...Cultural Diversity in School Lekesha Fraley ELL 240 Linguistically & Culturally Diverse Learners Instructor: Ashley Simpson May 15, 2014 Connecting with families of ELLs is every bit as important as connecting with the learners themselves in the classroom (Syrja, 2011 ).Working with families is an important first step in helping children accept, understand, and value their culture in school. By creating culturally aware school-family partnerships, school systems can reduce cultural discontinuities, create diverse learning opportunities, improve ethnic and racial perceptions and attitudes, and foster interethnic friendships. Parents are a child's first teacher, and play a vital role throughout their child's formal education. Healthy relationships between home and school contribute to student achievement. Regardless of socioeconomic level, ethnic/racial background, or parents' education level, students do better academically when their families are involved in learning process (Antunez, 2000). Family and parent involvement can take many forms, from volunteering in the classroom, to setting high expectations for learning and creating a supportive learning environment at home; the more ways schools and family’s partner to support student learning, the more family involvement takes place. Family involvement is linked to higher student achievement, better attitudes toward learning, lower dropout rates, and increased community support for education--regardless of...
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...Culture and Diversity Final Project ETH/125 * * * * Immigration time line reflects that immigration started during the colonial era (1565-1775) and the first permanent settlement in the U.S. was by the Spanish in the now state of Florida, followed by the First shipment of African slaves in Virginia in 1619, then in the 1630’s The great migration to Massachusetts by Britons to what is now knows as new Britain, and between 1841-1850 more than 1 million people migrated to the U.S. and the timeline does not end there it goes on to describe a U.S. history full of immigration from all over the world creating the diverse nation we live in today . Immigration was especially intense in the 20th century; between 1901-1930 when more than 18 million people migrated and used Ellis Island as a transit point from Europe. In short immigration defines the U.S. from the very beginning of the founding of the nation. Although immigration is said to have slowed down during the last couple of years, According to Pew Research 40.4 million immigrants lived in the U.S. in 2011 and the population of foreign born was a total of 13%, it also states that immigrant populations has increased 30% since the year 2000” ("Pew Research Hispanic Center", 2013). After reading trough the history of immigration in the U.S and understanding the full extent of our diversity, it is striking that we can still hold so much prejudice towards those that are different or foreign. All Americans except...
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...Culture –everyone has it ? In most families one or both parents work. If they have kids they have to get up early to get the kids ready for school. Breakfast usually constitutes of cereals, bacon, eggs, pan cake or waffles with coffee and fruit juice. They pack light meals usually sandwiches for lunch. Those who don’t pack grab fast foods. Dinner is considered as family time where everyone including children sits at the table talk and eat. An average work day usually spans from 8am -5pm. Punctuality and productivity are valued in the work place. There is an expectation for each individual to have basic competency of what they are doing and project that confidence onto others (colleagues, customers etc. ) when performing the task they are hired to do. In the leisure People walk on a faster pace. Often they will be accompanied either by their significant others or their pets when walking. In main cities and in down town it is common to see people jog with earphones plugged to their ears and gadgets attached to their arms or their waist which keep track of the calories burnt. For the most part people don’t seem to pay attention to what is happening around them. Two people can sit next to each other for hours and not say a thing. People don’t expect others to say hello when they pass by unless they know the person well. People feel comfortable being on their own usually having interaction with their iPods or cell phones. They wear casual attires for the most part jeans...
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... other time in human history. New technology has brought us a truly global economy with participants from all over the world. One key to being a good communicator today is an understanding of your audience. Cultural understanding is an absolute requirement for any business leader today. Failing to understand the culture of the people you are communicating with can lead to some spectacular communication blunders. For example, in my workplace the phrase “killing the sacred cow” is often used as a business term to indicate a radical change in thinking about a longstanding process. When we were a small company located in the wild west populated mostly with Americans this wasn’t a big deal. We now have a staff augmentation workforce from India. As you can imagine, the phrase “killing the sacred cow” is no longer appropriate. Our cultural insensitivity reached an all time low when the Director of Information Services decided to take his new Indian workforce out to a special celebration dinner. He took them to a traditional southwest steakhouse. Coming from a culture that reveres cows, they found a restaurant dedicated to the slaughter and eating of cows to be an abomination. This was not good for team morale. Cultural insensitivity has produced some major slipups over the years. The alcoholic beverage Irish Mist had abysmal sales in Germany, where the word mist translates to manure. The Japanese sports beverage Pocari Sweat doesn’t sound very appealing to english speakers...
