Human capital,social integration,and tournaments: A test of graduate student success models

A tournament model emphasizes variation in graduate department resources and environments and is compared to human capital models of graduate student success. Success is defined as participation of sociology students in professional activities and commitment to various professional aspirations. Data from a random survey of 25 sociology graduate programs provided student achievement indicators and department resource factors that are regressed on student success rates. Both the department resource factors and student background variables show substantial effects on success, and human capital factors are moderated by the opportunity structure of the graduate program itself. Women students have lower academic aspirations and racial/ethnic minority students participate in professional activities at lower rates, when student achievement factors are controlled. Academic and private-sector career goals and department resource effects on graduate student involvement are discussed. This article is a revision of a paper presented at the American Sociological Association meetings, August 1991.     

Teachers’ unions, productivity, and minority student achievement

I estimate the unionlnonunion productivity differential for minority students attending public high schools. Education production functions are estimated for minority students attending union schools and for minority students attending nonunion schools using achievement scores as the measure of output and the individual student as the unit of observation. The union/nonunion productivity differential for average minority students is positive. However, the productivity differential is negative for minority students attending schools where the majority of students are nonminority, but the productivity differential is positive for minority students attending schools where the majority of students are minorities.     

Ethnic and gender diversity,process and performance in groups of business students in Sweden

This article investigates the complex interrelation between ethnic and gender diversity, process and performance among groups of business students. The article is based on an empirical survey of business students working on a complex assignment in groups of two to five in a small Swedish university. The results indicate that gender diversity leads to positive group outcomes, while ethnic diversity appears to create negative group outcomes. Intervening process variables, such as group communication, conflict and effectiveness in problem solving, were not found to be influenced by diversity, or to influence group outcomes. While the non‐influence of intervening variables can probably be explained by methodological difficulties, the negative outcome for ethnic diversity indicates a need to help students better manage ethnic diversity in order to reap its benefits.     

Latino Students' Transition to Middle School: Role of Bilingual Education and School Ethnic Context

Participants were 204 academically at‐risk Latino students recruited into a study when in first grade and followed for 9 years. Using piecewise latent growth curve analyses, we investigated trajectories of teacher‐rated behavioral engagement and student‐reported school belonging during elementary school and middle school and the association between trajectories and enrollment in bilingual education classes in elementary school and a change in school ethnic congruence across the transition to middle school. Overall, students experienced a drop in school belonging and behavioral engagement across the transition. A moderating effect of ethnic congruence on bilingual enrollment was found. A decline in ethnic congruence was associated with more positive trajectories for students previously enrolled in bilingual classes but more negative trajectories for nonbilingual students.     

Strategies for Multicultural Student Success: What About Grad School?

A workshop was presented to undergraduates as a collection of ethnic minority voices, which provided students an opportunity to participate in an ethnic minority focused event that encouraged mentoring relationships and created opportunities for the sharing of advice between ethnic minority undergraduate and graduate students. The workshop's goals and agenda and implications for counselors are described. The feedback from students was overwhelmingly positive. The authors believe that colleges and universities, and the ethnic minority students who attend them, would benefit greatly from the formal and structured implementation of a workshop series dedicated to encouraging graduate school as a postbaccalaureate option.     

Interpersonal Compatibility and Student-Faculty Evaluations: The Effects of Need Complementarity in the Classroom

Abstract

Previous studies have examined student characteristics or teacher characteristics as sources of variation in student-faculty evaluations. However, little attention has been given to the ways in which interpersonal needs of student and teacher may jointly contribute to such evaluations. This study investigated the hypothesis that complementarity of student-teacher needs for control and affection would be related to positive evaluations of teachers. Eight teachers and 265 students completed the FIROB Scales; student-faculty evaluation forms were later administered to the students. The hypothesized relationship for affection needs was not obtained; however, complementarity of control needs was significantly related to positive teacher evaluations. The results suggest that noncomplementary relationships tend to lead to negative teacher evaluations when the teacher expresses a high need to control others.     

Needed and Wanted? The school experiences of some minority ethnic trainee teachers in the UK

This paper considers the school experiences of a small group of black and other minority ethnic student teachers in the UK at key points during their postgraduate initial teacher education (secondary) course. Their views are examined against the backdrop of the continuing stated need to increase numbers entering the teaching profession from black and other minority backgrounds.     

Advising,gender, and performance: Evidence from a university with exogenous adviser–student gender match

This paper provides the first causal evidence on the effects of gender match in the adviser–student relationship (as opposed to the well-researched instructor–student relationship) on student outcomes along both the intensive and extensive margins. We analyze administrative data from a university with a faculty adviser assignment policy that makes gender pairing between advisers and students exogenous. We find that matching female students with female adviser has a positive and significant effect on retention and grade point average (GPA) upon graduation, particularly for students with academic challenges and non-science, technology, engineering, and mathematics students. For female students with below-median high school GPA, gender match is found to raise the odds of graduate school enrollments.     

