Multicultural Perspectives

ISSN: 1521-0960 (Print) 1532-7892 (Online) Journal homepage: http://www.tandfonline.com/loi/hmcp20

A Culturally Responsive Alternative to Drill and

Kill Literacy Strategies: Deep Roots, Civil Rights
Deborah S. Peterson
To cite this article: Deborah S. Peterson (2014) A Culturally Responsive Alternative to Drill and
Kill Literacy Strategies: Deep Roots, Civil Rights, Multicultural Perspectives, 16:4, 234-239, DOI:
10.1080/15210960.2014.951489
To link to this article: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/15210960.2014.951489

Published online: 17 Oct 2014.

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Date: 11 February 2016, At: 17:15

Multicultural Perspectives, 16(4), 234239

Copyright 2014 by the National Association for Multicultural Education
ISSN: 1521-0960 print / 1532-7892
DOI: 10.1080/15210960.2014.951489

A Culturally Responsive Alternative to Drill and Kill Literacy

Strategies: Deep Roots, Civil Rights
Deborah S. Peterson

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Portland State University

free and reduced-lunch program, 20% for services for
homeless youth, and most were African American,
Latino, or Asian/Pacific Islanders (Peterson & Lehnhoff,
2014). Our school, like many others, was struggling.
As the new principal, I knew I needed to provide hope
to our students and community (Duncan-Andrade, 2009)
and developed several strategies: Expanding college
credit-bearing courses, adding electives such as theatre
and music, paying tuition for courses at the local community college, engaging the broader community in academic and social services support, and increasing high
interest co-curricular activities. Many teachers provided
exceptional instruction.
A small group of English teachers was particularly
effective. One monolingual White teacher developed
caring relationships with students of all races and ethnicities who regularly visited her classroom before and after
school. She developed a strong Writers in the Schools
model where authors mentored students writing for
authentic audiences in Spanish and English. A National
Writing Project teacher who had lived in South America
chose literature reflecting student backgrounds, inspiring
them to write their personal life stories. Offering weekend writing workshops, her students went on to write
successful scholarship essays, becoming the first in their
families to attend college. Another teacher taught college-level Spanish, helping students receive full scholarships to college. I later wrote her successful nomination
for Oregon Teacher of the Year.
Despite these pockets of excellence, our data revealed
we were failing 77% of the students in the most important aspect of schooling: literacy.

This article describes two approaches to improving literacy in a high poverty, diverse urban high
school. One curriculum program, Striving Readers, included a prescribed course of study for students reading below grade level along with
schoolwide strategies. This approach did not
improve targeted students reading scores or motivation to read. The alternative approach, Deep
Roots: Civil Rights, was a culturally responsive
curriculum that had a strong impact on the identified students academic development as well as
their understanding of racism in this country. An
examination of Striving Readers and Deep
Roots: Civil Rights projects provides insight into
the impact of the curriculum on student achievement and motivation. At a time when many schools
are implementing the Common Core State Standards, this article is a reminder that a compelling,
rigorous, culturally responsive curriculum best
serves all our nations schoolchildren. Projects
such as Deep Roots: Civil Rights provide an
effective alternative or complement to prescribed
reading programs.

Introduction
This urban high school, where I was the 35th administrator in 15 years, served primarily bilingual and bicultural students living in poverty, and at the beginning of
my tenure, only two in ten students were reading at
benchmark. Motivated students were fleeing the school
for other high schools, the school was deemed a
dangerous school due to weapons violations, and seasoned administrators chose to serve elsewhere (Peterson,
2013). Among our 800 students, 75% qualified for the

Implementing a Prescribed Literacy Curriculum

Because of low literacy scores, our school was one of
four high schools in our large, urban district to receive a
substantial grant to implement a research-based literacy
program called Striving Readers (Fattis et al., 2011).
The projects goals were to increase students reading

Correspondence should be sent to Deborah S. Peterson, Graduate

School of Education, Educational Leadership and Policy (ELP), Portland State University, P.O. Box 751, Portland, OR 97207. E-mail:
dpeterso@pdx.edu

