Students who speak a language other than English as their native language are either placed in regular classrooms where they will learn to "sink or swim" or in "NE" (non-English) classes, where they are drilled in English all day and where they will remain until they leam English sufficiently well to perform in the regular classroom. In addition, parents are urged to speak to their children only in English at home. Their native language, whether Spanish, Vietnamese, or Korean, is per-ceived as a handicap to their learning, and as soon as they forget it, they can get on with the real job of learning. Although incidents of racism have occurred in the George Washington Middle School, they have been taken care of quietly and privately. For example, when racial slurs have been used, students have been admonished not to say them. When fights benveen children of different ethnic groups take place, the assistant principal has insisted that race or ethnicity has nothing to do with them; "kids will be kids" is the way he describes these incidents. What exists in the George Washington Middle School is a monocultural environment with scant reference to the experiences of others from largely sub-ordinated cultural groups. Little attention is paid to student diversity, and the school curriculum is generally presented as separate from the community in which it is located. In addition, "dangerous" topics such as racism, sexism, and homophobia are seldom discussed, and reality is represented as finished and static. In summary, the George Washington School is a depressingly familiar scenario because it reflects what goes on in most schools in American society.

Poor people exist because they wasted a good, free educa-tion. The poor themselves are the problem

They bave told me that many professors never showed any interest in hearing their voices. Accepting the decentering of the West globally, embracing multiculturalism, com pels educators to focus attention on the issue of voice. Who speaks? Who listens? And why? Caring about whether all students fulfill their responsibility to con tribute to learning in the classroom is not a common approach in what Freire has called the "banking system of education" where students are regarded merely as passive consumers

This reminded us that it is difficult for individuals to shift paradigms and that there must be a setting for folks to voice fears, to talk about what they are doing, how they are doing it, and why. One of our most useful meetings was one in which we asked professors from different disciplines (including math and science) to talk informally about how their teaching had been changed by a desire to be more inclusive. Hearing individuals describe concrete strate-gies was an approach that helped dispel fears.

Emphasizing that a white male professor m an Enghsh tra. ,. ak d arttnent who teaches only work by "great white men IS m -ep . . ing a political decision, we had to work cons1stently agamst and through the overwhelming will on the part of folks to deny the politics of racism, sexism, heterosexism, and so forth that · form how and what we teach

There must be training si tes where teachers have the opportunity to express those concerns while also learning to create ways to approach the multicultural classroom and curriculum.

If the effort to respect and honor the social reality and experiences of groups in this society who are nonwhite is to be reflected in a pedagogical process, then as teachers-on all levels, from ele-mentary to university settings-we must acknowledge that our styles of teaching may need to change.