Hispanic Heritage Month

It's Hispanic Heritage Month now (and every year) from September 15 to October 15. Should schools recognize it? If so, how?

On one hand, I worry about the message of celebrating ethnic heritage without giving it much thought. The unfortunate tendency of teachers and schools is to bring middle-class assumptions and values to the table, and to emphasize primarily heroes and holidays and then call it a day. Hispanic Heritage Month shouldn't just be putting up a poster of César Chávez on the bulletin board; what's the point of that? It's sad to see historical figures simplified to the point of becoming caricatures, as has happened too often to folks like MLK, Jr..


But schools must do something about the persistent achievement gap between white and minority students, and events like Hispanic Heritage Month provide us an opportunity to focus our thoughts and energy on improving the education of our growing Hispanic population. In my district, where Hispanic students make up about half of our elementary school students, we need to face some harsh facts and ask ourselves what we're going to do about them. Are we going to encourage greater participation in things that are working (like Dual Language Immersion classes, AVID, and Spanish for Heritage Speakers classes), or not? Are we going to help our students and families plan for a realistic path to college when they may not know any adults in their lives who graduated? In other words, what is our goal and what's the plan to get there?

Some ideas:
- Elementary school assemblies focusing on local Hispanic people who are community helpers and leaders.
- Focusing on career dreams and the education needed to get there.
- Connecting with parents, who may have limited English abilities, to hear their stories and find new ways to partner together.
- Finding ways to validate and build on the cultural and linguistic knowledge that many Hispanic students bring to school (in other words, culturally responsive teaching).
- Making sure all school programs represent the population of the school: sports, the arts, clubs and organizations, advanced classes and gifted programs.

What are you doing to commemorate Hispanic Heritage Month this year?