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A case study on African American parents' perceptions of Mandarin Dual Language Immersion Programs and the role social capital plays in student enrollment

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A case study on African American parents' perceptions of Mandarin Dual Language Immersion Programs and the role social capital plays in student enrollment

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Content Running head: AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 1

A CASE STUDY ON AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS’ PERCEPTIONS OF MANDARIN
DUAL LANGUAGE IMMERSION PROGRAMS AND THE ROLE SOCIAL CAPITAL
PLAYS IN STUDENT ENROLLMENT
by

Lawton Alexander Gray III

A Dissertation Presented to the
FACULTY OF THE USC ROSSIER SCHOOL OF EDUCATION
UNIVERSITY OF SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA
In Partial Fulfillment of the
Requirements for the Degree
DOCTOR OF EDUCATION

May 2018

Copyright 2018 Lawton Alexander Gray III

AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 2

Acknowledgements
I cannot say thank you enough or truly express my gratitude to my advisory, Dr. Artineh
Samkian, for her support, understanding and encouragement. Even though this dissertation took longer
than I expected to complete, she always had a way of encouraging, yet still pushing me to do my best to
produce a dissertation that I would be proud of. There were many times when I thought that completing
this dissertation was not possible, however, she encouraged me not to give up. Thus, with her guidance, I
was able to finish. I am eternally grateful to you, Dr. Samkian. Thank you so much!
To my amazing wife Melanie. Thank you for picking up the slack with the kids when I was not
able to be there for their events or when I needed time to write. You are such a strong woman and
understanding partner in life. I love you! To my wonderful children Lauren and Lawton, I thank you both
for all of your patience with me. Each summer, I had to leave our vacation in Palm Springs early to either
attend class or an event for school and you both were so gracious. I hope that in life, when you are ready
to have children, you both are lucky enough to have children as exceptional as the two of you. I am so
thankful to God for both of you.
To my mom and dad. I thank both of you for always believing in me and for encouraging me,
even when I did not feel like talking about how my dissertation was progressing. And mom yes I know, “I
can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.” And to my in-laws, Oscar and Kathy, thank you
for being our family’s rock and shield.
There are two more additional people that I would like to thank by name. Dr. Natasha Neumann
and Dr. Nancy Hong. Over the past three years, I have spent more time with them than my own family.
From driving to class two nights a week, in year two, to the three of us studying for, seems like, two years
in a row every Sunday in Natasha’s kitchen. It has been a wonderful journey and I am glad that the three
of us experienced it together. I am also so thankful for our friendship that grew during this process. I
know that we will always be there for each other.
Last but not least, the last group of people I would like to thank are the parents who decided to
participate in my study. With the topic and sample that I selected, it was extremely difficult getting
AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 3

participants. However, these five individuals were a lifesaver, and I will forever be grateful for them
agreeing to be part of my study, as without their participation, I would not have been able to complete this
dissertation.

AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 4

Table of Contents
List of Tables 6
List of Figures 7
Abstract 8
Chapter One: Introduction 9
Background of Problem 11
Desegregation 12
Minority Concentrated Schools 13
Parents and Community 17
Conclusion 18
Statement of Problem 19
Purpose of the Study 20
Research Questions 21
Significance of the Study 21
Organization of the Dissertation 22
Chapter Two: Literature Review 24
Dual Language Immersion Programs 25
History and Definitions of DLIPs 25
Purpose and Goals of DLIPs 37
Benefits of DLIPs 40
Benefits for All Students 40
Benefits for African American Students 57
Parents Who Choose Alternate Public Education Options and Why 61
Why Parents Choose 63
Social Capital and Characteristics of Parents Who Choose DLIPs 80
Pierre Bourdieu 81
James Coleman 84
Social Capital Theory and African Americans 86
Summary 94
Conceptual Framework 94
Summary 97
Chapter Three: Research Methods 100
Research Questions 101
Research Design 102
Philosophical Approaches 102
Qualitative Methodology 103
Sample 104
Setting 105
Participants 106
Data Collection and Instruments/Protocols 107
Data Analysis 110
Credibility and Trustworthiness 112
Limitations and Delimitations 113
Ethics 115
Conclusion 116
AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 5

Chapter Four: Findings 117
Characteristics of African American MDLIP Parents 118
Participants’ Parents’ Expectations and College 119
Information and Awareness about DLIPs 122
The Value of Second Language Acquisition 126
Summary 129
Reasons for Choosing DLIPs 129
Academic Benefits 130
Cultural Benefits 132
Issues with Cultural Awareness 135
Bilingual, Biliterate and Job Opportunities 138
Bilingual and Biliterate 138
Job Opportunities 140
Additional Benefits 142
Open Doors 142
Confidence and Empowerment 144
Summary 146
How African American Parents Choose DLIPs for their Children 147
Social Capital 149
How Parents Made the Decision to Enroll 157
Conclusion 160
Chapter Five: Discussion 161
Summary of Findings 162
College Education and HBCU’s 162
Opportunities and the Future 163
The Influence of Social Networks 165
Implications for Practice 166
Recommendations 169
School Districts 169
School Sites 170
Parent Groups 172
Future Research 174
Conclusion 176
References 178
Appendix A: Interview Protocol 189
Appendix B: Recruitment Letter 199
Appendix C: Information Fact Sheet 200

AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 6

List of Tables
Table 1: Data Analysis Steps 111
Table 2: Participants’ Chart 118
AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 7

List of Figures
Figure A: Conceptual Framework 96

AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 8

Abstract
There is a wealth of research on the academic struggles that African American students
face in the educational setting. Thus, finding ways to help support African American students to
improve their academic achievement is a priority for educators. Dual Language Immersion
Programs (DLIPs) have been viewed as an alternate educational option that produces positive
academic outcomes for all students, including African American students. Yet, African
American students’ enrollment in these programs is low. The purpose of this qualitative study
was to examine, through interviews with five purposefully selected African American parents,
how African American parents’ background, assumed benefits of Mandarin DLIPs, and parents’
level and use of social capital, influenced their decision to enroll their children in Mandarin
DLIPs.
The findings revealed that social capital creates opportunities for parents to get a better
understanding of the benefits that DLIPs offer, as well as, help parents to understand how the
benefits of DLIPs outweigh the drawbacks. This study recommends that school districts, school
sites and parent groups all have to work together reach out to African American parents in order
to increase the number of African American students in Mandarin DLIPs.

AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 9

CHAPTER ONE: INTRODUCTION
African American students continue to be outperformed academically and lag behind
other ethnicities in reading and mathematics. According to data from the National Center for
Education Statistics (NCES, 2016), African American students in the 4
th
, 8
th
, and 12
th
grades
have consistently scored lower than other ethnicities on the National Assessment of Educational
Progress (NAEP, 2015). This is unfortunately not a recent occurrence, for over the past decade,
African Americans have scored the lowest on this assessment. Test scores are not the only area
where African American students have shown poor academic outcomes. African American
students also have the lowest high school graduation rate (NCES, 2016). These disparaging
outcomes are not just limited to high school students. Researchers Allen (1992) and Porter
(1990) have studied how graduation rates for colleges show a wide gap between White and
African American students. Their data also revealed that African American graduation rates also
trail Latino students. The data from the U.S. Department of Education (2016) list the college
graduation rate for African American students at 20.8%, compared to Hispanic students at 29.8%
and White students at 43.3%. These numbers are significant as it has been well documented that
a college degree leads to higher income, upward mobility, better levels of employment, and a
greater ability to establish cultural and human capital to future generations (Douglass, 2009;
Porter, 1989).
In order for African American parents to combat these statistics of inadequate
performance of their children, it is important that they find schools and academic programs that
offer educational opportunities that have the potential to promote better academic outcomes for
their children. One alternative education pathway that has been found to provide positive
academic outcomes for all students is Dual Language Immersion Programs (DLIPs) (Christian,
AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 10

1996; Lindholm-Leary, 2012; Lindholm-Leary & Block, 2010). Parents who elect to place their
children in these programs are providing a different educational setting to help them obtain
academic success while learning a second language. The intended outcomes of DLIPs are for
students to develop high levels of proficiency in their first language, as well as, high levels of
proficiency in their second language, thus becoming bilingual and biliterate. Another outcome
for students is that they will be able to demonstrate positive cross-cultural attitudes and behaviors
(Christian, Howard & Loeb, 2000; Gerena, 2011; Giacchino-Baker & Piller, 2006; Howard,
Sugarman & Christian, 2003; Thomas & Collier, 1997).
The ability to speak and understand more than one language is an important skill in the
global multilingual society. As the demographics of the United States change, it has become
more important for students to learn languages such as Spanish or Mandarin to compete in the
work force. Spanish is an important language to learn because the population of Spanish
speakers in the United States continues to grow. Mandarin is another language that has grown in
popularity because of the global expansion of China and the sheer number of Mandarin speakers
in the world. As parents begin to prepare their children for the future, it is important that parents
seek out programs that will prepare their children to compete in a global society. DLIPs have the
potential to provide such programming.
DLIPs have been in existence since 1963, with the first program, Coral Way Bilingual
Elementary School in Coral Gables, Florida (Bearse & de Jong, 2008; Christian, 1996, Padilla,
1990). Since that time, DLIPs have continued to grow in number because of the benefits that
have been described above, and as of today, according to the Center for Applied Linguistics
(2016), there are 448 DLIPs nationwide. DLIPs are a significant educational alternative for
African American students, yet, few African American parents enroll their children in DLIPs.
AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 11

Since student enrollment in DLIPs is determined by parental choice, it is important to explore the
reasons and the process that African American parents who have enrolled their children in DLIPs
use. Ultimately, this understanding can enable educators to find ways of recruiting more African
American parents to enroll their children into these programs, thus ultimately providing
opportunities to help them narrow the pervasive achievement gap.
This study seeks to identify the characteristics of African American parents who enroll
their children in Mandarin Dual Language Immersion Programs (DLIPs), as well as, why and
how they went about making that decision. Chapter One provides the background of African
Americans in school and the problems that students face that often hinder them doing well
academically. This chapter also states the problem of the study, followed by the purpose of the
study, my research questions, the significance of the study, and my roles and identity as a
researcher.
Background of the Problem
The problem of academic underachievement has been ongoing for African American
students. Historically, African American students have performed worse than their racial and
ethnic counterparts, which has been influenced by the historic and structural circumstances for
this racial subgroup. Starting in 1740 South Carolina became the first state to outlaw the
education of African Americans. Other southern states followed with all of the southern states
having some type of law forbidding the education of African Americans by 1836 (Anderson,
1988; Caldas & Bankston, 1997). It was not until the end of the Civil War in 1865 that all
African Americans were allowed to be educated (Anderson, 1988; Caldas & Bankston, 1997).
Not having the opportunity to receive formal schooling created an academic disadvantage for
African American families. And even when African Americans were allowed entry into
AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 12

American public schooling, the education received was by no means equal to that of their White
counterparts. The U.S. Supreme court decision Plessy v. Ferguson (1896) created the “separate
but equal” ideology, which in education meant, that African American students were allowed to
be educated, however, not with their White counterparts. The Plessy v. Ferguson decision
ultimately held African American students back educationally, as their schools were inadequate
compared to white students (Anderson, 1988; Caldas & Bankston 1997).
Desegregation
For over 50 years, the Plessy v. Ferguson decision allowed African American students to
receive an inferior education. Not until the 1954 U.S. Supreme court decision, Brown v. Board of
Education, did de jure segregation end in education. The Brown vs. Board of Education decision
of 1954 started the desegregation movement in the United States. Desegregation was designed to
benefit African American students and give them a better future. However, because of
desegregation, an unintended consequence was that African American schools were closed and
black teachers, staff, and principals were fired and students had to bused outside of their
community (Caldas, Bankston, & Growe, 2002; Lynn, Bacon, Totten, Bridges, & Jennings,
2010; Mikelson & Heath, 1999; Milner & Howard, 2004). African American students were
placed in schools where they were not wanted and were made to feel as if they were less than
other students, which had a detrimental effect on how they performed. The decision to
desegregate was intended to level the playing field, however, African Americans did not
understand how desegregation brought about equity to the community (Caldas, Bankston &
Growe, 2002; Milner & Howard, 2004). Mickelson and Heath (1999) found in their study that
there were fewer school resources at the predominately African American schools. Darling-
Hammond (2007) illustrates this point by underlining the fact that schools that served
AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 13

predominately African American students, did not provide comparable class size, class offerings,
facilities or textbooks. Looking at educational outcomes of African American students today, it
is clear from the data presented earlier in this chapter that legal desegregation efforts have not
remedied the problem and opportunities for high quality education are still far from reach. Even
with desegregation African American are not receiving equal educational opportunities and are
one of the most underachieving groups in the American education system (Howard, 2003;
Powell & Arriola, 2003). However, desegregation is not the only problem that has plagued
African American students’ performance, the problems created by minority concentrated schools
has also had an effect on African American students’ academic outcomes.
Minority Concentrated Schools
The desegregation policies that closed African American schools and moved African
American students from their neighborhoods to predominantly white schools made schools more
segregated than before (Bankston & Caldas, 1996; 1997). After the desegregation ruling, many
white families chose to leave their school in order to avoid the possibility of their schools
becoming predominantly populated by minorities and this created what researchers described as
minority concentrated schools. These schools currently exist, where the students at the schools
are predominantly minority, low-socioeconomic status (SES), and have poor academic
achievement (Saporito & Sohoni, 2007). The socioeconomic circumstance of most African
American families, have resulted from a long and entrenched history of slavery and
discrimination. Scholars have long argued that there is an inextricable link between race and
socioeconomic status (SES) (Saporito & Sohoni, 2007). African American students are more
likely to attend an underperforming school in a low SES neighborhood, which hinders their
AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 14

academic achievement. These minority concentrated schools also receive fewer resources than
schools for white students (Anderson, 1988; Caldas & Bankston 1997; Milner & Howard, 2004).
Low Socioeconomic Status. Social scientists have recognized the importance of how a
family’s SES influences students’ academic achievement. Research by Adams and Singh (1998)
in this area demonstrated the effects of SES on school achievement. Adams and Singh’s (1998)
findings describe how the higher a student’s SES, the better they performed on the exams. These
findings parallel the Mickelson and Heath (1999) study regarding the effect of SES on school
achievement. Mickelson and Heath also found that racial composition and low socioeconomic
status have a negative effect on student academic outcomes. Many minority concentrated schools
are made up of students from low SES communities. Besides poor academic achievement,
minority concentrated schools are associated with other disadvantages that have had a negative
impact on African American students’ success, such as teacher quality, teacher expectations,
teacher attitudes, and tracking (Bankston & Caldas, 1996; Milner & Howard, 2004).
Classroom Teachers. In addition to structural issues with which African American
students have had to contend, other factors within the classroom have affected students’ ability to
succeed in school. Teachers play an important role in the success or struggles of African
American students. The disparities in teacher qualifications for minority concentrated schools is
apparent by the number of African American students, with unqualified teachers, in low
performing schools (Darling-Hammond, 2007). Milner (2012) in his study on opportunity gaps
shared how often in urban high poverty schools there is a lack of commitment from new
educators. These urban schools also have teachers who are absent frequently and thus, students
are taught by substitute teachers who do not possess the training to work with students (Milner,
2012).
AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 15

Teacher Expectations. Long held teacher biases shaped by race and low-socio-economic
status, for example, can and have negative effects on student performance (Good, 1987; Ladson-
Billings, 2006; Milner, 2012; Rist, 1996). Researchers have agreed that student performance is
influenced by the perception of the teachers (Steele & Aronson, 1995; James 2012). Classroom
teachers’ low expectations and negative perceptions have made it difficult for African American
students to achieve (Good, 1987; Ladson-Billings, 1995; Rist, 1996); Steele and Aronson (1995)
called this stereotype vulnerability. Educators’ low expectations of African American students
negatively affect the level of support and assistance given to the students, which leads to poor
academic results (James, 2012). Goodman and Burton (2012) called this attitude towards
students with cultural differences from teachers, what Rosenthal and Johnson (1968) referred to
as the self-fulfilling prophecy. The idea behind the self-fulfilling prophecy is when a person’s
prediction of another person’s behavior becomes a reality at some point (Rosenthal & Johnson,
1968). Teachers’ low expectations have also limited the quality and quantity of information that
would assist students’ comprehension of the school system, which would help African American
students navigate the educational system (Goodman & Burton, 2012). Graham and Anderson
(2008) conducted a study to understand how academically gifted African American students at a
predominantly African American urban high school negotiated the tension between their
academic identity and their ethnic identity. They found that teachers’ expectations were a driving
factor in African American students’ performance, as students were concerned as to whether
their teachers believed in them. Similarly, in the study by Adams and Singh (1998), one of the
findings was that the perceptions teachers had about students were a strong influencer of whether
students would perform well academically. African American students believe that when the
teachers believe in them, they perform better academically.
AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 16

Teachers Attitudes. Teachers’ attitudes and the level of care they show to their students
also have an effect on how students perform in the classroom (Ladson-Billings, 1995; Nodding,
1988). In an effort to recognize how low-performing schools cope with African American
student underachievement, Lynn, Bacon, Totten, Bridges and Jennings (2010) carried out a
qualitative study of 50 teachers, administrators and counselors. One take away from their study
was the fact that school personnel overwhelmingly blame students, families and their community
for the achievement gap. Howard’s (2003) study inquired about what influences African
American students’ academic identity. One of Howard’s (2003) findings was that the influences
of teachers and counselors was important, however, teacher centered classrooms, perceived
racism, and discrimination towards students were also found in classrooms with African
American students. Another finding was that the lack of a personal teacher-student relationships
and a lack of teacher caring attitudes contributes to student’s performance (Howard, 2003).
However, one way to overcome the challenges of these studies, is to use Noddings’ (1988) work
on the ethics of caring and Ladson-Billings’ (1995) recommendations of implementing culturally
relevant pedagogy.
Lack of Culturally Relevant Pedagogy. Teachers’ attitudes can be combated by
understanding how to support students (Ladson-Billings, 1995; Noddings, 1988). Ladson-
Billings’ culturally relevant pedagogy theory supports the idea that teachers are there to help
their students to be successful by meeting three criteria: the conceptions of self and others, social
relations and the conceptions of knowledge. The first criterion, conceptions of self and others is
the idea that all students are capable of academic success and they see themselves as members of
the community. The second criterion is culturally relevant teachers create social relations. These
teachers demonstrate a connection to each of their students. They develop in the classroom a
AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 17

community of learners and encourages the entire class to work collaboratively and make students
be responsible for each other. The last criterion is the teacher understands the conceptions of
knowledge. Teachers understand that knowledge is not static but constructed and that they must
scaffold their lessons in order to facilitate learning. Culturally relevant pedagogy takes time and
dedication and is connected to Noddings’ (1988) work on caring. Implementation of these
approaches have been lacking in the American educational system.
Tracking. Researchers have also found that African American students were tracked
more than their white counterparts (Oakes, 1986). African Americans were also more than likely
to be in a non-college preparation track than white students (Mickelson & Heath, 1999; Howard,
2003). Oakes (1986) found that there were substantial differences in the students’ classroom
experiences based on the student’s track. The high track classes had more time set aside for
learning activities with their teachers enthusiastic about their instruction, compared to low track
classes where students’ discipline problems, socializing, and class routines took up most of their
time (Oakes, 1986). Therefore, when African American students are placed in a tracking system,
they are not given the opportunity to take classes that will prepare them for a higher probability
of success in the future.
Parents and Community
In order to combat some of the negative effects of minority concentrated schools, parents
and the community play an instrumental part in supporting African American students’
achievement. Researchers have found parents’ SES as a strong predictor of student performance.
For example, Sirin (2005) set out to find how SES affects academic achievement. Sirin (2005)
took 101,157 students from 74 independent samples to construct his findings. Among all factors
considered in student performance, the parent’s location in the socioeconomic structure has the
AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 18

largest impact on student achievement. There was a strong correlation between parents’ SES and
student attendance in higher performing schools. It was also found that high SES schools
employed teachers with more experience. These results were similar to what Howard (2003)
found in his study of the influences on African American student academic identity. The results
from that study suggest that parents are a powerful influence on academic identity. Caldas and
Bankston (1997) found from their study that peers, family and social status have a significant
effect on individual academic achievement. In the same study, Caldas and Bankston (1997)
found that the high SES group promoted academic achievement because of the resources
available to those families and parents’ occupational status.
Conclusion
The achievement gap that begins early in African American students’ schooling
experiences persist into adulthood. Differences between home and school ways of being and
doing have hindered African American students’ ability to succeed in formal American
schooling. The high SES advantages start in pre-school and primary grades with access to age
appropriate learning tools, parents who emphasize vocabulary development, and engage in
questioning strategies that are consistent with formal schooling (Heath, 1983). Researchers argue
that African American students are less likely to attend college because of these inherited
disadvantages and access to resources (Roderick, Coca, & Nagaoka, 2011). Another theory is
that African American college attendance numbers are low because African American students
lack the social capital to navigate through the college admissions process (Caldes, Bankston, &
Cain 2007). Both of these findings bring to light the need for alternate educational programs that
will combat the inherit disadvantages of being African American in the current educational
landscape. Alternate educational programs like DLIPs offer African American students a better
AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 19

opportunity to succeed. If more African American students are able to attain the benefits
associated with these programs, they will be in a better position to do well in college and support
positive educational, personal and economic gains for future generations (Douglass, 2009).
Statement of the Problem
Low student achievement in African American students has been a problem for years, as
described earlier in this chapter. There has been a persistent gap in achievement for this subgroup
(Howard, 2003; Ladson-Billings, 2006; Milner 2012; Powell & Arriola, 2003). This gap,
unfortunately, is not shrinking, but in fact growing as African American students’ achievement
continues to fall below other ethnicities (Bastedo & Jacquette, 2011; Howard, 2003; Mickelson
& Heath, 1999). Traditional American schooling has not found success in providing academic
opportunities for African American students. Researchers such as Blank (1984) and Saporito
(2003) discuss alternatives such as magnet schools to support high quality education for all
students. Studies by researchers for DLIP schools have also described the benefits of DLIPs and
how these benefits are attainable by all students (Christian, 1996; Christian, Howard & Loeb,
2000; Gerena 2011; Howard, Sugarman & Christian, 2003; Lindholm-Leary, 2000; Thomas &
Collier, 1997). The problem however, is the enrollment of African American students is far
below other ethnicities in these programs. Thus, even though DLIPs offer demonstrated benefits
for students, if parents are unaware of or uninterested in these programs or the benefits of the
programs, African American student participation in DLIPs will continue to lag behind other
ethnicities. This lag in participation will also continue to sustain and/or expand the educational
gap and the ability for African American students to compete with other ethnicities in a global
society.
AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 20

An important concept that guides parent awareness and interest in alternative educational
programs for their children is social capital, usually gained through social networks (Bourdieu,
1986; Coleman, 1988; Perna & Titus, 2005). Bourdieu (1986) saw social networks as being
closed and limited to a certain group or class. However, Coleman’s (1988) concept of social
capital is the way parents view alternate education programs. Parents have the ability to share
with each other resources, through the relationships they build with one another. Perna and Titus
(2005) also describe social capital as a way for parents with different backgrounds to seek advice
from each other in order gain more resources. This study is a way African Americans can use
social capital to benefit their children educationally.
Purpose of the Study
The purpose of this study was threefold. The first was to identify the characteristics of
African American parents who enroll their children in a DLIP. For the purposes of bounding this
study, Mandarin programs were selected as a specific case within DLIPs. I am bounding my
study to only Mandarin DLIPs because Mandarin is the most widely spoken language in the
world, with over one billion speakers (Nations Online, 2016). Being bilingual and biliterate in
Mandarin will also create business and other opportunities in a global society. It is important to
examine parents’ characteristics because you can then identify themes or commonalities among
parents who choose Mandarin DLIPs to help target additional parents for participation in the
program. Secondly, the study explored the reasons why African American parents enrolled their
children in Mandarin DLIPs. Parents’ reasons are important to examine, because as mentioned
previously in this chapter, African American parents have a powerful influence on students’
academic identity, thus understanding rationale for enrollment will ultimately help to promote
Mandarin DLIPs to other parents (Caldas & Bankston, 1997; Howard, 2003; Sirin 2005). Finally,
AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 21

the study examined how social capital affects African American parents’ decisions to enroll their
children in a Mandarin DLIP. Each one of the research questions work in tandem to gain more
information from parents who have enrolled in the program in order to support recruitment of
other African American parents either through social networks or school districts.
Research Questions
1. What are the characteristics of African American parents who chose to enroll their
children in Mandarin DLIPs?
2. What are the reasons why African American parents chose to enroll their children in
Mandarin DLIPs?
3. How do African American parents go about choosing Mandarin DLIPs for their
children’s schooling?
In order to answer the research questions, a qualitative case study was used, which
focused on African American parents to gather insight from them about their background,
reasons for choosing a Mandarin DLIP and how they decided to ultimately enroll their children
in the program. At the end of this study, I am hoping that my research can help increase the
number of African American parents choosing to enroll their children in Mandarin DLIPs as well
as support districts in the recruitment of African American families.
Significance of the Study
As African American students continue to lag behind other ethnicities and the
achievement gap grows, finding ways to close the achievement gap for African American
students is imperative. As stated above, DLIPs are an attractive alternative option that have the
potential to make positive changes in order to reverse the dire educational outcomes we have
observed. However, as noted above, enrollment of African Americans in these programs is low,
AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 22

especially in Mandarin DLIPs. Without participation in alternative programs like DLIPs, African
American students are destined to remain disadvantaged by formal, traditional schooling in this
country, as well as, limit global opportunities for them in the future. This study of African
American parents who enroll their children in Mandarin DLIPs is significant because it is
designed to explore ways of increasing African American student enrollment in the program.
To inform educators on the potential ways to increase African American student
enrollment, more needs to be understood about the particular kinds of people who enroll in such
programs. There is research about the benefits of DLIPs for African American students, but little
research exists on the types of parents or how the parents learn about the programs and ultimate
choose these programs for their children. By describing these parents’ background, the benefits
they see and the process they use to choose DLIPs for their children, I hope to create a road map
for educators to use to help recruit other African American parents into these programs, as well
as giving districts the ability to identify ways in which they can increase the number of African
American students in the DLIP.
Organization of the Dissertation
This dissertation is organized into five chapters. Chapter One provided the background of
the problem and introduction to the study. The statement of the problem and purpose of the study
was the described, followed by the research questions and the significance of the study.
Chapter Two is organized into two sections. The first part of Chapter Two is the literature
review, which presents the literature on the history of DLIPs, the benefits of DLIPs and also the
limited research that exists on the characteristics of parents who enroll their children in DLIPs.
The literature review also examines the theories of social capital and social networks from the
work of Bourdieu (1986) and Coleman (1988). The second part of Chapter Two is the conceptual
AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 23

framework and explanation of the conceptual framework. The conceptual framework is a graphic
representation of my view of how social capital and social networks affect African American
parents’ decision to enroll their children in a Mandarin DLIP.
Chapter Three describes the research methods that I employed in this qualitative case
study. My research questions will be reviewed again, followed by the research design used for
the study. The sample for the study is identified and methods for collecting data are reviewed.
The data analysis process is also explained in Chapter 3 and the ways I accounted for credibility
and trustworthiness will be presented. The last two portions of Chapter Three will be the
limitations and delimitations of the study followed by a section on ethics.
Chapter Four presents the findings after data analysis was performed in the study. The
data is organized by category from interviews with the five participants in my study. Data
collection was analyzed with the themes that were presented in Chapter Two along with
similarities and differences from each participants’ experiences.
Lastly, Chapter Five concludes this dissertation with a summary of the findings, identifies
recommendations and implications for practice, along with further research that would support
this study, as well as, sharing my final conclusion.

AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 24

CHAPTER TWO: LITERATURE REVIEW
As the achievement gap continues to grow amongst African-American children, many
African-American families have explored alternative ways to close the gap for their children
(Palmer, 2007). Whether it is private schools, charter schools, magnet schools or Dual Language
Immersion Programs (DLIPs), African-American parents, are trying to find ways to level the
playing field and improve opportunities for their children (Howard, Sugarman & Christian,
2003). This literature review will focus on the DLIPs and why some African-American parents
choose DLIPs for their children. The first section of this chapter will focus on the history of
DLIPs and will define and describe these programs focusing on the program components, goals,
and purpose that bring about positive student outcomes. The literature review will then shift to a
discussion of how DLIPs benefit students, and especially African American students.
Researchers Bastedo and Jacquette (2011), Caldas and Bankston (1997), as well as Powell and
Arriola (2003) have shared how traditional public schools have failed African Americans
students. As stated in the introductory chapter, there is an abundance of literature that states how
African American students have struggled in public schools for years. As such, researchers have
explored DLIPs because data suggests there are positive benefits for students who attend these
schools and enable students to avoid the traditional public schools that have not served them
well. This information regarding the benefits of DLIPs will illuminate why some parents choose
to enroll their children in DLIPs. For example, I will discuss why DLIPs are seen as a way to
close the achievement gap with students of color and also help to all students who participate in
these programs embrace biculturalism. However, not all parents choose DLIPs for their children.
Thus in the last section of this chapter, I will review the work of Pierre Bourdieu and James
Coleman who advanced different forms of capital. Specifically, my interest is to examine how
AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 25

social capital affects parents’ decisions and ultimate ability to enroll their children in alternate
forms of public education including DLIPs as well as a conceptual framework for this
dissertation.
Dual Language Immersion Programs
It is important to understand how DLIPs came into existence before one can understand
its benefits for African American students and thus parents’ choice to enroll their children in such
a program. While some researchers do not support DLIPs, the existing literature on DLIPs sheds
light on why dual language programs came into existence and why they have grown in
popularity. Researchers who support DLIPs have revealed several common outcomes of DLIPs
that this literature review will focus on. In the first section, I am going to focus on the history and
definitions of DLIPs. The purpose and goals that make up DLIPs will be the focus of the next
section as different thoughts and ideas are examined. This section will then conclude by
discussing the program components, both structurally and logistically and what it takes to
successfully implement these programs.
History and Definition of DLIPs
Bilingual education has been part of the United States since the 1800’s (Padilla, 1990).
Padilla explained that in the late 1800’s, states in different parts of the country had established
schools that supported the language of their community. In the west in California and New
Mexico there were Spanish-language schools, in the mid-west, there were German-language
schools and in Louisiana and New England there were French-language public schools. This was
possible because education, at that time, was not compulsory and the education system revolved
around the community and the needs and ability of workers in those communities. Since there
AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 26

were a large number of immigrant families in each of those locations, there was a need to support
student language acquisition in both their native language and English.
While these schools were providing services for students in their communities, because
of different societal changes many of these community language schools began to close. One of
the changes that affected these language schools was the establishment of compulsory public
education as a means to educating all students, especially the poor and immigrants. Among the
most prominent purposes for the designers of the early public education system was a desire to
homogenize the population. This purpose and the move to a common educational system
regulated English only instruction and limited school funding to English only schools. This in
turn deleteriously affected the number of language schools leading into the 1900’s (Padilla,
1990).
In some instances, the use of another language was outright banned. In 1923, for
example, the United States Supreme Court deliberated the Meyer v. Nebraska case. In this case, a
teacher was appealing her conviction for teaching reading in German to an elementary school
student. Due to the conflict in World War I, the German language could not be taught in schools
in many states. During the Supreme Court’s ruling however, there was a reverse in the
government’s stance on instructing children in their first or home language, and the Court found
the Nebraska law to be unconstitutional. However, the ruling still allowed states to have the
power to require the use of English when instructing children (Padilla, 1990).
From 1932 to the 1960’s states were still in charge of curricular decisions. States were
instructing children mainly in English and not focusing on the non-English speaking students’
needs (Padilla, 1990). However, in 1963 an experimental bilingual education program was
introduced called Dual Language Programs. The first program that came into existence was the
AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 27

Coral Way Bilingual Elementary School in Coral Gables, Florida (Bearse & de Jong, 2008;
Christian, 1996; Christian, Howard & Loeb, 2000; Giacchino-Baker & Piller, 2009; Howard &
Christian 2002, Padilla, 1990). The school taught students in English and Spanish and was
started because Cuban families, who fled Cuba because of Fidel Castro’s regime, thought that
they would eventually return to Cuba to attend school. During this same time period in
Massachusetts, the French-English school Ecole Bilingue was created. Students were taught in
English, as this was a public school, however, because of the desire to support student’s home
primary language, which was French, students were also taught in French during the students’
instructional day. The decision to allow students to be taught in French was specific to this town
because the large number of French speaking residents in the community (Gomez, Freeman &
Freeman, 2005).
In 1968, the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA) was passed. This Act
addressed the growing awareness that non-English speaking students needed additional academic
support to achieve in school. Title VII of the ESEA became known as the Bilingual Education
Act (BEA). The BEA established federal policy for bilingual education and stipulated that the
federal government provided financial assistance for bilingual programs. The main goal of the
program was to provide access to bilingual programs for limited English speaking students
(Pena, 2002; Stewner-Manzanares, 1988). Following the BEA in 1974, there was another U. S.
Supreme Court ruling that had a huge effect on bilingual education. Lau v. Nichols was a class
action suit against the San Francisco Unified School District put forth by limited English
proficiency Chinese public school students and their parents. Students claimed that they were not
able to keep up with the curriculum, because despite not having English language fluency, they
were not provided additional support to learn the language. Their argument was that they were
AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 28

entitled to receive special accommodations because of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the ban it
placed on educational discrimination on the basis of national origin. Therefore, they claimed that
since the Chinese students were not receiving appropriate support, they were being denied equal
educational opportunities in mainstream classrooms. After hearing arguments from both sides,
U.S. Supreme Court ruled in favor of the students. The Lau v. Nichols decision affirmed that
educational services were a right to limited English speaking students, and that educational
opportunities needed to be provided to support limited English-speaking students (Sugarman &
Widess, 1974). This decision affected students nationwide who were limited in their English
proficiency.
In the 1980’s and the decades following, the United States experienced a considerable
amount of immigration. As the US population grew from 227 million to 275 million, from 1980
to 2000, the growth rate of different ethnic and racial groups varied. The Hispanic population
increased by 83% and the Asian American population grew at a rate of 153%. This increase in
demographics led to political shifts in how the public viewed language education. The increase
in minority languages led the public to want more opportunities for students to continue to learn
their native language as well as English speaking parents desire for the students to learn a
different language. Politicians began to see that in order to support second language students,
they would need to support the development of students’ home languages (Lindholm-Leary &
Block, 2010). The states most impacted by these shifts were the states that had a large number of
immigrants such as California, Texas and New York. These three states had the largest
population of immigrants living in them as well as in their educational system. The political
shifts affected all students in the educational system, not just those learning English as a second
language. At the National Governors’ Conference in 1989, it was agreed that two of the six
AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 29

national education goals would be to increase the percentage of students who are competent in
more than one language and that students would be knowledgeable about the diverse cultural
heritage of the nation and about the world community (Lindholm-Leary, 2001). Also between
the 1980’s and 1990’s states began to mandate elementary foreign language classes. This change
helped to support the once experimental DLIPs. Another factor that supported the growth of
DLIPs was the success that the DLIP schools were having in Illinois, Florida, Washington DC
and San Diego. The fact that both language minority and language majority students in these
programs were becoming bilingual and biliterate, achieving at or above grade level and
developing positive cross-cultural attitudes helped to build support for offering more such
programs (Lindholm-Leary, 1987).
Support for bilingual programs was not without debate, however. Over the years there
has been opposition to the teaching and learning of languages other than English in the United
States. The English Only movement that had political support from Americans who feared the
loss of American identity primarily drove this opposition. In two states there have been
challenges to DLIPs, and voters passed laws to limit bilingual education of all varieties. In 1998,
California voters passed Proposition 227 and in 2000, Arizona voters passed Proposition 203
(Shannon & Milian, 2002). However, even with these setbacks, DLIPs have continued to grow.
Lindholm-Leary (2001) observes that immersion education began to grow because the program
name changed. When the word bilingual was changed to immersion, to many the program felt
more like enrichment than mediation. Given that program name matters, before more reasons are
identified as to why DLIPs are growing in spite of efforts to stall their progress, it is important to
have a common understanding and definition of the programs.
AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 30

There are many different variations in how DLIPs are defined and described. I first want
to address what DLIPs are not. The Center for Applied Linguistics (CAL) website defined
Bilingual education as both an umbrella term for dual language and transitional bilingual
programs, and synonymously with transitional bilingual programs
(http://www.cal.org/twi/glossary.htm). Pena (2002) helped to define DLIPs, and his purpose in
writing this article was to examine the confusion in defining terms used in bilingual education.
The article also focused on examining problems with bilingual education historically. The article
presented survey results about teachers’ understanding of the bilingual program at their school.
Pena selected 10 teachers in grades two through four at an elementary school and asked them
questions about the bilingual education program at their school. Five out of ten teachers did not
know which program was used at their school site, even though the programs were defined for
them. Findings from the questionnaire also showed that teachers did not understand the term
bilingual education. Eight out of ten teachers strongly believed that Transitional Bilingual
Programs allow students to become literate in both languages, which is an inaccurate
understanding according to the research on Transitional Bilingual Programs. CAL defines
Transitional Bilingual Education as a program for English language learners in which the goal is
proficiency in oral and written English and the students’ native language has been gradually
phased out in favor of English (CAL, 2016). This study shows that teachers are confused about
the definitions within bilingual education. Therefore, to clear up confusion, I am separating DLIP
from the umbrella of bilingual education. Both DLIPs and bilingual education use two languages
to interact with students. However, bilingual education is subtractive, where students’ native
language is phased out and replaced by English, while DLIP is enrichment and the aim of the
program is bilingualism, biliteracy, and cross-cultural awareness. The goal of DLIPs is to gain an
AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 31

additional language while supporting students’ first language, a goal that is seen as additive and
enriching to students’ lives. However, many other forms of bilingual education are seen as
subtractive because students lose their first language in favor of learning a new language, in this
case English (Gerena, 2011; Giacchino-Baker & Piller, 2006; Howard, Sugarman, & Christian,
2003). In DLIPs students’ language and culture are embraced and celebrated. Thus I am
characterizing DLIP as a program separate from bilingual education because they have two very
different goals and purposes.
In the literature, there are two types of dual language education programs: one-way and
two-way. One-way programs are characterized by Thomas and Collier (2004) as programs where
only one language group learns though two languages. These programs are sometimes called
heritage language programs, because students, who have the same heritage and thus speak the
same language, have higher concentrations of students speaking those languages (Gomez,
Freeman, & Freeman, 2005). However, two-way programs (TWI) are dual language programs in
which two language groups learn through two languages (Gomez, Freeman, & Freeman, 2005;
Howard, Sugarman, & Christian, 2003; Thomas & Collier, 1997). Two-way immersion programs
are the most common programs used within the dual language education umbrella.
The terms dual language immersion programs (DLIP) and two-way immersion (TWI)
programs have been used interchangeably. For clarity, going forward I will use DLIPs instead of
TWI. DLIPs integrate language minority students – students whose first language is not English
– with language majority students – students whose first language is English – and teach students
in the same class for a portion of their day in English and the other language that is being taught
(Howard, Sugarman, & Christian, 2003). DLIPs give students who were born and raised
speaking only English the opportunity to learn a second language while continuing to develop
AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 32

their English language proficiency. DLIPs give students, whose second language is English, the
ability to improve their native language while also learning English. DLIPs were chosen as the
context of focus for this study because the research questions are designed to understand African-
American parents’ decision to send their children to a DLIP. Given that African-Americans tend
to speak English as their first language, the context of the DLIPs is relevant to our students.
In addition to understanding the terminology, it is also important to understand the DLIP
language of instruction and the DLIP model. The language of instruction is the language that is
taught in the program alongside English. Over the last decade, the number of DLIPs has
increased as well as the number of languages that are offered. According to the Center for
Applied Linguistics website, currently the languages that are taught in DLIPs in the U.S. are
Armenian, Arabic, Cantonese, French, German, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Mandarin, Navajo,
Portuguese, Russian and Spanish (Christian, Howard, & Loeb, 2000; Howard & Sugarman,
2001). According to the Center for Applied Linguistics (2016) there are currently, in the public
and private school sector, 448 DLIPs nationwide, with 94% of those DLIPs focused on Spanish
and 89 in Mandarin. Once a language is chosen, the program model is decided. Nationally there
are many program models, but the two most common is the minority-language dominant or
90:10 or 80:20 model, used in 42% of the DLIP schools, and balanced programs or the 50:50
model, used in 33% of the DLIPs schools (CAL, 2016; Howard & Sugarman, 2001).
In the minority-language dominate model the minority (or target) language is used for
instruction 80 to 90% of the time. In this model, kindergarten instruction begins with 80 or 90%
of the day in the target language, and 10% of the day in English. Instruction then increases in
English each year by 10% and decreases in the target language by 10% until students are in the
4
th
grade, at which point instruction in both languages levels off at 50% target language and 50%
AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 33

English (Christian, Howard, & Loeb, 2000; Gomez, Freeman, & Freeman, 2005; Howard &
Sugarman, 2001; Lindholm-Leary, 2012; Lindholm-Leary & Howard, 2008; Palmer, 2008;
Thomas & Collier, 1997).
The other model that is often used in DLIPs is the balanced program, also known as the
50:50 model. In balanced programs, instruction for all students is balanced evenly between the
two languages. This 50:50 ratio is kept all the way through elementary school (Christian, 1996;
Christian, Howard, & Loeb, 2000; Howard & Sugarman, 2001). Students are either taught half of
the day in different languages by time or by subject, which is split throughout the day.
Howard and Sugarman (2001) found that based on the information that was gathered
from the CAL program directory, the majority of DLIPs are located in California, Texas and New
York, with California having the most programs. In California 63% of the DLIPs used the
minority dominant model. DLIPs in Texas consisted of 41% minority dominant and 47%
balanced and in New York, 60% of the programs used the balanced model. Nation-wide schools
in the west tended to implement minority-language dominant model and most of the schools in
the east coast, midwest and the south implemented balanced programs. Christian (1996) and
Howard and Sugarman (2001) did not specify why the different regions choose the models they
use in the DLIPs.
Given the two different models, researchers have explored whether there are differences
in outcomes depending on the model in which students are enrolled. Lindholm-Leary’s (2000)
work noted that there were many ways in which the 50:50 and 90:10 models student outcomes
results were similar. She reported on two major studies that looked at the outcomes of students
from DLIPs. One study was a set of longitudinal studies conducted by her that represented 7,120
students in 20 schools that were located mostly in California. Thomas and Collier (1997)
AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 34

conducted another set of longitudinal studies on reading achievement with a national database of
700,000 ELL students from five large districts. Even though a majority of the students in the
study participated in an ELD pullout program, 3% of the study involved students who
participated in a DLIP. The DLIP students’ results in both studies showed those students’
outcomes were very similar. What both studies found when comparing the 90:10 and 50:50
model was:
- Both models promoted proficiency in two languages
- Both models promoted equal proficiency in English
- There was no evidence to suggest that participation in DLIPs has a negative effect on
native language development of the students or English speakers.
- Students in both programs made significant progress in reading and language and
they performed at similar levels as their same language-background peers using
California state assessments
- Students in both programs scored around the same as their peers on mathematic
achievement test.
Also, there was no real difference between 90:10 and 50:50 students’ mathematics scores;
therefore, the researchers found there are no disadvantages if students receive more instruction in
the target language and less instruction in English. However, the main difference between the
50:50 and 90:10 model was that students in the 90:10 model developed higher levels of bilingual
proficiency than students in the 50:50 model, because of the length of time using the language
(Lindholm-Leary 2000; Lindholm-Leary & Howard, 2008).
In order to meet the goals of DLIPs and support the three focus areas of bilingualism,
biliteracy, and cross-cultural awareness, Howard, Sugarman and Christian (2003) described the
AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 35

criteria that DLIPs must have in place. The purpose of Howard, Sugarman and Christian’s report
was to summarize research of different DLIP studies. The studies in the report were broken into
the 12 areas: general information, implementation, program profiles, academic achievement,
language and literacy outcomes, cultural context and social impact, integration of language
minority and language majority students, language status, student attitudes, teachers’ experiences
and professional development, and parent attitudes and involvement. This section will focus on
the general information portion of the review. Christian, Howard and Loeb’s (2000) and
Christian’s (1996) reports were used to synthesize information about DLIPs. They demonstrated
that DLIPs first need to focus on the linguistic make-up of the classroom. Programs need to
enroll an equal number of students who are language majority students (students who are native
English speakers) and language minority students (students who are non-native English
speakers), where the non-native students speak the language that will be taught with English in
the classroom. This composition is said to be important because students are able to be peer
models and tutors for each other. Peer models are able to keep each other engaged by their
interactions in the classroom.
After the classroom population is created, both the language majority students and
language minority students need to be taught together in an integrated setting. In other words,
academic instruction in DLIPs is provided to all the students in both English and the target
language. The target language is the language that is being taught in the classroom alongside
English (Christian, 1996; Giacchino-Baker & Piller, 2006; Howard, Sugarman, & Christian,
2003; Lindholm-Leary & Howard, 2008; Shannon & Milian, 2002). In DLIPs the languages
students speak do not separate them unlike in other language learning programs. Instead students
work side by side to support each other in their language development. Both Thomas and Collier
AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 36

(1997) and Lindholm-Leary and Block (2010) emphasized how important it is for students to
work as peer language models as one of the keys to success of DLIPs. Similar to Thomas and
Collier’s (1997) idea of students supporting each other in the DLIP classroom, Lightbown (2007)
described how students naturally act as each other’s medium between the two languages.
Lightbown described this phenomenon as one of the ways to solve the problem of one teacher in
a classroom. With students serving as language models, the ratio of teachers to students is
changed dramatically, because now the teacher is no longer the only proficient speaker of the
target language. Students can now support each other by using the target language in the
classroom and outside on the playground. Even though group work is not discussed in detail in
this literature review, research literature about good pedagogy has found that collaborative
grouping is a way to support student acquire a language.
Furthermore, to what happens in the classroom, Christian (1996) as well as Thomas and
Collier (1997) described additional criteria that make up DLIPs in general, and help to support
both majority and minority students’ acquisition of the both languages. These criteria were
developed through Thomas and Collier (1997) study of 700,000 ELL students, some of which
participated in DLIPs, which identified each of these eight areas of focus, which are:
1. Programs need to provide a minimum of 4 to 6 years of bilingual instruction
2. Academic instruction should be the same core academic curriculum that supports
students in the regular program.
3. Students should be afforded opportunities for sufficient language input and output in
both languages.
4. The target language should be used at a minimum for 50% of the day.
AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 37

5. The program should have an additive lingual structure where students learn L2 while
continuing to grow their L1.
6. Classrooms should include a balance of students from target language and English
who participate in classroom activities together.
7. Students should work in cooperative groups.
8. The school should employ qualified personnel and provide school-wide collaboration
opportunities.
However, while these criteria look appropriate on the surface, there is little empirical
evidence that these criteria are necessary elements of DLIPs. While not all the criteria have been
fully examined empirically, a few of the criteria have been shown to support positive student
outcomes, such as: students working in cooperative groups, students needing four to six years of
bilingual instruction to show true growth, students having an additive language structure, and
employing qualified personnel and providing collaboration for the instructors.
Purpose and Goals of DLIPs
This section of the literature will focus on the purpose and goals of DLIPs. Researchers
have communicated different goals for DLIPs. While researchers have communicated many
different goals for DLIPs, there is general agreement on a set of goals they believe characterize
most DLIPs. For both language majority students and language minority students, one of the
goals of DLIPs is to create bilingual proficiency so that all students can speak and interact with a
high level of understanding in both languages (Christian, 1996; Lindholm-Leary, 2000; Thomas
& Collier, 1997). Bilingual proficiency means to be able to fluently and accurately speak and
communicate in two languages at the same level as a native speaker.
AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 38

Another goal of DLIPs is to create biliteracy in language majority and language minority
students. Biliteracy differs from bilingual proficiency, as biliteracy is the ability to communicate
through reading and writing proficiently in two different languages at the same level as a native
speaker. Another way of viewing the difference between bilingualism and biliteracy is that if you
are bilingual you may not be biliterate. However, if you are biliterate, then you also have to be
bilingual. This is especially important for the language minority students who initially start out
bilingual in their native language. These students have the ability to become biliterate in their
native language while becoming bilingual in English, with the goal to also become biliterate in
English. Researchers Alanis and Rodriguez (2008) and Christian, Howard and Loeb (2000)
found that students’ native language proficiency is a good predictor of their English language
development, therefore, it is extremely important to make sure that language minority students
are able to receive support in their native language as a foundation, which DLIP programs are
structured to accomplish.
An additional goal of DLIPs that Christian (1996), Lindholm-Leary and Block (2010)
and fellow researchers Giacchino-Baker and Piller (2006) all agree on is that DLIPs allow
students to gain cross-cultural awareness and understanding. This understanding of other cultures
and an awareness of different perspectives is a component of all DLIPs. Ultimately, the idea that
DLIPs give students the ability to be bilingual, have biliteracy, and possess cross-cultural
awareness, helps to improve our society (Howard, Sugarman, & Christian, 2003). This
improvement in society can be seen throughout classrooms and schools, as children of different
racial backgrounds are seen gaining a better understanding of different cultures, and celebrating
those cultures together in the classroom and on school campuses.
AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 39

In listing the outcomes for DLIPs Christian, Howard and Loeb (2000) along with
Howard, Sugarman & Christian (2003) described four intended outcomes of DLIPs:
1. Students will develop high levels of proficiency in their first language (L1). This means
that language minority students will develop high levels of speaking, listening, reading,
and writing ability in their native language (e.g., Spanish) and native English speakers
will develop high levels of speaking, listening, reading, and writing ability in English;
2. All students will develop high levels of proficiency in a second language (L2). DLIPs are
considered additive bilingual programs for both groups of students because they afford all
students the opportunity to maintain and develop oral and written skills in their first
language while simultaneously acquiring oral and written skills in a second language;
3. Academic performance for both groups of students will be at or above grade level, and
the same academic standards and curricula used for other students in the district will also
be maintained for students in DLIPs; and
4. All students in DLIPs will demonstrate positive cross-cultural attitudes and behaviors.
In summary, the goals of DLIPs are to give all students the ability to be bilingual, have
biliteracy, and develop cross-cultural awareness (Gerena, 2011; Giacchino-Baker & Piller, 2006).
These four goals will be further developed in the section below as a way to further explain the
benefits of these DLIPs. Lindholm-Leary (2000) noted that DLIPs are based on three principles:
1) a second language is best acquired by language minority students when their first language is
firmly established, and their second language is best developed by language majority children
through immersion in that language, 2) knowledge learned through one language paves the way
for knowledge acquisition in the second language, and 3) students need to reach a certain level of
native language proficiency to promote higher levels of second language development and
AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 40

bilingual proficiency. Given these three principles and the four outcomes of DLIPs stated above,
it is clear why DLIPs are in such high demand for parents. The next section of the literature
review will focus on how these goals and outcomes produce the benefits that have been found for
DLIP students.
Benefits of DLIPs
Now that we have an understanding of what DLIPs are and how they are structured and
operate, this next section of the literature review will examine the benefits of DLIPs for all
students. As noted above, the popularity of these programs has increased over the last decade and
the number of languages that are offered has increased. Currently the Center for Applied
Linguistics website has the following nine different languages listed as being taught in DLIPs
across the nation: Arabic, Armenian, Cantonese, French, German, Italian, Japanese, Korean,
Mandarin and Spanish. One of the biggest reasons for their increase in popularity is the benefit
that students who participate in these programs gain (Christian, 1996; Giacchino-Baker & Piller;
2009; Lindholm-Leary 2012). This section will document the benefits that multiple researchers
have found to be associated with DLIPs. First, the benefits will be examined as they relate to all
students and relevant data will be reviewed. The focus will then turn to the benefits for African-
American students specifically, who make up a much smaller portion of both the population in
DLIPs and as represented in the research literature.
Benefits for All Students
This section examines empirical studies that have explored the benefits that all students
receive from participating in DLIPs. The benefits that are most often identified in the literature
are 1) students’ academic performance, as measured by standardized or norm referenced test are
higher than their non-DLIP peers, 2) students become bilingual and biliterate, and 3) students
AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 41

gain cross-cultural awareness. Most of the literature in this section is from DLIPs where Spanish
is the target language. This is the case because the majority of the programs in the United States
use Spanish as the target language. (Christian, Howard & Loeb, 2000; Howard & Sugarman,
2001). The benefits of DLIPs are seen not only in the English only students, but also the students
who are English language learners (ELL) (Christian, 1996; Christian, Howard, & Loeb 2000;
Lindholm-Leary, 2012; Lindholm-Leary & Block, 2010).
Lindholm-Leary and Block (2010) found that there is a positive correlation between
students who participate in DLIPs and their academic achievement. One of the purposes of their
study was to examine how Hispanic students in DLIPs in states with predominantly Hispanic
students and low socio-economic status (SES) schools performed on standardized tests compared
to non-dual language groups. The study examined 659 California Hispanic students in DLIPs in
segregated or predominantly Hispanic/low socio-economic status (SES) schools and their
performance on standardized test compared to school and statewide averages. Lindholm-Leary
and Block (2010) created six hypotheses for this study. Their first hypothesis was that Hispanic
English proficient (EP) students in the fourth through sixth-grade, both English-dominant and
English only, and ELL students in dual language programs would achieve at or above their
Hispanic EP and ELL peers in mainstream classrooms. The achievement levels were defined by
the state standardized test in language arts and mathematics. The second hypothesis was dual
language EP and ELL students’ scores on standardized tests would have greater change over time
compared to their EP and ELL students in mainstream classrooms. Another hypothesis was that
DLIP ELLs would close the achievement gap with their EP classmates more than mainstream
ELLs do with their EP peers. The fourth hypothesis was students would demonstrate
achievement at or above grade-level norms in math and reading achievement measured in
AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 42

Spanish, as well as scores higher than the state average in California. The last two hypotheses for
this study were the achievement across the two languages would be positively correlated and
students in segregated DLIPs would demonstrate positive cross-cultural attitudes.
Lindholm-Leary and Block gathered data from two studies of low-income DLIP schools
in California. In total, 659 Hispanic students from three districts participated in the study. Of the
four schools that were in the study, each school’s low SES population was at least 66% and the
Hispanic student population was 80%. The four schools also employed the minority-language
dominant or 90:10 model in the Spanish target language. In order to achieve accurate data,
students were included in the study only if they had been in the same school setting for three
years prior to gathering the data. Thus students who entered into the school later were not
included as to not skew the results with students starting at different points in the study.
Study 1 included 193 Hispanic students in grades four and five from three schools.
Twenty-eight out the 81 EP students were in DLIP classes and the other 53 were in English
mainstream classes. One hundred and twelve ELLs participated, 62 in the DLIP and 50 in the
mainstream classrooms. Reviewing the passing rates on the language arts and the mathematics
subtest of the California Standards Test (CST) assessed student achievement in Study 1. Since
the CST is broken into five levels, Far Below Basics, Below Basic, Basic, Proficient and
Advanced, a student was considered to have passed the assessment if his or her scores reach the
level of proficient or advanced (passing).
Study 2 included 466 students in grades 4 through 6, from one school. Of the 466
students in the study, 207 students participated in the DLIP, while 259 students were part of the
mainstream English program. Students in Study 2 also took the Aprenda, which is a norm-
referenced standardized achievement test for assessing reading and math achievement in
AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 43

Spanish. The test score data was obtained from student records and parent questionnaires.
Students in both studies also completed a questionnaire that asked students about their cross-
cultural attitudes. In order to gather the data from the students, consent forms were distributed to
all students in the participating schools.
The results from Lindholm-Leary and Block’s (2010) first study found that EP DLIP
students performed better than the EP students in the mainstream program on the 4th and 5th
grade English language arts (ELA) CST. In this study, 38% of the 4th grade students in the DLIP
passed compared to 27% in the mainstream program. In the 5th grade 50% of the DLIP students
passed compared to 42% of the mainstream students. In the second study, twice as many EP
students achieved the passing rate in the DLIP program compared to the mainstream program.
The DLIP passing rates in Study 2 in grades 5 and 6 were also higher than all of the students in
California. The 5th grade pass rate in Study 2 had 54% of DLIP students passing while the
mainstream students’ pass rate was 19%. In the 6th grade the scores were even more impressive
as the DLIP students’ pass rate was 60% and the mainstream pass rate was 23%. The 6th grade
group even doubled the State Hispanic pass rate average of 26%.
The pass rate for ELL students in DLIPs on the ELA CST was similar to the results for
EP DLIP students. In Study 1, the

4th grade DLIP ELLs’ passing rate was 33% compared to 24%
for their mainstream peers. However, what is intriguing is 5th grade ELL DLIP students’ passing
rate was 27% in Study 2, which was extremely close to the statewide pass rate of 29% for
California Hispanic students. This is interesting because the Hispanic pass rate for California
includes many Hispanic students whose first language is English.
Like the ELA CST, the mathematics section of the CST had similar positive results for
students in the DLIPs. More of the EP DLIP students than mainstream students in Study 1
AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 44

passed, 56% to 31% in the 4th grade and 67% to 53% in the 5th grade, respectively. The results
were similar for Study 2 in mathematics where students in the DLIP had a 46% pass rate in 5th
grade compared to mainstream students whose pass rate was 24% and a 73% pass rate for DLIP
students in the 6th grade compared to 30% for mainstream students.
The analysis of data on the CST in ELA and mathematics for the ELL DLIP students was
similar, however, there was one main difference. In Study 1, 39% of the 4th grade ELL students
in the DLIPs passed the mathematics test and the mainstream ELL pass rate was 43%. This was
the only case where mainstream students in either program scored higher than their DLIP peers.
However, in this same study, ELL DLIP students in the 5th grade had a pass rate of 67% and the
mainstream ELL student pass rate was 25%. In Study 2, the ELL DLIP students constantly
outperformed the ELL mainstream group in the 4th, 5th, and 6th grades. This group of ELL
DLIP students also either just missed or had a higher pass rate than the Hispanic state average for
testing.
From comparing the data in this study, the achievement gap in this school and in the state
of California can be considered to be closing. This is especially true for Hispanic students and
ELL students. This article is significant to this literature review because the study shows that
there is a relationship between students’ participation in DLIPs and academic achievement as
measured by standardized tests such as the CSTs.
Another component of Lindholm-Leary and Block’s (2010) study was to gather students’
thoughts and attitudes as to whether they were obtaining positive cross-cultural attitudes in
regards to other cultures. Students in Study 1 and Study 2 were given surveys to complete that
would help identify if students had positive cross-cultural attitudes. Students in the surveys were
asked questions such as:
AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 45

1. Learning another language would help me to get along better with others.
2. I would like to become friends with someone who mostly speaks a non-English language.
3. I like to play with others no matter what they look like.
In the study both the EP and the ELL DLIP students had higher positive scores than mainstream
students in terms of having positive cross-cultural attitudes compared to the non-DLIP student
group.
In sum, this study found that Hispanic students who participated in DLIPs achieved
comparably or significantly better than their mainstream peers in ELA and mathematics and had
more cross-cultural awareness as measured by self-reported surveys. This study demonstrates
that DLIPs represent a way of closing the achievement gap, which is similar to what Alanis and
Rodriguez (2008) found in their research of DLIPs when they studied an urban city in south
central Texas.
One of the purposes of Alanis and Rodriguez study was to find what in the DLIP
contributed to student academic outcomes. Their study closely relates to Lindholm-Leary and
Block’s (2010) study, however, Alanis and Rodriguez study was completed on a much smaller
scale. There was only one elementary school used with 321 students. The Texas Assessment of
Knowledge and Skills (TASK) was used to evaluate student performance in the areas of reading,
science and mathematics. However, only the fifth graders’ scores were examined for the study.
What Alanis and Rodriguez found was DLIP students scored better than the mainstream students
in all areas, even though students in the DLIP did not receive formal English instruction in
reading until the third grade. The results also indicated that learning Spanish did not hinder the
development of English for the English dominant or Spanish dominant students. Lastly, the data
from students in the DLIP infers that mathematics, ELA and science scores reflect a high degree
AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 46

of achievement. Both Alanis and Rodriguez and Lindholm-Leary and Block found benefits of
DLIPs to academic outcomes.
However, through the examination of the data from Lindholm-Leary and Block, it is
unclear whether the higher test scores of the EP DLIP group could be attributed to the DLIP
group’s treatment, or whether another variable such as a slightly high parent educational level or
higher socio-economic status (SES) was a factor. The teacher quality, parent involvement and
school-wide support were other variables that were not equal at all school sites and were left
uncontrolled in each study.
While the studies just summarized were not conducted using experimental design, some
possible positive effects of DLIPs on EP and ELL students were documented. Yet other studies
have examined the benefits for subgroups, such as ELLs. Collier and Thomas (2004) conducted a
longitudinal study of one-way and two-way dual language education models of schooling to see
if DLIPs enhanced ELL students’ outcomes and closed the achievement gap. This study was
conducted over 18 years, in 15 states in 23 large and small school districts that included urban,
suburban and rural areas. Collier and Thomas (2004) started the study in 1985 analyzing
databases from school districts in all parts of the U.S. Over an 18-year time period, over two
million student records were analyzed. Each student record included all the school district
records for that student over one school year. The quantitative data collected from the schools
included data that were stored on magnetic media in machine-readable files from registrars,
student information system databases, testing databases as well as offices that worked with
linguistically and culturally diverse students. Qualitative data were collected from the school
sites and districts over the 18-year time period by obtaining source documents from meetings,
detailed interviews with district administrators, school board members, principals, teachers, and
AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 47

community members as well as school visits and classrooms observation. The participating
schools and reasons for selecting these schools were not explained explicitly. What was apparent
by the selection of the schools was that the schools used in this study had a high population of
ELLs. The largest school district in the study was Houston Independent School District (HISD).
The district had over 210,000 students, with a demographic breakdown of 54% Hispanic, 33%
African-American, and 10% Euro-American.
Collier and Thomas’s (2004) goal for the study was to analyze different education
services for linguistically and culturally diverse students in U.S. public schools. Collier and
Thomas also wanted to analyze students’ academic achievement in both students’ first language
and English with ELL students who participated in the 90:10 DLIP and other students who were
enrolled in a traditional bilingual program. In order to see the difference in student outcomes,
Collier and Thomas used the national norm-referenced tests, the Stanford 9 and Aprenda 2 to
analyze student outcomes from both groups. Using a sample of size of 6,240 ELLs in the
traditional bilingual education program and 1,574 ELLs in the DLIP, student achievement
between the two groups was compared. The students in the DLIP scored higher than the students
in the traditional bilingual program as measured by the Aprenda 2 test in Spanish Reading. The
closest the two groups scored was in the

1st and

3rd grade when the traditional bilingual
education students scored at the 57th percentile and the DLIP students scored at the

60th
percentile. The largest difference in students’ scores was in the

5th grade when the traditional
bilingual education students scored at the

51st percentile and the DLIP bilingual students scored
in the

61st percentile. When tested in English, the scores were even more impressive for the
students enrolled in the DLIPs. Using the Stanford 9 assessment in English Reading, students in
the DLIP once again outperformed the traditional bilingual education students. Their sample size
AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 48

for this portion of the study was 9,314 traditional bilingual education students and 2,158 DLIP
students. The closest traditional students came to matching the performance by the DLIP students
was in the

3rd grade when the traditional bilingual education students scored at the

46th
percentile while the DLIP students were at

54th percentile. The largest difference in student
achievement occurred in the

5th grade when the mean score of the bilingual education students
was at the

40th percentile and the DLIP students mean score was at the

52nd percentile. The data
from this study helps to support the finding that DLIPs also help ELLs achieve not only in their
native language, but also in English. Another part of Collier and Thomas’ (2004) study looked at
1,599 students who entered school as ELLs, however, their parents refused special services for
their children and placed them in English mainstream classes with no DLIP or English as a
second language (ESL) support. From the second grade through eleventh grade student
achievement was measured using the Stanford 9 and their scores were compared to students who
participated in a DLIP. The students whose parents refused to give them any special services or
support scored at the