A survey of substance abuse prevention efforts at Virginia's colleges and universities

The extremes of college student substance use and the negative consequences students face as a result of such use are of great public health concern. Although a multitude of campus-based substance abuse prevention efforts have appeared in literature, a clear picture of the programs and policies currently in use at colleges and universities is not readily available. This research was undertaken to detail both the efforts aimed at general student samples and those targeting at-risk (eg, Greeks, student athletes) and historically underserved (eg, ethnic minorities, students with disabilities) student groups at colleges and universities in the Commonwealth of Virginia. While a variety of efforts were being made, there was a reliance on program orientations with limited scientific support. Four-year institutions used a wider array of outlets for their prevention messages. Targeted programs for at-risk groups were common but were largely unavailable specifically for ethnic minority students and students with disabilities.     

Attainment gap and responsible factors: a quantitative study in secondary schools in Cyprus

The population in Cyprus, a recent European Union member, has become much more heterogeneous during the past decade. Here, we examine the attainment patterns of minority and native students enrolled in six secondary schools from different cities in Cyprus, and identify factors responsible for these patterns. The combination of examined factors has not, to our knowledge, taken place in previous studies. Findings confirm that ethnic minority groups perform significantly lower than native students. In terms of aetiology, we show that ethnic background, gender, parental education, parental occupation, generation status, absenteeism and school minority concentration have a significant effect on student attainment.     

Pension prospects of minority ethnic groups: inequalities by gender and ethnicity

Minority ethnic groups have low income in later life from private pensions, partly due to shorter employment records in Britain since migration. Yet disadvantage and discrimination in the labour market, as well as differences in cultural norms concerning women's employment, may lead to persistence of ethnic variation in private pension acquisition. Little is known about the pension arrangements made by men and women in minority ethnic groups during the working life. This paper examines the extent of ethnic disadvantage in private pension scheme arrangements and analyses variation according to gender and specific ethnic group, using three years of the British Family Resources Survey, which provides information on over 97,000 adults aged 20-59, including over 5,700 from ethnic minorities. Both men and women in minority ethnic groups were less likely to have private pension coverage than their white counterparts but the extent of the difference was most marked for Pakistanis and Bangladeshis. Ethnicity interacted with gender, so that Blacks showed the least gender inequality in private pension arrangements, reflecting the relatively similar full-time employment rates of Black men and women. A minority ethnic disadvantage in private pension coverage, for both men and women, remained after taking account of age, marital and parental status, years of education, employment variables, class and income. The research suggests that minority ethnic groups - especially women - will be disproportionately dependent on means-tested benefits in later life, due to the combined effects of low private pension coverage and the policy of shifting pension provision towards the private sector.     

Culturally responsive teaching in China: instructional strategy and teachers’ attitudes

The aim of this study was to investigate the manner in which teachers facilitate the pedagogical process within a culturally diverse student population. The study focused on two primary schools in China; one located in a more fully developed city in eastern China (Case A), while the other was in a less developed city in rural western China (Case B). This allowed the researchers to compare and analyse the different instructional practices by means of semi-structured interviews and questionnaires. The findings indicate that: the teachers in Case A demonstrated overall affirmative attitudes towards ethnic minority cultures, as well as towards the students belonging to those cultures. However, the teachers also chose not to mention the specific ethnic identities and cultural differences of the students during the course of their instruction in order to ensure equal treatment for everyone. This leads to a kind of ‘cultural blindness’ in the classroom. In Case B, opinions regarding minority cultures were more varied. Compared with the teachers in Case A, more teachers in Case B found minority cultures to be inferior to the dominant Han culture. Some teachers also, counter intuitively, were of the opinion that the minority cultures were even superior. At the instructional level, school leadership developed courses on local culture and ethnicity for the teaching staff. This was done for a variety of reasons. The strongest evidence to support culturally responsive teaching in Case A does not stem from teaching and learning demands but from the necessity to pursue characteristics that make them distinctive from other schools at the same time, Case B’s practice of culturally responsive teaching was strongly supported by the government and UNICEF. Teachers in both schools indicated that they had integrated their knowledge of ethnic minority groups into the subject matter when it was necessary.     

Children,Kitchen, Church: does ethnicity matter?

Ethnic differences in the allocation of non-market time are important, as they may shed more light on the integration level of ethnic minorities and on the factors that affect both household productivity and ethnic identity. In this paper we examine the role of ethnicity and gender by analyzing differences in the time spent on a range of activities employing the 2000 UK Time Use Survey. Based on the economics of religion and identity economic models, we hypothesize that if ethnic minority women have lower opportunity costs of time and a strong ‘ethnic’ or ‘traditionally female’ identity, they will engage more in ‘traditional’ home activities. Double-hurdle regression results indicate that while the effect for childcare is not significant when estimated for parents only, non-white women spend significantly more time on food management and particularly religious activities than white women, with the greatest effect of the latter being for Pakistani and Bangladeshi women.     