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interventions (Fattis et al., 2011). The culminating analysis indicated that low fidelity to the model, competing
initiatives, and teacher and administrator turnover
caused the failure. While Fattis et al. (2011) may be correct that these circumstances caused Striving Readers to
fail at our site, I propose another explanation.

ability and their motivation to read through a prescribed

curriculum for targeted students as well as schoolwide
interventions. One group of students reading two or
more years below grade level received directed interventions in a class meeting four times a week for 55 minutes
a session. Interventions included direct instruction,
teacher modeling, small group practice, and independent
practice on strategies such as word mapping, word identification, self-questioning, visual imagery, paraphrasing, and inference. The class used student-selected
materials identified as high interest by the researchers
and also included classroom management and community building strategies. The logic model for this intervention is supported by strong research and resulted in
reading improvement elsewhere (University of Kansas
Center for Research on Learning, n.d.).
At our site, schoolwide interventions were gradually
introduced into content courses over three years, first in
social studies and language arts, the next year in math
and science, and finally in physical education and health.
Interventions included graphic organizing strategies and
unit and course organizers, interventions also supported
by numerous researchers (Reeves, 2008).
An early analysis of the impact of the Striving Readers program indicated that the program was not implemented with fidelity and that several distractions
complicated implementation: multiple simultaneous initiatives, start-up issues, and staffing complications (Fattis et al., 2011). While the schools overall literacy data
improved the first year, evaluators indicated the prescribed curriculum had no statistical impact on student
reading gains nor on student motivation to read. Seeking
to increase fidelity to the model in the targeted intervention class, I asked a particular teacher, Mr. Brown, to
teach the Striving Readers class in the second year.
Mr. Brown had a track record of motivating students
to learn and of connecting with students of color and
those living in poverty through weaving students interests into instruction, key components of culturally
responsive teaching (CRT; Gay, 2010). His personal circumstances contributed to his ability to connect with our
youth. From a humble background, Mr. Brown was the
first college graduate in his family and was a White man
married to an African American woman. Further, Mr.
Browns training as a poet therapist caused him to
understand the importance of creating an emotionally
safe learning environment. Mr. Brown, known for keeping his word, indicated he would implement Striving
Readers with fidelity.
However, despite the best efforts of teachers like Mr.
Brown, at the conclusion of the second year, and, indeed
at the end of the five-year project, the analysis remained
the same: The Striving Readers program had had no
impact on student motivation to read and little impact on
the reading progress of students receiving targeted

CRT and Literacy

Gay (2010) exhorted educators to apply the concepts
of CRT to all aspects of our schools curriculum. Gay
reminded us that CRT is transformative and includes not
just teaching strategies, but also the selection of materials, how students work together to make meaning of the
materials, and how students present their learning. Gay
included Noddings (1992) concept of care in CRT,
expanding the concept to include affirmation of the
potential and human dignity of the students through our
curriculum, a concept also endorsed by Duncan-Andrade
(2009). Further, Gordon (2012) examined care through
the role of relationships, putting relationships at the center of reducing educational disparities. One could posit
that absent CRT and culturally responsive care, no literacy program will work.

Deep Roots
From my experiences as a student, mother, teacher,
and principal, I knew the impact of the arts on students. I
was a student who survived high school only because of
my choir classes, a mother who saw her children thrive
in middle school because of a theater program, and a former elementary principal who saw her innovative music
teacher tie weekly music lessons to each of the 20 classrooms literacy goals. I also knew the research indicating
arts education increases mathematics, reading, and
thinking skills in addition to improving social skills,
flexible thinking, and motivating students to want to
learn (National Assembly of State Arts Agencies and
Arts Education Partnership, 2002). Further, arts education improves the school environment, a key condition
of successful learning for youth of color (Gay, 2010).
Thus it was that I generated interest in a literacy program
developed by a local English teacher who used poetry
and music to which adolescents could relate in order to
teach reading and writing (Gragg, n.d.).
Knowing Mr. Brown had a strong interest in poetry
and music, we asked him to teach both the Striving
Readers and the Deep Roots classes, an elective that we
started second semester of the second year of Striving
Readers. We knew Mr. Brown would continue to display
culturally responsive care for his students by regularly
commenting on their positive attributes, attending their

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solution had to reflect the principles of CRT (Gay,

2010). Therefore, in the third year of the Striving Readers literacy interventions and the second year of Deep
Roots, the program became known as Deep Roots:
Civil Rights.

