Matriz de problemáticas de la mentoría

To consider how principals66 _{view the academic achievement of newcomer} students relative to Irish students, principals of primary and second-level schools were asked the following question: Compared with other students in your school, how would you rate newcomer students on academic achievement: above average, average, below average.

Figure 7.1: Principal Perceptions of the Relative Rating of Academic Achievement of Newcomers

Figure 7.1 illustrates that the majority of both primary and second-level principals indicate that newcomer students had ‘average’ or similar academic achievement to Irish students. However, differences were evident in relation to the sector of education: a higher proportion of second-level principals rate newcomer students as ‘above average’ relative to primary principals (28 per cent relative to 14 per cent respectively).

66 _{Principals’ perceptions of the academic achievement of newcomer students relative to}

native students were used as the study did not collect data on the individual attainment of students. While this approach offers an insight into how principals view the educational progress of newcomer students relative to native students across schools, it treats all newcomer pupils as a homogenous group and cannot point to differences across nationality groups in their academic performance.

0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80

Above average Average

Academic achieveme % o f s c hoo ls Primary Second-level Below average nt

150 ADAPTING TO DIVERSITY:IRISH SCHOOLS AND NEWCOMER STUDENTS

Based on the perceptions of primary principals, there is no clear-cut relationship between the rating of newcomers’ achievement and the concentration of newcomers in the school or the prevalence of language difficulties among newcomer students in a school. Ratings are somewhat higher in DEIS schools (particularly rural DEIS) than in other schools. These patterns are also broadly evident in the case-study schools. A number of school staff outline the difficulty in making statements about newcomer children as a group relative to Irish children in terms of academic performance. Typical comments from school staff were as follows:

It varies. I wouldn’t say better or worse than the Irish, there are some very weak Irish and there's some very good, you know, you certainly couldn’t say that the Irish are doing better than the international. For example, one of my best at Irish is from Liberia, you know, one of my best at maths is Chinese, you know, and his English wouldn’t be great but he has super maths skills, you know, some of my weaker children, some of them are newcomers, some of them are Irish.

(Teacher, Thomas Road primary school)

Oh it's very varied, like there's two of the boys would be like top of the class, no doubts, and then like one of the newcomers is probably one of the lowest, so I mean it's all the scale. We have the whole range. (Teacher, Durango Street primary school)

As with responses from the questionnaire, perceptions of the academic achievement of newcomer students are somewhat more positive in rural DEIS schools. However, it should be noted that school staff were generally more positive than negative about newcomer students.

I know that there was one or two Lithuanians in our class that fared well in the reading test, came up in the top three or four, but that is for the exceptionally gifted that pick up the language straight away you know. I think they are sharper, yeah, Irish pupils tend to take things for granted I think, you know. I think there is a methodical approach to learning, taking things in and taking things step by step, for example in mathematics would be the main area where you would see that. (Teacher, Adams Street primary school)

School staff often spoke about higher academic achievement when parental involvement was evident, supporting the findings from the principal questionnaire. At primary level, it was evident that some newcomer parents had much higher educational aspirations for their children than native parents, particularly in disadvantaged schools.

A lot of them are very, very able children and this is a DEIS band one school, which would have a high number of educationally disadvantaged children. It can also mean that the number of high achievers may not be huge, not that one doesn’t have high achievers, but the numbers may not be huge. I would have said the advent of the newcomer children would have lifted the base because as I'm sure the teachers told you some of their parents are very, very ambitious for them and they would be the children of the up and at it, you know. (Teacher, Thomas Road primary school)

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Some of them, their parents are pushing them really, really hard to work, they’ve got a really strong work ethic, they come to school to learn, they work very hard at everything they do, they present their work nicely, any homework that goes home is done properly … sometimes the home background can make a big difference, like I'm sure that studies have proven it in Irish terms as well, that the amount of support and encouragement you're getting at home make a big difference and also they come here to make a better life so they want their children to do the same. Some of them might even be pushed a bit harder than you might like. (Teacher, Durango Street primary school)

In second-level schools, principals were also asked to rate the academic achievement of newcomer students relative to native students, and, as before, the proportion of newcomer students in the school or the incidence of language difficulties among newcomer students in the school was not significantly associated with the rating of newcomer students. In schools where ‘nearly all’ students show respect for their teachers, a quarter of principals see newcomers as above average in achievement compared with 36 per cent in other schools. School climate is most positive in schools where newcomers are perceived as having average achievement and less positive where they are seen as above or below average. Principals of designated disadvantaged schools are more likely than principals of non- DEIS schools to report newcomers as ‘above average’. Vocational school principals are most likely to report newcomers as above average (32 per cent) than all other school types, while those in boys’ secondary schools are least likely to do so (14 per cent) compared to those in other sectors.

In the interviews with second-level staff, teachers were asked to reflect on the academic performance of newcomer students in their school. While proficiency of English emerged as a difficulty for these students with regard to their academic performance and achievement, the majority of staff noted that, given these difficulties, most newcomer students get on well:

They seem to get on fine here and if they are not they seem to find their own level and at the end of the day the language you know doesn’t seem to make a huge difference. Okay they have difficulties but if they are academic hard working pupils they seem to prosper. (Teacher, Bentham Street second-level school)

While newcomer students were seen as highly motivated and competitive, some of the case study staff did outline that their academic progress and ambition was sometimes hindered by their English language competence:

Interviewer: How do you find newcomer students get on academically?

It varies, I tend to think though that from the disadvantaged start that they have in relation to having the language, or maybe having no English to begin with, they tend to do very well. Students that I’ve had to teach over the last number of years are from we’ll say Brazil or from the Czech Republic or from Latvia or Poland they tend to be very competitive. I know now [student G] is there from Brazil and he was really, really into it. Wanted to learn as much as possible, didn’t want to do ordinary level if he could, but to be realistic he had to in some cases. They

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really work hard. They do very well. (Teacher, Bentham Street second- level school)