50th percentile in the second grade. However, each year as school became
more difficult, the students receiving no support scored lower on the Stanford 9, until in the

11th
grade when the students scored at the

25th percentile. However, students who were part of the
DLIP also initially scored at the

50th percentile in the second grade, yet they kept pace with the
mainstream population and scored at the

48th percentile by the 11th grade. The DLIP students’
scores did drop slightly from where they began in the second grade, however a possible
explanation is that schooling and the test get progressively harder, and the DLIP students’ scores
at the 48% were in line with the state average (Collier & Thomas, 2004). As such, these results
speak to the academic benefits of DLIPs. Positive results like these for ELL students in DLIPs
increases interest in the community for these schools.
AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 49

The positive academic results that Collier & Thomas (2004) found in their study was
supported by the work of Lindholm-Leary and Borsato (2001), who looked at student academic
outcomes as well as focused on students’ attitudes. The purpose of Lindholm-Leary and Borsato
(2001) study was to examine the influence that participation in a DLIP had on students’ language
and achievement outcomes, college path, and attitude towards themselves and others. Another
purpose of the study was to compare the outcomes of three groups; 1) Hispanic Spanish
bilinguals, Hispanic students who spoke Spanish before starting the program, 2) Hispanic
English bilinguals, Hispanic students whose language skills were English-dominant, and 3) Euro
American English bilinguals, students who entered the program speaking English-only. A total of
142 students in grades 9 through grade 12 participated in the study. These students were enrolled
in a DLIP since either kindergarten or first grade at one of three public elementary schools in
California. Of the 142 students who participated in the study, 84% were Hispanic, 13% Euro
American, 2% African American and 1% Asian and Native American. It was not designated in
the study how the school or students were selected, however, there was a comparison group that
was created for the Hispanic Spanish bilingual students. The comparison group was comprised of
17 students who entered kindergarten speaking Spanish, however, they were not part of the DLIP
while in elementary school. These students were found through the local boys and girls club near
the schools. These students were selected from the boys and girls club because Lindholm-Leary
and Borsato had a difficult time finding comparable high school students who were both
interested in participating and whose parents gave permission to participate.
Students in the study completed a questionnaire comprised of questions about identity
and motivation, attitudes towards school, current schooling path and college ambitions, attitude
towards bilingualism and the DLIP, parental involvement and attitudes, and school environment.
AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 50

The Hispanic students who were not part of the DLIP did not answer questions about their
attitude towards bilingualism and DLIPs. Students were also asked to rate their proficiency in
Spanish, based on the Stanford Foreign Language Oral Skills Evaluation Matrix. Most of the
questions were rated on a 5-point Likert scale which ranged from “strongly disagree” (1) to
“strongly agree” (5). The DLIP students were given the questionnaire to complete by their
classroom teacher and filled out the questionnaire on their own time, while the comparison group
completed the questionnaire at a club meeting. The researchers did not provide response rate
figures for the different groups to analyze each group’s participation.
Analyzing the academic performance of students using their classroom grades, the three
DLIP groups performed well. In Language Arts and Social Studies, 61% of the DLIP Euro
American students had grades of A’s and B’s, 30% of the DLIP Hispanic English-dominant
students had grades of A’s and B’s, and 51% of the Hispanic Spanish-dominant students had
mostly A ’s and B’s. In math and science, the percentages were a little closer. Thirty-nine percent
of the DLIP Euro American students had A’s and B’s, 35% of the DLIP Hispanic English-
dominant students had A’s and B’s, and 28% of the DLIP Hispanic Spanish-dominant students
had A ’s and B’s. There was no non-DLIP group included in this portion of the data analysis, so
there is no way of comparing the group’s performance to non-DLIP students. However, the non-
DLIP group was included in the survey about the likelihood of students enrolling in Advanced
Placement (AP) courses in high school. The non-DLIP group had the lowest number of students
who responded with yes compared to the other three DLIP groups. Yet, when asked about
students’ willingness to go to college, the non-DLIP student group had the highest response rate
of students agreeing with that sentiment at 94%, with Hispanic English-dominate and Hispanic
Spanish-dominant students tied at 93% and Euro American at 75%. This result was not expected
AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 51

as all of the literature up to this point has supported DLIP students having higher academic
achievement and success in school (Alanis & Rodriguez, 2008; Collier & Thomas, 2004;
Howard, Sugarman, & Christian, 2003; Lindholm-Leary & Block 2010). There are several
limitations and threats to validity in the study. The first issue is the small sample size of the
Hispanic Spanish-dominant comparison group. The next issue is the sample did not come from
the high schools in the study. Instead it came from students who were selected because of their
participation in the boys and girls club after school. Students’ participation in after school
activities makes it difficult to obtain an accurate reading on how these 17 students results
compare to a larger sample of students who were chosen from a school context, irrespective of
their involvement in this after school club.
All three groups of students who are part of the DLIP identified multiple benefits of being
part of the program. Through the questionnaire, 41% of all students felt that they were ahead of
their peers in their schoolwork. Only 20% felt that they were behind. Students were also asked
the benefits of studying through two languages. The top three responses were job benefits at
43%, a strong identity at 24% and a good education at 17%. Another benefit that all three of the
DLIP groups identified was that they were proud to be bilingual and have the ability to speak a
language other than English. Students also felt valued in the DLIP program and that learning
through two languages helped them learn better, made them smarter and helped them do better in
school (Lindholm-Leary & Borsato, 2001). Students also shared that they have a better
appreciation for each other and each other’s cultures. This article is significant to this study
because the data once again supports the finding that ELLs and native English speaker’s
participation in DLIPs is related to positive academic outcomes.
AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 52

While these studies show a strong relationship between Spanish DLIPs and student
achievement, there have not been many studies that have examined the effects of Mandarin
DLIPs on student performance, which will be the focus of this study. One study conducted by
Padilla, Fan, Xu, and Silva (2013) looked to see if the same level of positive student academic
achievement exists when students are taught in a Mandarin DLIP. Padilla et al. (2013) conducted
a five-year study to track the progress of heritage language learners, who in the study were the
students who spoke Mandarin and non-heritage language learners, those students who did not
speak Mandarin. Students in this study were enrolled in a public Mandarin DLIP from
kindergarten to fifth grade and the study compared the Mandarin DLIP students’ academic
performance with their peers who attended the same school but did not participate in the
Mandarin DLIP. The students in the study came from a suburban school district of approximately
12,500 students in an upper-middle-income community in Northern California. The district
performed well academically and had a 98% graduation rate. The school district had 13
elementary schools, a Spanish DLIP at one of its elementary schools and in 2008 opened a
Mandarin DLIP at a different elementary school. The participants in the study were students in
two K-1 mixed-grade classes, which had an equal number of students who were native speakers
and non-native speakers at both grade levels. At the beginning of the semester students were
given an oral interview to determine whether they would be considered a native Mandarin
speaker. The other 10 spots in kindergarten and 10 spots in

1st grade were determined by a
lottery for the non-Mandarin speakers.
Padilla et al. (2013) used the California Standards Test (CST) to measure student
achievement in English. The Mandarin Proficiency Assessment (MPA), which was developed
with Mandarin immersion teachers and researchers at Stanford University, was used to measure
AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 53

student achievement in Mandarin. The MPA consisted of three sections: oral language, reading,
and writing. Classroom teachers administered the MPA and CST near the end of each academic
year. The teachers for each student scored the MPA, however, the CSTs were scored at the state
level. In order to have an external measure for the Mandarin language testing component,
students were also given the Standards-Based Measure of Proficiency (STAMP) test as an
external measure of students’ Mandarin performance.
The first set of results of the study focused on students’ oral, reading and written
performance from kindergarten to fifth grade on the MPA. In each area of the assessment and at
each grade level from kindergarten through 3rd grade, heritage language speakers performed at a
higher level than the non-heritage language speakers. However, by the 5th grade non-heritage
students were acquiring an intermediate level of oral, reading and writing competency in
Mandarin, which was similar to the heritage language speakers. (Padilla, et al. 2013). The
significance of comparing the performance of non-heritage speakers with heritage speakers is
that despite some bilingual education critics’ assumptions, the study shows that non-heritage
students are able to perform well academically while simultaneously learning in a new language.
Padilla et al. (2013) used the CST to compare the DLIP non-heritage students’ academic
performance with the non-DLIP non-heritage students’ academic performance. The study looked
at the CST results in English language arts from 2010 to 2013. Students’ scores from 2nd grade
were averaged together from each cohort of students and the sample size for the lower grade
levels grew as more students took the CST at the lower grade levels. In the 2nd grade, 84 DLIP
non-heritage students and 300 non-DLIP non-heritage students were part of the sample. In the
2nd grade, 75% of the DLIP non-heritage students were proficient or advanced in ELA and 82%
of the non-DLIP non-heritage students scored proficient or advanced. In the 3rd grade, the
AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 54

sample size decreased to 55 students in the DLIP non-heritage group and increased to 304
students in the non-DLIP non-heritage group. The DLIP non-heritage proficient or advanced
percentage grew to 84% and the non-DLIP non-heritage students’ rate stayed constant at 82%. In
the 4th grade, the DLIP student sample size was 36 students and non-DLIP non-heritage
students’ sample size dropped to 156 students. Ninety-seven percent of the DLIP non-heritage
students scored proficient or advanced and 93% of the non-DLIP non-heritage students scored
proficient or advanced. In 5th grade, the trend continued where 100% of the DLIP non-heritage
students were proficient or advanced and 96% of the non-DLIP non-heritage students scored
proficient or advanced. The results are positive for both the DLIP non-heritage students and the
non-DLIP non-heritage students, however, the DLIP non-heritage students consistently
performed better than their non-DLIP non-heritage counterparts except in the second grade. In
math, the study results were similar to the English language arts results, however, the DLIP non-
heritage students performed 10% better than the non-DLIP non-heritage students after the 3rd
grade.
The significance of this study, besides the fact that the non-heritage DLIP students can
learn another language, is DLIP non-heritage students outperformed the non-DLIP non-heritage
students even though the DLIP non-heritage students received less instruction in English during
the school day (Collier & Thomas, 2004; Lindholm-Leary & Block, 2010; Padilla et al., 2013). A
limitation of this study, however, is that it used a very small sample, particularly DLIP non-
heritage language participants, especially in the 5th grade, where there were only 13 students in
the sample.
Howard, Christian, and Genesee (2004) conducted a large-scale research project on
DLIPs and their findings were similar to those of Padilla et al. (2013), however, the study was
AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 55

performed with Spanish DLIPs. They conducted a longitudinal three-year quantitative study,
from 1997 to 2000. The study included 474 students in 11 DLIPs from the beginning of the third
grade to the end of fifth grade. While there were three purposes of this study, for this literature
review I am going to focus on the first purpose, which was to investigate students’ language and
literacy development and academic achievement. Originally 40 DLIPs were invited to participate
in the study. The 40 schools were selected because they were either well known to staff members
or recommended by researchers who knew about them. Twenty programs accepted the invitation
to join the study and 12 were selected to participate based upon their ability to provide important
student background data, their willingness to collect additional data and their interest in working
with CAL researchers and other DLIPs. The number of sites had to decrease by one because of a
change in one of the school’s program structure, so the study continued with 11 DLIPs. The sites
were chosen across the U.S. because Howard, Christian, and Genesee wanted to see if the results
would vary based on geographic locations, student population and number of years the DLIP had
been in operation. Three programs were selected on the west coast, one in the southwest, two in
the mid-west, three in the northeast and three in the mid-Atlantic for the study. Consent forms
were sent home in September of 1997 to all third grade students in the DLIPs. Only students who
were continuously enrolled from the 1st grade and who were classified as native speakers of
English or Spanish were included in the study. The final sample included 344 students as,
through attrition, some students who began the program left before the 5th grade.
Students’ progress was measured in three areas: writing, reading comprehension, and oral
language. In the area of writing, samples in both English and Spanish were given to students and
collected by their teachers three times per year over a three-year period. To ensure fidelity across
sites, a memo was sent to participating teachers prior to each data collection to review
AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 56

expectations including the one-hour time limit students had to complete the writing assignment.
The writing samples were scored by DLIP teachers who were trained by CAL researchers to use
a rubric designed specifically for the study (Howard, Christian, & Genesee, 2004). For reading
comprehension, students were assessed using a multiple choice and cloze assessment in both
English and Spanish starting in the 3rd grade. The cloze reading assessment replaced words in a
text with blanks. As students went through the reading, they were given three words to choose
from to fill in the blank with what they thought would be the most appropriate alternative option.
Teachers were given a master key of the correct responses with which to grade each student. The
oral language proficiency test was administered to a sub-sample of students from each group.
Howard, Christian, and Genesee (2004), created a smaller sample because of the amount of time
oral proficiency test takes. Therefore, only 264 students participated in this portion of the study.
Assessments in both English and Spanish were collected from a random, stratified subset of
students at the end of third grade. The other students who were not part of the random sample in
3rd grade were assessed at the end of the 5th grade. One representative from each participating
school was trained by a CAL representative to give the oral assessment. When the assessment
was given to the students in each school, the trained site representative and a CAL researcher
interviewed the student together. The school representative was the primary interviewer and the
CAL researcher rated the students’ performance as they interviewed. The researcher also audio
recorded the interviews to later check for accuracy of their ratings. The students were
interviewed in pairs according to similar levels of proficiency in English and Spanish, which
helped facilitate their use of the languages. During the 15-minute interviews, students were given
the option to choose two scenarios from: tell a story about a recent trip, talk about a science
experiment, retell a fairy tale with a wordless picture book or role play about different scenarios
AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 57

at school and using English to discuss one of the scenarios and Spanish to discuss the other. The
teachers and researchers used a rubric designed for the study to determine student oral
proficiency scores.
From this study, the native English speakers (NES) and native Spanish speakers (NSS),
scored comparable to each other in all three of the assessed areas. In the English writing
assessment, the NES scored higher than the NSS, however, the gap in performance closed
between the 3rd grade, when students were initially tested, to the 5th grade when the study was
completed. The results were similar in the Spanish writing assessment except this time the NSS
scored higher. However, the gap in performance was once again closed by the end of the 5th
grade. The results for the oral proficiency and writing were the same, where each group
decreased the gap from the 3rd to 5th grade.
The studies had similar outcomes in DLIPs helping all students succeed. However, what
has not been specified in the studies above is how African American students perform in DLIPs.
The studies used thus far in this literature review have not had a numerically significant amount
of African American students to render results for that group. The next section will focus on how
African American students, in particular, have benefited from DLIPs.
Benefits for African American Students
Researchers Bastedo and Jacquette (2011), Caldas and Bankston (1997) and Powell and
Arriola (2003) have shared an abundance of literature about how traditional public schools have
failed African Americans students as well as all students of color. However, there is a growing
trend that shows that DLIPs are creating better academic environments as observed though the
educational success of African-Americans students in these programs. While still scant, there is
evidence that suggests that these programs are closing the achievement gap and leveling the
AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 58

playing field for students who have not found such opportunities in traditional school settings. In
fact, some of the findings presented in the section above showed the narrowing of the gap for
ELLs, generally Hispanic in background. In this section I will highlight several empirical articles
that speak to similar benefits for African-American students. It needs to be noted, none of the
articles in this section were focused solely on African-Americans, however, the findings in these
studies included African-Americans as a separate group when reporting out results of the study.
Thomas and Collier (2012) conducted a longitudinal study of school districts in North
Carolina that focused specifically on 7 school districts that had DLIP classes that reached the 3rd
grade level. The 3rd grade was chosen because that was the initial grade in which state testing
occurs in North Carolina. Eleven of the 12 DLIP schools in the study were Spanish-English and
the other was Mandarin-English. The schools were located in urban, suburban and rural areas of
the state. The data in this study was from the second year of a five-year longitudinal study of
DLIPs in North Carolina. The participating schools had the following breakdown by race when
comparing those who participated in the DLIP and those who did not: 33% Hispanic students
participating and 16% not participating, White students had 31% participation in the program
and 36% non-participation, African Americans had 24% participation in the DLIPs and 38% not,
while Asian students had 3% participation in DLIPs and 3% not participating. Three other groups
made up the remaining population of students in the DLIPs from the study. In total 85,662
students were included in the study for the 2008-2009 school year; 9,834 ELLs; 6,635 language
minority students, who were not classified as ELLs; 33,095 white students; 32,155 African
Americans; and 3,943 others (Thomas and Collier, 2012).
The North Carolina End-of-Grade (EOG) test was used as an assessment for the different
student groups. DLIP participants’ results were compared to the non-DLIP students. In reading
AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 59

achievement, and consistent with the findings of the studies described above, overall the DLIP
students outperformed their non-DLIP counterparts. DLIP ELLs outperformed their non-DLIP
counterparts by 5 to 10 points on average in grades 3 through 8. This data supports the findings
that participation in DLIP is related to the academic achievement of ELLs (Christian, Howard, &
Loeb, 2000; Collier & Thomas, 2004; Lindholm-Leary, Block, 2010). The next finding relates
specifically to the academic achievement of African American students who participated in
DLIPs compared to their non-DLIP peers. In the 3rd through 8th grade, African American
students who participated in the DLIP program scored higher than their non-DLIP peers in each
grade level. The other positive component of the scores for African American students was that
the DLIP students’ scores were almost as high as white students’ scores in DLIPs, which showed
positive gains in closing the achievement gap for African American students. In math, the scores
were similar to the English scores as DLIP African American students consistently scored higher
than non-DLIP African American students at each grade level.
This study was included in the literature review because the article sampled a large
number of African American students and compared data between African American students
who participated in DLIPs to those who did not. The study not only showed data on how DLIPs
helped all students, but specifically acquired data that showed how African American students’
participation in DLIPs increased their academic achievement and closed the achievement gap in
North Carolina, at least in this sample of students. A limitation to this study was that the data was
only from one state. However, the size of the sample and the vast area that was studied using 11
schools in different settings, adds validity to this study.
Lightbown (2007) also performed a study on how Latino and African American students
performed in DLIPs and their data supported the findings that African American DLIP students
AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 60

experience academic success in these programs. Lightbown’s (2007) five-year case study of a
DLIP in a mid-sized city in the northeastern United States is important to this study because the
school where this study took place enrolled a total of 400 students, where the largest enrollment
of students was Hispanic, however, African American students made up the second largest group
of students enrolled in the school. At the school there were three different classes at each grade
level: two classes of DLIP students, one with English only speakers whose instruction was only
in English, and one class of students who entered the school Spanish-dominant but had some
English exposure, and the last class was made up of students who spoke only Spanish. The grade
levels of the students who were included in this study ranged from kindergarten to 3rd grade.
Classroom observations were done five to six times each year and during the visits, time was
spent observing classes, meeting with teachers and administrators, participating in teacher
meetings and collecting and verify data among other things. Students’ progress in DLIP was
measured by classroom assessments created by the teachers and the Developmental Reading
Assessment (DRA), which is a test of reading. The DRA was administered individually to each
student and measured students’ skills ranging from identifying the front and back of a book to
making inferences about the text the student reads.
Students’ results were broken into four groups. Students who spoke English only and
were non-DLIP participants, students who were English-dominant and were in the DLIP,
students who were Spanish-dominant and participated in the DLIP, and students who spoke
mainly Spanish and were non-DLIP participants. For the study African American students were
included in the DLIP English-dominant results. From the results of the DRA, DLIP Spanish-
dominant and DLIP English-dominant students outperformed non-DLIP students after the second
AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 61

grade. Even though the non-DLIP English-speaking students scored better in the first two years,
the DLIP English speaking students continued to surpass the non-DLIP students.
The above data is another positive result that shows that English-dominant and Spanish-
dominant students in DLIPs performed better than the English-only students. This is significant
because students are making substantial progress in learning English as well as an additional
language without sacrificing the learning of content. What makes this study even more
significant for my study is the English-only students in this study where overwhelmingly African
American. Thus this study documents how DLIPs are beneficial for African American students’
academic achievement. One limitation to this study was it was never identified how many
African Americans participated in the study.
These findings, along with the findings from the studies that were described in this
literature review, show the benefits of participation in DLIPs for all students (Collier & Thomas,
2004; Lindholm-Leary & Block, 2010; Padilla et al., 2013; Lindholm-Leary & Borsato, 2001).
The data show that by the end of elementary school or sometimes sooner, DLIP students in all
the subgroups perform at least one grade level above the non-DLIP students. For these reasons, it
is easy to understand why some families are eager to place their children in DLIPs. The next
section of the literature review will focus on why parents make the decision to place their
children in DLIPs and what social constructs facilitate the follow through of the decision.
Parents Who Choose Alternate Public Education Options and Why
The benefits listed in the last section help to demonstrate why there has been such an
increase in the number of DLIPs across the country. Since it has been documented that student
participation in DLIPs is related to increased student achievement for all students (Christian,
Howard, & Loeb, 2000; Collier & Thomas, 2004; Howard, Christian, & Genesee, 2004; Howard,
AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 62

Sugarman, & Christian, 2003; Lightbown, 2007; Lindholm-Leary, & Block, 2010; Lindholm-
Leary, & Borsato, 2001; Lindholm-Leary, & Howard, 2008), this has made the programs more
attractive to parents. Besides the claims that DLIPs increase student achievement, research has
also identified that DLIPs can provide students with skills to interact competently in a world
community and can help students gain the economic benefits from being bilingual, biliterate and
cross-culturally aware (Goldring & Phillips, 2007). Parents want the best possible future for their
children and many have turned to DLIPs as a means to attain this goal.
Of course, DLIPs are not the only alternative educational program that is growing in
popularity. Goldring and Phillips (2007) also noted that parents chose other alternate educational
programs. They found that parents felt that there was a stronger emphasis on academics and
discipline, as well as feelings that their children were safer in an alternate educational program.
These alternative programs include charter schools, parochial private schools, independent
private schools, and magnet schools. While the focus of this dissertation is DLIPs, it is also
important to focus on parents’ perceptions of alternative programs like DLIPs in order to
examine what motivates parents to choose such programs as well as to understand what enables
them to do so. In other words, I will be taking a slightly broader perspective in examining parent
choice and the means through which they can act on this choice. In this next section of the
literature review, I will first focus on empirical studies that have examined the reasons why
parents choose alternate education programs such as DLIPs instead of a regular English only
public education for their children. But given that not all parents are in a position to make such
choices, I will then turn to the characteristics of parents who tend to choose alternative
educational pathways for their children. Specifically, the idea of social networks and social class
will be introduced as an important parental/familial characteristic that determines why some
AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 63

parents choose to send their children to alternative programs instead of the traditional public
schools. The concept of social networks and social class and social capital will be discussed at
length in a different section.
Why Parents Choose
There are multiple options for parents to choose in terms of schooling for their children.
Goldring and Phillips (2008) and Slaughter-Defoe (1991) have found that one of the most
important ways parents are involved in their child’s education is by choosing the school they
attend. Many parents choose the school based on where the family lives, which is a de facto
choice as this is the neighborhood school according to the families’ address. The other schooling
options such as private schools, magnet schools or charter schools are chosen for reasons beyond
simply where the family lives. For this literature review it is important to make a distinction and
clarify the difference between a public school, magnet school, charter schools, and private
schools. Public schools are available for all students and students are placed in a school
according to the school’s attendance zone, which are based on the students’ address. Another
important fact about public schools is no one can be denied entrance. Therefore, if you live
within the boundaries of any public school, you are allowed to attend the school. Magnet
schools, are public schools which generally have a specific content focus. An example of a
magnet school is Science Technology Engineering Arts and Math (STEAM), School of the Arts,
and DLIP. Charter schools are also public schools and can have themes or academic emphasis,
and they are allowed to have a selection process when admitting students. However, what all
these types of schools have in common is they present a more appealing option for parents than
their neighborhood public school (Goldring & Phillips, 2008). Private schools are schools that
are either parochial, faith based, or independent, and students have to pay to attend these schools.
AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 64

Some students may attend for a reduced rate or for free if they receive scholarships, but there is
still a fee imposed for attending the school since these schools usually do not receive state or
federal funding to operate. The focus of this portion of the literature review will be on magnet
programs, in particular DLIPs, which has an academic focus on learning two languages (Palmer,
2007). I include DLIPs in the magnet school category because magnet schools have a particular
educational focus and they have a similar structure in terms of student enrollment. I am not
including parochial private schools, independent private schools and charter schools in this
literature review, because these schools all have a selection process where students are not
admitted automatically. While DLIP schools technically do not have a selection process, they
aspire to meet a linguistic make-up of native and non-native speakers to make up a suggested
study body composition. Magnet schools do not have a selection criteria, if you live in the
attendance zone or apply for admittance to the school, as long as there is space, students are
admitted.
Farrell and Mathews (1990) wrote an article that summarized, from different studies,
school choice strategies of African American parents and the impact of choice on African
American children. Farrell and Mathews (1990) noted from their review of other studies and
similar to what has been stated in Chapter 1 choice, historically there has been an educational
gap for African American students. Many African American parents had to choose alternate
public education options because their neighborhood schools did not appropriately prepare
students and the schools were academically poor and unsafe. Many African American families
share this same problem because they do not have economic capital, and live in low-SES
neighborhoods, which have low performing schools (Farrell and Mathews, 1990; Rosenbaum,
Kulieke, & Rubinowitz, (1987). However, Rosenbaum, Kulieke, and Rubinowitz, L. (1987)
AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 65

found that if African American students in low-SES neighborhoods are able to attend higher
performing schools, they tend to have better academic outcomes.
Rosenbaum, Kulieke, and Rubinowitz completed a study that examined a program that
gave low-income African American families a choice, to move into middle-income white
suburbs or a black neighborhood. By moving low-income African American families into the
white suburbs, the study created both residential and school integration. There were two
hypotheses for integration of the low-income African American students into the school. The first
hypothesis was the school teachers would respond to the new African American students with
increased educational assistance and some racial discrimination. The second hypothesis was the
new students’ grades and view of school in general would not change as a result of moving to a
suburban school (Rosenbaum, Kulieke, & Rubinowitz, 1987).
Two groups of African American, low-income families supplied the data for this study.
These families participated in the Gautreaux housing desegregation program. This program was
set in 1976, as a result of the Gautreaux housing desegregation lawsuit, to assist low-income
families in Chicago, Illinois. The federal government funded this program to create rent subsidies
and make them available to low-income families to move to the suburbs of Chicago
(Rosenbaum, Kulieke, & Rubinowitz, 1987). The first group that supplied data consisted of 114
suburban families who moved to the white suburbs, where 96% of the residents were White and
middle class. The second group, or as Rosenbaum, Kulieke, & Rubinowitz called them, the
control group consisted of 48 families who moved to the Chicago urban area, where 99% of
residents were African American. Families in the second group were also participants in the
Gautreaux program, however, those families decided to move to a more urban area instead of the
white suburbs. For the study the first group was considered the suburban group and the second
AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 66

group the control group. The researchers did not report this to be an experimental study as they
were trying to conduct this study with low visibility, reducing the backlash and stigma for
families and the study (Rosenbaum, Kulieke, & Rubinowitz, 1987).
The two sample groups were similar in family structure and educational level. Both
groups consisted of mainly single-mother households with the mother not finishing college.
Students’ ages in the study ranged from 6 to 18 years old. In order to gather data, interviews were
conducted with the mother and randomly selected children from the sample. The interviews
included closed-ended as well as open-ended questions. Data from the interviews with the
suburban group were compared with their experiences before moving to the suburbs and with the
experiences of the control group.
Quantitative and qualitative analyses were used to review the data. In analyzing the data,
the control group was seen to be as strong because it controlled for the selection effects of
Gautreaux participation and the effects of moving. The suburban group was also asked
retrospective questions about their experiences in the urban setting. Consistent with the
hypothesis regarding teachers’ response to students, the suburban teachers offered educational
assistance at an increased level to the new students. Of the mothers in the suburban group, 45%
felt that their children received more help from their suburban teachers, than the children
received from their teachers in their former urban setting, while only 21% said they received
less. The suburban mothers’ results for their children receiving help from teachers was also
higher than what the mothers in the control group reported from their children’s school. Mothers
were also asked, whether teachers had gone out of their way to help their children during the past
three months and 59% of the suburban mothers and only 30% of the control group said yes. It
was also noted that the suburban mothers felt that the suburban teachers responded better to their
AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 67

children’s educational needs and treated them better, with 92% of the suburban mothers and
82.5% of the control group responding that way. The 10% increase in parents’ opinions on
whether the teachers were meeting their children’s needs was statistically significant, however,
the researches did not state that in their findings. Parents in their responses to the open-ended
questions stated that when they were in the urban school, when the teachers finished their eight-
hour work day they were done. However, at the suburban school, the teachers were perceived as
working extra hours to support their students. Teachers also were not aware that the new students
were part of a special housing program. This made the mothers feel even better about how
teachers worked with their children.
There were also problems that mothers identified with the program. Three problems were
mentioned more than others and they were: racial bias, higher standards and special education.
The percentages were not included in the study, however, many mothers who expressed approval
with the program, nevertheless mentioned that some teachers had racial biases towards their
children. Some felt that a few teachers picked on their children, while other teachers ignored
them. Other teachers let white students call them names and mothers reported that this happened
on a daily basis. However, these incidents evidently did not change the majority of the mothers’
general feelings about the school and the mothers noted that these incidents declined over time.
The suburban mothers also felt that the suburban schools had higher standards than their
previous schools. Some parents noted that fourth-grade work in the city was being done in the
second or third grade in the suburbs. The third issue that Rosenbaum, Kulieke, and Rubinowitz
observed from reviewing the data was that suburban schools placed the African American
students in special education programs at a higher rate than the city schools. Before the move 7%
of the suburban students were in special education. After the move 19% of the suburban students
AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 68

were in special education as compared to only 4.9% of the control group. Interviews with the
mothers of children were placed in special education classes in the suburban schools were
initially critical of the move and had concerns as their children were not considered a special
education student in their former school. However, after a sometime in the special education
classes, those same mothers felt that the move to special education was a great move for child.
Other mothers believed that racial bias affected their child’s placement into special education.
However, these parents also ended up feeling that special education was the appropriate place for
their child to receive support to get them caught up to the expectations of the suburban schools.
When analyzing the second hypothesis of African American students’ grades and
satisfaction with the move to suburban schools, one would think that the suburban schools’
higher standards, as reported by the mothers, would affect students’ grades and satisfaction with
school. However, the analysis of students’ grades showed that there was no significant difference
in how the suburban students performed at their previous school, before the move, and with the
control group students. Since there was no statistical significance between the suburban students’
grades after their move, suggests an ability of the African American suburban students to respond
to the higher demands of the suburban schools. However, this analysis is only for students in
regular education courses, not special education. A limitation of this study is that the analysis
was done with only teacher grades, which could be seen as subjective, as the researchers were
unable to obtain standardized test scores. However, since suburban teachers did not evaluate the
suburban group any lower than the urban teachers evaluated the control group (Rosenbaum,
Kulieke, & Rubinowitz, 1987). This indicates that the move to the suburbs for the African
American students was positive for students’ academic progress and parents’ perceptions of the
new school environment.
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While their study was not on African Americans choosing an alternate education
program, Lee and Jeong (2013) conducted a similar study of Korean parents to gauge their
perspectives of alternative schooling for their children. Their qualitative study examined the
experiences of Korean-American students, parents and teachers in a 50/50 Korean-English DLIP,
with a majority of the students being of Korean descent. The purpose of the study was to explore
students’, parents’, and teachers’ perspectives about the program, as well as identify the benefits
and challenges of participating in a DLIP. For this section of the review the focus will be on
parents’ thoughts of why they felt the program was beneficial for their children. The school in the
study by Lee and Jeong (2013) was located in southern California and was in its second year of
operation. The school was part of a larger traditional public elementary school, however, the
program was considered an alternate or enrichment program. There were 26 students in first
grade, and 20 of them were of Korean descent. Of the 20 students in the class, six Korean-
American families were recruited to participate in the yearlong study, three boys and three girls.
Over the course of one year, eight different full day observations were conducted at school and
an additional five full day family visits occurred at the students’ homes. The observations were
recorded with field notes and also video recorded. Additionally, four audio-recorded semi-
structured interviews were conducted with each parent, and focused on parents’ attitudes towards
languages, bilingualism, and experiences with the DLIP as well as motivations for participating
in the program. The interview data was first transcribed using a video and audio data
transcription program and then a qualitative analysis program called Transana. The themes of
motivation, attitudes, benefits, and challenges were frequently seen in the data. There were three
separate findings from the study, however, for this section of the literature review, the findings on
the benefits of DLIP will be reviewed. Some of the benefits that parents felt were important
AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 70

about DLIPs were that DLIP students were able to develop an understanding of their cultural
heritage and ethnic identity. Family members also saw the DLIP as a way to improve family
communication. An additional theme that was mentioned in this study was families in the study
felt that their child’s participation in the DLIP would help the student with future career
opportunities and make the student more marketable for higher paying jobs because the students
would be bilingual and biliterate. Parents in Lee and Jeong’s (2013) study also relayed a few
concerns with the DLIP. One of the biggest issues was the fact that Korean-speaking parents felt
that their children were not learning English at the same level as the English-speaking students,
because the Korean-DLIP placed more emphasis on the Korean language instead of English, to
the benefit of the English-speaking students and to the detriment of the Korean-speaking students
(Lee & Jeong, 2013). Even with the concern of their children lagging slightly behind the other
students who were taught exclusively in English, parents still felt that the DLIP was worth the
educational investment.
Parks (2008) sought out to research the types of parents that chose DLIPs for their
children and why? In order to find out more information about the types of families that enroll
their children in DLIPs, in August of 2005, Parks (2008) surveyed 724 families of Spanish DLIP
students in the Southwest region of the United States where students mainly spoke English and
the second most spoken language was Spanish.
The Family Survey Project was a consortium of public schools in the area and university
faculty. The Family Survey Project’s goal was to survey the families of DLIP students about their
experiences in the program. The survey was created by a smaller group of the consortium, which
included teachers, coordinators, administrators and university consultants. The surveys were
written in both English and Spanish, so that both English and Spanish speaking families input
AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 71

and concerns could be included in the surveys. The survey asked families to complete the
statement, ‘I chose dual language for my child because I want my child to be …’ with the
following choices, ‘able to speak, read and write in two languages’; ‘comfortable relating to
different people and cultures’; ‘better able to relate to his/her heritage’; ‘with teachers that speak
our language’; ‘more successful in school’; ‘successful in a global society’; and ‘other’. Parents
were encouraged to select as many of the fixed response choices as they felt applied to the reason
they chose a DLIP school for their child. Parents were also allowed to write in an answer if their
rationale was not listed. The group also collected information about demographics,
communications between home and school, and the involvement of families in the schools, as
well as families’ understanding, expectations, and perceived benefits of the DLIP, which is
relevant for this study. The surveys were color coded for each school and distributed to the
participating schools with consent forms. Before the surveys were sent to the home or given to
the students, researchers coordinating the project held a briefing for each school to make sure
that all personnel understood how to distribute and collect the surveys to help insure fidelity.
During the meetings, schools were informed that the surveys had to be returned within two
weeks and that incentives would be offered to schools that achieved at least a 45% response rate.
The school with the highest response rate was offered an additional $1000 to support their DLIP.
There were 1908 DLIP students attending the seven elementary schools and one middle school
that participated in the project. In all 724 parents agreed to participate in the survey out of the
1908 surveys that were sent home, thus the study had a 37.9% response rate. Once the data was
returned from the schools, survey monkey, an internet-based surveying system, was used to enter
the data from the paper copies.
AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 72

