Developing a Culture of Resilience for Low-Income Immigrant Youth

Developing a Culture of Resilience for Low-IncomeImmigrant Youth

Noah Borrero • Diane Sookyoung Lee •

Amado M. Padilla

Published online: 13 November 2012

� Springer Science+Business Media New York 2012

Abstract This study explores a story of success at a school where low-income,

English language learners (ELLs) comprise a majority of its students. In this paper,

we examine Bay Academy’s teaching and organizational practices that make it a

place where youth feel they belong and can succeed. Central to this description is its

culture of college, community- and family-involvement, and structural components

including the leadership team and innovative programming. We approach this

research from an ecological perspective of learning, and focus our analysis on the

Academy’s success in creating opportunities for students to develop academic

resilience. We present our findings in an attempt to share the successes of this

school as a model for educating students from similar backgrounds in similar

contexts.

Keywords Resilience � Ecological theory � Academic achievement �Immigrant youth

N. Borrero (&)

School of Education, University of San Francisco, 2130 Fulton Street,

San Francisco, CA 94117, USA

e-mail: [email protected]

D. S. Lee � A. M. Padilla

Developmental and Psychological Sciences, School of Education, Stanford University,

CERAS 202, Stanford, CA 94305, USA

e-mail: [email protected]

A. M. Padilla

e-mail: [email protected]

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DOI 10.1007/s11256-012-0215-4

Introduction

There is no doubt that an achievement gap exists between majority group students

and students of color in our public schools. Further, immigrant students and more

specifically immigrant students who are English language learners (ELLs), comprise

a significant, growing number of students on the low end of this gap (Garcıa and

Jensen 2009; Reardon and Galindo 2009). Amid all of the research documenting

this, there is relatively little research examining contexts in which ELLs are

succeeding academically. We believe that such research is vital to better-understand

the complexity of students’ experiences in our public schools, and to begin to

counter the deficit language inherent in discussions of the achievement gap (e.g.

Borrero and Yeh 2010). This paper documents a story of success at the ground

level—a public school in California where students of color (predominantly ELLs)

are not just passing state-mandated achievement tests, but are doing so because (not

in spite) of their sense of ethnic identity.

Bay Academy1 is a public charter school serving students in grades K-12 in a

predominantly immigrant community in Northern California. One hundred percent

of the Academy’ students are youth of color, approximately half of them are ELLs,

and over 90 % of them qualify for free or reduced lunch. In Californian schools, the

academic performance and growth of schools is measured through a standardized

test that students take annually and represented by an Academic Performance Index,

or API score. The Academy has an API score in the mid 800’s—a score comparable

to affluent schools in the area with largely majority group enrollments. More

important than test scores, however, is the college-going culture that youth at the

Bay Academy embrace. One hundred percent of the Academy’s first three

graduating classes (2010–2012) were admitted to college upon graduation. All of

the Bay Academy are first-generation college-bound students in their families.

Through data gathered from participant observation, focus-groups, and inter-

views, this study focuses on describing the core teaching and organizational

elements of the Bay Academy’s school culture that make it a place where youth feel

they belong and can succeed. Central to this description is the Academy’s focus on

family-involvement and students’ ability to achieve. We approach this research

from an ecological perspective (Bronfenbrenner 1990) of learning, and focus our

analysis on the Academy’s success in creating opportunities for students to develop

academic resilience (Luthar 2003). We add to previous research that has looked at

the instructional and structural resources in place at schools that predominantly

serve ethnic minorities in urban school contexts (e.g. Pressley et al. 2004) and

underachieving students who struggle with literacy (Pressley et al. 2006). We build

upon their findings by discussing the successes of a school that primarily serves

Latino students with a number of similar and different risk factors, including ELL

status and low-income background. Our study examines how teachers and school

leaders can create a culture that supports students who were once on the track to

failure, transforming them into college-going students. We present our findings in

order to share an effective model for educating students from similar backgrounds.

1 Pseudonyms are used to protect the identities of the school, community, staff, teachers, and students.

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Theoretical Framework

The ecological system framework suggested by Bronfenbrenner has long provided a

conceptual basis for studies on resilience, including those investigating the influence

of family and school on the academic achievement of children from high risk

backgrounds (Garcia Coll and Szalacha 2004; Lee and Bowen 2006; Taylor and

Wang 2000). In this framework, Bronfenbrenner proposes that a child’s environ-

ment consists of five different layers: the microsystem or immediate influences on

the child such as family, the mesosystem as constituted by connections between

elements of the microsystem, the exosystem including the indirect influence of

larger social systems such as parent employment, the macrosystem that is the

outermost layer that includes culture, and the chronosystem which is the dimension

of change over time. Each layer changes dynamically through bidirectional

interactions that flow toward and away from the child, who is at the center of

influence (Berk 2000). A child’s learning is shaped by the interaction within and

among nested levels of influence, which vary in proximity to the child.