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...Policy Issues and Cultural Diversity Student’s Name University Policy Issues and Cultural Diversity A research gap is an aspect of research or a research question that has not been answered sufficiently in a study (Alvesson & Sandberg, 2013). A research gap arises when the researcher in his study has not adequately solved the research problem, as per the research methodology (Alvesson & Sandberg, 2013). In this paper, therefore, I further evaluate the research on intercultural maturity.To gain insights on how the researcher addressed the research problem, and ultimately discover areas I will suggest for further study on cultural diversity. Cultural diversity is influenced by a myriad of factors (Tierney, 2007).The factors affecting cultural diversity forms the first research gap; a study may be conducted with an aim of analyzing how these individual factors affect cultural diversity. These factors are both external and internal. Again from, the research on intercultural maturity, I feel that the study did not sufficiently indicate how the educational practices; models promote intercultural competence and effectiveness. This knowledge gap second suggests gap for further research on culture diversity. Also, the research on intercultural maturity has no sufficiently indicated how achievement of intercultural maturity promotes human development and positive interactions. This gap is an area that suggests further...
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...Effect of workforce diversity in the performance of an organization Name: Institution: 1.0 Introduction Diversity in the workplace has for a longtime been viewed as a challenging issue to manage within an organization. The management therefore takes quite some time to ensure that the employees get along. This has to be done to enable every single employee feel engaged within the organization. The website identified for this study is Apple Company website. The company clearly highlights the reason it identifies diversity among its staff. The website also highlights on what it aims to benefit from a diverse force based on its quest for more innovation. When the term diversity is searched a series of plans the company has for diversity pop up (Apple, 2016). For instance the plans it has for the present workforce, future plans, job creation by identifying diversity, its policy on diversity and inclusion and diversity based jobs. The material on diversity is related to the organization’s plans for innovation as it targets to have a workforce that have different ideas that will enable it come up with unique products. The mission and goals are all inclined with the plans the company has for a diverse workforce (Apple, 2016). Potential employees and customers will be able to know by logging onto the website the immense opportunities the organization has and will not hesitate working with them. The information on diversity is current because the management has put...
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...Annotated Bibliography In the essay I will argue that having a diverse heterogenic workplace has many benefits. I will be focusing on diversity in employee cultural and gender. Due to the increasingly diverse nature of Australia’s workforce, organisations will have to use strategic tactics such as successful Human Resource Planning, in order to attract, select and retain a diverse workplace. A company with employees that bring different perspectives is presented to be able in finding more efficient ways to operate and grow (Wojcik 2012). Diversity programs enhance the ability of an organisation to meet client needs, which can improve its profits (Wojcik 2012) Dwyer et.al (2001) discusses the potential benefits of gender diversity, such as novel insights, perspectives, creativity, and experience appear to foster and support expansion into new markets. Finding a similar association between racial diversity, growth, and firm performance, This insight will assist me to form an argument to why organisations should select a diverse workforce. Management teams with higher proportion of women promote more interpersonal channels of communication, employee participation in decision-making and monitor feedback and development more intensely (Melero, E 2010) Communities and consumers want to engage with and do business with organisations that reflect themselves and the current population (Lieber 2012). Attracting diverse employees to organisations has a flow on effect on the...
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...Cultural Diversity in Life Sciences Janet Chauhan Chamberlain College of Nursing SOCS350: Cultural Diversity in Professions Spring May 2016 Cultural Diversity in Life Sciences Cultural diversity in professions is a critical success factor in all aspects of business, but none as much as in Life Sciences. The webpage and company chosen to research cultural diversity in life sciences is Bayer.com. According to Bayer’s website, Bayer is a global company operating in almost all markets in the world for a little over 150 years. For a company with such a long history of over 150 years and operating in 120 countries with a little over 100 thousand employees, the question is how culturally diverse is Bayer? Introduction Bayer was chosen to research cultural diversity for the inherent nature of the diversity in the company itself. Being that Bayer is so diverse, how does the bayer.com webpage portray cultural diversity. Germany is the largest country in the European Union, and Bayer is in the Top 5 companies from a market valuation perspective on the German stock exchange. As all multinational companies, and United States (US) being the largest market in the world, Bayer also has a very large presence in the US. Finally, the business model is very interesting where Bayer has three main pillars of business; 1) Pharmaceuticals (prescription medication), 2) Consumer Health (over the counter general medicines) and finally 3) Crop Science (crop protection and growth). Since Bayer...
