inappropriate types of behaviors under normal circumstances," quoted from their powerpoint presentation.

Their main argument was the differece in the way a child is diagnosed. With E/BD, the child is referred, and then a diagnostician (usually school psychologist) determines eligibility. The child then receives services relatively quickly if he/she is considered E/BD and given an IEP, under IDEA. For ADHD, a child is referred, evaluated by a primary care doctor, and then eligilibity is determined. If a child is found to have ADHD, his/her services come from section 504, since the disorder is considered a physical medical condition.

Problems with this method:

[53% of parents believed their child would be negatively labeled if he/she was diagnosed ADHD, and 47% said getting information on ADHD was an important factor (since they did not receive any from the health care provider), 64% of African Americans reported not knowing were to go for assistance, and 52% citedcosts as a berrier to seeking health care.]

1) Cost/economics: Seeing the school psychologist is free, seeing the primary care doctor depends on if a family even has a primary care doctor, if a parent can get off of work to take a child to the doctor (a number of visits, potentially), if a family can physically get to the doctor, if a family has health insurance, if a famliy can afford the co-pays.

2) Cultural beliefs: African American males may be seen as hyperactive when they are really displaying culturally appropriate behaviors. The presenters discussed "verve" (or as they affectionally called it, "swagger") and a study that was done on teachers on the movement of African American males, and how they are perceived as "troublemakers" simply by the way they walk (Webb-Johnson, 2002)

3) Distrust of Health Care Providers & Services: Numerous historical episodes of exploitation of medical experimentation on uninformed African American groups were cited: The Tuskegee Syphilis study, Agent Orange, and the theories of HIV/AIDS and Crack cocaine as being developed by the govenment and used to eradicate African American populations. Also, informed consent is seen as a document that allows the patient to sign away his/her right to sue a doctor or hospital if malpractice occurs.

4) Levels of Knowledge, Literacy, and Technology's Influence: 66% of US adults ages 60+ have low to marginal reading skills, 50% of welfare recipients read below the 5th rgade level, 40% of African Americans have reading difficulties, 75% of those surveyed reported having long-term illnesses of 6 months or more & limited reading skills (all statistics are taken from the National Adult Literacy Survey).

The presenters also conducted a survey on African Americans about their knowledge on ADHD (relatively high), attitudes towards the diagnosis (pessimistic), and desire to have knowledge about a diagnosis (high, but may be impeded by reading skills and levels).

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The poster session focused on a study done by the presenters at SUNY Geneseo on different education majors (childhood, CH/SE, early childhood, social studies, literacy, and adolescent development). With an attitudinal survey, the researchers found that the education majors largely agreed with the need for social justice and did not agree with statements about discrimination, racism, and inequality. However, on the question "We, as teachers, have no right to indoctrinate our students," the students overwhelmingly agreed.

After I read the poster, I wound up having a long discussion with the woman about the results and what they meant precisely. She felt that the results showed a fear of initiating social justice education curriculum with students because it is wrong to "indoctrinate them." I had a problem with this question, since I feel the word indoctrinate is negatively connotated and carries a lot of baggage. No offense to anyone here, but I was thinking while I read this, that many of the undergraduates surveyed may not have even known what the word meant, or thought of it as having a negative connotation. From this, I can see a possible point where the data could have been skewed.

In an unrelated note, she told me she persoanlly knows Obama's educational advisor, LInda Darling-Hammond, and expects that should she become the secretary of education, she will do a fantastic job in the way of social justice education and curriculum. How exciting!