According to Bronfenbrenner, learning results from the interaction between the

student and complex ‘‘layers’’ of the environment, including his or her immediate

and distant surroundings. Each of these layers contains protective and risk factors

that work together and can shape a child’s school achievement. Students who are

able to optimize their protective factors and perform well in school despite less than

ideal circumstances are called resilient. As will be discussed in this paper, the

students at Bay Academy have consistently demonstrated resilience through a

protective, college-going school culture. We define resilience as a pattern of positive

adaptation in the context of significant adversity or risk (Masten and Obradovic

2006; Masten and Reed 2002).

The Construct of Resilience

The construct of resilience rests on the existence of two factors: risk factors and

protective factors, both of which reside within the child’s multiple spheres of

influence in Bronfenbrenner’s ecological model. Risk factors are measurable

characteristics among a group of individuals or their situation that predict a higher

probability of a specific negative outcome (Masten and Reed 2002). Among the

many challenges Bay Academy faces daily is a high poverty rate among its large

immigrant population. As a consequence, the school has higher percentages of ELLs

and students receiving free-reduced lunch than the state average.

Protective factors, on the other hand, offset risk factors to help students display

positive adaptation in the face of adversity. These factors are qualities of a person or

context that predict better outcomes among struggling youth (Masten and Reed

2002). According to research, students are more likely to be resilient in classrooms

that foster agency and warm relationships (Doll et al. 2004). Such classrooms

promote agency by nurturing students’ academic efficacy, self-determination, and

self-control. These classrooms also promote supportive relationships that extend

into students’ various social groups, including their teachers, peers, and family

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(Borrero 2011; Valenzuela 1999). In the following section we discuss Bay

Academy’s risk and protective factors in light of the current literature on resilience.

Examining Academic Risk at Bay Academy

One of the defining characteristics of the Bay Academy’s student body is that it

entirely consists of ethnic minorities, with approximately 50 % speaking English as

a second language and 90 % coming from low-income backgrounds. Statewide

statistics suggest that students from such backgrounds are at risk for lower academic

achievement. In California, ELLs’ academic achievement, as measured by the

California Standards Tests (CSTs) and California High School Exit Exam

(CAHSEE), falls short of the state average (EdSource 2008). Data from the

California Department of Education (CDE) demonstrate that while only 15 % of all

high school students in California are ELLs, they account for 33 % of all 68,000

high school dropouts (EdSource 2008). Furthermore, the academic risks associated

with being an ELL are usually compounded by the risks of low socioeconomic

status. According to California Legislative Analyst’s Office’s 2007 report, 85 % of

ELLs in California qualified for free and reduced lunch, while only 41 % of non-

ELLs were economically disadvantaged.

Bay Academy is located within a neighborhood in California called Bay City,

which has long had a history of drugs, murder, violence, and low educational

attainment. Over the years, residents of Bay City have actively fought to protect

their families against the possible consequences of risks. When an explosion of

crack/cocaine hit the city, residents stood on street corners and hotspots in order to

petition against illegal street vending (Dreams of a City 2003). Community leaders

responded to increasing poverty rates by initiating the Gateway 101 project,

building its first major shopping center atop the site of the former high school that

was closed in the 1970s as part of the school district’s school desegregation plan to

increase tax revenue. Community members sought to improve Bay City education

in the past by initiating various projects relevant to both education and social

change, including alternative schools like Nairobi College in the 1970s. The impact

of such efforts has not been sustained, however, and Bay City schools continue to

lag far behind other Bay area public schools. Today, students at Bay City public

schools are still exhibiting low levels of academic achievement. A recent city census

reported that 30.7 % of students in the Bay City school district drop out before

entering high school (U.S. Census Bureau 2000a, b).

Though Bay City continues to battle old challenges such as poverty, drugs, and

crime; it has also recently turned its attention to newer concerns, such as providing

quality education for its children (see Borrero 2011; Paris 2010). In the midst of the

City’s gradual move towards improving its education, Bay Academy stands apart in

how it is enabling students to achieve at a high level.

