This study focuses on understanding the impact of the Cultural Identity Group (CIG) program on the racial/ethnic identity development of students who were involved in a sixteen-week program in an ethnically diverse middle school in New England. The program began in October 1996 and ended in May 1997. The cultural identity groups met once a week except during school holidays and vacation. This study was part of a larger project funded by the Carnegie Corporation of New York. The Cultural Identity Group model on which this study is based was jointly developed and piloted in a Western Massachusetts Elementary School by Phyllis C. Brown, MMHS, Ernest Washington, Ed.D., Allen Ivey, Ed. D. and Mary Bradford-Ivey, Ed.D. Qualitative and quantitative measures were used to gather information about the impact of the Cultural Identity Group on the racial/ethnic identity development of the students as well as on their attitudes toward people from different racial/ethnic backgrounds. The Multigroup Ethnic Identity Measure developed by Jean Phinney (1989) was used to assess students' ethnic awareness. Interviews conducted with a racially/ethnically diverse sample from the Cultural Identity Group provided evidence of the impact of CIG on the racial/ethnic identity of participants. The findings in this study demonstrated that students who participated in CIG gained a heightened sense of their racial/ethnic self as well as an increase in interethnic awareness. There was an emerging awareness of the pervasiveness of racism among participants in this study. Participants also gained skills to help them deal with and interrupt injustice. These skills included recognizing ethnic jokes and developing constructive, practical solutions for confronting racist behavior directed toward adolescents. The implications of this study concern students, and educators, as well as theories of adolescent development and racial identity development. Providing students structured environments in which to talk and learn about their own ethnic background, race and racism may have a positive impact on their racial/ethnic development which may promote better interethnic relationships in school. Any study of adolescent development must consider differences as well as similarities in adolescent development based on racial/ethnic factors. Future and current educators need to learn about theories of racial/ethnic identity and understand how it plays out in adolescents' lives and in school, in order to create school culture that affirms all students.

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Teachers of English to students of other languages in the United States face complex teaching realities. The students themselves come from diverse social, economic and political backgrounds and their needs and demands vary widely from context to context. Teachers face external pressures from the institutions in which they teach and struggle with the impact of their own visible and invisible identities on the students' learning. This thesis is a participatory inquiry into the challenges of six women teachers, all with very diverse and extensive linguistic and intercultural experiences. Over the course of six years, these teachers, in conjunction with the author, searched themselves and discussed as a group the impact of their diverse backgrounds on their approaches to teaching. Data used as the basis for the inquiry includes extensive initial individual interviews and conversations among the women, subsequent workshops given for other teachers on the topic by the group and papers and theses written with regard to their approaches to teaching for their Master's Degree theses. The literature review includes references to the sociopolitical dimensions of ESL teaching, intercultural communication, research in identity, and gender issues in education. Conclusions point to the impact of extensive intercultural experience and reflection on teacher confidence, skill building and resilience.

This qualitative study investigated how White student affairs practitioners described and reflected on the practice of race awareness education. The methods of data collection included semi-structured, in-depth interviews and some field observations with ten White student affairs practitioners from diverse university and college settings throughout the United States. The principal focus of this study was to acquire knowledge as to: (1) what informs practitioners about their practice; (2) why they make the decisions they do regarding their approach to race awareness education; and (3) how has their practice changed over time. Practitioners were also asked to reflect on what it meant to be doing this work as a student affairs practitioner. The findings suggested emergent themes related to the relationship between the practitioner, the practice, and their reflection. Themes regarding the practitioners' background centered on their intrinsic motivation; reliance on experiential learning; and the importance of tracking their own White identity development. In their narratives about the practice, themes emerged regarding the range of interventions utilized in the field; pedagogical issues related to impacting students' learning at the cognitive, affective, and behavioral levels; the use of self as a teaching tool; and viewing practice as an art form. In their reflections, practitioners spoke of the challenges inherent in evaluation; their desired changes; minor shifts that occurred with their practice; and the need for processes to insure reflective thought. The study concludes with a discussion of the implications for further research.

During the past two decades, out-of-country development assistance training programs have emerged in response to the need to promote peoples' self-determination through increased participation at the community level. Participatory training based on an empowerment ideology has been advanced by some practitioners. Yet, little emphasis has been placed on evaluating the efficacy of this strategy as it pertains to applying training experiences in program participants' home setting. When this is attempted, the traditional evaluation procedures typically used render information which is of limited value to planners, practitioners, and program participants themselves. Thus, the development field operates with a distorted understanding of the complexity involved in applying empowerment training principles in actual community settings. The study investigates the possibilities and limitations of participatory evaluation (PE), and alternative evaluation approach, as a research strategy. A training case for Guatemalan community development workers referred to as the Central American Peace Scholarship Project sponsored by the United States Agency for International Development provides the program background. The PE strategy is based on a theoretical perspective rooted in critical theory and a methodological perspective derived from a participatory research paradigm. By focusing the PE process on participants' questions critical insights that might not appear in traditional evaluation findings are revealed. Further, PE increases the possibilities for evaluation to serve a developmental role for program participants and an informational role for program planners. In application, the process moves through three key stages: (1) a collaborative assessment of the Guatemalan research context, (2) the emergence of participants' evaluation questions through a series of informal interview encounters, and (3) critical reflections, the creation of alternative solutions and action-taking. PE provides participants with training reinforcement in their home setting while informing program planners of the efficacy of a particular training methodology from a Guatemalan perspective. Findings challenge policy makers, planners, practitioners, and researchers to acknowledge multiple field realities as well as contextual and structural impediments to applying an empowerment based methodology in various socio-political contexts.