Of the families that responded to the survey, 95.2% identified themselves as parents
whose children were enrolled in the DLIP and 65% of those families spoke Spanish in the home,
while 27% spoke English. Seven elementary schools and one middle school participated in the
survey. The schools that were surveyed employed either the 50-50 program model or the 90:10
model, with one school employing both models. The percentage of ELL students at the schools
ranged from 25% to 80%, and the number of students who were eligible for free and reduced
lunch range from 60% to 100%.
After analyzing parents’ survey responses to the question of what motivated them to
choose DLIP for their child, Parks found that 93% of the respondents chose DLIPs because they
wanted their child to be able to speak, read, and write in two languages, 63% of the respondents
stated that they wanted their child to be successful in a global society, and 61% of the
respondents felt their children would be more successful in school if they participated in the
DLIP. Approximately 60% of the parents selected wanting their child to be comfortable relating
to different people as the reason they chose the DLIP for their child. One limitation to this
portion of this study was, as a fixed response survey, parents had limited choices as to why they
enrolled their children in DLIPs. Listing the reasons may have persuaded certain parents to
include choices, even if they might not have been one of their original reasons.
Even though there was a high number of parents in agreement for why they chose DLIPs
for their children, not all parents had the same motivations. Of the six major reasons that parents
mentioned for choosing DLIPs for their students, the English-dominant parents’ percentage was
higher in all categories except for parents choosing DLIPs for their child to be with teachers that
speak their language. With that option, 38.56% of Spanish-dominant parents responded in
agreement to that statement compared to 27.27% of the English dominant parents (Parks, 2008).
AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 73

The study also examined the two types of families that enrolled their child in the DLIP.
There were the families who transferred into the school for the DLIP and those who were in the
DLIP because it was their neighborhood school. Survey responses to the question about how the
child was enrolled in the school helped to show the background of parents who chose the DLIP
school. Parents who enrolled in the DLIP because it was their neighborhood school answers were
separated and compared to the parents of students who transferred their child to the school. There
were 164 families who chose the DLIP and transferred. Within the transfer families 42.33% were
English speaking and 50.92% Spanish speaking. In terms of education level, 50% of transfer
parents had a high school education or less while 32.14% had an undergraduate degree and
17.86% had a graduate education. Of the neighborhood families, 20.25% were English speaking,
while 75.7% were Spanish speaking. In terms of education level, 84.53% of parents had a high
school education or less, 11.15% had an undergraduate degree, and 4.32% had a graduate
education. No matter the language or educational background, almost all the parents were
committed to keeping their child in the program with 96% of parents stating they would keep
their child in the program through 12
th
grade. This study is important to this literature review
because it documents some of the background of parents who chose a DLIP for their child.
Gerena (2011) also studied why parents chose DLIPs for their children’s education. After
two years of field observations, Gerena (2011) conducted focus group interviews to examine the
perceptions and viewpoints of parents in one DLIP. Gerena selected a K-5 public elementary
school with a newly implemented DLIP located in urban Southern California as the study site.
This school site was chosen for the study because it housed a transitional bilingual program,
English as a second language (ESL) pullout support, and a DLIP, which allowed the researcher to
gather information and analyze the data from different groups for the study. The research site had
AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 74

1,017 students in grades K through 5, with the following ethnic breakdown: American
Indian/Alaska natives 0.3%; Asian 2.7%; Pacific Islander 0.2%; Filipino, 0.9%; Hispanic/Latino
42.5%; African American 3.9%; White 46.8%. Of the students enrolled in the school,
approximately 45% of the students received free or reduced lunch.
Over a two-year period, Gerena (2011) took on the role of an overt ethnographic
participant observer and recorded the interactions between parents as well as interactions
between parents and teachers. There were also instructional practices that were observed and raw
data collected through field observations, and survey data collection. Gerena (2011) participated
in and observed parent activities that occurred on campus such as parent support meetings and
parent teacher meetings. During this time, English-only, Spanish-only, and bilingual parents were
also interviewed and surveyed.
The focus groups were composed of 15 parents, six parents were English-only speakers,
eight were Spanish-only speakers, and one was bilingual. Parents were invited to participate in
the focus groups by language so parents would be more comfortable contributing and eliminated
the need to have translation during the meetings (Gerena, 2011). During the two separate focus
groups, parents were presented with the same focus group question protocol and there were eight
questions asked during the focus groups. The first question asked, ‘What were your reasons for
choosing this program?’ Both focus groups were taped recorded and their responses transcribed
to analyze the themes. The findings from this study were similar to the findings from the studies
by Lee and Jeong (2013) and Parks (2008). Parents in both the Spanish and English-speaking
focus groups shared that they chose the program because they wanted their children to have more
opportunities and success in the future. Both sets of parents also wanted to enhance their
children’s interpersonal relationships (Gerena, 2011). A difference between the sets of parents
AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 75

was Spanish-speaking parents stated that they chose the program to have their children maintain
their heritage language and culture, while English-speaking parents were motivated with job
opportunities and global connectedness for their children. Consistent with other studies, while
minority families who speak a language other than English saw DLIPs as a grounds to maintain
their heritage language, English-only families considered it as enrichment for their children.
In another, two-year research study conducted by Giacchino-Baker and Piller (2006)
parental motivation, attitudes, support and commitment to a DLIP elementary school in San
Bernardino County was examined. The school had an enrollment of 794 students during the
2001–2002 school year. The school was selected for the study because it had been a
demonstration school for the California State University, San Bernardino (CSUSB) since 1987,
and it was in a convenient location for visits by the researchers (Giacchino-Baker & Piller,
2006). During the 2001-2002 school year the school’s demographics consisted of:
Hispanic/Latino 71% Hispanic/Latino; 20% White; 6% African American; and 3% Native
American.
Data were collected through surveys from the kindergarten and first-grade parents, as the
study occurred in the second year of the school’s implementation of DLIP which began with the
kindergarten cohort a year prior. The surveys were written in Spanish and English, to make sure
that input from all stakeholders was collected. Parents completed the surveys at a regularly
scheduled school meeting that the researchers decided to attend. For the parents who were unable
to attend the meeting, surveys were mailed home to them. The return rate of the surveys was
100% for the kindergarten parents and 50% from the first-grade parents. In all, 30 families out of
a possible 40 participated in the survey. The goal of the surveys was to determine the attitudes,
motivation, and commitment behind both Spanish and English-speaking parents’ decisions to
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select DLIPs for their children. There were 19 questions on the survey, which asked a range of
questions from family demographics to open-ended questions about parents’ experiences at the
school. In addition to the surveys, a group of respondents volunteered to be interviewed and were
organized into four focus groups. Similar to Diamond and Gomez’s (2011) study, the focus
groups were homogeneously organized for Spanish and English-speaking groups. There was a
total of 11 participants in the focus groups, six kindergarten parents, three English-speaking and
three Spanish-speaking and five first grade parents, three Spanish-speaking and two English-
speaking. There were two separate Spanish-speaking focus groups for the kindergarten and first
grade parents, as well as two separate English-speaking focus groups for the kindergarten and
first grade parents. The focus groups were scheduled in the afternoon and the evening to
accommodate parents’ work schedules. A semiformal protocol was used in all focus groups
sessions, and it had 10 questions and 10 follow-up questions. Parents were asked to describe
their experiences in the program and why they chose the program. To help with analyzing data,
the interviews were video and audiotaped. The data from the surveys and focus groups were
triangulated with information that was shared from meetings with administrators and teachers.
Two fixed-response questions on the surveys asked parents to identify the influences and
motivation for enrolling their child in the DLIP. The results of the question about who and what
influenced their decision indicated that 44% of the parents identified other parents as what
influenced them to enroll their child in the DLIP, followed by teachers 29%, other influences
25%, existing students 11%, and printed information 11%. The school’s good reputation,
personal interest in maintaining a cultural heritage and the desire to have their child speak
another language were also strong influences (Giacchino-Baker & Piller, 2006). Parents’
motivation for choosing the DLIP was sought through seven fixed-response choices with parents
AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 77

allowed to select multiple answers. The ability to read Spanish and English received the most
selections with 86% of parents feeling that this motivated them to place their child in the DLIP,
followed by the ability for their children to speak a language other than English, which 79% of
the parents replied motivated them. The child’s ability to get a good job as a bilingual person had
a 75% response rate and preservation of a home language was marked by 48% of participating
parents.
The focus groups provided additional insight into why parents chose to enroll their child
in a DLIP. The ability for their child to speak with other parents and adults in general in another
language gave the parents a sense that the DLIP was beneficial. Some parents also wanted an
alternative setting to a regular public school, such as a magnet or accelerated program and felt
that this DLIP could offer that opportunity to their child. The focus group interviews also found
that for five of the six Spanish-speaking parents, the school was not their neighborhood school.
Even though this question was asked of both groups, the fact that some of the Spanish-speaking
parents drove between 20 to 45 minutes to get to the school, shows that they saw the value in the
program and they were not happy with their home school (Giacchino-Baker & Piller, 2006).
As mentioned in the beginning of this chapter, there have been debates about the value of
DLIPs. In the spring of 2000, Ron Unz, a politician from California, who worked with voters in
California and Arizona to amend their state constitutions to eliminate bilingual education, tried to
bring the same initiative to Colorado. To combat claims by Unz and other bilingual opponents,
that immigrant parents did not want bilingual education and felt that bilingual education was
forced upon immigrant parents, Shannon and Milian (2002) conducted a study with parents who
chose to enroll their children in DLIPs. The focus of the study was to find out why immigrant
parents decided to enroll in the DLIP and their thoughts since enrolling their child in the DLIP.
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At the time of the study, the Colorado Consortium of Dual Language Programs had 10 programs
that were operating in 2000 when parents became aware of Unz’s proposal to stop bilingual
education including DLIPs. The parents suggested that a study be conducted to explain why
parents choose DLIPs and their perceptions of the effectiveness of the program (Shannon &
Milian, 2002). A one-page questionnaire was created that asked parents to share their ideas on
school choice, the purpose of DLIPs and the effectiveness of the programs. The survey consisted
of six fixed-response items that parents had to reply either “yes,” “no,” or “I don’t know” on
some questions and “very important,” “important,” “somewhat important,” or “not important” on
others as well as three open-ended questions. The questions were created in both English and
Spanish. It was decided that any parent whose child attended a DLIP school in the Colorado
Consortium of Dual Language Programs would receive the questionnaire with a cover letter that
explained why they were receiving the letter and the questionnaire. The questionnaires were
distributed and collected by classroom teachers.
In all, 1,043 surveys were completed and returned out of 1,868 surveys, for a response
rate of 55.8% for students attending the 10 schools in the Colorado Consortium of Dual
Language Programs. The fixed-response questions asked about the program in general and its
effectiveness, however, the open-ended questions asked parents why they chose to enroll their
child in the DLIP. The answers provided by the parents were transcribed in a separate document
in the original language so that the data could be analyzed. Two bilingual researchers read 35%
of the responses to the open-ended questions together to calibrate how they were categorizing the
information. Before the categories were finalized, the other bilingual researcher read all of the
answers and the categories where the answers were located to insure that the information had
been placed correctly. The question why they enrolled their child in a DLIP generated 938
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answers and 14 different categories (Shannon & Milian, 2002). Shannon and Milian found that
the categories that generated the most answers were: value and benefit of bilingualism (17%),
future benefits of bilingualism (16%), need and importance to become bilingual, biliterate, and
bicultural (15%), learn a second language (12%) and other reasons (12%). These results, even
though the percentages are lower than in other studies, point to parents’ belief that being
bilingual or biliterate will have a positive effect on students’ future (Gerena, 2011; Giacchino-
Baker & Piller, 2006).
Many parents understand that enrolling their child in a DLIP has a number of benefits.
These parents want their child to have the best opportunities and alternate education settings such
as DLIPs help to accomplishing this need. Not surprisingly given the goals of DLIPs, becoming
bilingual, biliterate and gaining cross-cultural understanding are three reason parents want their
children in the program. Also, giving students better opportunities in the future and helping them
keep their heritage language are other reasons for enrolling their children in DLIPs. However,
this study is important because there is not a lot of literature on African American students’
enrollment in Mandarin DLIPs, as well as, how parents learn about these programs. Also, with
all of these benefits mentioned for enrolling in a DLIP and the concerns previously mentioned in
Chapter One that African American students face in their schooling, there should be more
African American students participating in DLIPs. In the next section, I highlight the
characteristics of parents that have tended to choose DLIPs and other alternative programs for
their children. In fact, research has shown that there are certain characteristics of parents that
make it more likely for them to choose such programs. Parent background, financial status, and
ethnicity are all important components that point to parents’ ultimate ability to choose alternative
educational programs instead of general public education.
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Social Capital and Characteristics of Parents Who Chose DLIPs
As you will see as you read through this section of the literature review, the idea of social
capital has been cited numerous times as a reason why parents chose to enroll their children in
magnet or DLIP schools (Diamond & Gomez, 2004; Parks, 2008). For African American
families, the concept of social capital is crucial to giving their children the best possible
educational opportunities. There is a need for African American parents to place their children in
the best educational setting because many of the schools in African American communities are
low performing and do a poor job of educating these students for their future (Diamond &
Gomez, 2004; Farrell & Mathews, 1990; Goldring & Phillips, 2008; Slaughter-Defoe, 1991).
Many African American parents who learned how to create and use social capital, have seen
positive benefits such as giving their children additional educational opportunities (Diamond &
Gomez, 2004).
There are multiple forms of capital, however, social capital, cultural capital and economic
capital have been mentioned repeatedly in the literature related to this topic. When some people
think of capital, they think of it in the monetary form. However, Bourdieu’s (1986) concept of
capital was generalized as a resource that can assume monetary and nonmonetary forms as well
as tangible and intangible forms. The definition of the three main forms of capital, taken from
Bourdieu (1986) and Coleman’s (1988) work, defined economic capital as monetary income,
other financial resources and assets, or property rights. Cultural capital was defined by Bourdieu
(1986) as long-standing dispositions and habits acquired through socialization, such as the
accumulation of valued cultural objects and formal education and training. Social capital, on the
other hand, was defined as the sum of the actual potential resources that can be mobilized
through membership in the social networks of people and organizations. Although all three forms
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of capital are important, as Anheier, Gerhards, and Romo (1995) described, economic capital can
be seen as transferring easily into social and cultural capital. As parents have more money,
economic capital, they have more formal education and access to training. These same parents
with the economic capital have more networks, social capital, and membership in organizations
that contribute to keeping their social status above families and individuals with low social
capital. Even though economic capital is seen as form of capital that can influence cultural and
social capital, one can have social capital even if he or she does not have economic capital. And
social capital is often more important for African American families because many may not
possess a lot of economic capital. Therefore, they have to use or create social capital to help them
navigate through different life settings including the education of their children. While the
dissertation will focus on social capital, the following section with mention the other forms of
capital and how they the other forms of capital have a connection to social capital.
Pierre Bourdieu
The theory of capital began with sociologist Pierre Bourdieu (1986). Bourdieu defined
capital as “accumulated labor which, when appropriated on a private basis by agents or groups of
agents, enabled them to appropriate social energy in the form of reified or living labor.” Which in
general terms means that capital is all the work that an individual does to make a better life for
him/herself or his/her family. Bourdieu identified three fundamental types of capital: cultural
capital, economic capital, and social capital. Bourdieu explained that cultural capital can exist in
three forms: the embodied state, objectified state, and in the institutionalized state. The embodied
state means that this form of cultural capital must take time and is an investment. A person does
not just achieve this state, it must be undertaken by the individual and can be seen as self-
improvement. This type of capital has to become a person’s habitus or their way of thinking. It is
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not like money or a gift, it cannot be transmitted instantaneously (Bourdieu 1986). However, in
the embodied state, transmission of cultural capital can occur more easily with children whose
parents have sufficient economic capital and can provide the time for their children to
accumulate more capital. The objectified state of cultural capital is the materials objects and
articles that a family possesses. This could include paintings and writings that are important and
have a monetary value, which is economic capital. The example of money and material objects
shows how the different forms of capital are interconnected. If you take an object that has
cultural capital and connect a monetary value to it, the object is then seen as having economic
capital. Or if you have economic capital, you can purchase objects that will have cultural capital.
In the institutionalized state, cultural capital is seen as the academic qualifications of an
individual. The institutionalized state, similar to the objectified state, has a connection to
economic capital, as the more economic capital an individual possesses, the more likely he or she
is to have more education.
Bourdieu (1986) defined social capital as the aggregate of the actual or potential
resources which are linked to possession of a durable network of more or less institutionalized
relationships of mutual acquaintance and recognition. Thus, social capital provides members in a
specific group, who hold the same credentials, backing and part of the collectively owned
capital. The group can consist of a family, tribe or school where the members shares a common
name or experience. The full impact and extent of the social capital possessed by a person,
group, or organization depends on the volume of economic or cultural capital possessed by the
members of its network (Bourdieu 1986). This is another example that shows how economic,
social and cultural capital are interconnected. When a person possesses social capital and is part
of a group of people who also possess similar social capital, the members in the group can
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continue to profit from each other because of their solidarity, whether it be material profits, such
as services, or symbolic profits derived from membership in a prestigious group. Bourdieu
(1986) found that the network of relationships is the product of investment strategies aimed at
establishing social relationships where there is a feeling of obligation to all who are members in
that group. The establishment of this obligation also places limits on the group to where
individuals inside the group do not look outside the group for trade, conversation or even
marriage. In order to encouraging this separation of social capital, certain groups have created
places where people in the membership will gather, such as, schools, clubs and neighborhoods,
or special occasions, such as parties, receptions, or practices, and exclusive sports, and cultural
ceremonies. These actions bring together the group and exclude other who are not part of the
group.
Bourdieu (1986) noted that the form of capital, from which all other forms of capital
flow, is economic capital. If one possesses economic capital, then it is easier for an individual to
access different goods or services because those items can be purchased. In order to derive
cultural capital, you need time. Economic capital often gives individuals time, which allows
them to cultivate cultural capital. Also going back to the definition of cultural capital, which is
effectively transmitted within the family based on the amount of free time of either the individual
or family members, means that the holders of economic capital have the ability to purchase the
time of others. This in turn allows the holders of economic capital to delay the entry into the
labor market through prolonged schooling, which pays off in the long term. While social capital
is the primary focus of this literature review, it is also important to acknowledge that economic
capital is also a way for families to acquire social capital.

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James Coleman
James Coleman (1988) extended the work of Bourdieu and connected social capital to
human capital. Coleman (1998) found that social capital was a variety of different entities, with
two things in common: they consisted of some aspect of social structures and they facilitated
certain actions within its structure. He also found that social capital produces certain outcomes,
which in the absence of social capital, would not be possible. Coleman (1998) used different
examples to differentiate the different forms of social capital. One example is the wholesale
diamond markets and the trust that members of that particular group has in each other in order to
function productively. The fact that this group has a high degree of intermarriage, lives in the
same community and attends the same synagogues is similar to what Bourdieu (1986) described
when discussing how members who share the same social capital will congregate together in the
same communities.
Coleman noted that social capital is difficult for some to see. This is because physical
capital is being able to see something that is tangible, compared to human capital which is less
tangible, such as the skills and knowledge acquired by an individual. Social capital is even more
difficult to see because of the fact that it is connected to relations among different individuals.
Coleman (1988) noted that there were three forms of social capital: obligation and
expectations, information channels, and social norms. Obligations and expectations was the first
area examined by Coleman. The idea that if an individual does something for another person and
trust that the same person will return the favor in the future, creates the expectation in the first
person giving and an obligation from the person who is expected to return the favor. This form of
social capital can only be attained if there is trust of the social environment that the obligation
will be repaid and the extent of the obligation would be held.
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Information channels is the second form of social capital that Coleman (1988) described.
The right information is important in making decisions that affect life choices. Having a group of
individuals that you can gather information from for something that you do not have an adequate
understanding of is very important. Thus, having individuals who can help research and relay
information to other individuals is another powerful form of social capital.
The last form of social capital according to Coleman (1988) is norms and effective
sanctions. When there are norms that are being carried out effectively, then an environment
where people feel safe is created. A norm that ignores the interest of the individual and focuses
on the interest of the group creates an even stronger community. These norms however, also have
an opposite effect on a different set of individuals. For example, a school with effective norms
about student behavior, could be seen as being positive for the school, however, some students
would see the norm as negative because it keeps them from having a good time.
From within the family perspective, social capital may be the most important form of
capital for students. Economical capital is important because it provides physical resources for
students, such as materials to support learning. Human capital, as measured by parents’ education
level, is also important because it helps to have parents can support students academically. Social
capital is important because it is the relationship between children and parents, as well as the
extended relationships with network of other people who can assist the student in meeting their
educational goals. Coleman (1988) also found that if a family had human capital, which
Bourdieu (1986) described as cultural capital, and economic capital but those two forms are not
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complemented by social capital, then the student’s human capital and economic capital are
irrelevant.
1

Social capital theory and African Americans
Multiple researchers have written about social capital theory to examine how social
capital has been used by African American parents to select their children’s schooling and where
they choose to live (Bodovski, 2010; Kerpelman & White, 2006; and Yan, 2000). The following
articles provide additional insight into how social capital supports African American students
specifically.
As you may recall from chapter one, there is an educational achievement gap that exist
between African Americans and races. Taking the idea of the achievement gap further,
researchers Buttaro, Battle and Pastrana (2010) set out to examine the aspiration-attainment gap
for African-American students. The aspiration-attainment gap was defined as the difference
between the educational levels when the student was in middle school in 1988 compared to the
actual level the student attained in 2000. This study is relevant to this literature review because
one of the components examined in this study was how parent participation in the child’s life
influenced this aspiration-attainment gap. Participation in the child’s life is considered as social
capital as participation is viewed as the relationship that the parent has with the child. The study
consisted of data that was acquired from the National Education Longitudinal Study (NELS),
which was conducted by the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES). The study
commenced in 1988 however, the study failed to mention how students were selected to
participate. The sample was created from 1,052 public and private schools that had eighth grade

1
Bourdieu’s idea of cultural capital and Coleman’s idea of human capital are used interchangeably in this
study.
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students enrolled. In total almost 25,000 students were surveyed. Beside the initial survey, most
of the students were re-surveyed in four other data collections rounds in 1990, 1992, 1994 and
2000. Ultimately of the 25,000 students from the four rounds of surveys, 823 African-American
students were selected for analysis.
In order to analyze the data, dependent and independent variables were defined. As
mentioned earlier, the Aspiration-Attainment Gap was the difference between the educational
level that 8
th
grade students aspired to have for the future and the educational level the students
actually attained in 2000. In order to come up with this variable, the type of high school diploma
received as of 2000 and the highest post-secondary education degree attained as of 2000 were
combined, which became the attainment variable. Buttaro, Battle, and Pastrana (2010) computed
the aspiration-attainment gap by subtracting the educational aspirations in 1988 from the
educational attainment in 2000. If the value that was created was positive, a positive gap was
created, and if the value was negative, then a negative gap was created. In addition to computing
the aspiration-attainment gap, interaction effects such as, parents’ educational level, family
income level, grades, and percent minority at the school were used to desegregate the data.
The results of this study showed that African-Americans students in general had a
negative aspiration-attainment score. The aspiration-achievement score baseline was 0, which
meant that the group met their goal, a negative number meaning that the group did not meet their
goal, and a positive number which shows the group exceeded their goal. African American
students overall had a mean of -1.10. This meant that African American students in the study
aspired to attain a degree in the eighth grade but most did not attain this goal as of 2000.
However, African American students whose parents were involved in the students’ school life
produced positive results with the aspiration-attainment score of 2.43 (Buttaro, Battle, &
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Pastrana, 2010). Parent participation in their child’s education, either by helping the student with
homework or attending parent-teacher meetings helped let the school staff know that parents
were involved. This article is important to this literature review because it helps to show that
when African-American parents are involved in their children’s education, it benefits the
educational attainment of their children (Buttaro, Battle, & Pastrana, 2010).
The role of parent involvement with successful African-American students has also been
discussed by Yan (2000). Yan identified unique characteristics of social capital that African-
American students have compared to non-successful African-American students. The purpose of
the study was to identify the factors that influence parent involvement as well as finding ways to
make social capital available to more African-American students. Similar to the study by
Buttaro, Battle, and Pastrana (2010), data for the study was taken from the National Educational
Longitudinal Study (NELS) of 1998 conducted by the U.S. Department of Education’s National
Center for Education Statistics (NCES). This database has data from students who were first
surveyed starting in the eighth grade in 1988 and then those students participated in follow-up
surveys in 1990, 1992, 1994, and 2000. This data was used for the study because it provided
enough background information about students, parents, teachers, and other information that it
could help determine the type of social capital students experienced. The NELS data also
provided information from a nationally representative sample of students spanning from 1998,
when the students where in eighth grade until two years after they graduated.
In the study, three group of students were identified, successful African-American
students, who were the target group, successful European-American students, and non-successful
African American students. For this study, successful was defined as those students who
completed high school and were enrolled in a postsecondary institution. The sample consisted of
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a total of 6,459 students, of which 11% were successful African American students, 82% were
successful European American students, and 7% were non-successful African American student
(Yan, 2000). There were four constructs of social capital with a total of 11 indicators. In the first
construct of Parent-teen interaction, the indicators were: discussing school experiences and
future plans, discussing matters of interest to teen, and participating in cultural activities together.
In the second construct of parent-school interactions, the indicators were: participating in parent-
teacher organizations and activities, contact their teenager’s school about teen’s school
experiences and future plans, and knowing about teen’s school experiences and future plans. In
the third construct of interactions with other parents, the indicators were: discussing school
experiences and future plans with other parents and knowing parents of teen’s friends. For the
last construct family norms, the indicators were: family rules, educational expectations, and
positive parent-ten relationships. Each of these constructs and indicators were taken from the
questionnaire and analyzed for the study.
The measures of social capital that Yan used were analyzed based on the entire sample
taken from the NELS. Eleven t-tests were performed to compare the measure of social capital for
African American and European American families. The results revealed that African American
students’ families had two social capital measures that were significantly higher than the
European American students, which were home discussion and school contact. The two social
capital measures that were lower than the European American families was discussion with other
parents and parent-teen relationship. However, all of the social capital constructs for successful
African American parents were higher than the non-successful African American parents (Y an,
2000). This finding supports other studies that describe social capital as being an important
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aspect for African American students to possess as they matriculate through their educational
setting.
From the analysis, family income (economic capital) had a strong relationship with
students’ educational expectations, which supports the finding that students have less capital
when they come from low-SES families, with parents who have no or little education, or live in a
single parent homes. In analyzing the data, Yan (2000) found that African American students
were generally more likely to come from a low-income household that were more economically
disadvantaged than European American students. It was also noted that in the African American
homes there were generally more single parent households and parents who were less educated
(cultural capital). However, this study reveals that the role of parent involvement in the success
of African American students is extremely important. Even though some African American
students are in disadvantaged environments with less economic and cultural capital, this study
showed that they can still do well if their parents develop a strong level of social capital.
Diamond and Gomez (2004) have also conducted research on the type of African
American parents that chose magnet schools for their children. Even though this study focused
on magnet schools and not specifically DLIPs, earlier in this chapter the similarities between
magnet schools and DLIPs were covered. Thus this study is relevant to this literature review as it
focuses on African American parent choice and social capital. Diamond and Gomez (2004) used
the theoretical perspectives of Pierre Bourdieu and James Coleman to guide their work and
analysis of human, cultural, economic, and social capital. Diamond and Gomez (2004) conducted
a study of African American working-class and middle-class parents’ involvement in choosing
and customizing their children’s school experiences. The purpose of the study was to examine
how social class shapes the educational orientations of actively engaged working-class and
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middle-class African-American parents. One of the main findings was that African American
parents who had family capital customized their children’s school experiences (Diamond &
Gomez, 2004). As we defined earlier in this chapter, capital is resources that are obtained and
accumulated by social groups and are valued in certain contexts (Diamond & Gomez, 2004).
These resources are valuable because they enhance parents’ ability to support their children’s
education. Coleman (1988) identified three forms of family capital; human capital, which is
having knowledge, skills, or expertise in certain areas, usually measured in years of parents’
education level; economic capital, which is having income and wealth and refers to a family’s
monetary resources; and social capital, which is having networks and positive relations with
other individuals. These three forms of capital with the addition of Bourdieu’s cultural capital,
which is access to valued high-status help to create strong and positive social interactions
(Bourdieu, 1986). Therefore, the structure of Bourdieu’s (1986) view of capital combined with
Coleman’s (1988) view of capital created the idea of what Diamond and Gomez refer to as
family capital.
Diamond and Gomez (2004) drew on data from two different sets of interviews and
observations of African American working-class and middle-class families. The first set of
interviews and observations were conducted with working-class African American families in
three school communities to attain their educational beliefs about schools in Chicago. The
second set of interviews and observations was with middle-class parents and conducted as part of
a larger research study of middle and working-class African American, White, and Asian
families. The study focused on families’ language and literacy practices. Parents were also asked
about their attitudes, beliefs, and involvement in their child schooling in Chicago. There were
eight middle-class African American families in the middle-class sample and ten African
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American families in the working-class sample. Even though the interviews were conducted in
different studies, the studies occurred within a six-year period of each other and the interviews
were conducted with parents who lived in Chicago. The interviews were semi-structured, and
even though the two studies were not identical, there was a considerable amount of overlap in the
questions. In order to collect the data, the researchers chose parents from both income level
groups through school administrators’ recommendations of parents who were actively involved
in the school, either as a Parent Teacher Association (PTA) parent or volunteering at the school
site. A snowball sampling technique was then used to identify additional parents in both the
working and middle-class parents’ groups. The parents in the middle-class group were college
educated and working professionals. None of the working-class parents attended college and
were all on some form of public assistance. After interviewing the 18 African American parents,
there were several themes that were found in the data. The working-class African American
students’ attended their neighborhood schools, which were almost entirely African American.
The majority of students who attended these schools also received free or reduced lunch, and the
schools’ test scores were lower than the state average. Schools attended by middle-class African
American students were magnet schools with a smaller population of low-SES students, a more
heterogeneous student population, and higher student performance as measured by state
assessments (Diamond & Gomez, 2004). Diamond and Gomez’s findings suggest that African
American parents’ social class plays an important role in parents selecting the schools for their
children. Middle-class African American parents possess significant resources to help them
choose the school for their child. These parents had regular discussions with other parents about
different school options for their children. Diamond and Gomez (2014) found that middle class
African American parents were more active than working-class parents in school choice. The
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middle-class parents exhibited value on choice for schools and researched school compatibility
with their children. In contrast, working-class African Americans parents want a good education
for their child, but seek a quality education in their neighborhood school (Diamond & Gomez,
2004). Unfortunately for the students, the working-class African American students’
neighborhood schools do not have the best academic setting nor prepares students as well as the
magnet schools. However, middle-class parents leveraged the economic, human, social and
cultural capital to gain entrance into magnet and better public schools. For example, one middle-
class African American father described the process he used for selecting his son’s schooling,
saying he chose the school to reflect his child’s social and intellectual needs. As a teacher,
another African American parent stated in an interview that she selected the school for her child
because of her knowledge of educational contexts and pedagogical approaches. Middle-class
African American parents drew on the background of attending college, being a working
professional and knowledge from participating in different social networks, such as family and
friends, to research school offerings, performance, and enrichment programs to secure the best
possible educational fit for their children (Diamond & Gomez, 2004).
Bourdieu (1986) defined social capital as the sum of a person’s actual potential resources
associate with their social network. As the previous literature has described, social capital is an
important factor for students, and it is especially important for African American students from
low-income families (Buttaro, Battle, & Pastrana; Kerpelaman & White, 2006; Yan, 2000)
because many African American students start with an economic disadvantage compared to
White students. Social capital, which is made up of students’ interactions with supportive adults,
connections with positive peers, along with the environment students are placed in make a
positive difference in students’ academic and personal achievements. Thus, the more social,
AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 94