Examining Protective Factors at Bay Academy

While academic resilience refers to the pattern of positive academic achievement in

the face of risk, academic efficacy, or confidence in one’s abilities to learn

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effectively, is one aspect of agency that can promote academic resilience (Doll et al.

2004). Students with strong academic efficacy believe that they can attain desired

outcomes through personal effort, and are therefore willing to not only set

challenging goals, but also persist while attempting to attain them (Bandura 1997).

Pressley et al. (2006) explored the construct of academic efficacy in their study of

elementary and middle school students with histories of school failure. The

researchers demonstrated the importance of successful experiences and an emphasis

on student effort in building academic efficacy, thus increasing students’ overall

school achievement. High efficacy contributes to achievement by increasing

attention, memory, engagement, and commitment to appropriately challenging tasks

(Doll et al. 2004). Favorable school outcomes can also be fostered at the group level

through acts of collective academic efficacy, through different forms of encour-

agement among group members or vicarious mastery experiences (Bandura 1997).

In such environments, students take on more challenging tasks by using supports

within the classroom that make success more likely.

While internal assets like academic efficacy can shape students’ classroom

experiences, classroom experiences also foster academic efficacy by providing

students with a context where they can build meaningful relationships with teachers,

peers, and importantly with family members. Positive relationships with teachers

and peers motivate students to do well in school (Krovetz 2008; Pressley et al.

2006). Teachers can promote resilience by maintaining high expectations and clear

classroom structures and boundaries while at the same time being warm and

responsive to their students (Doll et al. 2004). Students who enjoy supportive

friendships value and pursue shared goals and feel more engaged in learning as an

important member of the class (Doll et al. 2004). Teachers can facilitate this process

by maximizing cooperation and promoting the advantages that come from working

in groups.

Bay Academy has optimized internal assets and extended external assets by

acting as a connective force between students’ home and school lives. Families

promote their children’s academic achievement by reinforcing values and expec-

tations consistent with their school lives, setting clear rules and guidelines for their

students’ work, and providing them with resources that support their learning (Doll

et al. 2004). Teachers and staff members facilitate a strong home-school relationship

by encouraging students to share and learn about their cultural lives at school

(Borrero and Bird 2009) by communicating with parents on a regular basis, and by

recommending positive parenting practices. Schools that foster resilience also

provide ways for parents to get involved in their child’s education, such as

participating in parent-teacher conferences, assisting at school events, and

monitoring their student’s schoolwork on a consistent basis.

By ‘‘continually seek[ing] educational partners, community volunteers and parent

participation to support their goals’’ (EPACS 2011), Bay Academy employs

protective community assets that reside in the outer layers of Bronfenbrenner’s

ecological model. City residents, parents, volunteers, and partners have collaborated

to expand facilities and programs for Bay Academy students. Student volunteers

from a local university tutor Bay Academy students, and members of local

community agencies and non-profits assist them with their applications to private

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high schools and/or college. Similarly, a local church organization holds annual

volunteer events to create and improve school facilities. Through Bay Academy’s

example, we learn that schools and families are not enough; it takes a ‘‘village’’ to

raise a child who is interested in learning and performing at high levels. Community

support allows ‘‘families to operate out of strength’’ within the school as they form

partnerships around a shared commitment to educating their children (Benson et al.

1998).

The purpose of this study was to examine the teaching practices and

organizational structure of a K-12 school that takes great strides in developing a

culture of resilience. In particular, we explore the school qualities that have

contributed to the high academic achievement of students from high-risk

backgrounds, characterized by high poverty, immigration, limited English language

proficiency, and community violence.

Method

The Community and the Academy

Bay City, the community served by the Bay Academy, has approximately 34,000

residents. Approximately 40.5 % report that they were born in another country and

67.5 % speak a language other than English in the home (United States Census

Bureau 2009).

Of the residents, 55 % indicate that they are Hispanic/Latino, 20 % are African

American, 8 % are Pacific Islanders, 5 % Asian, and 11 % Other Race (United

States Census Bureau 2009). Like many other cities in Northern California, Bay

City is a community in transition. In 1990, approximately 50 % of the city’s

residents were African American and this number has continually decreased while

the number of Latinos (primarily Mexican immigrants) has continually risen.