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co-curricular events, and checking in with them daily.

Our students work was published under the title The
St. Johns Poetry Sessions, Volume I. Attending the
CD Listening Class when students first heard their
poetry recorded in song, I watched their excitement and
curiosity about the volunteer bands musical choices.
The CD Publishing Party was held later that spring;
attended by teachers, family members, and friends, the
students enjoyed their newfound celebrity status as
songwriters. The Deep Roots class had created a dignityrich environment in which the social, cultural and intellectual needs of each student were met and the benefits
of integrating arts into the curriculum were seen (Gay,
2010; Nieto, 2000; Tatum, 1997).

Deep Roots: Civil Rights

Once a week for 105 minutes during an elective block
period, Deep Roots: Civil Rights students engaged in
rigorous discussions and reflections of their personal
experiences and the history of civil rights in the U.S.
using poetry, film, song, and other historical documents
(Lindsey, Roberts, & Campbelljones, 2005; Nieto, 2006;
Tatum, 1997). We strategically enrolled students in this
elective class: some read substantially below grade
level; others were exceptional readers. Several were off
track for graduation; others were on track. Some had
excellent school attendance; others attended school sporadically. This combination of students allowed each
student to have a peer mentor who was succeeding in
school. The class included seven African American, two
Latino, and two White students.

Literacy and Racial Incidents at State

Basketball Playoffs
In the spring of my third year as the campus principal,
one key incident influenced our focus on equity and
increased literacy. While it is not common for athletics
to impact literacy curricula, in our case athletics did. Our
school basketball team unexpectedly qualified for the
state playoffs for the first time in 54 years by having one
of the best winloss ratios in the state. Competing in single elimination games against the top teams, most of
which represented primarily White communities, the
games were well attended and highly publicized. During
the three final playoff games, our students were taunted
in racial incidents that became the focus of a civil rights
complaint, an Oregon Schools Activities Association
investigation (Diets, 2007), and extensive media coverage (Beaven & Schmidt, 2007; Canzano, 2007). The
official investigation declared a culture of disrespect at
the games and confirmed that a number of derogatory
racial comments were made to the Roosevelt
students. . . (Diets, 2007, p. 13).
As principal, I knew my response to the playoff incidents mattered to our students; they would discern
whether I was walking the talk. The path, however,
was not clearly marked. Despite pressure to ignore the
racial incidents, the playoff events stimulated discussions regarding the imperfect perceptions that we have
of one another based on race and class, how these perceptions impact student achievement, and the students
perspective on equity (Barton, 2007). These discussions
occurred at student leadership meetings, all-school
assemblies, conferences, community events, and among
our staff (Diets, 2007). We also facilitated student
exchanges with the playoff schools.
Student discussions confirmed we needed an ecological or context-based solution for our school, rather than
an externally imposed, prescribed course of action.
Because of our student demographics, we also knew our

Once a week for 105 minutes

during an elective block period,
Deep Roots: Civil Rights students
engaged in rigorous discussions
and reections of their personal
experiences and the history of civil
rights in the U.S. using poetry,
lm, song, and other historical
documents . . .
In addition to the characteristics of the students in
class, we kept the class size small allowing personal
relationships with Mr. Brown as well as with the three
additional educators who volunteered weekly. Two of
our four faculty members were White, one was Latina
and bilingual in Spanish and English, and one was African American. The diversity of our students and staff
allowed for intentional interactions and community
building among youth and faculty from diverse racial,
ethnic, and class backgrounds, important components of
culturally responsive schools (Banks & Banks, 2010;
Gay, 2010).
In the spring, students submitted their favorite poem
to the bands that had offered to record a song pro bono
(Peterson, Moore, & Brown, 2010).

