An Argument Against Multicultural Education

Admittedly, multiculturalism is a separate topic from most schools curriculum which makes critics and teachers believe it is not needed nor is it a real thing. Stephanie Spina in a 1997 opinion paper “What’s In a Name? An Argument Against ‘Multicultural’ Education,” addresses the common belief that multicultural education is only towards students from another race than the dominant group. Therefore, multicultural courses or agendas are put to the outer limits or on the edge of discussion (3). She further details that this “neutralizes conflict” and “depreciates the significance of struggle” (3). For example, ethnic programs are present but they are located on the edge of the institutions, they are not heard of or densely populated in class …show more content…
A teachers’ values, perceptions, and the style one may teach their future classroom can all be influenced by the educators in teacher programs. In “Multicultural Teacher Education: Examining the Perceptions, Practices, and Coherence in One Teacher Preparation Program,” professors Lori Czop Assaf, Ruben Garza, and Jennifer Battle at Texas State University in San Marcos, Texas in the College of Education noted how practices to incorporate multicultural ways in the program can be superficial (116). For instance, one practice is having future teachers add one or two courses that attempt a multicultural perspective that involve learning to say hello in different languages or sampling different foods from different cultures. Likewise, these practices agree with Spina’s argument of the superficial idea of multiculturalism. Multiculturalism is about life and preparing students to know how to interact with people in their communities and around the world. A simple hello in Spanish or French doesn’t do its justice when learning about different cultures. However, Assaf, Garza, and Battle state how these practices occur because educators and future teachers have very “different ideas about multicultural perspectives on teaching and teacher education and how important they are” (116). In order to add on more effective practices to gain a multicultural perspective, …show more content…
It means that teacher educators at higher institutes can “build a shared vision of good teaching, strive for and identify a central focus for teaching learning, be collectively responsible, and to have the opportunities to influence policies and practices” (116). When all teacher educators strive for one goal and build coherence towards multicultural education it will benefit the new teachers further in their career. To build this coherence certain frameworks can be used such as conceptual framework. Research cited on this particular framework was designed by Cochran-Smith in 2003 suggesting this can be the main tool for multicultural teacher education when establishing a coherent program (see fig. 1). Conceptual frameworks are needed to help clarify differing underlying assumptions such as sorting out differences between theory and practice. The design of the framework is organized by identifying the varied meanings of multicultural teacher education. Cochran-Smith organizes the framework “around seven key questions that relate to issues of diversity, ideology, knowledge, teacher learning, teacher practice, outcomes and teacher candidate selection” (117). The main idea of the seven questions is to gather it to a final overall question, which is how does each question relate and connect to one another? Similarly, different perspectives of multiculturalism can relate