The local school district, which grants the Bay Academy its charter, serves

approximately 5,000 students in grades K-8 and includes 10 school sites. The public

high school was closed in the 1970’s as part of a desegregation plan. Since then,

students from Bay City have been forced to attend neighboring high schools for

grades 9–12. For some students, this means riding a bus for up to 45 min each way.

This has had severe negative consequences since students are generally not able to

participate in after school activities and are not perceived as members of the

surrounding school community.

The Bay Academy is comprised of two sites in Bay City. The K-8 site is located

at the end of a residential block off of the main street in the city, and the 9–12 site is

less than one mile away. The K-8 school was founded in 1996 after a group of

parent activists sought an alternative school for their children that would foster high

quality education in their community, because the district schools had not been able

to do so. The school existed as an independent charter school for 7 years, and in

2004 it joined with a larger organization of charter schools operating in California.

The high school extension of the Bay Academy was opened 4 years ago and

graduated its first high school class in 2010. The high school has been housed in a

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nearby industrial park complex, but parent enthusiasm and push by school personnel

broke ground to build a new high school in the community.

The Academy serves 560 students in grades K-12. Eighty percent of students are

Latino, 14 % are African American, and 5 % are Pacific Islander. Approximately

90 % of the students qualify for free or reduced lunch at the school. Figure 1

compares the percentage of students receiving free or reduced lunch at Bay

Academy, the other K-8 schools in the district, and the State as a whole. With

between 80 and 90 % students over the last 5 years receiving free or reduced lunch,

it is clear the schools are marked by extreme poverty.

There are 40 paid staff members of the Academy including 31 teachers. The staff

is predominantly White non-Hispanic with the exception of 6 Latino/as and 3

African Americans. Approximately 8 staff members are Spanish–English bilinguals.

However, as stated above, the school composition is marked by a large ELL

population. Figure 2 shows the percentage of ELLs enrolled in Bay Academy and in

the other schools in the district for the period between 1999 and 2009. As can be

seen, the proportion of ELLs was just under 50 % in 2009, which is below the

percentage of ELLs in the district. It is not clear what accounts for this discrepancy,

except possibly that Bay Academy does not have a bilingual education focus and

may thus draw Latino parents who want their children to benefit from a school with

a strong academic reputation regardless of whether it offers a specific bilingual

program. Overall, the schools in this community have between 2 and 3 times the

number of ELLs than the statewide average.

As measured by the Standardized Testing and Reporting (STAR) system in

California, Bay Academy has continually improved test scores over the past decade.

As shown in Fig. 3 the current API score of 847 is nearly 200 points higher than the

average API score for the district and the advantage increased over the preceding

decade. In addition, the API scores at Bay Academy are higher than the state average—

a trend that has continued over the last 5 years. Importantly, the school boasts a 100 %

Fig. 1 Free-reduced lunch

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pass rate for 10th graders taking the California Exit Exam for the first time. As

mentioned earlier, all of the graduating seniors have been accepted to 4-year colleges.

Data Collection and Analysis

As part of a larger research study, we collected data over the course of 2 years. The

three authors visited the school regularly and met with students, teachers,

administrators and parents. Data collection was purposeful and sequential, and took

place in collaboration with school personnel. Data collection began with observa-

tions of classrooms, which typically lasted from 2 to 4 h and included follow-up

conversations with teachers and students (Merriam 1988). These initial interviews

led to the development of our central questions: ‘‘What makes the Bay Academy

successful?’’ and ‘‘How is academic resilience communicated to students?’’ With the

Fig. 2 English language learners

Fig. 3 API scores

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suggestions and help of school personnel, we identified teachers and administrators

for interviews and from these initial interviews, we developed three focus groups—

teachers, administrators, and parents—of approximately 3–5 participants each. Focus

group sessions were facilitated by the researchers and lasted for approximately 1 h.

To begin data analysis, each member of the research team (the three authors)

independently indexed and reviewed field notes and recordings from focus groups

and interviews. We each read and reread interview and field notes independently

(Merriam 1988). We then began to find recurring units (Lincoln and Guba 1985)

from the data by identifying phrases, sentences, or longer quotes that answered our

central questions. From these units, we each developed categories that emerged

from the data (Glaser and Strauss 1967) and began to more specifically address

factors like school structures, parent involvement, and academic programming. This

‘‘open coding’’ was used to generate as many codes as possible.