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Six Day Field Trip of Civil Rights Sites in the South

South, the excitement was palpable. Some students, in

fear they wouldnt wake up on time, stayed up all night
rather than risk missing the plane.
Mr. Brown developed daily reflection topics to begin
and end each day: Standing on the Shoulders of Giants:
Learning from the Freedom Riders; From Tragedy to
VictorySlavery Circle and Selma; Out of a Unified
People, Heroes EmergeBirmingham; and Crossing
the Bridge to the Rest of my Life: What I Will Do to
Make my Life Count. We often had to sympathetically
pull our students away from exhibits that had piqued
their interest in order to reach destinations that included
14 historical sites such as the Civil Rights, Slavery, and
Voting Rights Interpretive Museums, the Birmingham
Civil Rights Institute, and the Civil Rights Memorial.
Students found some sites particularly disturbing and
compelling: Slavery Circle in Montgomery; the Alabama Capitol building where to this day the Confederate
flag still flies, a symbol for many of our racist history;
and the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma, Alabama,
where African American citizens were brutally attacked
in 1968 simply for marching for the right to vote.
Because our school was developing a college-going culture, we also visited three historical black colleges:
Clark-Atlanta, Spellman, and Morehousevisits that
inspired our students.
Despite very long days, students were engaged and
motivated as we conducted a nightly poetry slam and
journal reflection, often writing and sharing within the
group until well after 10 p.m. One junior student took me
aside and in a whisper asked me why he had never seen
this course content until his junior year of schooling.
Others cried as they shared their days reflections. Students asked about applying to the historical black colleges we visited. On our ten-mile march from Selma
toward Montgomery, many cars honked and gestured in
support; others yelled for us to go home. One gentleman invited students to speak on his radio program the
next morning. So Live from Selma, Roosevelt students
spoke about race, hope, their dreams, and how our
school was preparing them for their future. Student comments confirmed the research of those who believe CRT
(Gay, 2010) and hope (Duncan-Andrade, 2009; Peterson, 2013) are a key part of our work in schools.
The Deep Roots: Civil Rights project helped students
recognize and respond to the dominant cultural norms
that make even routine acts such as riding the bus to
school or shopping for groceries, let alone thriving in
school, a challenge. Each of us fell silent, shed a tear, or
became angry at some point in the trip as the enormity of
the educational and economic disparities in our country,
our community, and our school became clearer, and we
realized their personal impact. Our journal writing,
poetry, and evening circles gave us an outlet for our
emotions and affirmation of our experience.

Then it came time to finalize our six day field trip to

the heart of the Civil Rights Movement: Atlanta, Selma,
Montgomery, and Birmingham. We strategically chose
the travel dates to minimize time away from school and
symbolically state our belief in racial reconciliation by
choosing the anniversary of the successful Voting Rights
Act, rather than the anniversary of Bloody Sunday,
aiming to set the tone for our work with students.
Students were expected to fundraise for the field trip,
selling holiday wreaths, flowers, and cards. Due to our
demographics, our fundraising had to include members
outside our community. One unsolicited donation
arrived after a donor called and pledged $5,000 in recognition of the leadership it took to address equity
issues. Our most popular fundraiser allowed students,
teachers, and community members to write their wishes
for creating a better future on a purchased form. In
return for a donation of any size, we placed these
wishes at diverse places of historical significance for
the civil rights movement. Students loved reading the
words of hope that were written. I dream of a world
where our differences are respected instead of tolerated, wrote one donor. Another wrote, Rosa Parks
sat, so Martin Luther King, Jr. could walk. King walked
so Barack Obama could run. Obama ran so our children
could fly. We later placed our donors wishes at various sites such as Slavery Circle, Dr. Kings birthplace,
and atop a Montgomery statue that we believed inappropriately honored the Ku Klux Klan. We also
received donations collected at a district administration
meeting when a courageous principal commandeered
the microphone and urged administrators to do something concrete for equity by donating just a few dollars
each, enough to provide a scholarship for one student to
attend the field trip. So while raising money, we were
also building community with our families, colleagues,
and friends back home who couldnt travel with us but
believed in our journey.
On a weekly basis, the Deep Roots: Civil Rights
teachers and I quietly noticed our students doing something right, and we converted donations into scholarships for the trip. Students made progress toward their
fundraising goal but, most importantly, felt cared for and
that others believed in them.
As we approached the date of our field trip, all students met the academic, attendance, and behavioral
requirements. One student had not fundraised and had no
personal funds for the trip; however, believing it important that all Deep Roots: Civil Rights students attend the
field trip, we pre-paid her expenses and asked her to
work for the school when she returned until the funds
were repaid, which she readily did. Meeting at the airport in the early hours of the morning of our flight to the