economic, and cultural capital that parents possess, the more likely they are to explore and chose
alternate public school options for their children.
Summary
The research presented in this chapter provides an overview of DLIPs, the characteristics
of parents who chose to enroll their children in DLIPs along with the benefits that students
acquire from their participation in DLIPs (Lindholm-Leary & Block, 2010; Thomas & Collier,
2012). The literature review also described the different types of capital from the work of
Bourdieu (1986) and Coleman (1988), focusing specifically on social capital and social
networks. From the information provided in the literature if a family has social capital and strong
social networks, then it makes the family more likely to know about alternate educational
opportunities for schooling. It is extremely important for African American parents to possess
social capital and have strong social networks because many students’ schools do a poor job of
educating African American students, thus the need for alternate educational opportunities. I
have used the literature and key concepts covered so far in this chapter to develop my conceptual
framework. In the section that follows, I outline my conceptual framework that will guide this
study.
Conceptual Framework
The conceptual framework that I will present is a graphic representation of concepts from
the literature that I feel are important to understand and to frame the way my research questions
will be addressed. Maxwell (2013) defined a conceptual framework as “the system of concepts,
assumptions, expectations, beliefs, and theories that supports and informs your study” (p. 39).
My conceptual framework was developed by focusing on the literature derived from the previous
section of this chapter and creating a graphic representation of the information and my
AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 95

interpretation of how the literature supports African American parents’ decisions to enroll their
children in alternate educational options. This study has three goals. The first goal is to research
the characteristics of African American parents who chose DLIPs for their children’s education.
A second goal of my study is to explore the reasons why African American parents chose DLIPs
for their children and my final goal is to find ways to increase African American parents’
awareness of the benefits of DLIPs, so that they will choose to enroll their children in them. My
conceptual framework is based off of three pertinent areas of the literature review: (1) the
characteristics of the parents who chose DLIPs (2) the social network parents are a part of who
chose DLIPs and (3) the benefits that parents see as an outcome of participating in DLIPs. In my
conceptual framework, I claim that, when students’ parents have certain characteristics, those
characteristics create the opportunity for parents to create stronger social networks, which gives
parents the knowledge and awareness to make a well-informed decision as to what type of school
they would enroll their child in. Ultimately, the purpose of this study is to identify the
characteristics of African American parents who chose to enroll their children in DLIPs and their
reasons for doing so. Additionally, this study will also look into the ways that social networks
influence parents’ decisions to enroll their children in DLIPs. Below is a graphic representation
that shows how parents’ social network relationships contribute to parents’ decisions to enroll
their children in alternate educational opportunities, including DLIPs and Magnet Schools. This
conceptual framework will also help to explain the benefits and enhanced outcomes that
participating in these alternate educational opportunities provide.

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Figure A
Conceptual Framework

Starting from the bottom, African American students are the inputs for this conceptual
framework; however, it is the student’s parent’s actions that guide students through their
matriculation through school. The first component that has an impact on the students is the
characteristics of the parents. There are certain characteristics that Giacchino-Baker and Piller
(2006) described that are present in supportive parents that have strong social networks. These
characteristics help to form the type of capital that the parent possesses. The works of Bourdieu
(1986) and Coleman (1988) describe three types of capital, with the most important of them
being social capital or social networks for this study. If a parent has limited or no social capital,
AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 97

then the parents are more likely to enroll their child in a regular neighborhood school setting,
since these parents are not connected to other individuals who are aware of alternative schools
and the benefits of attending the other schools.
When parents possess a strong social network, they have the opportunity to choose either
a regular school setting or an alternate educational setting for their child’s education. They can
choose either the regular school route, which is represented by the line off to the side or enroll
their child in a school that provides alternate educational opportunities, with a focus on a specific
theme such as DLIPs, or Magnet Schools, that are structured around the arts, or technology. The
alternate educational opportunity characterized by DLIPs have outcomes that consist of more job
opportunities, becoming biliterate and bilingual, increased cultural awareness, and better
academic performance (Christian, 1996; Christian, Howard & Loeb, 2000; Gerena 2011;
Howard, Sugarman & Christian, 2003; Lindholm-Leary, 2000; Thomas & Collier, 1997). These
enhanced outcomes have been identified as a way to close the achievement gap with African
American students (Lightbown, 2007; Lindholm-Leary & Block, 2010; Thomas & Collier,
2012). The dotted lines going from each of the enhanced outcomes to the arrow between social
network relationships and alternate educational opportunities show that these enhanced outcomes
also serve as the reasons that parents cite to enroll their children in alternate educational
opportunities (Christian, 1996; Christian, Howard & Loeb, 2000; Gerena 2011; Howard,
Sugarman & Christian, 2003; Lindholm-Leary, 2000; Thomas & Collier, 1997).
Summary
For parents, navigating a child through the educational system is complicated and nerve
wrecking. All parents try to provide the best educational opportunities for their child’s future.
However, for African American parents, navigating the educational system is even more difficult,
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due to the quality of education that is afforded to many African American students in their
neighborhood schools. This chapter provided a comprehensive overview of the literature about
DLIPs and the benefits that these programs provide for all students, and specifically African
American students. Those benefits included more job opportunities, becoming biliterate and
bilingual, gaining increased cultural awareness, and better overall academic performance. The
chapter also reviewed Pierre Bourdieu’s (1986) and James Coleman’s (1988) concept of the
different forms of capital and specifically their theories on social capital and social networks.
The work of Bourdieu and Coleman was used by other researchers to show that parents’ social
capital and social networks are used to help make informed decisions about their child’s
educational options for school.
This chapter also contained my conceptual framework where I drew on the work of
Giacchino-Baker and Piller (2006) to understand parent characteristics and how they supported
parents’ access to social networks. The work of Gerena (2011) was also a strong influence on the
conceptual framework as parents’ expected outcomes from their children’s participation in the
program were provided. Drawing from the work of Bourdieu (1986) and Coleman (1988), in my
conceptual framework I claim that when parents have more social capital and strong social
networks, they are able to gain more information about different programs that will assist them in
making informed decisions about alternate educational opportunities that are available for their
child, such as DLIPs or Magnet Schools. The goal of my research was to identify common
characteristics of African American parents who decided to enroll their child in a Mandarin
DLIPs as well as the reasons why those parents chose a Mandarin DLIP specifically. My
qualitative study will contribute to the existing literature by trying to identify ways to increase
the number of African American parents who decide to enroll their children in Mandarin DLIPs
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as there have not been many studies done specifically on African American families and DLIPs,
let alone DLIPs with a focus on the Mandarin language. Given the literature review and my
conceptual framework, the interview participants were asked to share information about
themselves, including their education, as well as other questions about their life. These parents
also shared the reasons they decided to enroll their children in the DLIP over other school
options and the process that they used to make that choice. The next chapter will outline the
methods for my qualitative study before delving into the findings.

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CHAPTER THREE: RESEARCH METHODS
This study attempted to examine the background of African American parents who chose
Mandarin DLIPs for their child’s education, as well as understand the reasons why African
American parents enrolled their children in DLIPs. Researchers have found that parent networks
and social capital are instrumental in identifying alternate educational opportunities for African
American students (Diamond & Gomez, 2004; Giacchino-Baker and Piller, 2006). From the
literature described in the previous chapter, African American parents want the best educational
opportunities for their children, however, these parents do not always have the ability to provide
the best educational setting for them, either because of their understanding of the educational
system, or their socio-economic standings.
In many of the studies in the literature review, it was difficult to find information about
African American families’ participation in DLIPs, especially Mandarin DLIPs. As such this
study focused on the characteristics of African American parents who chose to enroll their
children in a Mandarin DLIP and the reasons why African American parents made that choice. I
intentionally decided to narrow the study and focus exclusively on Mandarin DLIPs as Mandarin
have become the most spoken language in the world and there are immense connections to
business and commerce in a global society along the Mandarin language. I could have also
selected Cantonese, as the language to focus on, however, there are two reasons why I excluded
Cantonese. The first is that Mandarin has been chosen as the official language of China, and
there are no Cantonese DLIPs in this area. Most Cantonese DLIPs are located in Northern
California.
This chapter begins with the research questions that guided my study. I will then move on
to explain the research design and the rationale for using a qualitative case study approach. Next,
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I will describe the criteria used for selecting the sample for this study. The chapter will then
transition to the methods that I used for data collection and protocols for the interview process.
Following that, I will discuss my data analysis methods and move into discussing the credibility
and trustworthiness of my research. Finally, I will review the limitations and delimitations of my
study, as well as discuss the ethical issues that pertain this study.
Research Questions
1. What are the characteristics of African American parents who chose to enroll their
children in Mandarin DLIPs?
2. What are the reasons why African American parents chose to enroll their children in
Mandarin DLIPs?
3. How do African American parents go about choosing Mandarin DLIPs for their
children’s schooling?
To answer my research questions, I drew on the literature from Chapter Two and my
conceptual framework that investigated the role of social networks in African American parents’
decisions to enroll their children in a DLIP. The interview protocols for question one examined
parents’ backgrounds, educational level, as well as how they learned about the program. The
second research question inquired from parents the benefits or other rationale that went into their
decision to choose a Mandarin DLIP over a regular school. Understanding the rationale for why
African American parents chose a Mandarin DLIP, will enable DLIP schools to recruit more
African American students into the program and increase the diversity of these programs.
Finally, interviews asked parents about the process they went through to learn about and
ultimately enroll their children in a DLIP. This articulation of process will also shed light on how
parents were ultimately able to leverage their characteristics and social networks to make an
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active choice in their children’s educational trajectory. This, too, can inform schools and districts,
with and without DLIPs, how to recruit African-American families.
Research Design
“Qualitative research is an approach for exploring and understanding the meaning
individuals or groups ascribe to a social or human problem” (Creswell, 2014, p. 4). Using this
definition, this study utilized interviews with parents of African American students who decided
to enroll their children in a Mandarin DLIP and explored parents’ backgrounds and other
characteristics about them. Using a qualitative case study approach, the interviews tried to
discover the reasons that African American parents chose DLIPs for their children and how they
went about learning about and ultimately enrolling their children in these programs. A case study
approach was appropriate for this study because I wanted to understand parents’ thoughts and
ideas about a particular type of program. It was my goal to get as much descriptive information
as possible and to understand my unit of analysis, parents of Mandarin DLIPs. In defining a case
study, Merriam (2009) states, “a case study is an in-depth description and analysis of a bounded
system” (p. 40). I bounded my case study and used African American parents as my unit of
analysis for this study, as my research questions were centered around African American parents’
backgrounds and thoughts on DLIPs.
Philosophical Approaches
Creswell (2014) and Merriam (2009) as well as other researchers identified four
epistemological perspectives that are used when conducting research; 1) positivist/postpositivist,
which assumes that reality exists and is observable and measurable, 2) interpretive/constructivist,
which assumes that reality is socially constructed, thus there is no single observable reality, 3)
critical, where meaning revolves around power and structures in society that reinforce the
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distribution of power, and 4) postmodern/poststructural, where there is no single truth, rather
multiple truths. For this study, I was informed by the interpretive/constructivist approach. Using
Crotty’s (1998) three assumptions referenced in Creswell’s (2014) work, I interviewed African
American parents who enrolled their children in Mandarin DLIPs using open-ended questions to
learn more about the parents’ backgrounds, to gain a better understanding of the type of African
American parents who enrolled their children in Mandarin DLIPs. I also inquired about the
reasons why they chose to enroll their child in a Mandarin DLIP. And finally, I explored the
process of how African American parents went about making the decision to enroll their children
in a Mandarin DLIP. This last question really focused on how parents found out about the
program and what other factors led them to select a Mandarin DLIP for their child. Following
Crotty’s assumptions, I constructed meaning from the information that I received from the
parents to get a better idea on how to promote Mandarin DLIPs to African American families to
ultimately increase their enrollment in the program.
Qualitative Methodology
I conducted a qualitative case study because I wanted to know more about the type of
African American parents who chose to enroll their child in a Mandarin DLIP, the reasons why
they decided to enroll their children in the program and how they went about doing so. A
quantitative study does not allow the researcher to understand the rationale behind a decision. A
quantitative case study simply enumerates a situation and then makes the researcher assume the
reasons why the phenomenon occurred. However, with a qualitative case study, the end product
is a rich and thick description of the phenomenon that is being studied (Merriam, 2009).
When using a qualitative method, data can be collected through interviews, observations,
or documents and/or artifacts (Creswell, 2014; Maxwell, 2013; Merriam, 2009). Interviews allow
AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 104

the researcher to obtain an accounting of what occurred when they are not able to observe a
behavior that they are interested in seeing. Interviews are also important when trying to identify
why a person has chosen to do something, as it allows the researcher to ask individual open-
ended questions, and when needed, have the interviewee elaborate on their answer with further
explanation. Interviews help researchers understand the meaning-making of their participants.
In order to get a full understanding of the characteristics of African American parents
who enrolled their children in a Mandarin DLIP and the different reasons why African American
parents chose to enroll their children in a Mandarin DLIP, I conducted qualitative interviews with
open-ended questions. The rationale for using this one method of data collection was that the
research questions didn’t easily lend themselves to the other methods. Parents’ background and
characteristics were easily obtained through self-reported means. Parents’ choice and reflection
on the process they went through was also best obtained through in-depth explorations of
meaning making. As such, qualitative interviews in the context of a case study approach were an
appropriate way to study the phenomenon of interest.
Sample
Maxwell (2013) and Merriam (2009) identify two basic types of sampling, probability
and nonprobability, that are normally used when deciding how to conduct research and whom
you include in your research. Nonprobability sampling is used when you want to obtain specific
information about why an incident occurred or the implications of the incident (Merriam, 2009).
Nonprobability sampling is most appropriate in qualitative studies that aim to obtain rich
information from specific kinds of people. One type of nonprobability sampling is what Maxwell
(2013) calls purposeful selection, in which a “particular setting, persons, or activities are selected
deliberately to provide information that is particularly relevant to your question and goals…”
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(p.97). Since my research questions required asking African American parents’ specific
information about themselves and their decision-making process when they enrolled their child
in a Mandarin DLIP, purposeful selection was used.
Setting
I was interested in understanding the background of African American parents who chose
Mandarin DLIPs for their children and reasons why they decided to enroll their children in
Mandarin DLIPs. Additionally, I wanted to ask the parents how they learned about the program
and they eventually decided to enroll their child in a Mandarin DLIP. Given the specific type of
parent in a specific type of DLIP I examined, the setting (schools from which participants were
recruited) was purposely selected to gather as much data for the case study. Thus, the following
were the criteria used for selecting the setting.
Criterion 1: The first criterion for the recruitment setting was selecting an area that was
feasible for data collection. The study was originally bounded to one K-5 school in the Los
Angeles County, as it is important that I can reasonably obtain access to the parents to conduct
interviews and gather data. However, in order to achieve a larger sampling size, the study was
expanded to include three schools in the Los Angeles County. The study also included
participants whose children attended a Mandarin DLIP school in North Carolina.
Criterion 2: The second criterion was the site had to have a sufficient number of African
American students to enable data collection, as enrollment of African American student in the
programs varies immensely.
I conducted my research with African American parents at elementary schools in Los
Angeles County that offer a Mandarin DLIP and one in North Carolina. There are a limited
number of schools that offer a Mandarin DLIP. To be exact, in Los Angeles County there are
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seven public school that have a Mandarin DLIP. Two of the seven Mandarin DLIPs are located in
the Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD) and five are in smaller districts in the San
Gabriel Valley. I selected multiple sites from which to draw my sample to get variation in parent
experiences. For example, one site has an African American student population of 7%, the
highest percentage of African American students enrolled in the districts that have Mandarin
DLIP in the Los Angeles County (http://dq.cde.ca.gov/dataquest). I also collected data from
parents whose children attend a site that has an African American population of less than 1%.
These sites had parents with different experiences, which was useful to my understanding of my
research questions. The schools from which I chose my sample had a wide range of experiences
with Mandarin DLIPs. For example, I included elementary schools that housed the program for
five years as well as schools that had just implemented a Mandarin DLIP this year. One common
element was that all of these Mandarin DLIPs served as a school within a school and housed
both a Mandarin DLIP, as well as, a mainstream program. In all of these schools, there were
more African American students enrolled in the school, than in the MDLIP.
Participants
The participants of this study consisted of African American parents who decided to
enroll their children in a Mandarin DLIPs. Given this specific criterion, my study used a
purposeful selection of participants. However, there was an element of convenience sampling as
well. I attended my children’s African Parent Council meeting and asked if anyone was
interested in participating in my study. At that same meeting, I asked parents if they knew any
African American parents in the other Mandarin DLIPs in Los Angeles County. Two parents
responded yes and I asked those parents to introduce me to other parents as a form of snowball
sampling (Merriam, 2009). In order to obtain a larger sampling, I also reached out to principals at
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the other Mandarin DLIP schools and asked if I could attend one of their parent meetings to ask
for volunteers to join my study. I ended up attending two schools’ parent meetings to recruit
more participants.
I interviewed parents who met the criteria for this study because, as Maxwell (2013)
describes, I was purposefully selecting my interview respondents because they had a working
understanding of the area that I was researching. The parents fit the description of the sample that
I was studying, including being African American and having decided to enroll their children in a
Mandarin DLIP, which gave me a better understanding of the type of African American parent
that chose DLIPs for their child and how they decided to enroll. In all, I interviewed five
families. I had planned to interview six to ten participants, however, I had a difficult time
securing additional participants, which is telling and also not surprising given the framing of this
study. I had two additional participants that I planned to interview, however, both were extremely
difficult to get into contact with. I met each parent at a parent night in their respective districts.
So their lack of responsiveness might have had to do with the fact that I was a complete stranger
to both. We consistently called each other and set dates to meet, but they were both ultimately
unavailable on the times we scheduled. In order to complete my research in a reasonable amount
of time, I decided that I had to complete my data analysis with the five individuals that I had
already collected data from.
Data Collection and Instrumental/Protocols
In order to understand the background of African American parents who chose to enroll
their children in Mandarin DLIPs and understand the rationale behind making that decision, it
was important to ask each parent questions that elicited responses that give a rich and thick
description of their feelings in their own words. Additionally, to examine the process they went
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through to learn about and enroll their children in a DLIP, I needed to interview them as these
processes occurred in the past and are thus unobservable. Since my research questions were
based on parents’ backgrounds, connections, reasons for and the process of enrolling their
children in a Mandarin DLIP, conducting interviews was necessary. Acquiring information about
parents’ background is not observable and I am unable to interpret the reasons why a parent
enrolls their child in a Mandarin DLIP without asking them (Merriam, 2009). Additionally,
observing the process of learning about and enrolling in a program is also conducive to
interviews because this process happened in the past and is thus unobservable.
In order to collect the data needed for this study, I used what Merriam (2009) describes as
a semi-structured interview process, which is a mix of more and less structured interview
questions. This interview approach allows for flexibility while also being sure to ask for specific
data related to my research questions and conceptual framework. My questions were open-ended
which allowed parents to express themselves in their own words and provided me with valuable
information about their background, experiences and reasons for and processes for why they
chose a Mandarin DLIP for their children.
The conceptual framework presented in Chapter Two drove the focus of my interview
protocols. The open-ended interview questions gave the parents the ability to describe and tell
me their story and gave me information about their backgrounds, interactions and experiences
that led them to where they are today. The families that I interviewed answered questions that
were focused on the key concepts that were formed and constructed from the literature review.
The responses to questions driven by my first research question (RQ1) helped me understand the
different components that made up parents’ background. In addition to gathering information
about parents’ background, the responses also provided insight on characteristics, which could
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possibly influence why they chose to enroll their children in a Mandarin DLIP. RQ1 was
developed given the findings from the literature review, which mainly identified parents’ ethnic
background, but not asking additional questions to create more of a narrative about the parents
who chose these programs. The literature review also did not specifically target African
American families and none of the literature explored African American families in Mandarin
DLIPs. As such, open-ended questions allowed me to explore whether and how the
characteristics noted in the literature held true for African-American parents who chose a DLIP
as well. The second research question (RQ2) focused on the rationale that parents used when
deciding to enroll their child in a Mandarin DLIP. I was interested in finding out how portions of
RQ1 possibly influenced parents’ decisions to enroll their child in a Mandarin DLIP. As a
qualitative researcher, my goal through the interview process was to understand and make
meaning of the reasons why African American parents chose to enroll their child in a Mandarin
DLIP. To address my third research questions (RQ3), the interview respondents were asked to
walk through the process of how they finally decided to enroll their children in a Mandarin DLIP.
Each interview lasted between an hour and a half to two hours, depending upon the
amount of information I gathered going through the interview protocols. I ended up gathering a
total of 12 hours of interviews from the five participants. It was my hope that I made each
interviewee feel comfortable as they gave me informative answers to my questions. I conducted
one interview with each of the five families. Four of the five participants interviewed with only
one parent, even though I gave the option to interview the parents together. The interviews were
conducted without children present, so as to give the parents the opportunity to speak freely
when answering questions. While conducting the interviews, I also used field notes to help me
remember all the components of the interviews, including the respondents’ body language and
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facial expressions. I conducted the semi-structured interviews at two different coffee houses and
two different restaurants in Los Angeles County. Both locations were selected by me and
approved by the participants. The first location worked out very well as I was able to secure a
room separate from the busy café. The second location did not work as well. We had to move
outside so that we could hear each other better and there were a number of times that the noise
from traffic became distracting. However, the participants were great and the translation service
was able to pick up the interviews with little to no issues.
Data Analysis
Merriam (2009) states “data analysis is the process used to answer your research
question” (p. 176). Thus, to answer my research questions, data analysis was conducted by
compiling data from the interviews, including transcripts of the audio-recorded interviews, which
was transcribed using Rev.com, a transcription service, as well as myself typing the field notes
created during the interviews with the parents. Maxwell (2014) and Merriam (2009) both
mention that simultaneous data collection and analysis should be used to support the data
analysis process. Therefore, I reviewed each transcribed interview before I conducted additional
interviews. I also coded the transcripts, which involved “assigning some sort of shorthand
designation to various aspects of your data so that you can easily retrieve specific pieces of data”
(Merriam, 2009, p. 173). The coding of the transcripts helped me identify themes and patterns to
help construct the answers to my research questions.
In order to support my ability to make sense of the data, I used the data analysis process
that Creswell (2014) introduced. As I prepared to conduct my data collection, I scheduled time
after each interview to code each transcript, as well as typed the field notes from the interviews.
Since I had some knowledge of parents’ ideas regarding participation in DLIPs from the
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literature review and which informed my conceptual framework, I used what Creswell (2014)
described as a combination of emerging codes, codes that bubble up from the interview, and a
priori codes, codes that are predetermined before the interview to code the transcripts.
Once the data from each interview was transcribed and coded, I began to determine the
categories to construct using inductive reasoning. Creswell (2014), Maxwell (2013), and
Merriam (2009) described these categories or themes as being derived from the codes that appear
often and are similar in nature. After each subsequent interview and transcription, I checked that
the categories created from the early data supported the current data, and if they did not, I created
additional categories. I used the analytical tools that Corbin and Strauss (2008) described, such
as questioning, in which I questioned what the data was telling me in order to make sense of
them. I also used questioning to decide what data was not relevant to the study and left it out of
the analysis. Personal experience was used to identify certain meanings of what parents
described given my connection to the subject both as a researcher of DLIPs and as a parent of
children in such a program. Comparisons were also used during my analysis process to look for
conceptual similarities and differences to support my themes and categories.
Table 1:
Data Analysis Steps
1. Transcribe
each interview
soon after each
interview using
Rev.com
2. Type up field
notes from the
interview soon
after interview
3. Analyze each
transcript to
identify a priori
or emerging
themes
4. Assign a
code to each
theme or
category from
the transcripts
5. Create a
codebook using
Atlas.ti with the
themes and
categories by
code from each
interview.

I used Atlas.ti, a qualitative data analysis and research software program, to manage my
interview data. In order to keep my participants concealed, I created naming conventions for my
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participants. Transcripts from Rev.com were then uploaded into Atlas.ti. I then began coding the
data assigning codes to the data from each transcript. Atlas.ti enabled me to clearly see different
themes emerge as it enumerated the codes that I created and assigned from each transcript.
Atlas.ti also created my codebook and helped to organize quotations from participants and
helped facilitate my data analysis.
Credibility and Trustworthiness
When analyzing and presenting data, it is important to ensure credibility and
trustworthiness of the data (Creswell, 2014; Maxwell, 2013; Merriam, 2009). Merriam (2009)
shares that “validity and reliability are concerns that can be approached through careful attention
to a study’s conceptualization and the way in which the data are collected, analyzed, and
interpreted, and the way in which the findings are presented” (p. 210). As Maxwell (2013) and
Merriam (2009) state, the researcher is the key instrument of data collection and thus, in order to
ensure the credibility and trustworthiness it is important for me to attend to who I am and my
perspective on this study’s phenomenon of interest.
Maxwell (2013) states that there are two specific validity threats in a qualitative study:
bias and reactivity. Subjectivity of the researcher, or researcher bias is a strong threat to validity.
As an African American parent who has chosen to enroll both of his children in a Mandarin
DLIP, I have my own set of theories and views on the type of background of parents who choose
to enroll their children in a Mandarin DLIP. I also have my opinions on why parents choose to
enroll their child in the program. However, it was important to be aware of my thoughts and
opinions and be open to listening to other parents’ perspectives that may be different from mine.
Reactivity, which Maxwell (2013) describes as “the influence of the researcher on the setting or
individuals studied…” (p. 124) is another threat to validity in qualitative studies. Thus, I know
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that it is important to understand how I might influence the information that the respondent give
me, by the way that I ask questions or my facial reactions to an answer a parent gives.
In order to minimize the threats of researcher bias and reactivity, I used validity strategies
outlined by Creswell (2014), Maxwell (2013), and Merriam (2009) to check the accuracy of my
findings. The first strategy that I employed to add validity to my study was member checking. I
took portions of completed sections and shared with respondents the themes that I constructed
from the interviews to determine if respondents felt that I accurately represented what they
shared. Merriam (2009) also calls this strategy “respondent validation,” as I solicited feedback of
my findings from the respondents. The second strategy that I used was to “use a rich, thick
description to convey the findings” (Creswell, 2014; p. 202). By conducting a case study of
African American parents in Mandarin DLIPs, I was able to ask in-depth questions and also
follow them up with probing questions to extract the information needed for the study. I
conducted five interviews with parents to not only gather quality interviews but also have enough
information to be able to create a profile of these parents. The final strategy that I used was
reflexivity, which also coincides with what I mentioned earlier about including any biases I hold.
I did this by writing self-reflection notes to myself after each interview to account for any biases
that I possess. I wrote about the parts of the interviews that stood out to me that either support
my thoughts, or go against what I believe. Identifying these differences or possible biases helped
to make sure that I was reporting and collecting all of the data that was obtained, and not just the
portions that I agreed with, which would influence how the data was collected and reported.
Limitations and Delimitations
As a researcher, it is important that I identify and describe some of the limitations and
delimitations of this study. There were two limitations of this study, which included sample size
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and data collection. The first limitation was sample size, as I only conducted this case study with
five families. While I worked hard to find additional participants, the limited time I had for
recruitment and the difficulty in finding specific participants that fit my criteria for selection
meant I had a smaller sample than originally intended. Therefore, consistent with other
qualitative studies where the goal is to gather in depth information rather than generalize, this
study is not generalizable. Despite this limitation, the thick and rich descriptions derived from
this case study will help schools and districts transfer any relevant findings to their own contexts
in order to identify themes that can assist in publicizing Mandarin DLIPs to other African
American families.
The second limitation of the study was limited data collection. I only conducted
interviews to collect my data. And while this approach is appropriate given the questions that I
asked parents refer to their background and thoughts on participation in the Mandarin DLIP, this
study ultimately only has self-reported data. Like I mentioned in the previous section, since this
study strictly focus on interviews for my data collection, the in-depth interviews will provide a
rich description of the respondents’ answers to try to make the most of this data collection
method, but it should be noted that I was beholden to the honesty of my participants as they self-
reported answers to my interview questions.
I had two delimitations to my study, the language of the program, which in turn
determines the study’s location and my interview protocols. The first delimitation to my study
was I chose to conduct the study on Mandarin DLIPs. This choice to intentionally focus and
narrow the study on Mandarin DLIPs was strategic, because Mandarin is one of the most spoken
languages in the world and opens doors to the global economy to those who are biliterate. This
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decision in turns affected where this study could be carried out as Mandarin DLIPs are limited to
seven schools in the Los Angeles County.
The second delimitation to this study was the interview protocols that were developed
and used with the respondents. I used my conceptual framework to guide the development of my
open-ended, semi-structured interview questions. Probes were also developed to help expand on
the research questions. While I chose to use a semi-structured interview format to remain
flexible, the main concepts of interest had already been determined by my review of the literature
and the subsequent development of my conceptual framework. Both the limitations and
delimitations had an effect and limited the data collection as well as the findings.
Ethics
Ethical dilemmas can arise in many different parts of this study, especially given that I
was the primary instrument for data collection and decided what was important or what should or
should not be included after collecting or analyzing data (Merriam, 2009). Ethical dilemmas
were important to consider when disseminating the findings. In order to support an ethical study,
I followed the steps outlined by Creswell (2014). Prior to starting this study, I sought approval
for the study by presenting it to the University of Southern California Institutional Review Board
(IRB).
I protected the participants who were gracious enough to provide me with the data for my
study and in so doing also protected the confidentiality of the school settings that allowed me to
recruit from within their parent population. The purpose of the study was disclosed to the
participants. I was sensitive to the needs of the district, school, and each individual and kept their
identities confidential by using pseudonyms, as well as, keeping the participants’ responses
confidential. The participants were each made aware that participation in the study was
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voluntary. The participants were also made aware that if they no longer wanted to participate in
the study, they were free to do so at any time. Before each interview, I received from the
participant’s permission to audio-record the interview and offered to provide each participant
access to their transcript to check my work. So as not to coerce, but to show my appreciation to
each participant for allowing me to take up their valuable time, I gave them a $25 Visa gift card
after the interviews were concluded.
Conclusion
This qualitative study had two goals. It first sought to identify characteristics of African
American parents who chose to enroll their child in Mandarin DLIP. The other goal of this study
was to understand the reasons why and processes through which African American parents chose
to enroll their children in Mandarin DLIP. Through a review of the literature, DLIPs have shown
to have a positive effect on student academic performance, yet African American student
participation in these programs are lower than other ethnicities. My ultimate goals, by
conducting this study, was to find ways to promote DLIPs to African American parents to
increase the number of African American students enrolled. My conceptual framework and
interview protocols guided my data collection. Data from this study was collected through semi-
structured interviews of five families from elementary schools in Los Angeles County and one in
North Carolina, that have a Mandarin DLIP. Interviews were then transcribed and participants
were allowed to review their transcript as one way to ensure validity. The transcripts were then
coded to create categories and themes from the data.