As a team, we shared our preliminary codes and discussed general themes that

reflected these codes. Themes were defined as consistent patterns that emerged in

interviews that identified key administrative and/or instructional practices that were

mentioned as contributing to the academic success of students. These themes were

explored in depth (Strauss and Corbin 1998), and we each then re-read the interview

and field notes with these themes in mind. During this reading, we started more

selective coding—looking to identify distinctions within themes. We then met to

discuss final themes. The discussion lasted until consensus was reached, and themes

were later shared with and confirmed by representatives from the Bay Academy staff.

Findings

Community/Family Involvement

Since the school opened as a new charter school, there has been widespread parent

involvement and support. One parent in describing the school and its relationship to

the community stated:

The role that Bay has in the community is getting our children ready for

college. The school helps the kids want to better themselves and by bettering

themselves the kids will also help their families to improve themselves…The

strength of this community is in the families that live here. The families

support the school and want their children to go to school here. We see this in

the waiting list of families that want to have their kids at this school. Some

families wait 3–5 years just to have their kids come to this school.

One strategy for ensuring parental involvement is requiring all parents to complete

40 h or ‘‘effort units’’ at the school. Parents are required to complete 40 h at the

school and fulfill these ‘‘effort units’’ in many ways (e.g., working in the garden,

setting up before a school event, and helping teachers with projects that accompany

curriculum units). The school invites families, teachers, and other responsible adults

in the community to get involved in the school and communicates through its school

practices that everyone must do their part if a child is to be successful.

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By combining resources available within the community, the Academy

reinforces the idea that every child can succeed and that low socioeconomic status

is not an obstacle to success. As one parent said:

I want the kids to get a high quality education. I want them to realize that just

because you live in a poor community doesn’t mean you can’t succeed and go

to college. This is what I want kids to realize.

At the same time, families receive the message that school is not just an endeavor

involving the teacher and the student, but that the family is critical, since family

members can provide support to the school and the student in multiple ways. One

school administrator summed this up by indicating that because of efforts to

incorporate parents in their children’s education, parents now come to the teacher

and ask: ‘‘Okay, teacher, what should I do? I want to work with you. I see that my

child is stumbling when he/she is reading. What can I do to help?’’

Every Student Will Go to College

One of the defining characteristics of Bay Academy is its omnipresent belief that

every student will someday go to college. College-going is simply a part of the

discourse at the school, as teachers and administrators are purposeful in the ways

they infuse this expectation in day-to-day interactions with students. For example,

each classroom at Bay Academy is labeled with a university name (e.g., UCLA).

The children in the classroom are told about the college by their teacher and rather

than identifying by grade level, they identify as students of the university that their

classroom has adopted. Teachers often decorate their classrooms with photos,

memorabilia, and diplomas from their college, and use this foundation to

continually share their own experiences and expectations about college with their

students.

The idea that children will go to college is correlated with the higher

socioeconomic status of parents who play an important role in directing their

children along the pathway to college in such a manner that college just becomes a

natural part of the discourse around schooling (Auerbach 2004; Kane 2004).

Further, this parental ‘‘managing’’ begins early in the life of a middle class child and

continues until the child is off to college (Auerbach 2004). For children at Bay

Academy most parents are not high school graduates, many have only a rudimentary

proficiency in English, and virtually all are poor. So while many Bay Academy

parents hope that their children can someday go to college, most lack the knowledge

and resources to guide their children toward college (Kimura-Walsh et al. 2009).

Thus, teachers at the Bay Academy take on the parental role and begin

communicating with students about college as early as Kindergarten. As students

reach middle and high school grades, they attend presentations from college

counselors and admissions officers, visit local universities, and work on college

applications. This intentional focus on college is a central component of the cultural

context at Bay Academy.

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Leadership Team

Teachers, staff members, and administrators continually referred to the ‘‘Leadership

Team’’ when describing the core, structural elements of Bay Academy. The

Leadership Team is comprised of the site administrators (principals and vice

principals) and the ‘‘Lead Teacher’’ from each grade cluster. There is a Lead

Teacher for grades K-2, 3–5, 6–8, and 9–12. The Lead Teachers assume the

leadership role when grade clusters meet every week (with representation from each

grade level). The Team serves as both an administrative body, and a mechanism for

communication between grade levels and across the school sites.

All teachers were quick to acknowledge the Leadership Team as a foundational

element of the school, which not only made administrative decisions, but also ‘‘kept

the school together.’’ For example, new teachers were able to contribute to the

Academy’s success soon after joining the school by turning to the Leadership Team

and the Lead Teacher for direct support. Through grade cluster meetings and Lead

Teacher representation, new teachers also felt they had a voice on the staff and in

decision making processes.