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district leaders proposed focusing solely on using the

prescribed curriculum.
What Mr. Brown, the faculty, and I learned from the
Deep Roots: Civil Rights curriculum and our transformative field trip was that students with the greatest educational disparities, like students in every classroom
around our country, deserve an innovative, relevant, culturally responsive curriculum taught by the most creative teachers who also provide care for the youth. Each
student in the Deep Roots: Civil Rights class reported
transformation and engagement in the class as well as
other school activities; all went on to finish high school
and enroll in post-secondary studies. We know our curriculum was culturally responsive, rigorous, and compelling. The curriculum elevated the students status as
leaders through their field trip and subsequent speaking
events.

This project provided further evidence that the

schools low literacy rates should not be blamed on our
students. Our schools had failed to provide a relevant,
culturally responsive literacy curriculum in a manner
responsive to students learning styles.
As principal, I didnt need additional evidence such
as state reading scores to understand the success of the
Deep Roots: Civil Rights. I experienced first-hand the
focused learning during the field trip, the deep reflection
and curiosity, the hopeful glances at one another when
sharing their dreams, and students eyes rapidly scanning each museum exhibit. I saw the students mesmerized amazement when they heard the bands first
performance of their poetry. These moments affirmed
my belief that we had tailored our instruction to meet our
specific youths needs.
At numerous school and community events, student
comments provided additional evidence of the projects
success. One student whispered, We were the lucky
ones. The chosen ones (personal communication, May
10, 2009). While only 11 students attended the field trip,
one student said, My eyes are wide open and We
should put the whole school in the Deep Roots: Civil
Rights class and take them each on the field trip. A
local superintendent later asked me how we could adjust
the field trip to build on local sites related to the Civil
Rights movement so that more students could experience
the transformation we did. Community feedback elevated students sense of pride.
As the principal of the school, I also experienced
what Gay (2010) would characterize as culturally
responsive care, with two particular moments illustrating its importance. On the first night of the field
trip, I was one of three White people at a popular
Atlanta roller skating rink in an African American
community. I couldnt roller skate, falling every ten
feet. Yet instead of laughing at their principal, studentsand dozens of observers on the sideline
cheered me on. I felt physically and emotionally vulnerable yet strongly supported. Another moment happened near the 10-mile mark of our voting rights
march when an African American student with
incredible resilience and a smile that could light up
the darkest moment slowed down from her place at
the head of our line and linked her arm through that
of mine, a White, middle-aged, middle-class woman
who could not keep up. This student strode arm-inarm with me, confidently and with purpose across the
10-mile finish line, almost as if our lives depended on
crossing that line together. Perhaps they do.
For those who only believe that quantitative data
prove a strategys success, the grades, attendance, and
disciplinary records of the Deep Roots students also
improved. Students unanimously and vigorously advocated for the continuation of Deep Roots even as some

