Bias in the classroom starts young
Many civil rights movements went into the how people are viewed today. What would the world still be like if African Americans never gained their freedom? People may say it would be crazy but in ways it’s still like this today just not as extreme. Or has the world really even changed since then?
Many people have implicit bias or also known as a bias toward something without even thinking that you're judging that person or scenario. Everyday someone has an implicit bias; however, research shows that this bias against people can start as early as preschool with the teachers having an implicit bias towards their African American students.
A recent study taken in June “stated that black students are nearly four times as likely to be suspended as white students, and nearly twice as likely to be expelled” (Young). Teachers have an implicit bias towards their black students which can often lead to lower expectations for the student and students getting referred to gifted programs.
A school had teachers sign up to view different videos on preschoolers and to detect the challenging behavior that may or may not be there. The conductor of this experimenter states that “while the teachers were asked to detect “challenging behavior”, no such behavior existed in any of the videos. Yet when asked which children required the most attention, 42 percent of the teachers identified the black boy” (Young). This shows how teachers have an implicit bias against their black students. No unruly behavior was occurring during the video but still almost half the teachers thought a black child was causing trouble.
So while these results are saddening they are true. People do automatically assume before they know the truth. This happens all throughout aspects of life, not just in racial discriminations. If someone doesn’t have the nicest of clothes on we assume their poor, if someone is pretty, they can’t be smart, and so many more stereotypes are happening in the world around us.