Teachers also believed that the Leadership Team was critical to sustaining

commitment to academic achievement at Bay Academy. They explained that the

school was able to maintain its high academic performance despite high teacher

turnover rates (approximately 20 % per year)2 because of the commitment of the

Leadership Team and the core group of individuals who had been at the Academy

for a number of years. Bay Academy teachers and administrators work together to

make the Leadership Team an effective administrative body that promotes the long-

term vision and goals of the school, while also enabling all teachers to feel

connected to the Leadership Team through their Lead Teacher.

Innovative School-Wide Programming

The curriculum at the Bay Academy is based on the California State Standards and the

course requirements outlined by the University of California (i.e., A-G requirements)

necessary for admission to a public university. Also, while many students at the Bay

Academy begin school as English language learners there is not a bilingual education

program and all academic content is delivered only in English. Students are thus held

to the same academic and language arts standards as native English speakers. Over

time, teachers, parents, and students have engaged in dialogue of how to create

school-wide programs that would provide multiple options for student learning

outside of the traditional math, science, and humanities classes. A description of all of

the programs available to students at the Bay Academy is beyond the scope of this

article, but school personnel and students continually mentioned three programs:

Spanish, After-School Tutoring, and Garden. These innovative programs provide

learning opportunities in one way or the other for students regardless of grade level.

2 Although there is teacher turnover, this is not alarming because many of the teachers are young, first-

time educators who, after several years of teaching, desire to return to graduate or professional school

because they are drawn to increase their level of professional development to work in educational

administration or policy.

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The Spanish Program

Instruction in Spanish at Bay Academy has been in place since the school’s

beginning in 1996. It was a conscious decision on the part of parents, teachers, and

administrators that all students (native and non-native speakers) would take Spanish

each year starting in Kindergarten. The program is not to be confused with a

bilingual program, where students initially learn content in Spanish and gradually

transition into an English-only classroom as they acquire the language. The program

and its philosophy remains to date, with all students taking a grade appropriate

academic class in Spanish that focuses on reading, speaking, and writing (see

Borrero 2011 for details). The Spanish instruction is similar to an elementary

foreign language class for non-native Spanish speakers, but is taught as a language

arts class for Spanish speakers to bolster their proficiency in their home language.

In 2004, the Spanish program expanded to include the Young Interpreters

Program for students in grades 6–8. The goal of the Young Interpreters Program was

to enable bilingual students in the skills of translating and interpreting so that they

can become on-site interpreters between the largely English monolingual teaching

staff and the large Spanish speaking parent community. Students in this program

take classes in Spanish and English and learn about specific translating strategies

(like paraphrasing and note-taking); and they also participate in translating and

interpreting experiences at school (like the monthly newsletter from the principal to

parents and parent-teacher conferences). Teachers who commented on the

importance of the Spanish (and Young Interpreters) program noted how it was

central in communicating the message to students that their language and culture

were academic strengths and were important to the Bay Academy community.

The After-School Program

An after-school tutoring program focuses on literacy for students requiring extra time to

improve their reading. Every day, students can stay after school and work on homework,

read, and/or receive help from adult tutors who commit to them for the duration of the

school year. Many of the tutors come from a nearby university and develop relationships

with students over the year as they talk about what life is like at college, what it takes to

get accepted to college, and how important reading is for college success. The after-

school program is crowded every day and students know that they are expected to work.

Teachers spoke of the importance of the after-school program, not just as a safe and

productive space for students to do their homework, but also as an extension of their

classrooms. They knew they could count on tutors to support their academic and

behavioral expectations for students during the tutoring sessions. Students also spoke of

the after-school program as a time when they could receive individual help from

someone who knew them and cared about them getting their work done.

The School Garden

In 2000, what was once a vacant lot on the side of the K-8 school site was

transformed into an organic garden; and by 2003, the school had implemented a

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garden-based education program through the help of the Collective Roots Garden

Project. Students involved in the program learn about native and non-native plants,

gardening, landscaping, health, and nutrition. The garden-based education program

is integrated into the school curriculum so that K-5 teachers design science units that

meet varying State science standards. In the middle school grades (6th to 8th grades),

students can sign up for an elective class and engage in science-based activities,

cooking, and nutrition as part of garden class. For example, students handle and work

with the garden’s solar power equipment to learn about solar photosynthesis with

plants. In addition, the garden offers parents with an agricultural background an

opportunity to become involved as teachers or consultants.