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...Introduction Quill Corporation is an office supply company owned by Staples Incorporated. In 1956, the company was founded by Jack Miller who was joined by his brother Harvey Miller a year later. The brothers started selling office supplies to small firms throughout the Chicago area. They would market themselves by going door-to-door to promote their products. By 1963, Quill became the largest mail-order office supply in the country making total revenue of $400 million. In 1998, the Millers sold their company to Staples Incorporated for $685 million where it is still booming in sales (International Directories of Company Histories, 1999). Quill is known for office supply products but sell other products such as cleaning / breakroom supplies, electronics, and business furniture. Quill also provides services such as printing which includes business cards, letterheads, envelopes, and promotional materials; ink and toner finder/recycling, service plans, etc. Quill products and services are only offered online and in catalogs. They have 5000 employees at their corporate office located in Lincolnshire, Illinois and twelve distribution centers located in Florida, Georgia, Ohio, Texas, Colorado, Pennsylvania, Illinois, Wisconsin, Kansas, California, Oregon, and Connecticut. The CEO/President of the company is Sergio Pereira and the company currently have revenue of $1.6 billion. Quill value their employees by offering many activities such as a wellness center, intramural sports, and...
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...Cultural diversity is divided into two: primary and secondary. Primary diversity includes factors such as age, race and physical abilities. Secondary dimensions include factors such as family status, first language and religion among others. In the work place there are three main categories that cultural diversity is classified into, organizational, external, and internal. Organizational dimension is the functional level. It includes content/field work, area/department group, seniority or position status, the work place, trade union affiliation, and management status. The external dimension refers to the geographic location, income, personal habits, leisure activities, regional knowledge, education, work experience, appearance, parental and marital status. The internal dimension refers to age, sexual orientation, physical abilities, ethnic group, and race. (Andresen) Workplace diversity training is crucial. Diversity is essential in the workplace because a diverse population has different backgrounds, experiences, knowledge and understanding. A diverse workplace is better able to solve a problem and implement new ideas because there are more people able to come up with the required solutions and ideas. Workplace training is training for the purpose of increasing the participant’s cultural awareness, knowledge, and skills, which is based on the impression the training will benefit an organization by protecting against civil rights violations, increasing the inclusion of different...
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...Cultural Diversity In today’s world we are seeing more and more cultural diversity within communities and within work environments. It is becoming very important to have diversity training within work environments to have a cohesive environment. What are the dimensions of cultural diversity? With my research the dimensions of diversity are divided into two groups called the primary dimension and secondary dimension. Though each dimensions adds layers of complexity to an individual’s identity. What influences self image, opportunities, values and individual expectations is the interaction with all the dimensions. Characteristics of primary dimensions are exclusive to an individual. Such would be how old they are, their mental and physical abilities, also his or her race, gender, sexual preferences and his or her ethnic heritage. The term for these six dimensions is known as core dimension of diversity since these dimensions are part of the beginning of an individual’s socialization and have a profound impact on his or her experiences, values and his or her expectations in every phase of life. Next are secondary dimensions which are not as seeable and also allow for a larger ability to choose. These would be where a person lives, work profession, income, religion, language of choice along with education and type of family environment. What ethnic, cultural, or other groups do you identify? I am a 58 year old female who was born in Tucson, AZ and raised in Calif...
