An Exploratory Study of Change in Teachers' Attitudes Toward Intergroup Relations in the Classroom During the First Year of Desegregation in the Kansas City, Missouri, Public Schools PDF Download

Author: Constance Burkhardt Nelson
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Attitude (Psychology)
Languages : en
Pages : 888

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Book Description
As an increasing number of social scientists have pointed out, the process of desegregation in the public schools presents a rare opportunity for basic social science research. Whereas it has been illegal in seventeen border and southern states for white and negro children to attend the same schools, now in many communities it is legal for them to do so. In March, 1955, the Kansas City, Missouri Board of Education implemented the 1954 Supreme Court decision by announcing that all of its schools would be desegregated as of September 1, 1955. Here was a clear-cut change in administrative policy which would bring about changes in local schools and in individual classrooms. One might say that a desegregated classroom would be a "ready-made social laboratory" where one might study what happens when people of different races meet and begin to work together. This study focused on the teacher who was assumed to be one of the key persons in such a transitional period. Since he was in close touch, not only with students but also with other teachers, parents, and many persons in the larger community, it seemed evident that his attitudes would be important in determining how desegregation of schools might work out. This was an exploratory "experimental" study, testing in the fall and in the spring (with both quantitative and qualitative instruments) teachers' attitudes toward intergroup relations in their classrooms during the first year of desegregation in the Kansas City, Missouri, public schools, 1955-56. The subjects were 114 teachers of both white and negro races who taught in the first and sixth grades. The "control group" was composed of those teaching in segregated classrooms; the "experimental group", those teaching in desegregated classrooms. This study seeks to explore two questions: 1. Will there be change in teachers' attitudes toward intergroup relations in their classrooms during this first year of desegregation? 2. What are some of the socio-psychological correlates of this change or lack of change in attitudes? The major hypothesis of this study was that there would be a significant difference in desegregated and segregated teachers' change in attitudes toward intergroup relations in their classrooms. This hypothesis, tested with the "Intergroup Relations Test", was confirmed. The nature of this difference was that more of the desegregated teachers became "inconsistent" in their attitudes during the year and their actual change scores were higher than were those of the segregated teachers. It was not concluded that desegregation operated automatically "out there" to effect change "within" the teacher. Rather, it was suggested that the "induced force" of desegregation had interacted with the teachers' "own forces" (i.e., values, concept of the teacher's role, etc.) and immediate classroom "situational" factors (here, the three intergroup problem areas built into the test), to gring about such change. It seemed feasible that a break-up in former attitudes had begun and that clarification and in-service training during such a transitional period might help toward more "favorable" attitude change. It was postulated that many conditions reported in the literature to facilitate "favorable" attitude change were probably not present during this first year of desegregation. The four secondary hypotheses concerned the relationship between attitude change and seleced socio-psychological variables: grade-taught, race of teacher, "authoritarianism" (Fall "F" score), and age, years-taught, and mobility of the teacher. With few exceptions, these variables were shown to be not significantly related to attitude change in this study. Utilizing qualitative data from interviews, which were held with a representative sample of the teachers, several hypotheses were suggested for further research. It was postulated that such interpersonal variables as equal-status contacts (made possible by integrating faculties), strong local administrative support, and favorable group norms at the local level may be important concomitants of "attitude change", as compared with the relatively "static" socio-psychological variables studied here.