Health outcomes for adults in family foster care as children: An analysis by ethnicity

Studies have linked the experience of child abuse or adversity to health problems in adulthood, and researchers have long documented health problems affecting children in foster care. Yet, the adult health outcomes of maltreated children placed in foster care have not been sufficiently isolated. Although information on transitioning youth and young adults is now beginning to emerge, the impact of ethnicity on adult health outcomes has been largely ignored. Given the overrepresentation of ethnic minority children in foster care and the national disparities in the health of ethnic minorities, this study examined the relationship between ethnicity and physical health outcomes for African American, Hispanic, and White adults who experienced family foster care as children. Logistic regression models indicated that ethnicity was not a significant predictor of physical health (p > .05). However, gender and age were associated significantly with their physical health outcomes.     

书院制下少数民族大学生教育管理新模式

近些年,部分高校进行书院制学生管理模式改革,为进一步完善高校少数民族学生工作服务体系、创建特色文化提供新的契机。少数民族学生中存在文化基础薄弱、理想信仰认识模糊、小团体意识较强等教育管理难点,高校学生管理的一般模式对少数民族学生的特点敏感度不够,针对性不强。高校可充分发挥书院制模式的特点,依托书院制学生社区,依靠强大的导师团队,开展"第二课堂"通识教育,做好少数民族学生的"三贴近"工作,完善奖助体系,强化学生"四个认同",引导学生树立正确的宗教观。     

Making education count: the effects of ethnicity and qualifications on intergenerational social class mobility

This paper examines the role of social class and ethnic group background in determining individuals' social class destinations. It explores the extent to which these background factors are mediated by educational achievement, and the role of educational qualifications in enabling intergenerational class mobility. To do this, it uses the ONS Longitudinal Study. These data allow us to observe parents' characteristics during childhood for a group of children of different ethnic groups growing up in England and Wales in the same period and who had reached adulthood by 2001. Results show that the influence of class background on these children's subsequent social class position varied with ethnicity: it was important for the majority, even after taking account of educational qualifications, but had a much smaller role to play for the minority groups. The minority groups made use of education to achieve upward mobility, but to greater effect for some groups than for others. Among those without educational qualifications, minority groups suffered an ‘ethnic penalty’ in relation to higher class outcomes; but for Pakistanis and Bangladeshis, this penalty persisted at all levels of education. These findings challenge the notion that a more equal society can be achieved simply through promoting equality of opportunity through education.     

Social and academic profile of the university student of social work a comparative study in Spain,Argentina, and Venezuela

ABSTRACT

The article presents the results of an empirical investigation that aimed to analyze comparative socio-demographic characteristics, motivational aspects and professional role of students who attend universities. The contexts of research were University of Mar de Plata (Argentina), University of Murcia (Spain) and University of Zulia (Venezuela). The universe of research was 304 students, with the participation of a total of 253 (TR 83,2%), 109 from University of Murcia—Spain—100 from University of Mar del Plata—Argentina and 44 from University of Zulia—Venezuela. Two hundred and forty-four measuring instruments were checked favorably. The results of the research allowed to highlight significant coincidences in most of the variables studied. In the analysis of self-perceived personality styles, there is high coincidence both in style (attributed qualification) and score (assigned quantification). At the three universities, the docent–student relationship is a positive variable that affects the favorable self-perception beyond academic success. Design and implementation of programs based on the described characteristics are recommended.     

Urban poverty,ethnicity, and personality development

There are multiple factors which contribute to the development of the individual's personality. Many of these factors have been amply discussed in traditional theories of personality formation. An area that has been neglected in these discussions has been the role that poverty and ethnic and cultural factors may have in this regard. This paper offers a discussion of these issues with special emphasis on cultural, ethnic, and socioeconomic factors which tend to characterize the lives of Latino and Black individuals. Recommendations are made for a re-evaluation of the traditional theories of personality when applied to poor and minority individuals.     

School discipline and disruptive classroom behavior: the moderating effects of student perceptions

This study examines the relationship between school discipline and student classroom behavior. A traditional deterrence framework predicts that more severe discipline will reduce misbehavior. In contrast, normative perspectives suggest that compliance depends upon commitment to rules and authority, including perceptions of fairness and legitimacy. Using school and individual-level data from the National Education Longitudinal Study of 1988 and multilevel regression modeling, the author finds support for the normative perspective. Students who perceive school authority as legitimate and teacher–student relations as positive are rated as less disruptive. While perceptions of fairness also predict lower disruptions, the effects are mediated by positive teacher–student relations. Contrary to the deterrence framework, more school rules and higher perceived strictness predicts more, not less, disruptive behavior. In addition, a significant interaction effect suggests that attending schools with more severe punishments may have the unintended consequence of generating defiance among certain youth.     

Advancement in social work education: fostering a supportive environment for students of non-dominant racial and ethnic backgrounds

Doctoral students from non-dominant racial and ethnic backgrounds continue to be underrepresented in programs of social work despite efforts to increase student diversity. This paper highlights the unique challenges experienced by non-dominant racial and ethnic students and offers suggestions for addressing retention and attrition concerns among these students across systems within doctoral social work programs. The authors identify structural inequalities, marginalization, discrimination, minority stress, and lack of support as potential barriers to student success. Suggestions for increasing diversity and retention are rooted in critical multiculturalism and involvement theory, emphasizing institutional change, socialization, recruitment, and social support.