The garden program offers a venue for students to feel comfortable and confident

in their abilities as learners. For example, when showing the school to visitors,

student tour guides (often members of the Young Interpreters Program) will

typically start in the garden. It is a visually striking part of the campus, and visitors

quickly notice that all of the plants are labeled—in English and Spanish. Again, this

small but important detail shows that the garden program embodies the larger vision

of the school—creating a school community where students feel confident and

competent about who they are and what they are learning.

Discussion

Bay Academy students who have typically been stereotyped as deficient (e.g. ELLs)

and ‘‘at risk’’, and for whom expectations of school achievement have been low are

showing that they can perform academically at high levels on State standardized

tests used to assess academic achievement. The striking performance levels of Bay

Academy students are interesting because, on the surface, the school is not doing

anything that one would not expect a school to be doing for its students. The K-12

curriculum is rigorous and conforms to the State standards in the core content areas.

In addition, at the high school all students take courses that meet the University of

California A-G requirements in order to complete graduation requirements. Further,

students are expected to perform at a high level despite their relative socioeconomic

disadvantage and the fact that many enter school as ELLs.

The salient differences at Bay Academy in comparison to surrounding public

schools is that students are socialized to the belief that college is in their future and

that it is easier said than done. In being socialized to expect college as a goal in their

academic careers, they gradually and systematically are guided by their teachers to

understand what going to college actually means and how the path to college

includes strong academic preparation that can only be achieved through hard work

and persistence. The success enjoyed by Bay Academy has evolved over time as the

leadership team and the administrators of the school have developed strategies and

programs to accommodate the special cultural and environmental needs and

strengths of the students, their families, and the community at large. In this paper,

we attribute Bay Academy’s success to a protective school culture that extends from

local levels of influence such as family to more global levels like cultural context.

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School Success and Academic Achievement

Students, teachers, staff, parents, and administrators take great pride in the success

of Bay Academy. There is no doubt that students’ academic achievement (as

measured by state-mandated tests) is taken very seriously by all who are involved in

the school community. As discussed above, much of this success is attributable to

the fact that students feel they belong, can succeed, and are cared for by adults on

campus (Benson, et al. 1998; Duncan-Andrade 2007; Valenzuela 1999). It is

important to note that this care does not come solely through trust and relationship-

building. This care also comes through rigorous academic expectations that teachers

hold for students (Camangian 2010; Pressley et al. 2006). Our findings show that

there are multiple, overlapping external assets in place that make the Bay Academy

a place where youth can develop the internal assets necessary to achieve success

(Benson et al. 1998). The ways in which these external assets impact youth are

complex and certainly not prescriptive. Additionally, these structures acknowledge

the different ecological contexts that students navigate as a part of their lives inside

and outside of school (Borrero and Yeh 2010; Lee 2003; Paris 2010). What is

central across the different core elements that we present above is a focus on high

expectations for all students and an inherent belief that all students can succeed. But

importantly, success has the same connotation for these students as it does for

middle class students in affluent communities—meaning that college is attainable if

one starts early enough and if hard work and persistence are coupled with the belief

that college is achievable (Auerbach 2004).

These expectations get played out in classrooms each day as students from

different cultural backgrounds with different learning styles and at different stages

of English language development work together with committed teachers and staff

members. The high academic expectations embodied by teachers are non-

negotiable, but they are also not ‘‘color-blind’’ (Nieto 2002). Teachers know that

students come to Bay Academy with different strengths and different challenges

(Borrero and Bird 2009). The core elements of the school that we present show that

philosophically, the Academy is unwilling to label students simply by what they

cannot do, or what ‘‘deficits’’ they have. So, instead of creating labels that may have

negative implications such as designating students as ELL or creating an English

Language Development (ELD) track that may segregate students, they focus on the

positive aspects of bilingualism with their Young Interpreters Program. This

attention to students’ language as a cultural asset and a part of students’ lived

experience is what attracts parents to this school site (Borrero 2011) and what leads

to student success. While the school does not offer a formal bilingual program

students’ bilingualism is enhanced through their cultural interactions across

ecological spaces. Similarly, students are treated, and expected to behave as young

scholars—instead of having an ‘‘after-school detention hall,’’ the school supports an

after-school tutoring program. This asset approach (Benson et al. 1998; Moll et al.

1992; Valenzuela 1999) to student diversity is central to the school’s mission of

valuing and motivating students to hold high academic standards for themselves.