I am convinced that culturally

responsive care made the
difference in their experience as
students, as well as my experience
as their principal, and my
colleagues experience as teachers.
We each believed in our students
and one anothers potential as
learners and human beings.
I am convinced that culturally responsive care made
the difference in their experience as students, as well as
my experience as their principal, and my colleagues
experience as teachers. We each believed in our
students and one anothers potential as learners and
human beings. Perhaps our most important goal in
schools should be ensuring each student has culturally
responsive teachers and a principal who believe in their
dreams, their potential, and their future. Our schools
must embrace each student as a precious human being
with unlimited potential.
Many may wonder where to start with CRT. Our
Deep Roots: Civil Rights group was comprised of only
11 students and five adults and yet, as one student said,
we changed the school. Another student said that if our
school (with our demographics) could take this field trip,
any school could. This project brought the local and
larger community together to provide hope to our
students.
Perhaps all each school needs is one small group
of students and a few adults to change the concept of

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238

what our schools could provide for our youth. Perhaps when we put CRT, care, and hope at the center
of our work, we will see the end of educational disparities in our schools (Duncan-Andrade, 2009; Gay,
2010; Gordon, 2012; Peterson, 2013). When we asked
students at the end of the year to share the one word
that described this classs experiences in Deep Roots: Civil
Rights, students used these words: relevant, unforgettable,
memorable, equitable, honorable, inspirational, lifechanging, incredible, intense, amazing, motivating.

Diets, M. (2007). Report to the OSAA regarding conduct during the

2007 5A boys high school basketball playoffs. Retrieved from
http://www.osaa.org/broadcastemail/5ABasketballInvestigation
Report.pdf
Duncan-Andrade, J. M. R. (2009). Note to educators: Hope required
when growing roses in concrete. Harvard Educational Review, 79
(2), 181194.
Fattis, B., Beam, M., Maxim, L., Gandhi, E. V., Hahn, K., & Hale, R.
(2011). Portland public schools: Year 5 evaluation report. US
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programs/strivingreaders/performance.html
Gay, G. (2010). Culturally responsive teaching: Theory, research, and
practice. New York, NY: Teachers College Press.
Gordon, S. (2012). Beyond convention, beyond critique: Toward a
third way of preparing educational leaders to promote equity and
social justice (parts 1 and 2). Retrieved from http://cnx.org/
content/m43701/1.6/
Gragg, C. (n.d.) The deep roots music project. Retrieved from http://
www.deeproots.com/training_institute.htm
Kansas University Center for Research on Learning. (n.d.). Adolescent
literacy. Retrieved from http://www.kucrl.org/research/topic/
category/adolescent-literacy
Lindsey, R., Roberts, L., & Campbelljones, F. (2005). The culturally
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Noddings, N. (1992). The challenge to care in schools. New York, NY:
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Conclusion
The program that began as Deep Roots has now continued into its fifth year and under new school leadership
is currently called Freedom Riders. A tour of historical
black colleges is now a separate project.
Those supporting the Common Core State Standards
are right: Educational leaders must focus on a consistent
curriculum with common understandings of what quality
literacy instruction involves. Despite its strong research
base and careful development, Striving Readers failed to
motivate students and did not impact our students reading ability. Years later, I doubt any Striving Readers students will say that Striving Readers made a difference in
their lives.
However, culturally responsive care and CRT did
make a difference in our students lives. In their absence,
new education initiatives will also likely fail. In their
presence, all of our children will thrive, not just in
school, but also in life.

References
Banks, J. A., & Banks, C. A. M. (Eds.). (2010). Multicultural education: Issues and perspectives (7th ed.). Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley
& Sons, Inc.
Barton, R. (2007). Bridging barriers. Northwest Education Magazine,
13(1), 1221.
Beaven, S., & Schmidt, B. (2007, March 14). Alleged racist behavior investigated. The Oregonian. Retrieved from http://blog.
oregonlive.com/oregonianpreps/2007/03/by_stephen_beaven_
and_brad.html
Canzano, J. (2007, March 15). Roosevelt exposes deeper issue. The
Oregonian, pp. D1, D3. Retrieved from http://blog.oregonlive.
com/johncanzano/2007/03/roosevelt_exposes_deeper_issue.html

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