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CHAPTER FOUR: FINDINGS
The purpose of this study was to identify the characteristics of African American parents
who enroll their children in a DLIP. For this study, the focus was specifically on Mandarin
DLIPs (MDLIPs). The study also sought to identify the reasons and rationale why African
American parents enrolled their children in Mandarin DLIPs and how they chose the program.
The first chapter focused on providing an introduction to the challenges that African Americans
face in the educational system that result in reduced opportunities and lower academic
achievement. The second chapter presented literature on the history, definitions, purpose and
goals of the DLIP. The literature review also discussed the benefits of enrolling in the program,
and why parents choose DLIPs. The literature review also introduced the idea of social capital,
and looked into the characteristics of parents who enrolled their children in DLIPs. Drawing on
this literature, my conceptual framework was then presented on how and why African American
parents choose to enroll their children in DLIPs and the role of social capital in this decision. The
third chapter outlined the approach used to conduct the study, including my research design,
sampling, data collection and analysis, and how I safeguarded the data to ensure that my study
was credible, trustworthy and ethical.
In this chapter I will present the findings from my data collection. The conceptual
framework from Chapter Two will be used to outline the data and support the presentation of my
findings that emerged from the data collection. As a reminder, the following research questions
guided this study:
1. What are the characteristics of African American parents who chose to enroll their
children in Mandarin DLIPs?
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2. What are the reasons why African American parents chose to enroll their children in
Mandarin DLIPs?
3. How do African American parents go about choosing Mandarin DLIPs for their
children’s schooling?
In this chapter I will take each research question and review and discuss the findings
from the interviews. The following table summarizes the five DLIP parents who provided their
perspectives to help answer my research questions.
Table 2:
Participants’ Chart
Name Child(ren) Age College(s) Attended Profession
Barbara 8 and 11 UC K-12 Educator
Dana 12 HBCU College Professor
Earl 6 and 10 Cal State/HBCU Entrepreneur
Ethan 5 and 9 HBCU Doctor
Lauren 10 HBCU/UC Airline Industry

Characteristics of African American MDLIP Parents
Parents have many options to choose from when it comes to educating their children.
Parents can choose to enroll their children in public schools, parochial private schools,
independent private school, charter schools, and magnet schools just to name a few. However,
for many African American families who live in big cities, their neighborhood school is not a
good option for many different reasons. The schools that are in many African American
communities have a number of problems that make them not as appealing as other schools.
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The fact that many of the schools in African American community’s employ more unqualified
teachers, have larger class sizes and are not funded as well as other schools are just a few
reasons why parents have issues with these schools (Caldas, Bankston & Growe, 2002;
Darling-Hammond, 2007; Milner & Howard, 2004). Therefore, in order to ensure a higher
quality education for their children, many of these parents look for other opportunities to
support their children’s academic growth. However, as the first chapter as demonstrated, not
all parents pursue these alternative opportunities. What is it about parents who actively choose
to look elsewhere to educate their children? This section will examine the characteristics of
African American parents who chose alternate avenues of education for their children.
Participants’ Parents’ Expectations and College
Interview data suggest that the parents’ background has a lot to do with their ability to
and interest in enrolling their children in a MDLIP. What stood out immediately from the data
was that participants stressed how much their parents helped shape their views on education.
Four out of the five participants specifically mentioned the influence of their parents on their
views on education, which shaped their subsequent decisions about their children’s education.
In particular, these parents have internalized the expectation that higher education and
academic excellence are critical. For example, Barbara shared:
My parents, you know they didn't talk a whole lot about their expectations, but we
just. It was kind of, it wasn't quite stated, but we knew that they expected us to do
well. They had high expectations. They expected us to be self-starters and take
initiative when it came to doing our homework and our projects, they weren't doing
everything for us. My mom wouldn't get my homework folder and pull my things out
and say, "All right, you need to do this you need to do this." She wasn't checking
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things off. It was as if she expected us to take that responsibility and you know, I just
remember we, you better not ask her too late for help for homework, you know. It was
something that we needed to get done early. We had to get it done before ... It was the
expectation as soon as we walked in the house after she made us a snack or we had a
little bit of food that we get started immediately and finish. And then we could not do
anything else after that.
While specific conversations about school and college were not had between Barbara and her
parents, there was an unspoken expectation that the children in the house must do and take
responsibility for their academic work. Dana’s experiences with her parents were similar in
that specific conversations weren’t had. However, she was aware of the expectations her
parents had. Dana shared:
I don't know what they thought about school. I know it was important, I'll say that. I
knew it was very important, and I will say what felt different about like the kids I was
talking about who got to high school and they weren't going to class what felt different
was that college was expected. I think it's because they were both college graduates, so
it was just kind of like a foregone conclusion that you got to go to college, and so you
have to get good grades to go to college. That was it.
For both Barbara and Dana the expectation for them to do well in school was just implied.
The parents did not explicitly state that they had to do well in school. It was just something
that was known to them and expected from the parents from their interactions with them. This
expectation from their parents led to the participants’ ability and desire to do well in school.
Four of the five participants did well in school and always knew that they were going to
college.
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In contrast, the one participant whose parents did not push college did not see himself
as worthy of attending college. Earl explained:
And the duration of my time until I graduated high school I just kind of flowed but
never had no plans to go to college because nobody was preparing me.
Even though Earl did not get the push from his parents to attend college, he still ended up
attending a college in central California with the help of people in the community who saw
his potential. In other words, for Earl, a push came from somewhere, though not from his
parents. For the most part, the parent participants in this study who enrolled their children in
MDLIPs had parents who instilled in them high expectations, so they knew that they would
attend college.
The fact that all five parents graduated from a college or a university is also an
indication of the characteristics that make up DLIP parents. Each parent that was interviewed
has a bachelor’s degree or higher. Barbara attended a college near west Los Angeles, Dana
attended a Historical Black College and University (HBCU) near Virginia, Earl attended an
HBCU after leaving a school in central California, Ethan attended an HBCU in Georgia and
Lauren attended a HBCU in Virginia. What is ironic about the college background of four of
the five parents is four of the parents attended a HBCU. The fact that all but one of the
parents I interviewed attended a HBCU made me think if there is some connection to
HBCU’s and MDLIPs. Even with a small sample size, the fact that all but one parent had
attended an HBCU, suggests that there is something about HBCU’s that instill in parents the
desire to give their children different opportunities to set them apart from other students.

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Information and Awareness about DLIPs
Another characteristic that all of these parents possessed was that they took initiative
and conducted research on understanding DLIPs before enrolling their children in the
program. These parents either read up on DLIPs or interviewed parents they know who had
their children in DLIPs, before enrolling their child(ren). When considering enrolling their
children in a DLIP, many parents are concerned that they will not learn as much English and
will be behind their peers that are in an English only program, because the amount of time
focused on the target language (Christian, Howard & Loeb, 2000; Thomas & Collier, 2012).
In the case of the five parents, too, the participants had some initial doubts about the program.
One concern parents had was the inability for their children to communicate in another
language. Barbara shared her encounter with a parent who enrolled her child in a DLIP and
was mentioning how her child cried for almost a year because he could not communicate
with his teacher:
Maybe not two years. Maybe the whole kindergarten year. And I was like, "Oh man,
that's not good for a kid." And that just stuck in my head. I was initially impressed
with what he was able to do but I did remember that she said that he was in the
classroom, he goes to school and the teacher's talking all in Spanish and that just
wasn't good for him. And maybe she exaggerated, maybe it wasn't the whole year,
but that was my, that's the first time I'd heard of it and I kind of tucked that away in
my brain.
Barbara continued:
And I'm thinking, "No way, I'm not sending my kid to that." And I was just, I just
thought, "No." As a mom, letting her, whose child was home with her most of the
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time and only went to pre-school twice a week. I just thought ... I wasn't on board
initially because I just thought about that.
Much like many parents who stay away from DLIPs, Barbara recounted a memory that
demonstrated her own hesitation with enrolling in her own children in this type of program.
She was concerned about her own children having a difficult time and “wasn’t on board
initially.”
Lauren also had similar concerns about how the DLIP model would affect her child.
She said:
The program that we chose is a 90-10 model so in kindergarten they would be getting
Mandarin for ... They would be immersed in Mandarin, and all their instruction
would be in Mandarin for 90% of the day and only 10% in English. And the 10% in
English worked out to be 30 minutes. And so they would be getting 30 minutes of
English instruction as opposed to other schools where maybe it's like 90 minutes.
And so that could be a drawback in terms of what they get in English, their English
support. You know building those basic building blocks and the foundation for
reading.
Similar to Barbara, Lauren’s initial hesitation was with her own child’s ability to understand
and to pick up English language skills necessary to be successful in school in later years. She
mentioned the “basic building blocks” in English being necessary for later reading ability.
However, the parents that enrolled their children in the MDLIP were aware of this concern.
These parents overcame their initial hesitation because they learned that their children would
not be on pace with their non-DLIP schoolmates in the early grades in English proficiency,
but that around the fourth grade their children would be on par with their non-DLIP peers.
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The parents were also aware that in the years to follow their child would perform equally or
better than their non-DLIP peers. This understanding of the MDLIP shows that the parents
did their research as each parent knew the data and expectations for how their children would
fare. For example, Barbara’s husband met with a parent who previously enrolled her child in
MDLIP and he shared with Barbara information that this parent had given him. Barbara
explained:
And then, I think my husband met with her once again and she recommended some
resources actually a book that I ended up reading called, The Bilingual Edge. And
after reading the book and kind of doing some research and learning about the
different benefits of enrolling your child in a dual-language program, and the benefits
of being bilingual and attaining high levels of proficiency in two languages or more,
I was ready to enroll my child in the program.
For Barbara, it wasn’t until after she became aware of the ultimate benefits of bilingualism
that she overcame her initial concerns and decided to enroll her child in a MDLIP. An
“interview” with another parent, some resources that provided background on the approach
and about bilingualism allowed her to make the final decision.
Earl also did some initial research to prepare him for his children’s experiences and
progress in the program:
Again, the older one I believe that initially he experienced some setbacks which, from
my research and development about Mandarin programs particularly dual language
programs is that you will see some regression in their native language particularly
when the programs are structured where there 80/20 splits and above. When you're
coming from a 90/10 split from an 80/20, you know those first two years you gone
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have some regression so that's why the reading is so big and the supplemental
education is so big for them because there's a natural regression when only a half an
hour out of the day is being devoted towards English as the native language.
Earl specifically mentioned his “research and development about Mandarin programs,” which
demonstrates his active pursuit of information to make him aware of the initial drawbacks
(i.e., regression) and how to mitigate them (i.e., reading and supplemental education). Earl’s
and Barbara’s active pursuit of the research made it easier for them to understand some of the
initial drawbacks of enrolling children in a DLIP. In other words, the concerns were just
“initial” concerns as Barbara mentioned in her quote above. Interviewing others and seeking
out resources about the program helped them move past these initial hesitations. This finding
is consistent with my conceptual framework, which states that knowledge of how DLIPs
affect students’ performance is an important characteristic that parents who choose to enroll
their children in DLIPs understand.
In addition to allaying anxieties about the drawbacks of DLIPs, Earl also stated that
his reading and research on DLIPs allowed him to see the myriad benefits. He said:
Because my research and my studies showed that learning a second language early,
it's like playing an instrument. It opens a different part of the brain that allows your
kids to learn in different ways. They have to adjust - especially when they have to go
back and forth from English to Mandarin, they have to adjust and I think it makes
their response time quicker, right, with certain things. So for me it was a no brainer
really.
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Earl’s systematic examination of studies allowed him to see how bilingualism is beneficial.
He used “playing an instrument” as an analogy because many of us know the benefits of
playing instruments and how it can “open a different part of the brain.”
All five parents who were interviewed shared the same understanding of there
possibly being some type of gap in the educational attainment of the student in the first few
years of enrollment in a MDLIP. Yet, their research helped to answer questions that they had
about their children’s’ initial performance and allay their anxieties. While parents still had a
few concerns about DLIPs, to be discussed in a section below, by and large, their research
allowed them to take the plunge and enroll their children in this program.
The Value of Second Language Acquisition
Another common characteristic among the participants was that while none of them
were bilingual or biliterate, they each expressed a desire to speak another language. Dana
wished that she could speak another language as it would help her at work. Dana shared:
And had the opportunity to travel to France, but that way of learning the language I
took it in high school, I took it for maybe three years in high school. I got to college, I
took it again a couple of times, passed the classes, but I still can't, you know I can say
a couple of phrases, I can understand a couple of things, but I'm not fluent. I
remember having a French teacher she was like the student teacher, and I remember
she said to us her professor told her, "You will know you're fluent when you dream in
the language." I was like, oh. I've always known I was really far off from that. I
always wanted to study abroad, but I missed that opportunity as well. I just thought it
would be great to learn another language, as I think it really opens up opportunities for
you.
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Dana used the phrased “missed that opportunity,” which demonstrates a feeling of loss and a
gap left unfilled. Her comment above shows that learning another language is an opportunity
to be seized, and that it can “really open up opportunities” for those who do seize it. Lauren
also shared that she felt speaking another language would be beneficial on her job as well as in
life in general:
Okay, I'm so big on this because I fly the world and I was just at my domicile and I
heard French over here, German over here, Italian over here. Everybody was speaking
and then if they had to speak to me, it was English and I'm like, well. I think that it is
key, it is key, and when we try to isolate ourselves into that English only movement
and believe me, if you have on blinders, you can only see it that way, but the world,
you have so much more access when you can because once you speak someone's
language, now they're willing to share so much more with you because it means you
took a moment in time to learn and know something more about me, about my
culture, about this that and the other. Once you speak someone's language.
Lauren’s use of the words “more access” as contrasted with “isolate” shows the value she
places on being bi- or multi-lingual. She speaks in a deficit manner when speaking about the
“English only movement” but her words change to more positive aspects of interaction and
opportunities when she speaks about bilingualism.
These sentiments shared by these two individuals were echoed in each of the five
interviewees’ comments. Barbara, the K-12 educator in the sample, shared how she wished
she could conduct her parent conferences in Spanish:
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I work with teachers who can do their parent conferences without a translator. I think
it really is nice to be able to communicate with parents in their language. I wish that I
was able to speak Spanish so that I could run my own parent conferences.
Barbara’s comment shows that she feels restricted because she needs a translator, and in this
way, she confirmed the value she places on knowing the language of the parents she serves.
Earl also shared how his experiences with his import-export business might have been
different if he spoke Chinese. He said:
That's what really, really ultimately because I had to get an interpreter to negotiate
with different business people, right? So I was trying to import furniture and I was
bringing little trinkets back, clothes, luggage, all kind of little stuff but ultimately the
goal was to bring furniture. I did ship a container of couches and love seats back ...
you know make some decent money on it before the market crashed and all that but
that's what really motivated me to really pursue that because of the experience I had
had in China and how the experience might have been better if I spoke Chinese.
Like Lauren’s comment about people being "willing to share so much more with you,” Earl
wondered about the benefits he could have gleaned had he taken the time to speak the
language of his clients, to be able to better negotiate the purchase of the products he was
importing. In sum, each of these parents stated their desire to speak another language to help
them communicate. Even when they didn’t know another language, they understood the
benefits and wondered how their lives would have been different had they been multi-lingual.
Wanting to speak another language and valuing it is another characteristic of African
American parents who enrolled their children in DLIPs.

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Summary
For the most part, parents who chose MDLIPs for their children received
encouragement from their parents to do well in school. Even when specific mention of college
was absent in their homes, the high expectations were present and clear. The parents were also
well educated, having attended colleges and universities across the nation. All of the parents
had jobs and professional careers and two of the parents held advanced degrees. Another
characteristic of parents who have enrolled their children in a MDLIP is they have researched
the program and made themselves aware and knowledgeable about it. For example, they knew
what to expect in terms of student learning progression and recognized that there might be a
language lag to start. So despite having initial concerns about DLIPs, their research put them
at ease and allowed them to finalize their decisions.
Despite not being bilingual or biliterate, these parents also valued language
acquisition. They saw the need for bilingualism in all of their professions. These parents also
mentioned the benefits for their children learning and being fluent in another language. The
parents’ views on the benefits that DLIPs can offer their children is also supported by research
on DLIPs (Christian, 1996; Giacchino-Baker & Piller; Lindholm-Leary, 2012).
Reasons for Choosing DLIPs
The previous section of this chapter explored the characteristics of parents who decide to
enroll their children in DLIPs. While Chapter One detailed why many African American parents
in certain areas were not satisfied with their neighborhood schools, this section will focus on the
benefits that the participants expressed for enrolling their children in a DLIP. In the literature
review there were different types of benefits that surfaced that explained why parents chose
DLIPs. Academic and cultural benefits, being biliterate and bilingual, and job opportunities were
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the main areas of benefits for students. These benefits were corroborated in my own study, but
there were additional benefits that surfaced from the data. In the following sections, each benefit
will be discussed from the perspectives of the participants.
Academic Benefits
One of the areas that the participants identified as a reason that they decided to enroll
their child in a DLIP is academic. Researchers Howard, Christian, and Genesee (2004);
Lindholm-Leary (2000) and Thomas and Collier (2012) all mentioned how participating in
DLIPs had positive effects on students’ academic performance after the fourth grade. As
previewed in the section above, many parents became aware of the academic benefits of DLIPs
by conducting their own research on DLIPs. Barbara shared from her reading:
And then they talked about, they compared bilinguals to monolinguals in terms of
bilinguals out performing their monolingual counterparts on standardized tests. And this
is once, of course they have gained a certain level of proficiency in both languages. And
they're saying that they out performed their counterparts on tests.
Barbara was aware of this information because when she researched DLIP it described how
students in a DLIP performed better academically. Her emphasis on the comparison the literature
drew between bilinguals and monolinguals is telling. In the above quote, she used “outperform”
and “counterparts” twice, which signals that these two words stuck out in her memory from this
research. However, her statement also shows that she was aware that the performance was not
necessarily better in the primary grades. Barbara explained that she was okay with the initial
struggles because there will be a benefit for her child in the end:
The research says that they, bilinguals tend to outperform their monolingual peers, over
time and I think those benefits, typically they kick in maybe around middle school.
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Barbara also recognized from her research that DLIPs produce better results for children
academically. She understood that if she keeps her child enrolled in a DLIP:
it will lead to better test scores. That it will lead to stronger reading skills. And stronger
academic skills because of the mental flexibility and because of you know, all their brains
have had to do to kind of grasp these very different languages.
In this statement, Barbara was projecting into the future and demonstrating her understanding
that the long term academic benefits are seen after “all their brains have had to do.” This quote
indirectly reflects Barbara’s understanding of why there is a delay as per the literature. Students
working hard over time to “kind of grasp very different languages” is what positions them to
perform better academically.
Another area were parents felt that their children benefit academically from DLIPs was in
their cognitive awareness. Barbara saw this program as supporting her child’s ability to think in
two different languages:
I think it causes you know all the cognitive benefits, the way the mind works. I think it
affects the way their brain works and that they're able to think, you know, like I said,
more flexible creative ways. So I think it will benefit them.
So Barbara had learned through her research that academic achievement was gained through a
rewiring of the brain, because as she said bilingualism “affects the way their brain works.” Her
statement at the end of this quote, “so I think it will benefit them” demonstrates her recognition
that this cognitive benefit stretches beyond the reaches of school.
Earl’s research also aligned with Barbara’s and informed his views on the cognitive
benefits of bilingualism, and thus a program that teaches multiple languages, for children made
Earl’s decision easier as he felt it was a “no brainer” that a MDLIP would have academic
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benefits for his child. The ability for students to think critically and exercise their brain by
moving back and forth between two different languages helped to keep students engaged in their
work and actively thinking. These academic benefits that the parents mentioned were the same
academic benefits that in my literature review, researchers Christian (1996), Christian, Howard
and Loeb (2000), Collier and Thomas (2004) and Lindholm-Leary and Block (2010) mentioned.
Clearly, Barbara and Earl had been exposed to similar research as their awareness of these
benefits aligned nicely with the literature.
Cultural Benefits
Cultural benefits was another area where parents mentioned that their children benefited
from by being in a DLIP. The opportunities for students to interact with students from different
cultures and backgrounds was a strong benefit of participation in the program (Christian, Howard
& Loeb, Gerena, 2011; Howard, Sugarman & Christian, 2003). This area was also one of the
areas where African American parents were also slightly concerned about the program. Some
parents were concerned with the DLIPs lack of exposure of the African American experience to
all students. This concern will be addressed towards the end of this section, but to start, the data
did show some corroboration between participants’ views and the literature.
Barbara saw multiple benefits of enrolling her child in a DLIP. The idea of getting an
academic edge over other students as well gaining an appreciation and understanding of other
cultures helped her make her decision to enroll her child in a DLIP:
And then there's all the social aspects as well. You can communicate with other people,
you have a ... An appreciation, and an understanding of another culture, another
language. And there's benefits of that too. And there's just tons of benefits. I probably
can't even remember all of them. But when I read that, that it can ... And it gives them an
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academic edge and all of that. And professionally I thought it would be beneficial. Yeah,
after learning about all the things it can do for your, for your brain and cognitively and
academically, I was sold.
“An appreciation, and an understanding of another culture” was seen as a positive aspect of
learning another language. Similarly, the cultural awareness that Lauren spoke of, centered
around how wonderful it has been for her child to be exposed to the different cultures that are in
her child’s class:
Learning another language and then being exposed to other culture other people. Our
children have, you know they have friends that are other races, other cultures. I think it
makes you more aware, well you know well these people speak this language, well and
these people over here speak this language. They've learned about other people who
speak other languages have other cultures, they speak Spanish, they speak Korean, they
speak Japanese.
Lauren’s point here was that language is intertwined with culture. By learning another language,
it opens up children’s mind to other cultures. Dana’s take on the cultural awareness is that it is
important to understand the different cultures in the classroom:
And I think it just, it broadens their-their small worlds. And it exposes them to you know,
the differences and diversity of people. And it teaches them about I think having an
appreciation and an understanding of different cultures.
Like stretching their brains, Dana’s comment speaks to a metaphor of broadening, expanding.
Another example that connects to Dana’s idea of cultural awareness, and broadening the students
“small world” is Barbara’s revelation that her daughter is interested in speaking additional
languages because of her experience learning in the DLIP:
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My daughter talks about how she wants to learn a third language. She's wants to, well
actually four, she wants to learn Spanish and French. And my son had even mentioned
that he'd like to learn another language. And I don't necessarily think that they would be
having this desire ... And well not early on. To I don't think at eight and ten they would
be telling me, "Oh, I want to learn two more languages, or another language." Maybe if
they had just gone to a traditional school so I think it gives an appreciation for language
and a love for it. And for at least for my kids, a yearning for more. I mean, you know,
who wouldn't want to communicate and have these different avenues for communicating
and being able to speak to more people. I don't know, I think it broadens their
perspective, in a good way.
Barbara says that a traditional school wouldn’t have positioned them to “yearn” for more at such
an early age. From her quote, it’s clear that Barbara’s awareness of the cultural benefits of DLIP
moves beyond what she learned from her research. She is able to see it in her kids and see it
“early on.”
In a slightly more concrete way than Barbara, Lauren and Dana, Ethan saw the reasons
that he chose a DLIP as being more of a decision based upon China’s status as an up and coming
power in the world, and understanding their culture will help his children in the future:
I also think that they chose Mandarin because I just saw somewhat of a shift in the power
structure where America and European countries have been so strong for so long, but
there was a growth in importance of Chinese culture and how it was going to kind of
affect their world as opposed to my world growing up. There might be a shift for that,
China could be more of a super power than where we are now. So you just want them to
have them be able to offer that opportunity to learn that language. Then you also think
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about it being a global culture where things are just getting tighter and tighter, where it's
better to know every aspect of every culture.
While Barbara had generally said the cultural awareness would “professionally” benefit her
children, Ethan made a specific point about global changes, shifts in power, and globalization as
more specific reasons for the importance of language learning. His comment of things “getting
tighter and tighter” demonstrates this recognition of globalization, sparking the need for
knowledge of other cultures beyond our borders. I feel Barbara summed up the feeling that
parents have expressed in this section when she shared her thoughts about the program as a
whole:
It was like, "You're going to get these," In my opinion, "These academic benefits, these
hopefully these professional benefits from learning this other language." Oh, and on top
of that, you get this cultural awareness and that's great. So it was more of like the cherry
on top and it wasn't actually the main reason why I chose it. I just thought it was a great
benefit added on to, you know, the main thing that I thought was beneficial about the
program.
For Barbara, the cultural awareness was a bonus that supplements the academic benefits.
Issues with Cultural Awareness
Even though these parents seemed fine with how students experience and learn about the
Chinese culture, they were not satisfied with how African American culture was being shared, or
rather, the lack thereof. All of the parents felt that the cultural awareness of the program is
limited to Chinese culture and not representing the other cultures of the students who make up
their respective programs. Barbara had many positive things to say about the program and how it
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had helped to increase her children’s understanding of other cultures. However, she had a
concern that some cultures are left out of the DLIP:
Well one, I mean it's just kind of the obvious one it's just that they're learning this other
language, they're immersed in it. At their school, and there's opportunities for ... To say
are learning Chinese at my children's school, they do have celebrations of and kind of
some teaching and exposure to the Chinese culture. You know they've had some ... They
learned about Chinese calligraphy, they celebrate the Chinese different holidays, the
moon festival, the Chinese New Year. So that's exposing them a lot to that culture, that
cultural awareness. But the focus is mainly on that particular culture.
Barbara’s use of the word “but” as she moves from the exposure to Chinese culture to the point
that that’s the main focus, signals that this is a concern. Dana had a similar concern about the
lack of other cultures receiving recognition in the DLIP. She sees the value of learning about the
Chinese culture, however, not to the detriment of others:
So that's definitely something that, it's like anything important to focus on obviously the
target language or the language that the kids are learning. And so they can get an
appreciation. Not just though, cause it's not, you know you learn about the language, but
when you learn about it in context of learning about the culture as well and the traditions,
I think that that enriches their educational experience. But I don't think it should be to the
detriment of learning about other cultures as well, cause, and other cultures and other
traditions.
In this quote, Dana was saying that while she was in agreement with the idea of learning not just
a language, but about the culture in which it lives, the experience should be a “both/and”
experience rather than an “or” experience. Her comment that it should not be “to the detriment of
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learning about other cultures” shows her desire for an additive rather than an exclusive or
subtractive experience.
Lauren also saw that only Chinese cultural awareness was being stressed at her child’s
school. Lauren understood the importance of Chinese cultural awareness, but like Dana and
Barbara, she also felt that awareness of other cultures needed to be presented:
Cultural awareness for the language that you are enrolled in and there's nothing wrong
with that, but we have to acknowledge how do we make it a school where you can say,
"Yes, I know Mandarin, I know Spanish, I know French, but I also know this about the
history of my country. The history of what happened on different continents in this
world."
Each of these parents had a concern that only Chinese culture awareness was occurring at their
respective school sites. However, even though all of the parents interviewed agreed that there
was a lack of culture awareness besides Chinese at their schools, not all parents felt it was a
problem. Earl had the view that his children are African American, so they experience the
African American culture every day. He wanted them to gain as much of the Chinese culture and
experience as possible, since he cannot provide those experiences at home. He said:
There is a degree of cultural awareness that's being brought to the children. It's just not in
the form, as an African American parent that I think on first glance that you want for your
kids right? Certain things that they're being culturally made aware of that's part of the
Asian culture, right? But they need that too though, right? They can get black any day.
They black any time they come home. They black any time they go play a sport, every
time they watch a sport, every time they listen to the radio and they singing along. They
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black all the time, that ain't gone never leave them. How 'bout trying to be understanding,
like we say, tolerant right? That's the whole thing, you know?
Earl’s comment suggested that despite not learning about being black at school, the DLIP is still
an additive experience because it exposes them to something new. It can be out of school
experiences that help them maintain who they are, “they black any time they come home.” And
even though there were concerns from some of the African American parents with how African
American culture is being infused into the DLIP, specifically that it’s not present, the positive
effects of the DLIP overshadow the negative, as these parents have allowed their children to
continue to matriculate through the DLIP.
Bilingual, Biliterate and Job Opportunities
A third reason why African American parents enroll their children in DLIPs is because it
gives them an opportunity to become bilingual and biliterate, which increases the opportunities
of employment (Douglas, 2009; Goldring & Phillips, 2007). Parents wanted their children to be
successful in life and try to give them every opportunity to succeed. And while the earlier section
on cultural benefits touched on this benefit tangentially, this section parses out the specific
benefits mentioned by participants and the specific connections they made to job opportunities.
Bilingual and Biliterate. Providing the chance for children to become bilingual and
biliterate can help to set them apart from other children. The participants in this study echoed this
sentiment. One of the benefits that Dana saw in her child is becoming bilingual and biliterate, as
it fills a void that was missing in Dana’s life. She said,
but it at least gave me a deeper understanding of the value of being bilingual. Actually
being monolingual to me just feels so like illiterate to me in some regard, because I feel
like most people in the world are at minimum ...
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Her feelings of being inadequate, “at minimum” is demonstrated by her use of the term illiterate.
Rather than seeing monolingualism as normal, Dana, with her now deeper understanding, sees
bilingualism as what should be the norm. This perception was what helped Dana make the choice
she made about enrolling her child in a DLIP.
Barbara’s understanding of how being bilingual and biliterate supports your ability to
think critically and be creative is another reason why she chose a DLIP for her child, Barbara
shared:
All the nuances of language. And they said that people that are bilingual, they get that
better. They are more apt to be able to do those things. They understand the structure of
language better and that they have benefits, it talks about something called mental
flexibility and that they're more creative and they see more, how what did they say? You
know, basically you understand that this one particular item can be described in a lot of
different ways and that does something for your brain.
Interestingly, Barbara’s comments mostly point back to her research on DLIPs as demonstrated
in this quote. Her ability to talk about “the structure of language” and “mental flexibility” sound
academic, but were nonetheless reasons that convinced her of the program. Barbara seemed to
understand that academics and being bilingual and biliterate are intertwined.
In a more observed instance, Ethan shared how his daughter enjoyed the DLIP so much
that she wanted to learn another language. This sentiment was also expressed by Barbara’s
daughter as she wanted to learn four languages. Ethan shared:
Well one, my daughter talks about how she wants to learn another language. And I think
that that's because she is learning you know, obviously she has a positive attitude towards
bilingualism because she wants to be trilingual. So if she thought it was a bad idea or she
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didn't like it she would be like, "I don't want to learn another language, this is a waste of
time." Or "This has not been a good experience for me so I just want to stick with one
language." But I feel like, since she's interested in learning another language, then she's
obviously having a positive experience with the second one that she's learning.
With the positive reflections, both academic and observed, that parents shared about learning
another language, it is clear that the participants wish for their children to bilingual and biliterate;
it is clear why being bilingual and biliterate is an important factor in parents enrolling their child
in a DLIP and then sticking with it.
Job Opportunities. Job opportunities is another area the research mentioned as a reason
why parents enroll their children in DLIPs (Gerena, 2011, Howard, Sugarman & Christian, 2003;
Lindholm-Leary, 2000). The ability to speak multiple languages makes people more marketable
and helps with finding employment. While there are certainly connections between job
opportunities and other benefits discussed above and while these benefits are necessarily
intertwined, in this study, participants were connecting job opportunities with being bilingual and
biliterate. Ethan saw the ability to learn another language as a skill to support students find a job:
I just think they live in a global community and I think there's a certain part of learning
language that is problem solving. I think those types of skills, problem solving skills, are
going to be a lot more important in the job market as opposed to rote memorization skills
and whether or not you can multiply something in your head real fast as opposed to
looking at a scenario and trying to figure out what the best way to solve the scenario is. I
think that language helps in that component.
Interestingly, Ethan was connecting the cognitive benefits mentioned in an earlier section in
conjunction with professional benefits. Rather than simply saying that it allows you to learn
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another language which can be placed on a resume as a skill, he was alluding to the benefit of
problem-solving as the skill that bilingualism and biliteracy helps one gain, and that it is this
more advanced skill that is marketable. Dana, recognized that in her position knowing another
language, specifically Spanish, would have benefited her immensely and would have made her
more sought after in her field. She said:
I think, honestly I think there are only positive effects to it. In general, if you know
another language, that just makes you more marketable. I think, you know, I wish, I work
with a high Spanish speaking population. And I even told my husband, you know, "We
need to learn Spanish."
While she is currently employed without being bilingual and/or biliterate, Dana could see the
need for another language in her current position. Like Dana, Ethan in his job search saw the
importance of speaking another language in the job market. He shared how speaking another
language is now being suggested and or recommended for different jobs. He said,
I think it's necessary. I think cause right now I'm about to be in the job market and not
knowing a second language is a hindering. So every resume, every little job offering I'm
looking right now it asks for it. It's not like optional, really isn't.
Ethan’s comment alludes to a shift when he mentions the jobs he is “looking [at] right now” are
requiring it. Even the “little” jobs are not mentioning a second language as optional. Lauren
summed up how important it will be for people to speak a second language when applying for a
job:
It just gives them an opportunity that they're gonna need so, we're probably gonna be the
ones left behind we don’t know a language so what else do you have.
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Like Ethan’s comment, Lauren’s, too, situated language as a “need” rather than an option.
Barbara also saw the global competiveness of the world today and recognized that it is important
for a student to not only learn a second language, but specifically to learn to speak Chinese.
So I'm thinking, if they can speak Mandarin, this language that's, you know especially
with China becoming the economically on the rise, I mean they're doing so well. And it's
like, and what like a billion other people speak it, I think it really opens up the doors for
them in their careers, if they can speak and read and write in Mandarin, it's only going to
benefit them. I mean it will open up all types of opportunities for them, the business
world, teaching, very beneficial in terms for further professionally speaking.
So not just globalization, but specifically the economic rise of China, was a driving force in the
particular choice that Barbara made in the DLIP. In other words, she didn’t just pick a DLIP. She
chose a Mandarin DLIP given its potential to prepare her children for the global marketplace.
Additional Benefits
My original beliefs of the benefits of participating in DLIPs began with those presented
in the literature: academic, cultural, becoming bilingual and biliterate, as well as job
opportunities. However, through data collection, additional benefits surfaced. While these were
not the initial reasons to enroll their children in DLIPs, these additional benefits are some of the
reasons why parents continue to enroll their children in DLIPs.
Open Doors. Participants used the metaphor of “open doors” when speaking about
DLIPs. While the earlier section discussed job opportunities resulting from being bilingual and
biliterate, this section examines the metaphor of “open doors” from a more general standpoint. A
great example that shows how doors open when you can speak another language is what Dana
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shared about her cousin who speaks multiple languages. This quote describes how people are
treated differently based on whether they are biliterate in another language:
He was like, "For example when I go to Singapore I don't need to speak another language
they all speak English. It's not necessary. But because I speak Mandarin, and so many of
them speak Mandarin in their homes, and amongst their families as soon as I use the
Mandarin I get invited to different dinners, I get invited to people's homes. It opens
doors.”
Dana’s cousin used the literal phrase of “opens doors” as he recounted being “invited” in for
different dinners. Her recounting of this comment shows that the opening of doors is related to
how one is treated. Similarly, Earl, because of his job has done some work overseas in China and
has seen first-hand how people are treated who can communicate in Chinese compared to the
individuals who cannot. His comment also speaks to the opportunities, which also conveys that
doors are open, when you can communicate with someone in their language:
The respect level that they have for you is tenfold. And not only that, I think you have a
better opportunity to convey the type of person you really are when you can talk to
people in their natural dialect. Particularly when you really understand - you got a good
hold on what that language is and you can use words that truly evoke how you feel. That
really sum up the way you feel.
Earl mentioned a few aspects of how you are treated in this statement. First, he said that a person
is respected when he or she can speak another’s language, but also the opportunity to treat you
better is heightened by the fact that you are better known by the other as a result of being able to
communicate who you are. In other words, by opening up to others in their “natural dialect,” one
opens up doors to others.
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Confidence and Empowerment. Building children’s confidence is an important part of
parenting. We want our children to be able to believe in themselves and feel as if they fit in all
walks of life, whether it is school, their job, or out in the community. One strong theme that
came out of the data analysis of the participants’ interviews was this idea that participating in a
DLIP builds students’ confidence. This was an idea that each parent brought up in their
interviews. Earl shared how his son’s confidence has grown since entering the program. He
began to see how his son’s interactions within his job increased his confidence:
We not even gone talk about when he goes out there and he's negotiating for me, what
kind of impact that's gone have on them and for them to start a business and actually ship
something out here that they can sell on their own, how much more confidence can it
give him across the board about having a sense of self-worth because I always had no
confidence growing up.
In comparing his son to himself, the lack of confidence he recounts is counter to what he sees in
his son. This difference made Earl imagine a better life for his son. Barbara also shared how her
child’s confidence grew because of her ability to communicate with others. This is especially
true because of the fact that her daughter can communicate with people who speak a different
language than her parents. She said:
And then confidence and being able to speak another language, but then confidence in
meeting other people, talking to other people. Understand that, "Well I can speak in this
language too." You know and just, I don't know, feeling more comfortable in their own
skin, feeling comfortable in that they've been exposed to these different languages these
different cultures. I think that it creates more confident, secure individuals because they
have this additional skill, another asset that they can pull upon. I think that that's
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something that they would benefit from, as opposed to someone who hadn't gotten that
opportunity in school.
As confidence is one of the benefits that has emerged from the data, along that line, when Earl is
sharing about his business dealings and child’s experiences within it, the idea of empowerment
has also surfaced as a benefit of the DLIPs. Earl’s including his son in some of his business
conversations has given his son the opportunity to interact with adults who speak Chinese. The
information shared shows Earl’s thoughts on why it is important to have his son in a DLIP:
And if you gone do business with them you need to know how to speak the language,
right, and if you gone succeed and the idea about going to see the Great Wall in China or
doing business out there how powerful it makes your kids feel. I had my son call the
company to source something from China to get pricing on something. I said, "I need you
to call this guy" in the middle of the night 'cause they're like, 15 hours different from us
and he gets to call and he gets to ask questions for me, he's empowered. When I take him
to East West bank and when I'm talking to them about their hard money loan and I ask
him to ask them a question in Mandarin, he's already empowered because now his father
is relying on him to do something that he can't do. That gives him stock and invests him
into becoming something.
Again, the theme of having something, an “asset”, that he himself doesn’t have is thought to be
empowering for his son. Beyond just being confident, Earl believes his son is empowered by
being equipped with a skill that even his own father doesn’t have. While it was not an initial
reason to enroll their children in a DLIP, confidence and empowerment surfaced as two of the
reasons parents keep their children enrolled in the program.
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Lauren comments about the reasons why she has her child in the program also fits the
sentiments of other parents:
my job is to give them every opportunity to be successful and so this is just a piece and a
major piece. Another language. A major piece for them to show, it's like Tiger Woods
showed African Americans you can golf. The Williams sisters showed African
Americans, you can play tennis. Arthur Ashe did that earlier. You understand what I
mean?
Lauren’s connection to the athletes is used to show that African American students can learn
another language that will benefit them in their future, just like these African American athletes
have shown other African Americans that we can be successful in sports that you do not see
many African Americans playing. While she didn’t use the words “confidence” or
“empowerment” in this quote, by using famous athletes as an example, Lauren is alluding to the
need to feel confident and to feel empowered that they can be successful. In other words, while
you do not see many African Americans speaking another language, you should have the
confidence, because it is possible.
Summary
This section examined the reasons the African American parents in my study decided to
choose a DLIP for their children. While much of what they shared corroborated the literature on
the benefits of DLIPs, there were some nuanced differences. First, while parents did mirror the
idea that their children were receiving cultural benefits from being enrolled in a Mandarin DLIP,
a few participants did express some concern about the lack of exposure to African American
culture and identity. Second, parents spoke generally about the opening of doors for their
children and the fact that they gain more confidence and are empowered. All of these were the
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“why” of choosing DLIPs. In the next section, the procedural element of how parents went about
choosing DLIPs will be discussed.
How African American Parents Choose DLIPs for their Children
Before we can discuss how African American parents choose DLIPs for their children, it
is it is important why parents feel they need to look for alternate educational opportunities for
their children. This is especially important for African American families who often are not
presented with the best options for schooling, as many African American families have to
contend with schools that are poorly funded and staffed (Bankston & Caldas, 1996; Milner &
Howard, 2004). Thus, many parents have resorted to finding alternate educational opportunities
for their children to receive a better education than their neighborhood schools. In this study, too,
the parents voiced needing to find other educational options for their child. Ethan’s view of the
reason for finding alternatives to the traditional school system mirrored what many parents in my
study felt:
Ultimately, yeah so that, I think that's a component that's sprung out of the lack of what
people are getting out of the traditional system. So you have the advent of magnet
schools, you have schools that cater to whether it's science, or language, or art, to kind of
address that because of some of the issues with the traditional public school system. So, I
mean, in a perfect world you would have a public school system that could offer all that
to all students if you had the resources, but when you don't I think you come up with
these alternative measures that can satisfy some parents as far as what their kid is
available to be exposed to in the public setting.
As you may recall from Chapter Two, African American families often have to search out
additional education setting for their children because of the low performance of their
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neighborhood schools (Diamond & Gomez, 2004; Goldring & Phillips, 2008). Ethan’s view of
the limited amount of offerings within many public schools for his child has created the need for
parents to try and find alternate educational settings for their children. Dana also spoke about the
concern of schools in her area:
Also just kind of talking to other parents. I wanted the kids to go to a school where you
know, that their behavior was pretty under control, teachers and schools are pretty good
at classroom managements. You know, I'm just like any other parent, I don't want to send
my kid to a school where there are safety concerns. So looking for a safe environment
where the schools were performing well academically and then just listen, hearing also
about you know, other things that they were doing. Other maybe extra-curricular activity
that they had to offer. Trying to pick a school we felt was pretty well-rounded. Those are
some of the things we were looking for.
Both Ethan and Dana, “just like any other parent,” wanted their children to have a well-rounded
experience in a safe school and they felt the need to search outside of their neighborhood school
to find that option, as neither of Ethan or Dana enrolled their child in their neighborhood school.
Giving children options and choices in school is extremely important for parents as Barbara
explains her thoughts on children having alternate opportunities in school:
I think variety is good. Cause not all kids are cut from the same cloth and I think like you
know a one size fits all for education. It's not good, cause the kids are all different. They
have different interests they have different strengths, they have different thing we may
need to focus on and I think all these different choices are great. And giving kids
different avenues for success. I think that's important.

