William F. Tate

Bio: William F. Tate is an academic researcher from Washington University in St. Louis. The author has contributed to research in topics: Connected Mathematics & Reform mathematics. The author has an hindex of 22, co-authored 53 publications receiving 6999 citations. Previous affiliations of William F. Tate include University of Washington & University of Wisconsin-Madison.

Toward a Critical Race Theory of Education.

Abstract: The goal of this chapter goal is to map critical race theory (CRT) scholarship in education over the past decade and draw this map with respect to larger conceptual categories of the scholarship on CRT, primarily focusing on the ideas applied from CRT in legal studies. The chapter focuses primarily on the past 10 years and creates "spatial" markers based on the view of significant features in the literature. Some of these markers are whiteness as property, counternarrative, and interest convergence. Others are newly-represented such as microaggressions, intersectionality, and research methods. From the perspective of far too many students of color in schools, we are STILL not saved. While the chapter outlines several recommendations for CRT scholarship to move forward, perhaps the most important recommendation is to collectively seek to ensure that CRT becomes more than an intellectual movement.

Race-Ethnicity, SES, Gender, and Language Proficiency Trends in Mathematics Achievement: An Update

Abstract: The purpose of this article is to document changes in U.S. mathematics achievement by reviewing national trend studies, college admissions examinations, and Advanced Placement tests. This article examined this quantitative research literature to determine trends in mathematics achievement of various social groups defined along lines of race, class, gender, ethnicity, and language proficiency. The findings of this review indicate that over the last 15 years all demographic groups have improved in mathematics achievement-specifically, in basic skills. Moreover, the mathematics achievement gap is slowly closing between White students and students of color on assessments of basic skills. Males tended to outperform females on standardized measures; however, gender differences were small and generally not significant. Consistent with past reviews of mathematics achievement, course taking was a powerful variable, often resulting in similar achievement gains across diverse groups. This finding has serious implications for equity-related policy. The article concludes with two other recommendations: the need for fiscal and cultural policy to support standards-based reform. The Curriculum and Evaluation Standards for School Mathematics and the Professional Standards for Teaching Mathematics together provide a vision of mathematical goals that have been adopted by a large majority of state departments of education in the United States (Massell, 1994; NCTM, 1989, 1991). In support of these two documents, the philosophical background of the Assessment Standards for School Mathematics (NCTM, 1995) states the following:

Returning to the Root: A Culturally Relevant Approach to Mathematics Pedagogy.

Abstract: (1995). Returning to the root: A culturally relevant approach to mathematics pedagogy. Theory Into Practice: Vol. 34, Culturally Relevant Teaching, pp. 166-173.

Addressing the Disproportionate Representation of Culturally and Linguistically Diverse Students in Special Education

Abstract: In this article, we present a conceptual framework for addressing the disproportionate representation of culturally and linguistically diverse students in special education. The cornerstone of our approach to addressing disproportionate representation is through the creation of culturally responsive educational systems. Our goal is to assist practitioners, researchers, and policy makers in coalescing around culturally responsive, evidence-based interventions and strategic improvements in practice and policy to improve students’ educational opportunities in general education and reduce inappropriate referrals to and placement in special education. We envision this work as cutting across three interrelated domains: policies, practices, and people. Policies include those guidelines enacted at federal, state, district, and school levels that influence funding, resource allocation, accountability, and other key aspects of schooling. We use the notion of practice in two ways, in the instrumental sense of daily practices that all cultural beings engage in to navigate and survive their worlds, and also in a technical sense to describe the procedures and strategies devised for the purpose of maximizing students’ learning outcomes. People include all those in the broad educational system: administrators, teacher educators, teachers, community members, families, and the children whose opportunities we wish to improve.

Whose culture has capital? A critical race theory discussion of community cultural wealth

Abstract: This article conceptualizes community cultural wealth as a critical race theory (CRT) challenge to traditional interpretations of cultural capital. CRT shifts the research lens away from a deficit view of Communities of Color as places full of cultural poverty disadvantages, and instead focuses on and learns from the array of cultural knowledge, skills, abilities and contacts possessed by socially marginalized groups that often go unrecognized and unacknowledged. Various forms of capital nurtured through cultural wealth include aspirational, navigational, social, linguistic, familial and resistant capital. These forms of capital draw on the knowledges Students of Color bring with them from their homes and communities into the classroom. This CRT approach to education involves a commitment to develop schools that acknowledge the multiple strengths of Communities of Color in order to serve a larger purpose of struggle toward social and racial justice.

