African American Student Stereotypes

bonuses, facility improvements, and allotments` for technology advancement from the state government. (If “success” is shown.) This point is brought to life in the national Blue Ribbon School Award. Eligibility for this honor is determined by a single factor hidden behind many little details: student success on standardized tests. All “subcategories” of the school, and the school as a whole, must be in the top fifteen percent in the state rankings for all standardized testing. In addition, they must show effort in “closing the gap” between the “subcategories.” At Ennis ISD, the Caucasian population of students may be in the top ten percent, however the African American student population’s low scores can only be pejorative to their ability

Ennis ISD serves a community that is very economically unstable; sixty-nine percent of Ennis’s high school students are classified as economically disadvantaged. In comparison, Dallas ISD has forty-eight percent of its students being classified as economically disadvantaged. The median family income for families living in Ennis is $50,692, and the federal poverty line of annual income is set at about $23,000. According to the United States Census Bureau, 10.4 percent of families and thirteen percent of the population of Ennis are below the government’s definition of poverty. The high percentage of economically disadvantaged students correlates with EISD’s low scores because it can be assumed that high school students below the poverty line must have some form of work or job after school, preventing them from being able to complete homework and study on a daily basis. This also inhibits their success on standardized tests and college readiness simply because they might not have the time to practice concepts or ask questions to understand testing material. Another key issue with economically disadvantaged students is the lack of parental support and guidance on the significance of studying at home. Many of the parents of economically disadvantaged kids did not obtain a higher level of education, which may impact their ability to help their kids, and worse, their ability to pass on the motivation needed for their kids to succeed in school. In addition, they could also be

Out of Ennis High School’s 345 students class of 2013 graduates, 43 of them were disabled. This means that out of every graduating class, about 12 percent of them are disabled. The disabled students have a graduation rate of over ninety percent, which is two percent higher than the state average for non-disabled. However, Ennis ISD has a tendency to hold back their disabled students, especially in kindergarten, where nearly one-third of them are retained, and first and second grade. These retention rates are way higher than the state averages, but this leads to almost all of them graduating, so this policy must be