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Barbara went on to share:
So to have those options out there I think that's great as well. And then there's arts
magnets and STEAM magnets and all types of schools with different focuses. I just think
the variety is great because then you can meet the needs of more students. So I think
these alternative education, I think it's awesome. Choice is great.
Meeting the needs of their children and finding the right educational setting was an important
factor that went into each participant’s process in selecting a DLIP for their children.
Interestingly, Barbara mentioned “choice,” which has been coined by the voucher movement.
However, Barbara’s mention of “choice” centers around the programs that public schools can
offer students within their district or other public schools. This is different from the voucher
movement’s conception of “choice” because the voucher program involves public school
students leaving their public schools and enrolling in private schools. Of the participants who
enrolled their children in a DLIP, four of the five were on a permit to attend the DLIP school.
Which means the DLIP school was not located in their school of residence. As such, they had to
actively pursue a DLIP in order to have a chance at enrolling their children in the school. This
extra effort begs the question, what is it about these parents or what do these parents possess to
put them in a position to choose a DLIP school?
Social Capital
The 14
th
Amendment of United States of America Constitution states that no state shall make
or enforce laws that will deny it citizens privileges nor deny equal protection of the laws. This
amendment along with the compulsory education movement gave every child the right to a free
and public education (Katz, 1976). However, as argued above, not all public schools are created
equal. The schools in many African American communities have not done a good job of
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educating the students, and thus, African American families have chosen to enroll their children
in magnet or DLIP schools (Diamond & Gomez, 2004; Parks, 2008). From the literature review,
I identified three major forms of capital that people can possess; cultural capital, economic
capital and social capital. However, social capital was often more important for African
American families because by and large, they do not possess as much economic or cultural
capital as other families. The level of economic capital that the participants possessed is
described by Dana and Earl from their interviews. Dana shares:
Well the school options were you know in Pasadena there was a lot of private schools and
then there's obviously the public schools. There are a couple of charter schools that I
heard of, one in particular was doing pretty well, pretty stable. The private school wasn't
particularly an option for us because they're really expensive and the thought of paying
for school starting in kindergarten and then continuing to pay...
In this quotation, Dana walks through the options that were available to her when exploring
educational options for her children. She was aware of what was out there beyond her
neighborhood school, but was also quick to point out some of these options were cost
prohibitive. Earl in his interview added:
We just felt that if we could find a, you know with our support and supplementing at
home, if we can find a good public school option or charter school option that that would
be the route that we would go instead of trying to spend the money that we do not have to
go private school. So private school wasn't really an option for our family.
The idea of private schools for these families was attractive yet, the cost was a prohibitive factor
in these families deciding not to attend them. As such, both Dana and Earl looked to no cost
options that weren’t limited to the traditional neighborhood school.
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From the literature review, social capital was cited as a reason why parents chose to
enroll their children in a school outside of their public school of residence. From my interviews,
the idea of social capital or the parents’ social network had a large influence in parents deciding
to enroll their children in a DLIP. The families who opted not to enroll their children in private
school were open to the idea of a charter or DLIP school for their child because of the
information that they gathered from their social networks about the opportunities and options
that charter schools and DLIPs could offer.
In Chapter Two, social capital was defined as the resources that a person has from being
part of a network of people or an organization. Coleman (1988) identified three forms of social
capital: obligation and expectations, information channels, and social norms. Information norms
is the form that was used the most with the participants in my study as the families searched for
the right information to make choices for their children’s education. Information channels were
the way that most parents found out about the alternate educational opportunities for their child.
Each participant in this study conducted research to learn more about the program and then used
their social networks to help make their decision to enroll their child in the program. The
participants’ social capital was based on who they choose to associate with. Each participant’s
social circle either aligned to the participants’ educational background or life circumstances that
they had in common. Barbara’s social circle consisted mostly of her friends from college. She
explained how she mostly interacted with people who are college educated:
Actually I'm probably one of the least educated amongst my circle of friends and then my
best friend has like you know, a Juris Doctorate and a, you know they have so I, I have
my Bachelor's degree and I'm proud of my teacher's credential, but most of the people,
even the parents in the program are highly educated. Most have a college degree or
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graduate degrees. So yeah, most of my friends are my college friends so they have at least
a college education. Most of them have gone on to have like graduate degrees or
professional degrees beyond that.
When Barbara makes the comment, “even the parents in the program are highly educated” she is
talking about the DLIP, as most of the parents in the program also hold college degrees. With all
five of the participants in this study holding Bachelor’s degrees and some participants having
earned advanced degrees, they fit the demographic Barbara is referring to when discussing DLIP
families. Additionally, with her comment that “most of my friends are my college friends,”
Barbara is pointing to the social capital that each of them possesses by virtue of being college
educated themselves. Similarly, Lauren’s social circle includes her college classmates, as well as,
a group of African American mothers, who also graduated from college. Lauren describes how
her social circle has formed:
You just pick them up over the years, you know. It's a friend from Howard, or it's a friend
from, I was in a mother's group called "Mocha moms", we had a special circle. It was a
great social circle that we all were really much trying to do the same things. Have good
lives, provide for our children and it was a social circle made up predominately of
African American women who were married with children and had homes and we shared
information.
From their membership page online mochamoms.org, “Mochamoms” is an organization of
mothers who promote and provide support for women of color. Many of the members of
“Mochamoms” have the ability to work part-time or choose their schedule in order to participate
in different events or activities. Thus the social capital and networking opportunities afforded to
“Mochamoms” helps these African American mothers share information such as the benefits of
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educational programs for their children. Lauren’s quotation above also highlighted the mothers
in her “Mochamoms” group had homes. In the community in which “Mochamoms” reside,
homes are very expensive, pointing to the fact that the members of the “Mochamoms” group
include mothers who had the financial means and “shared information” relevant for themselves.
While Lauren isn’t explicitly saying it, her mention of having homes coupled with the sharing of
information speaks to their luxury of finding alternate school opportunities for their children.
Earlier examples of participants mentioning having choice are intertwined with the financial
capabilities to pursue those choices. Much of the information that the “Mochamoms” shared
centered around school options for their children, as many of the “Mochamoms” enrolled their
children in alternative educational settings.
They were looking for schools as we were all in the same boat, trying to find good
schools for our kids. A lot of the ... It was probably about half and half with my group of
mom friends, some of them they were just set on private school so that just what they
were doing, so didn't have a lot of conversations with them because I kind of knew, well
we talked, we talked about some of the benefits but really it was talking with the other
parents who were looking at the San Gabriel Valley Public Schools, you know like,
"What tours did you go on? What did you see? Which tour are you going on next?" And
we would just kind of compare and talk.
The mothers in this “Mochamoms” group were split about the type of school for their child,
whether to pursue private or alternate public schools. Of note, when Lauren mentioned “looking
at the San Gabriel Valley Public Schools,” she wasn’t talking about the neighborhood schools
because she specifically mentioned going on multiple tours. The choices they contemplated were
those that didn’t include the traditional neighborhood schools. Even though some of the
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“Mochamoms” had the means, there were still a cross section of these parents even with college
degrees that could not afford private school. For these mothers, the alternate programs were the
focus of their discussions.
In addition to social groups like “Mochamoms”, participants discussed sharing
information with their highly educated social circles. Ethan, a doctor by profession, shared that
his social circle was “composed of a lot of educators” and that his co-workers discussed schools
in the area and where they sent their children to school. Most of his colleagues also held college
degrees and were doctors in a city away from where he grew up and went to college. Therefore,
his social circle consisted of his co-workers. Social circles of the participants were made up of
either college friends, childhood friends, or colleagues from their job, but when referring to
them, participants used code words that pointed to their networks’ social capital. The bonds
formed by these groups is significant because it helps identify how social circles rely on groups
having similar backgrounds to help influence decisions. One of the most important things that
social capital did was help parents obtain information from trusted sources that was helpful in
deciding the best school for their child.
Besides conducting their own research on DLIPs, as mentioned in previous sections,
another major component in parents’ learning more about DLIPs was using social capital to
gather information. Parents’ use of friendships that were made in college, in their current jobs, in
their children’s activities or their family all contributed to the social capital that was used to ask
questions and gather more information about the advantages and disadvantages of DLIPs. Dana,
who is an educator, discussed how she talked to other parents to learn more about school options
for her child:
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[I spoke] primarily [with] other parents. Parents who had previously gone through
picking schools for their children, so they might have had older kids in primary school.
And then my husband is an educator as well, so we knew a lot of teachers and people in
the field. My sister's an educator. And I was subbing a lot at different schools and I had
made a lot of connections and I would just talk to a lot of teachers and parents, getting
their opinions, getting their advice. So that's pretty much it, educators and parents who
have already enrolled their kids in different schools.
Using the social capital that Dana and her husband possessed gave her multiple avenues to gather
information to make an educated decision about where she would enroll her child. Specifically,
Dana mentions a few times that she has made “a lot of connections” with teachers/educators who
are credible sources of information. Earl also obtained information by using his social network,
although his was an indirect connection. He learned about the DLIP when he went to an
informational night that one of his college classmates, who enrolled his child in the DLIP, told
him about:
He referred me and gave me the site information. When I arrived all of the Asian descent
people were really pushing to get into the school. But I am glad I went.
Earl’s comment about the Asian families trying to enroll their children in the school is a
testament to the type of program that school is offering. There is not a large number of Asian
students in the district, however, half the student enrollment is made up of students of Asian
descent. Earl was likely operating on the model minority stereotype (Lee, 1994) that this school
must be a better school because the families “of the Asian descent” were clamoring to get into
the school. The school’s performance as measured by their performance on the Smarter Balanced
Assessment Consortium (SBAC), too, serves to seemingly confirm this stereotype. The school
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has the highest scores in the district. And while Earl was able to see “the model minority”
pushing to have their kids enrolled in this program because he took initiative to attend a parent
meeting, this opportunity would not have been available to him had he not had a friend who
made him aware of the information session.
And while participants used their social capital to ultimately pursue a DLIP for their
children, it’s important to note that one’s social network could lead them to different choices.
Nonetheless, these are still positive aspects of social capital. Lauren’s membership in
“Mochamoms” positioned her to participate in discussions about different school options. Even
though Lauren knew that she did not have the financial means to enroll her child in all the
options that were discussed, she still was able to obtain information from other mothers who she
shared a common bond with and valued their opinion. It was still important for her to be part of
the conversation about schooling options for her child and her participation in “Mochamoms”
allowed her to have the opportunity and helped her select the current school for her child.
Unlike the other participants who were using friends or community groups to obtain
information, Ethan used his friendships in his workplace to determine where he would enroll his
children in school. He said:
You met other people once you got into the school but the majority, the initial thing was
talking to people that worked with me that were trying to get their kids in school and we
had kids the same age so. I think all in total by the end there were five different
colleagues that I had that had kids in that one school and that's a lot. Considering I might
have 40 doctors or something I work with so, to have that large percentage of them. It
was a good school.
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For Ethan, the fact that many of the doctors that worked with him placed their children into this
school signaled to him that the school was a good school. The fact that there were multiple
doctors, individuals that have credibility within his social network and in our society based on
their stature or affiliation, made the program and information about the program more credible.
Like Lauren’s comments about the “Mochamoms” and Earl’s comments that all the Asians were
trying to get in the school, this mention of doctor’s who chose a particular school shows that
participants weighed information from these more credible sources more because of the social
status of these information providers. The theme is, the stronger and more influential the social
network is, the more inclined individuals are to ask for information, as well as, listen to and join
the group. At the end though, the basic prerequisite was that the participants had to be alike
enough to have access to these social networks. All the participants in this study spoke of
connecting with these knowledgeable informants either through their college experiences or
through workplace relations.
How Parents Made the Decision to Enroll. After the participants used their social
capital to find out more about the programs from their social networks, the decision to enroll
their child in a DLIP still had to be made. Some participants’ decision to enroll their child in a
DLIP was not easy, as some participants’ family members expressed concerns that enrolling their
child in a DLIP was a bad idea. Dana shared:
The people that questioned me more were more like family members, like “old school”
people, like your auntie, and your grandparents. Like "OH, okay you're going to learn
Chinese, all right." But my peers though, like my girlfriends tend to be more into like
alternative education opportunities. They felt that going to a DLIP school would be a
great opportunity for my daughter.
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Dana’s use of the term “old school” to describe her older family members, helped to
compartmentalize from her social circle those who she chose to listen to in regards to the
educational opportunities for her child. Dana’s “old school” family members did not see the use
of learning a language. This “old school” view also can expand to her parents as they did not
push Dana to learn another language while in school. However, now in the 21
st
century, with a
more diverse cultural make-up, many younger adults see the need to learn more than one
language to support children ability to succeed in the future. This is apparent from the previous
section with parents discussing and sharing the benefits of their child becoming bilingual and
biliterate. Dana relied on her “new-school” friends to help her make the decision to enroll in a
DLIP because of the opportunities she was made aware of for her child.
Barbara’s decision to enroll her child in a DLIP had a lot to do with Barbara having a
friend from her social network share with her how much of a positive experience her friend’s
daughter had in the DLIP at her school:
There's word of mouth in the neighborhood about what schools are doing well. And so
when you look the schools up, you can see that this particular school, they've been kind
of high performing and succeeding and doing well in test scores and then there's the
schools in the neighborhood that people are, like the highly coveted schools that
everybody's trying to get into. But to have a person that like is actually in the school that
you can talk to, now that is, it is very helpful and it helped me decide.
Even though Barbara had read up and researched all the positive benefits of attending a DLIP,
she felt even more comfortable with the idea of a DLIP once she knew someone in her social
circle had enrolled their child in the school and had a good experience. The fact that she could
talk to someone about the program who could communicate why their child enjoyed the program
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and they felt the program was beneficial to their child, made it easier to enroll her own daughter
in a DLIP.
Ethan enrolled his child in the program based on the advice of his co-workers and how
many of them were trying to enroll their children in DLIP:
Yeah, and as a physician in Charlotte, I had colleagues that recommended that program.
It was highly recommended in that region as having the better educational system, and I
guess better teachers and whatnot. Yeah, I agree. You met other people once you got into
the school but the majority, the initial thing was talking to people that worked with me
that were trying to get their kids in school and we had kids the same age so. So I wanted
to enroll my kids in the school as well.
As mentioned above, the fact that these were doctors lent credibility to the program they were
promoting, and similar to Barbara’s choice being driven by word of mouth, Ethan’s decision to
enroll had much to do with knowing from others that this was a good choice, the right place for
his child.
Unlike Barbara, Dana, Ethan and Lauren, who all had a large social network to support
their decision to enroll their child in a DLIP, Earl only had one person in his social circle to help
him make his decision to enroll his child in a DLIP:
The only parent that had an influence was my friend that introduced us to it. And but
once again, he was a parent who already had some kids in the, had kids in the program.
So while Earl didn’t have a large network like the other participants, having someone that he
knew and trusted helped him to decide to enroll his child in a DLIP. However, once Earl enrolled
his child in the program his social circle changed:
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Once we were in it, then we kind of bonded and formed a group, but going into it, no.
There was just one parent that influenced me, beside me and my wife kind of doing our
own research.
Conclusion
For all of the participants, social capital was a major component in deciding to enroll
their child in a DLIP. Discussing their options with their social circles and conducting research
helped parents make the leap to enroll their children in a DLIP. What is important to note is that
parents did not feel comfortable choosing this option unless someone they trusted and who
occupied a high stature had made the same decision. Choosing alternative educational options is
a risky endeavor. The parents had to have a sense of comfort with their decision and that comfort
had to come from someone who the parents followed or shared a common bond with. These
parents did not leave the decision of where to send their child to school up to their zip code or
home school. Instead the decisions were based upon the social circles the parents had thanks to
the social capital that the parents possessed.