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Implications

We have only focused on four themes from our data that are clearly representative

of much larger, deep-seated elements of the school culture at Bay Academy that

make it an outstanding learning environment for students where they are able to

develop academic resilience and overcome barriers that for similar students in other

schools appear insurmountable (Krovetz 2008; Pressley et al. 2006). We continue to

work with teachers and administrators at the school to learn more about the school

community and find ways to share some of the successes the school has to offer.

With this, we recognize that schools are cultural contexts influenced by many

different factors—many of which we cannot begin to describe in this paper. So, we

present these findings with the hope of sharing attributes of the Bay Academy with

other educators for their consideration and possible implementation in different

contexts (Borrero 2011; Pressley et al. 2004, 2006). We know that the Bay Academy

is a special place for students, but we do not claim to have found any answers to

questions about issues like the achievement gap or best practices for ELLs.

Further, we have not presented the voices of students in this paper. While we did

spend considerable time interviewing and observing students at the Bay Academy,

for this article we chose to focus on our work with teachers and administrators, and

the structural elements of the school that had the most impact on student success.

We use standardized test scores and completion of University of California A-G

requirements as markers of success here because they are the conventional

yardsticks used to measure achievement and discuss academic distinctions between

different ethnic/racial groups. We feel justified in using these measures to suggest

that Bay Academy is successful as are its students and to tell an important story of

Latino/a youth and their achievement (Nieto 2002). However, we realize the

limitations of these measures and use them merely as a starting point (see Martinez

2010) in the development of educational research and discourse that recognizes the

many strengths that youth of color bring to our public schools. Our intent is to show

that the Bay Academy is promoting a sense of academic belonging and efficacy that

is rooted in a focus on the cultural assets of the community (e.g. Borrero and Yeh

2010; Moll et al. 1992) and not the harmful, deficit-laden labels that follow so many

youth of color through school (Nieto 2002; Olsen 1997).

We also recognize that Bay Academy is a charter school, and this reality provides

opportunities and limitations in light of the findings we present above. For example,

because the school has significant autonomy of its operating budget, it is able to

prioritize much of the programming and staffing we describe above. Further, we

know that the dedicated groups of professionals that work at the Academy go above

and beyond the call of duty every day at school to make it the place it is. As one

teacher told us, ‘‘working here is not a job—it is a way of life.’’ This reality at a place

like Bay Academy leads to some of the successes we describe above, but also leads to

the attrition of ‘‘burnt out’’ teachers. In spite of these factors, we do know the larger

challenges of the Bay City community and we know that there are many different

schooling options for students. Any student can attend the Bay Academy and we are

certain that the school is not ‘‘skimming from the top’’—there are now several elite,

private schools in the community and in the surrounding area that do this.

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Although our findings are not generalizable to every school context, we do

believe through our research at the Academy that teachers are instilling a college

culture in youth from a very early age. Essentially, teachers at the Bay Academy are

doing for children of Color what many White middle-class parents do for their

children—they are making college attendance part of the academic dialogue

beginning in grade school (Kane 2004). That said, there are theoretical implications

that arise from this research. From an ecological perspective, students’ cultural

worlds are acknowledged (and even honored) at the Bay Academy in a way that

disrupts the cultural discontinuity that so many youth of color face at school (Nieto

2002; Tyler et al. 2008). For example, in the Young Interpreters Program, students

are encouraged to succeed academically for their burgeoning bilingualism. This

shift in perspective utilizes ecological theory in a way that shows that school

systems and structures can impact youths’ learning across multiple ecological

contexts and help them navigate the different cultural realities they experience daily

(Bronfenbrenner 1990; Borrero and Yeh 2010).

If students, teachers, administrators, and parents work together to harness the

multiple, varied, and fascinating learning contexts that youth encounter regularly,

and begin to see school as one (instead of the only) context that matters, more youth

of color will find ways to make connections between ecologies (e.g., Paris 2010).

This research suggests that the Bay Academy is making strides towards doing this in

an context where academic failure is the norm for students. The achievements of

Bay Academy show that there are academic success stories to be told of immigrant

youth in high-poverty communities. As researchers, we feel compelled to tell these

stories—not just to share effective models with other educators and practitioners,

but to combat the dominant educational discourse that continues to highlight the

achievement gap between White students and students of color. The Bay Academy

and its students offer testimony to the belief that students can embrace their cultural

identity, develop academic resilience, and succeed in school.

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