By Dani Woodland
White students in Utah are outscoring minority students in statewide tests, and the state is working with minority groups to narrow that gap.
Utah Gov. Jon Huntsman established a group of community members from Utah?s different ethnic groups to study the issue, and their recommendations will go to the Legislature Tuesday.
The recommendations focus on closely monitoring student achievement. The group suggested the state form a permanent commission on student achievement that would help analyze student statistics and enforce statewide learning standards.
The 2004 Utah Criterion Reference Tests report that while about 80 percent of white students proved themselves proficient in language arts, only 60 percent of blacks and 50 percent of Hispanics were at that level. Similar discrepancies were evident in both math and science as well.
But tackling the gap may prove harder than instituting statewide learning standards.
Students who grew up with these achievement differences said the problem is more personal than institutional.
Brooke Ollerton, a Provo High graduate from a Honduran family, said teachers seem to expect less of minority students. Teachers assume that children of immigrants do not understand an assignment, and consequently let the student slide by with failing work, she said.
?It?s closet racism,? Ollerton said. ?It?s not hatred, but it?s almost as destructive because they?re held to a lower standard.?
Ollerton said she noticed a huge difference in her learning ability once she encountered the teachers at BYU.
?Getting to BYU and taking classes from professors who really cared about the subject, and who really wanted to teach it, made a big difference,? Ollerton said. ?I could learn from someone who cared about the subject and who cared that I learned.?
Marcus McCoy, president of BYU?s Black Student Union, agreed with Ollerton that learning is largely based on the teacher. McCoy attended a Louisiana high school with a predominantly black student population. The teachers, however, were white.
?The teaching style was kind of culturally biased,? McCoy said. ?They would teach based on their culture when the students that they were teaching were from a different culture, so they might not understand what the teacher is trying to convey.?
McCoy said racial prejudice in Louisiana plays a role in the institutions that should help students succeed.
?It all goes back to the teachers,? he said. ?They need to find a way to motivate their students to break those barriers that they have against them.?
Change in the government?s approach to achievement is a good place to start, said Rosemary Smith, the principal at Amelia Earhart Elementary School in Provo.
Smith said the main factor that leads to poor achievement with minority students is the language barrier, and right now the government expects too much of new English-speakers. Currently, the federal government wants schools to test immigrant students one year after their arrival in the United States.
?They?re not ready for the achievement levels that are expected of them,? Smith said. ?They?re expected to be the same as other kids, and we can enable them to get there, I believe, but they may not always be there when they?re expected to be there.?