Immigrant Children and School

Research from Florida State University shows immigrant children perform as well or better than their same-race, American-born mates. Professor Kathryn Harker Tillman found that first- and second- generation children are no more likely than their third-generation mates to have to repeat a grade, despite the many socio-economic problems they face.

"Immigrant children are more successful navigating the educational system than would be expected," Tillman said. "Against the odds, these children are performing as well as or better than their same-race, third-generation peers."

The researchers focused on grade retention rather than on more traditional markers of educational performance, such as high school graduation to see how immigrant children navigate the educational system, not just the final result. The study was made on almost 20 000 students.

First-generation boys are 54 percent less likely to repeat the grade than their male mates of similar ethnic/racial, family background and ability/language characteristics. Girls of all generations and backgrounds have the same rate of retention.

"Our findings run counter to expectations derived from traditional assimilation theory, which posits that outcomes should improve across time and generation spent in the United States," Tillman said. "The findings also run counter to expectations based upon immigrant children's over-representation in high-risk background categories and general public perceptions of immigrant students."

Immigrant children are able to surpass many of the problems of high risk for grade retention, such as being a racial/ethnic minority, having parents with very low levels of education and English proficiency and attending urban schools.

Immigrant children may present higher levels of ambition and motivation, high parental expectations, strong emphasis on the importance of education, and/or high levels of family/community support for educational achievement.

"Our finding that males tend to experience more of an immigrant advantage than females leads us to question, however, whether the family and community contexts of immigrant children are equally beneficial for girls and boys," Tillman said.

"Given the traditional gender ideologies of many immigrant groups' native cultures, high expectations and high levels of encouragement and support for educational endeavors may be aimed disproportionately at male children."

This study shows that these performances are not achieved at the cost of supplementary years of schooling or policies to get accustomed to a new language and culture, she said. Instead, immigrant students succeed while keeping pace with their American-born peers.

A study at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor and Columbia University in New York City focused on racial/ethnic background of the immigrant children. The researchers chose to study English verbal ability, because of its importance for children's success in school and after.

The researchers evaluated 2,136 immigrant and non-immigrant children from four racial/ethnic groups: white, black, Mexican and Puerto Rican from 80 Chicago neighborhoods. White children - immigrant or non-immigrant - generally had high average English ability, but non-immigrants results were higher.

Black immigrant children had higher average scores than non-immigrant children. Mexican and Puerto Rican children - both categories - had low average scores, but non-immigrants' scores were a little bit higher. The difference between immigrant and non-immigrant children was explained by economic factors and the mother's education and age.

All immigrant children showed more verbal ability into adolescence than their non-immigrant peers, except for Mexican immigrant children. Non-immigrant children entered kindergarten with sizable advantages over their immigrant peers. The immigrant disadvantage at school entry was especially large for racial/ethnic minorities.

"Family and neighborhood resources do not explain the immigrant group differences in verbal growth", said lead researcher Tama Leventhal, PhD, associate research scientist of the Institute for Policy Studies.

"The findings have important implications for research, theory and practice regarding immigrant children and children of color," said Dr. Leventhal. Studies of immigrant group differences in achievement that neglect variation across racial/ethnic groups may lead to biased results".

"Finally," she noted, "the policy implications point towards Mexican immigrants and African-American non-immigrants as groups that are struggling and merit attention."

20% of the children in US are either immigrants or children of immigrants.

"If we can gain a better understanding of the mechanisms that currently protect socio-economically disadvantaged immigrant children from grade failure we could incorporate that knowledge into the curriculum, policies and intervention strategies and enhance the academic success of all children," Tillman said.