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...The Dimensions of Cultural Diversity According to Geert Hofestede, a scholar and researcher from the Netherlands, there are four dimensions of cultural diversity: power distance, collectivism vs. individualism, femininity vs. masculinity, and uncertainty avoidance. (Hofstede, n.d.). As cited by Maloney, Geert Hofstede, “…defined a dimension as an aspect of culture that can be measured relative to other cultures. He suggested that people carry “mental programs” which develop in the family and in early childhood and are reinforced in a person’s organizations and community. Hofstede further suggested that these mental programs include a component of national culture and are expressed in an individual’s values…” (Maloney, n.d.). Asrani (2000-2010), defines power distance as the extent to which a society accepts the fact that power in organizations is distributed unequally. Individualism/collectivism is defined as the extent to which people act on their own or as a part of a group. Uncertainty avoidance is defined as the extent to which people in a society feel threatened by uncertain and ambiguous situations. Masculinity/feminity [sic] is defined as the extent to which a society values quantity of life (e.g., accomplishment, money) over quality of life (e.g. compassion, beauty). (Diversity in Workforce, para. 6). Identification and Explanation Referencing Textbooks The factors of racism, ageism, sexism, (including prejudices against gays, lesbians, and other sexual...
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...into your own work. Diversity: Challenges and Opportunities at Kennedy International School Suzy Student Western Governors University A. Introduction Kennedy International School is a unique middle school, located in suburban Commented [CT1]: An introduction is not on the rubric. However, a brief introduction or abstract introduces your school or organization and provides context for the report. Virginia. The innovative curriculum is academically challenging and integrates citizenship and global perspectives into all classes. The school has 600 students and 63 faculty members. Most students are from middle-income homes with college-educated parents. Recently, however, the student demographics have become more ethnically and economically diverse, leading to a host of challenges and opportunities for the students, faculty, and the surrounding community. A1. Local Demographics Members of the Kennedy School community speak a number of languages in addition to English, including Spanish, Arabic, Mandarin, and Russian. This increase in the number of home languages is a result of growth in the immigrant population and an increase in the number of international students. Other than English, the most widely used language is Spanish. Currently, we have Spanish-speaking students from Mexico, the Dominican Republic, and several Central American nations. Commented [CT2]: In this section, you must identify and explain three diversity demographics that are...
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...Cultural “Glasses” Cultural differences vary greatly between unique groups of people. Due to the sentiments it’s based on, culture is commonly passed on through generations, creating long–lasting bonds and traditions. When visiting or researching foreign cultures, there is no “right” or “wrong” and it is important to distinguish and respect opposing ideas that may arise. Both the United States and China have very large, established cultures that are known throughout the international community. Though there are many differences between these two vast cultures, it is precisely these diverse factors that shape the cultural atmosphere of each nation. In this paper I will discuss the similarities and differences between these two cultures using first-hand accounts in the form of a personal interview and factual evidence backed by research. Language Language is a universal form of communication, using different symbols and/or sounds to portray emotions, thoughts, or information; the meaning behind each language is unique to the culture of origin. In China, the predominant language – at about 94% of the population – is Mandarin, which has been influenced over the years by various forms of dialect (Ebrey, 1996). “In schools, I was taught both Mandarin (as a primary language) and English (as a secondary language).” (Haruno, S., personal communication, September 25, 2015). The U.S. is very similar in this manner, as we have adopted English as an official language, while simultaneously...
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...Cultural Diversity: What Would I Do? Anonymous Not so long ago, in the United States, white men made up the vast majority of doctors, lawyers, professors, elected officials, and corporate executives. Today, corporations, institutions, work environments, and neighborhoods are multicultural communities. Communicating effectively in these global communities is extremely challenging, considering we must collaborate with other people in culturally diverse group environments. Culture is “a learned set of shared interpretations about beliefs, values, and norms which affect the behaviors of a relatively large group of people” (Lustig & Koester, 2006, p. 25). Culture is also shared by everyone and by most members of any given social group. Older members of a group pass their culture on to the younger group members and it shapes behavior while structuring perceptions of the world (Adler & Gundersen, 2008). Diversity – a much broader concept – describes more than a person’s birth place, skin color, or ethnic heritage. In the most general of terms concerning group communication, diversity is simply the quality of being different. Most of the groups we are members of are made of individuals with different physical characteristics, traits, status, and attitudes. These characteristics include, but are limited to age, occupation, physical ability, marital status, personality, and religion (Engleberg & Wynn, 2010). Also, in terms of diversity, it exists within and among all cultures...
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