Adding It Up: Helping Children Learn Mathematics

Abstract: Adding It Up explores how students in pre-K through 8th grade learn mathematics and recommends how teaching, curricula, and teacher education should change to improve mathematics learning during these critical years. The committee identifies five interdependent components of mathematical proficiency and describes how students develop this proficiency. With examples and illustrations, the book presents a portrait of mathematics learning: * Research findings on what children know about numbers by the time they arrive in pre-K and the implications for mathematics instruction. * Details on the processes by which students acquire mathematical proficiency with whole numbers, rational numbers, and integers, as well as beginning algebra, geometry, measurement, and probability and statistics. The committee discusses what is known from research about teaching for mathematics proficiency, focusing on the interactions between teachers and students around educational materials and how teachers develop proficiency in teaching mathematics.

Just what is critical race theory and what's it doing in a nice field like education?

Abstract: Critical race theory (CRT) first emerged as a counterlegal scholarship to the positivistand liberal legal discourse of civil rights. This scholarly tradition argues against the slow pace of racial reform in the United States. Critical race theory begins with the notion that racism is normal in American society. It departs from mainstream legal scholarship by sometimes employing storytelling. It critiques liberalism and argues that Whites have been the primary beneficiaries of civil rights legislation.Since schooling in the USA purports to prepare citizens, CRT looks at how citizenship and race might interact. Critical race theory's usefulness in understanding education inequity is in its infancy. It requires a critique of some of the civil rights era's most cherished legal victories and educationalreform movements, such as multiculturalism. The paper concludes with words of caution about the use of CRT in education without a more thorough analysis of the legal literature upon which it is based.

But That’s Just Good Teaching! : The Case for Culturally Relevant Pedagogy

Abstract: (1995). But that's just good teaching! The case for culturally relevant pedagogy. Theory Into Practice: Vol. 34, Culturally Relevant Teaching, pp. 159-165.

Critical Race Theory, Racial Microaggressions, and Campus Racial Climate: The Experiences of African American College Students.

Abstract: Microaggressions are subtle insults (verbal, nonverbal, and/or visual) directed toward people of color, often automatically or unconsciously. Using critical race theory as a framework, the study described in this article provides an examination of racial microaggressions and how they influence the collegiate racial climate. Using focus group interview data from African American students at three universities, it reveals that racial microaggressions exist in both academic and social spaces in the collegiate environment. The study shows how African American students experience and respond to racial microaggressions. It also demonstrates how racial microaggressions have a negative impact on the campus racial climate. ... one must not look for the gross and obvious. The subtle, cumulative miniassault is the substance of today's racism... (Pierce, 1974, p. 516) In and of itself a microaggression may seem harmless, but the cumulative burden of a lifetime of microaggressions can theoretically contribute to diminished mortality, augmented morbidity, and flattened confidence. (Pierce, 1995, p. 281) These two epigraphs by psychiatrist Chester Pierce over a 21-year period speak volumes about an important, persistent, and underresearched social problem in the United States: racial microaggressions. Little is known about microaggressions, and yet this subtle form of racism has a dramatic impact on the lives of African Americans. Pierce and his colleagues have defined racial microaggressions as "subtle, stunning, often automatic, and nonverbal exchanges which are 'put downs' of blacks by offenders" (Pierce, Carew, Pierce-Gonzalez, & Wills, 1978, p. 66). They further maintain that these "offensive mechanisms used against blacks often are innocuous" and that the "cumulative weight of their never-ending burden is the major ingredient in black-white interactions" (p. 66). Additionally, Davis (1989) defined racial microaggressions as "stunning, automatic acts of disregard that stem from unconscious attitudes of white superiority and constitute a verification of black inferiority" (p. 1576). Racial microaggressions, or unconscious and subtle forms of racism, though pervasive, are seldom investigated (Delgado & Stefancic, 1992; Johnson, 1988; Lawrence, 1987; Sol6rzano, 1998). Occasionally, African American students get a glimpse into the world of unconscious racism as demonstrated in comments such as those related to us by students who participated in the study described in this article: "When I [a White person] talk about those Blacks, I really wasn't talking about you," "You [a Black person] are not like the rest of them. You're different," "If only there were more of them [Black people] like you [a Black person]," and "I don't think of you [a Black person] as Black." Referring to White authority figures in particular (i.e., judges and other criminal justice authorities), Davis (1989) has suggested that Whites are capable of such utterances because "cognitive habit, history, and culture [have made them] unable to hear the range of relevant voices and grapple with what reasonably might be said in the voice of discrimination's victims" (p. 1576). Subsequently, as Pierce (1974) maintained, each Black person "must be taught to recognize these microaggressions and construct his future by taking appropriate action at each instance of recognition" (p. 520). RACE, RAcism, AND RACIAL MICROAGGRESSIONS Our study of the collegiate racial climate and the effect of racial microaggressions begins by defining race and racism. One can argue that dominant groups often attempt to legitimate their position via ideological means or a set of beliefs that explains or justifies some actual or potential social arrangement. According to Banks (1995), an examination of U.S. history reveals that the "color line" of race is a socially constructed category, created to differentiate racial groups and to show the superiority or dominance of one race-in particular, Whites-over others. …