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CHAPTER FIVE: DISCUSSION
This qualitative study sought to identify the characteristics of African American parents
who enroll their children in a DLIP, explore the reasons why African American parents enroll
their children in Mandarin DLIPs, and examine how social capital influences parents enrolling
their children in Mandarin DLIPs. I began this study with a conceptual framework, which was
developed from information that I gathered in my literature review. The conceptual framework
then helped to guide how I would uncover more information about my topic. Many African
American parents have looked for different options for school for their children because of the
poor performance of their neighborhood schools. Considering options for their children to earn a
better education, my conceptual framework outlined the different options parents could take to
enroll their children in school and the reasons why African American parents chose Mandarin
DLIP for their children and the influence that social capital had in parents making those
decisions. In the study, the benefits of participating in a DLIP for parents outweighed sending
their children to traditional schools, however, the findings revealed that, as predicted, the social
networks that parents played an important role in them choosing to enroll their children in a
DLIP.
Using a qualitative approach, five African American families who chose to enroll their
children and a Mandarin DLIP were interviewed to answer my three research questions. The
participants were asked to reflect on their own background and decisions to help answer the
following research questions: What are the characteristics of African American parents who
chose to enroll their children in Mandarin DLIPs? What are the reasons why African American
parents chose to enroll their children in Mandarin DLIPs? And, how do African American
parents go about choosing Mandarin DLIPs for their children’s schooling?
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Summary of Findings
After analyzing the data, three main findings emerged around parents who enrolled their
children in DLIPs. Each of these findings help to address the research questions asked in this
study. The first finding that emerged from the data was that being college educated matters, and
having attended an HBCU was also helpful. The second finding is parents want opportunities for
their children and for them to be prepared for the future. The final finding is social networks
have a strong influence on parents’ awareness of and ultimate decision to enroll their children in
a DLIP. Each of the participants could name how their social networks exposed them to DLIPs
and how they shaped parents’ decisions to follow this educational path for their children. This
finding is corroborated by the literature from researchers Diamond and Gomez (2004) and
Giacchino-Baker and Piller (2009). After presenting a summary of my three overarching
findings, I will then go on to describe the implications and recommendations for school districts
and parents. Finally, I will present future research ideas and my final thoughts on DLIPs and the
African American community.
College Education and HBCU’s
The first finding is related to the background of the participants who enrolled their
children in DLIPs. The data revealed three common characteristics of participants: 1) each
participant was a college graduate, 2) four of the five participants attended an HBCU and 3)
despite their educational background, none of the participants that were part of this study were
fluent in a second language. The third finding does not suggest that only non-fluent parents
enroll their children in DLIPs, however, it did act as a catalyst for these participants to stress the
value of knowing another language to their children given that they felt the void in their own
lives.
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The participants in my study all attended and graduated from a four-year college or
university. These participants all had varying experiences in high school and post-secondary
school. Some attended private schools while others attended public schools. Interestingly, four of
the five parents mentioned that they attended an HBCU. Given that it was difficult to find
parents who met my criteria and that fact that I myself also attended an HBCU and my children
are enrolled in the Mandarin DLIP, this prompted a question of whether this was a coincidence.
This then made me wonder, is there something about attending an HBCU that makes African
American parents more apt to enroll their child in an alternate educational setting such as a
DLIP? I will leave this question for future research to hopefully look into. What also stood out
about the participants was that none of the parents were fluent in a second language. They all
mentioned taking a foreign language while in high school, however, none of them stuck with it.
It was merely a requirement to meet to go to college and not something that would be needed in
the future. However, now the participants all spoke about how they wish that they were able to
communicate with peers in another language. This desire to have an additional language at their
disposal persuaded these parents to introduce another language at an early age to their children.
While the literature review stated that parents wanted their children to learn another language for
certain benefits, what is new about these findings is these participants’ rationale for their children
learning an additional language was the fact that these participants were not fluent in a second
language.
Opportunities and the Future
The second finding emerged when participants shared their wishes for knowing a second
language. The parents saw that their inability to speak a second language created a barrier in
their life and they did not want not knowing a second language to be a barrier for their children.
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While this finding doesn’t suggest that parents who are fluent in a second language don’t enroll
their children in DLIPs, this theme was readily apparent in all five of the African American
parents in my sample. Even though all five participants mentioned that they have learned a
second language while in high school, the participants did not continue studying or using the
language while in college or after. The absence of a second language in these participants acted
as a catalyst to make sure that their children did not have the same shortcomings. The
participants emphasized the need for their children to learn another language so that their
children’s life experiences would be different from theirs, and could afford their children more
opportunities than they currently have. The occupations of each of the participants all require
them to work with people who speak many languages. One father imports and exports furniture
to China and Mexico, another mother is a flight attendant, another father is a doctor in a medical
clinic that serves low-income families, mainly Latino and Asian, and the two other mothers are
in education, one teaching elementary school and the other teaching film at a university. All of
these parents experienced first-hand the inconvenience and sometimes challenges of not being
able to communicate with families in another language. However, now these parents have an
understanding and appreciation of knowing a second language that was not instilled in them
while growing up. Second language acquisition for the participants growing up was more of a
requirement to get into college, instead of a way of life that would support their future growth
and ability to communicate in their everyday life. Thus, these parents now feel that by enrolling
their children in a DLIP, they have given their children opportunities that will open doors for
them in the future and give them an additional resource at their disposal that could possibly make
them a better candidate than their non-bilingual peers for job opportunities and future career
explorations. Along the line of this finding about opportunities, parents also wanted to enroll
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their children in a better school than available in their neighborhood. Four of the five parents
who enrolled their children in the program were also from a different attendance zone and moved
their child to this program as it was not offered at their home school. Much like what was found
in the previous chapters by studies by researchers Blank (1984), Howard, Powell and Arriola
(2003) and Saporito (2003) the participants felt that their children’s future opportunities would
be improved by their participation in an alternate educational setting, such as a DLIP.
The Influence of Social Networks
Similar to the findings from researchers Gerena (2011) and Giacchino-Bake and Piller
(2009), the last finding that became apparent was how strong the influence of social networks
was for parents enrolling their children in a Mandarin DLIP. Parents that enrolled their children
in Mandarin DLIPs used their social capital through their social networks to learn about these
programs as well as to support their decisions to enroll in the programs. With the low number of
African American parents who participate in these programs, I was intrigued to learn just how
parents find out about these programs. What became apparent was that these parents were
looking for something different, and many in their social circles had the same idea to find
alternate educational settings for their children. Most of the parents heard about the DLIP from
parents in their social circle.These same parents by virtue of their affiliation with each other
helped parents to feel more comfortable about making the decision to enroll in a DLIP.
The level of social capital that the participants held supported their acquisition of
information about the program. Multiple participants mentioned their friends from college or
colleagues in their workplaces allowing them to hear about the alternate programs that are
offered for their children. Even though some of the members of the participants’ social network
chose not to enroll their child in a DLIP, the conversations with the participants’ peers helped to
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create a pathway for parents to learn about the different options available besides the
neighborhood school. And while participants had different family and friends who had differing
ideas about educational programs, all five of the participants opted to do their own research and
to listen to more knowledgeable others in their social networks. And while the research they
conducted was also instrumental in their decision-making process, it was the credible friends
and/or family members in their networks that helped seal the deal. Thus, social networks were
critical as parents were also more apt to enroll their child in a DLIP if they had someone they
trusted also participating in the program (Bourdieu, 1986; Coleman, 1988; Diamond & Gomez,
2004).
Implications for Practice
For this study, I wanted to identify the characteristics of African American parents that
chose DLIPs for their children. Additionally, I wanted to understand the reasons why parents
chose DLIPs for their children and the role that social capital played in their decision process.
Focusing on African Americans parents who chose DLIPs for their children is important because
there is a clear achievement gap that exist within the African American student population and
their peers. According to the National Center for Education Statistics (2016), African American
students have consistently scored lower than other ethnicities on state tests and national testing.
African American students also have the lowest graduation rate, according to The United States
Department of Education (2016). However, local studies have shown that African American
students who participate in DLIPs have produced better achievement results and their
participation in such programs has helped to close the achievement gap for students participating
in those programs (Lindholm-Leary & Howard, 2008; Thomas & Collier, 2012). Thus, as I
argued in Chapter One, it is important to focus on African American parents who choose to
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enroll their children to identify more ways to get parents to see the advantages of the program
and get more students enrolled in these programs. In this section, I will describe the implications
of not making African American parents aware of the benefits of these programs.
The first concern is that there is a lack of knowledge about the programs and benefits
offered by DLIP in the African American community, especially the Mandarin program. Many
of these programs are not located in the African American community, thus, many parents are
not aware that some of these programs even exist. Some parents also mentioned that a number of
parents are nervous or scared of putting their child in a dual language environment, because they
think that their child will not be able to master the English language while trying to learn an
additional language (Thomas & Collier, 2012). Even participants in my study had to be
convinced, through their own research and communication with those in their social networks,
that students eventually catch up and exceed if they stay in the program long enough. If there
continues to be a lack of information available to parents in the African American community,
there will continue to be less students acquiring and benefitting from the language skills that will
support them in the future and help to close the achievement gap that exists. One participant
shared that a parent that decided to send her child to private school over attending a DLIP did
this because the parent felt that her child would feel dumb or stupid being at a school that was
mainly Asian. She focused on the stereotype that Asian students are extremely competitive and
that her child would not flourish in that type of environment. This thinking by an African
American parent is a symptom of a huge problem for the African American community. Even
African American parents who have enough financial capital and can afford to send their
children to private schools are unaware of the benefits of DLIPs. Currently, there is the academic
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gap, but it will soon turn to a cultural and even larger linguistic gap for African American
students.
Another area where not only African American students, but students from all races will
be at a disadvantage is the lack of diversity. With such small numbers of African American
students in DLIP classes, students are not getting a true understanding of all the different
cultures. For example, participants brought up in their interviews that their children were
sometimes being treated differently by the non-African American students. Many participants
felt that it was uncomfortable for the child to be “the only” black student in the class. All
participants shared that students are not learning enough about the African American culture in
their classes. The school does a wonderful job of celebrating the Chinese culture and
celebrations, as it should. However, students gaining knowledge as a whole of the African
American experience and community is lacking. In other words, being bicultural really only
meant a focus on the target language’s culture. Each parent cited the lack of assemblies, cultural
events and literature around campuses as a slight to the African American students. Some
participants felt that this issue is really a problem of numbers. However, four out of five parents
felt that their culture was not acknowledged as well as it should be at their child’s school.
The lack of diversity also affects what prospective parents see when they come to the
school site. Two parents mentioned that they don’t see faces like theirs, not only on the tour but
leading the tours, as there are usually two to three current parents present for each tour. If school
districts want more African American students enrolled in DLIPs, they need to work to have
current African American families present to welcome new families and lead tours. The next
section will list and describe the recommendations for school districts and school sites to reach
out to the African American community to improve enrollment in DLIPs. I will then share the
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recommendations for African American parents to support and increase student enrollment in a
DLIP. I will close the chapter with suggestions for future research and my conclusion.
Recommendations
School Districts
In order to get more African American parents involved, schools have to make a
conscious effort to recruit African American families. The district has to do more outreach and
purposely recruit for diversity in Pre-kindergarten and transitional kindergarten programs that
exist within the district.
Schools around Los Angeles county have been suffering from declining enrollment,
however, the sites that have opened a DLIP has actually increased their enrollment. In one of the
districts in my study, three elementary schools were on the list to close because of declining
enrollment, however, when the school added a DLIP those schools increased their enrollment.
Yet, those programs were placed at schools on the outskirts of the city in more prominent and
economically affluent neighborhoods. A recommendation that I would offer is that school
districts focus on opening DLIPs in schools that have a higher population of African American
students. If school districts want to narrow the achievement gap and fulfill the goals of an
equitable educational system that serves all, it’s incumbent upon educators to seek to open
programs in communities that have historically been marginalized. One item that two
participants mentioned is that the DLIP schools are not centrally located near areas where low
income families are concentrated and more African American students attend. Thus, if a district
was to place a DLIP in the less affluent neighborhoods, more low-income and students would
have the opportunity to attend.
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Another recommendation for districts is for them to do a better job of marketing the
program to the African American community. Currently, parents find out about these alternate
education programs through word of mouth. African American families who learn about these
programs are usually more affluent and college educated. Thus, many African American families
have never heard of DLIPs. In order to address this concern, district personnel can create parent
community nights, in a central location in different neighborhoods, to share the benefits of
DLIPs with families that have not heard about or understand the advantages of the program.
Years of practice in communities suggests that resources such as transportation and child care
can increase parent attendance and thus enable them the opportunity to be informed. DLIPs
could also be featured in material that is sent for open enrollment to incoming kindergarten
families, as well as, host parent informational nights for incoming students at schools where a
high population of African American students would attend. Districts could include the different
types of special programs offered in the district for parents on a handout. The district could also
share information about the benefits for all students in the handout for families. The participants
in this study were able to do their own research to learn about the benefits of DLIPs. Districts
could compile this research in easy to understand dissemination approaches to better
communicate with all parents, and particularly African American parents.
School Sites
School sites need to be aware of the balance between cultural awareness and cultural
insensitivity. All participants shared that they did not feel that African Americans and even all
students were receiving enough information on the African American culture. This could be
remedied by organizing activities to honor and recognize African American culture around the
campus. For example, students and staff could make posters of different African American
AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 171

figures and have students write information about the individuals in the target language and post
the posters around campus. To truly be bicultural, students in DLIPs should have a more robust
education of what makes up American culture, not just the cultures of the target language.
The site could also make the campus more welcoming to African American families.
When incoming parents attend tours at schools, they are greeted by the principal or
representative from the school and current parents. The school representative and parent
volunteers could share their experiences in the program and about the school in general. The
incoming parents would at this time get a feel for the school and comfort level with the
environment. Of the participants in this study, four parents went on a tour and none of them saw
or met with an African American parent or representative of the school on the tour. Parents
shared that at their child’s campus, they want an “ally” for their child, someone who would “look
out” for their kid. This was a considered a need for parents mainly because of the lack of
diversity on campuses. Thus, schools should try to secure an African American parent or staff
member to assist with tours as it would possibly make some parents feel more at ease. And while
the “ally” doesn’t necessarily have to be African-American, there is something to be said for
seeing others like oneself in school settings.
There could also be training for office staff on how to greet incoming parents. Multiple
parents stated that they did not feel like there were engaged in a positive way on their campuses.
These parents felt that they did not feel welcomed by the teachers or the school community as a
whole. Thus, working with the office staff to be conscious of the importance of making each
parent who walks on that campus feel special is important to increasing not only the African
American student enrollment, but enrollment in general for the school.

AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 172

Parent Groups
From the last two sections, it is apparent that school districts and school sites need to
work to get African American parents to come to their schools and make the campuses
welcoming and inviting. However, school districts have to juggle with the lack of funding and
the pressures of running a campus, thus it is important that African American parents “step up”
and assist districts and sites with the recruitment of African American families. One
recommendation is for African American parents to show up on tour days and become tour
guides. Even though many African American parents work during the day and would be unable
to leave work to be a guide, there should be a conscious effort made by African American
parents to try and participate in a tour.
While all of the participants in this study worked during the day and mentioned that they
would not be able to lead a tour, they were open to coming to an evening or weekend meeting to
talk about their experiences, both good and bad, and about the growth that they have seen in their
child. Thus, African American parents could create parent nights and invite their friends with
young children to come to a parent information night, run strictly by parents. The principal of the
school could be invited to come and speak for a few minutes at the beginning of the meeting and
then leave, in order for parents to have candid conversations about the DLIP. In so doing,
African American parents can create social networks that we know are so important in making
others aware of alternative educational options.
Another option for parents to spread the word about DLIPs in their communities is to
share their experiences of participating in a DLIP at their church or in the pre-schools where their
children attended. Each participant in this study enrolled their child in pre-school. If African
American parents in the DLIP would go back to their pre-school to share their experience with
AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 173

other African American parents, it would help to give another avenue for parents to learn about
the program. There are also African American newspapers in each city where parents live that
could publicize the program. Parents could interview students and even create a student of the
month section that talks about the student and his or her experiences and accomplishments in the
DLIP.
If the goal is to get more African American students involved in the program, it is going
to have to be by word of mouth and referrals, social networks in other words. This means that
parents have to be upfront and give the benefits and the drawbacks of enrolling their child in
DLIP. But African American parents need to take the lead. There may be Chinese or White
parents who says, “DLIP is a great program and my child is doing well.” African American
parents may respond by asking, “yes, but what about my kid,” because some African American
parents may not see the connection between the Chinese or White child and their child because
of perceived cultural differences. However, if another African American parent shares the
positive components and success their child is having, it is more meaningful because the other
family could possibly envision their child succeeding in the program, because their experiences
might be seen as more relatable.
In order to help the recruitment process, parents could also create videos that show
African American students speaking the target language and having conversations with each
other or the teacher. This video could be placed on different websites and social media, to get
people to see what the kids are doing. The video will not capture the full capacity of the program,
but it would act as a hook to capture parents’ attention and get them to come and learn about the
program. Once you have parents in the door, then the current DLIP parents can share their
experiences and the benefits that await their child if they enroll.
AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 174

School districts, school sites and parents need to all do their part to recruit more African-
Americans students into DLIPs. Increasing the enrollment of African American students would
create more diversity on DLIP campuses and help to close the achievement gap. African
American parents need to be given an opportunity to receive information about DLIPs so that
they can make an educated decision on all of the programs available to their child. Maybe they’ll
still choose to enroll their child in a general education setting, but an effort should still be made
to support parents so that they can make the most informed decision for their children’s
education.
Future Research
This study set out to focus on African American parents who decided to enroll their child
in a Mandarin DLIP. During the interviews, multiple items came up that would be interesting to
focus on in future research. The first area that was of interest is the connection that parents
collegiate academic background has on choosing an alternate education setting for their child,
such as DLIPs. The fact that four out of the five participants attended an HBCU is staggering,
especially since none of the participants knew each other before their children enrolled in a
DLIP. What is it about the HBCU context that produces graduates who explore alternative
educational options for their children? This could be an interesting line of research. Another
question that future research can look into is how HBCU’s builds the capacity for social capital.
Of the parents who were interviewed, only one parent was a member of a black fraternity or
sorority. That parent was the only parent who did not attend a HBCU, as she attended a
Predominantly White Institution (PWI). PWI are colleges or universities whose enrollment of
white students is over 50% (Russell & Atwater, 2005). This suggests that each of the parents had
one or another source of social capital, so examining the different avenues through which doors
AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 175

are opened for African Americans needs further exploration. Along with the connection to
fraternities and sororities, a study could center around how programs like Mochamoms and Jack
and Jill of America, Incorporated also build the capacity for social capital. Jack and Jill is similar
to Mochamoms, which was mentioned in Chapter Two, as both programs are made up of
mothers of African American children. However, Jack and Jill is a more exclusive group, as
members have to be African American woman and have to be invited to join the group through a
current member. These various organizations are potential ways through which social networks
are intentionally created, so understanding how they function could provide insight into how to
reproduce their benefits.
Since this study focused on parents, a second area that researchers could study is the
importance that districts place on African American students’ enrollment in DLIPs. Do districts
feel that it is important to have African American students represented more in DLIP classes?
Researchers could explore this question along with the actions districts are taking to attract and
retain African American students. If districts are not interested in these recruitment efforts,
researchers could examine what stands in their way of recruiting more African American
students into their programs.
A limitation to this study was my data collection came from parents who all currently live
in Los Angeles County. Another limitation to my study was that I had time and boundary
constraints, therefore I was not able to interview more parents. Thus, researchers may find it
valuable to conduct further studies in different locations to see if the perceptions, views and data
of African American parents in Mandarin DLIPs outside of Los Angeles County are similar or if
there are other perspectives that suggest different findings about parents’ social networks or
benefits of enrolling their child in the program.
AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 176

Finally, researchers should monitor the progress of students enrolled in DLIPs and
interview them to find their perceptions of the program and how they view the benefits. Hearing
from parents is great, however, many parents want to feel validated for choosing an alternate
program for their child. Hence, it would be helpful to hear from the students’ perspective on
whether and how participating in a DLIP has prepared them for life in a multi-cultural society,
and if the benefits that parents and the literature present corresponds with students’ views.
Conclusion
This study sought to understand why African American parents enroll their children in
Mandarin DLIPs and the role that social capital plays in parents’ decisions. The study focused on
five African American parents who enrolled their children in a Mandarin DLIP. The study used
in-depth interviews to gain insights into parents’ backgrounds, thoughts and beliefs.
Understanding the background of African American parents who enrolled their children
in DLIPs is important for multiple reasons. Researchers have shared that many public schools are
doing a poor job of educating African American students and the achievement gap is continuing
to grow. Researchers have also identified DLIPs as a way to close the achievement gap and
increase African American students’ academic performance. Therefore, there is a need to enroll
more African American students in DLIPs. Understanding African American parents’ rationale
and thoughts on the benefits of the program, as well as, understanding how they learned about
the program and who they discussed their child’s enrollment with is beneficial in marketing the
program to more African American parents, thus increasing African American student
enrollment and opportunities for their future.
Based on the interviews with the participants, the findings suggest that the parents’
decision to enroll their child in DLIPs was based on the parents wanting their children to be able
AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 177

to communicate in a second language. The participants felt that they were somewhat limited in
their life due to the fact that they do not have mastery of a second language. Another reason
parents decided to enroll their child in a DLIP was the fact that parents wanted to give their child
more opportunities. Parents saw that their child would be more employable in an ever-changing
society and would have more opportunities if their child new a second language. Finally, the fact
that these parents had access to social capital, that focused around alternate school options, made
it easier to find a program like a DLIP to support their child academically. These social networks
were also extremely helpful in giving parents the courage to make the choice to attend a DLIP.
Even though this was a case study specifically on African American families, these findings and
recommendations apply to all families, particularly those from marginalized groups. We as a
society have an obligation to support all disadvantaged and underrepresented minority students
and families. However, I specifically chose to focus on African American students and parents
because of the achievement gap that exists, which is greatest amongst the African American
community. In order for African American student enrollment in DLIPs to grow, there has to be
a partnership between the school district and African American parents. School districts and
other African American parents need to serve as the social capital for parents who don’t readily
have that. Both groups have to come together with ideas and work to increase the number of
African American students in the DLIP. The benefits to African American students participating
in DLIPs is clear, thus, it is imperative more African American parents are informed about the
benefits of these programs so that education can be more equitable and we can truly work on
closing not only the achievement gap, but also the opportunity and wealth gap.

AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 178

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Thomas, W., & Collier, V. (1997). Two languages are better than one. Educational Leadership,
55(4), 23-26.
Yan, W. (1999). Successful African American students: The role of parental involvement.
Journal of Negro Education, 68(1), 5-22.

AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 189

Appendix A
Interview Protocol
I. Introduction
Thank you for agreeing to participate in my study about African American Parents and
Mandarin Dual Language Immersion Programs (DLIPs). I appreciate the time that you have set
aside to answer some of my questions. This interview should take between one to two hours,
does that work for you?
Before we get started, I want to provide you with an overview of my study and answer
any questions you might have about participating in this study. I am currently working on my
doctoral dissertation at the University of Southern California. The primary purpose of my study
is to explore what prompts African American parents to choose to enroll their child in Mandarin
DLIP and how they go about enrolling their child or children. In order to answer my research
questions, I will be using interviews with African American parents like yourself. I plan on
interviewing six to ten current and former African American parents, who have enrolled their
child in a Mandarin DLIP, to learn more about their rationale for entering the program and how
you learned about and enrolled in the program.
I want to assure you that I am strictly wearing the hat of researcher today. What this
means is that the nature of my questions are not evaluative. I will not be making any judgments
on your background or any of your answers. Participation in this interview is voluntary and none
of the data I collect will be shared with other parents, the teachers, the administrators, or the
district that your child is enrolled in.
I am also happy to provide you with a copy of my final paper if you are interested. Might
you have any questions about the study before we get started? If you don’t have any (more)
AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 190

questions, I would like to have your permission to begin the interview. I have brought a recorder
with me today so that I can accurately capture what you share with me. I will be the only one to
use the recording and will destroy the recording after I have created transcripts. May I also have
your permission to record our conversation?
Could you start with telling me a little bit about your background, where did you grow
up? How did you come to arrive in the current city that you live in now?
Interview Questions Background
1. Tell me about your experiences in K - 12 schools growing up.
a. What type of school did you attend?
b. What were some challenges you faced in school? (Please provide a specific
memory as an example).
c. What were some things that helped you when you were in school? (Please provide
a specific memory as an example).
d. What did you like about school growing up? (Please provide a specific memory as
an example).
e. What didn’t you like about school growing up? (Please provide a specific memory
as an example).
2. How would you describe your parents’ feelings about school when you were growing up?
a. Can you describe what they expected from you when you were growing up?
b. How do you know what they expected from you?
c. Can you recall a conversation you had with them about school?
d. How do you think your parents’ own feelings about school influenced your own,
if at all?
AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 191

3. Can you talk about your thoughts on learning another language in school?
a. What other languages besides English do you know?
b. How did you learn this/these languages, if at all?
4. What did you do after you left high school educationally?
a. Can you walk me through your choices?
i. Possibly probing questions (only asked if were not covered in participant’s
answer:
1. College attended
2. Why did you select that college?
3. How was your college experience?
4. Career
b. If you could go back, what would you do exactly the same way?
c. If you could go back, what would you do differently?
d. What is the highest level of education that you have?
i. Did you attend grad school?
1. If so, where?
2. Why did you decide to go to grad school?
5. What are your views on the current education system?
a. What is your perception of the purpose of public schooling in the United States?
b. How do you think the purpose of public education is being fulfilled, if at all?
c. Generally speaking, what are your thoughts on alternative educational programs?
(i.e, charter schools, Magnet schools, private schools).
AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 192

6. Transition – So, we have spent most of our time talking about you as the parent and your
background, now I would like to shift gears, is there anything else you would like to add
before we transition?
Reason to Enroll
7. Tell me about the type of schooling your child received before enrolling into the
Mandarin DLIP?
8. What were the other school options that you considered when you were deciding to enroll
your child(ren) in school?
a. What, if any, do you think are the benefits of those other options?
b. What, if any, do you think are the drawbacks of those other options?
9. When it came to deciding what school your child(ren) would go to, what were some
things you considered?
a. Can you recount a specific thought or conversation you had about what school to
enroll your child(ren) into? (probe for conversations with partner, other family
members, friends, school personnel)
b. Who were these individuals who you had these conversations with?
c. Why was their input important, if at all?
d. How did you meet these individuals?
e. What were their connections to you?
10. What were your thoughts about DLIP after you first heard about the program?
a. How did you first learn about DLIPs?
b. Who first told you about DLIPs?
AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 193

c. What did they say about it? Can you recount a specific conversation you had with
him/her?
11. Tell me why you ultimately chose to enroll your child(ren) in a Mandarin DLIP,
specifically.
a. Of all the choices, why do you think this was the best choice?
b. What, if any, are the benefits of enrolling your child in a Mandarin DLIP?
c. What, if any, are the drawbacks of enrolling your child in a Mandarin DLIP?
12. What are your thoughts about the DLIP you have chosen for your child(ren)?
a. What do you like about the program? (Provide specific examples)
b. What don’t you like about the program? (Provide specific examples)
13. Some would say that a DLIP allows children to build cultural awareness. What are your
thoughts about this?
a. What, if present, does this cultural awareness look like? (Provide specific
examples)
b. How, if at all, is this cultural awareness obtained in a Mandarin DLIP?
c. What are your thoughts about children building cultural awareness? How much
did this factor into your decision to enroll your child/children in a DLIP, if at all?
14. How do you think enrolling your children in the program will affect their education?
a. What are some positive effects you anticipate?
b. What are some negative effects you anticipate?
15. How do you think enrolling your child in a Mandarin DLIP will affect their job
opportunities in the future?
a. What are some positive effects you anticipate?
AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 194

b. What are some negative effects you anticipate?
16. Overall, how have you seen your child develop as a result of enrolling your child in a
Mandarin DLIP?
a. What are the disadvantages of enrolling your child in a Mandarin DLIP? (Probe
for more than one to see if there is more than one)
b. What are the advantages of enrolling your child in a Mandarin DLIP? (Probe for
more than one to see if there is more than one)
17. What are the outcomes that you expect from your child’s participation in a Mandarin
DLIP?
a. How do you think your child will do in life compared to his/her peers in the DLIP
program?
b. How do you think your child will do in life compared to children not in a DLIP?
18. How do you feel your child has performed academically in the program so far?
a. How do you think your child has performed in comparison to his/her peers in the
DLIP program?
b. How do you think your child has performed in comparison to his/her peers not in
a DLIP program?
19. Do you have more than one child, and if so, are they enrolled in a DLIP?
a. If not, why did you not enroll them in this program?
20. Some people would say that a DLIP might put kids at a disadvantage academically
because they are having to learn two languages. What are your thoughts about that?
21. Can you provide me with an example of a time when your child(ren) expressed positive
attitudes towards bilingualism? Provide a specific example
AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 195

22. Can you provide me with an example of a time when your child(ren) expressed negative
attitudes towards bilingualism? Provide a specific example
23. Can you provide me with an example of a time when your child(ren) expressed positive
attitudes towards biliteracy? Provide a specific example
24. Can you provide me with an example of a time when your child(ren) expressed negative
attitudes towards biliteracy? Provide a specific example
25. How do you think DLIPs can be specifically beneficial to African American students, if
at all?
Social Capital and Enrollment
26. Tell me about your social circle.
a. How did you come about to know these individuals?
b. What do those in your social circle know about DLIPs?
c. What do those in your social circle think of DLIPs?
d. How did your social circle influence you in enrolling your child in a Mandarin
DLIP if at all?
e. How do you think the people in parents’ social circles influence what they know
about DLIPs?
27. Did you know other African American families who enrolled their child(ren) in a DLIP
prior to you deciding to enroll your child?
a. If yes, what conversations did you have with them about the DLIP?
28. What have you shared with other African American families about the Mandarin DLIP, if
at all?
AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 196

29. If you have shared out to other families, in what way did you communicate with other
families?
30. Tell me how you heard about the Mandarin DLIP in which your child(ren) are enrolled.
a. Tell me how you found more information about the Mandarin DLIP.
31. Tell me about the process you went through to enroll your child in a Mandarin DLIP.
32. What tours did you attend before enrolling your child in the program, if at all?
a. How did you find out about these tours?
b. Tell me more about these tours?
c. Can you tell me if anything particular stood out from the tours?
d. What from the tour, if anything, convinced you to enroll in the program?
33. What parent meetings did you attend before enrolling your child in the program, it at all?
a. How did you find out about these parent meetings?
b. Tell me more about these meetings?
c. Can you tell me if anything particular stood out from the meetings?
d. What from the meetings if anything convinced you to enroll in the program?
34. What can you tell me about the demographics in your child’s Mandarin DLIP
classroom?
a. What are your thoughts about who your child(ren) is going to school with?
i. What are some benefits of the peer group in the program?
ii. What are some disadvantages of the peer group in the program?)
35. Some people would say there isn’t an adequate amount of African American students
enrolled in the Mandarin DLIPs ? What would you say to them?
AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 197

36. What do you think are some of the challenges of enrolling African American students in
DLIPs? Mandarin DLIPs specifically?
a. Probe – What can schools and/or districts do to address these challenges?
37. Some people would say that programs like this should actively recruit African American
families. What do you think about that? Why do you say that?
38. If you feel the program should recruit African American families, what do you think is
the best way to go about doing that?
Demographics
39. What type of community activities, faith based, or social organizations do you participate
in?
a. Probe - If so, when did you become involved in those organizations?
40. What did you do in terms of a career?
41. What, if any, languages besides English do you speak? (If they say no other language
then I will jump to question 40)
a. Probe - How did you learn to speak that/those language(s)
b. What, if any, language did you learn while you were in school?
c. What challenges did you face when you were learning languages?
d. What supports did you receive that you feel helped you when you were learning
languages?
42. What are your thoughts about knowing more than one language?
a. What benefits are there to know more than one language?
b. What limitations are there to know more than one language?
43. What is your marital status? Or With whom do you live with?
AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 198

44. In which range is your combined family annual income?
a. (0 - $25,000), ($25,001 - $50,000), ($50,001 - $75,000), ($75,001 - $100,000), or
over $100,000
Before we conclude, I am wondering if there is anything that you would add to our
conversation today that I might not have covered?
Thank you so much for you sharing your thoughts with me today! I really appreciate
your time and willingness to share. Everything that you have shared is really helpful for my
study. If I find myself with a follow-up question, I am wondering if I might be able to contact
you, and if so, if email is ok? As a thank you, please accept this $25.00 Visa gift certificate in
appreciation of your time.

AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 199

Appendix B
Recruitment Letter

Lawton Gray
USC Doctoral Candidate
lawtongr@usc.edu

Dear Participant,

My name is Lawton Gray and I am currently an Ed.D. student at the USC’s Rossier
School of Education. My dissertation is a case study examining the reasons African American
parents decide to enroll their children in Mandarin Dual Language Immersion Programs (DLIPs)
and the process they go through to do so. I am interested in understanding the type of African
American parents who choose DLIPs for their children. This is important to understand because
of the small number of African American students enrolled in Mandarin DLIPs compared to both
their White and Asian counterparts. I plan to interview six African American families in order to
answer the research questions that are outlined below.

1. What are the characteristics of African American parents who chose to enroll their
children in Mandarin DLIPs?
2. What are the reasons why African American parents chose to enroll their children
in Mandarin DLIPs?
3. How do African American parents go about choosing Mandarin DLIPs for their
children’s schooling?
By interviewing African American parents who decided to enroll their children in DLIPs
and describing their background, the benefits they saw in the program and the process and social
networks they used to enroll their children in the program, I hope to create a road map for
educators to use to help recruit other African American parents into these programs. This study
will also give districts the ability to identify ways in which they can increase the number of
African American students in Mandarin DLIPs.
I hope that you will agree to participate in my study as I am interested in finding out more
about you and the reasons you chose a Mandarin DLIP for your child. Please contact me
lawtongr@usc.edu or my cell (XXX) XXX-XXXX if you are interested or have any questions.

Sincerely,

Lawton A. Gray III
USC Doctoral Candidate

AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 200

Appendix C
Information Fact Sheet

AFRICAN AMERICAN PARENTS IN DLIPS 201

Abstract (if available)

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Asset Metadata

Creator Gray, Lawton Alexander, III (author)

Core Title A case study on African American parents' perceptions of Mandarin Dual Language Immersion Programs and the role social capital plays in student enrollment

School Rossier School of Education

Degree Doctor of Education

Degree Program Education (Leadership)

Publication Date 01/31/2018

Defense Date 01/09/2018

Publisher University of Southern California (original), University of Southern California. Libraries (digital)

Tag achievement gap,African American,DLIP,dual language immersion,language benefits,OAI-PMH Harvest,parent choice,social capital

Language English

Contributor Electronically uploaded by the author (provenance)

Advisor Samkian, Artineh (committee chair), Escalante, Michael (committee member), Kistler, Melissa (committee member)

Creator Email lawgray@charter.net,lawtongr@usc.edu

Permanent Link (DOI) https://doi.org/10.25549/usctheses-c40-465274

Unique identifier UC11266824

Identifier etd-GrayLawton-5982.pdf (filename),usctheses-c40-465274 (legacy record id)

Legacy Identifier etd-GrayLawton-5982.pdf

Dmrecord 465274

Document Type Dissertation

Rights Gray, Lawton Alexander, III

Type texts

Source University of Southern California (contributing entity), University of Southern California Dissertations and Theses (collection)

Access Conditions The author retains rights to his/her dissertation, thesis or other graduate work according to U.S. copyright law. Electronic access is being provided by the USC Libraries in agreement with the a...

Repository Name University of Southern California Digital Library

Repository Location USC Digital Library, University of Southern California, University Park Campus MC 2810, 3434 South Grand Avenue, 2nd Floor, Los Angeles, California 90089-2810, USA