Tackling the Pobrecito Mindset: Latinx Community Cultural Wealth and Academic Achievement

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Date

2020-09-24

Authors

Nevarez, Nuvia

Journal Title

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Volume Title

Publisher

University of Oregon

Abstract

Researchers and practitioners have searched for methods to increase the academic achievement of Latinx students. Unfortunately, many of these efforts have been based on a pobrecito mindset or deficit ideology that ignores the strengths of Latinx students and shifts the focus away from eliminating systemic inequities. Instead of remediating deficits, researchers and practitioners should consider a strength-based approach. Yosso’s (2005) Community Cultural Wealth Model identifies six community cultural capitals (CCCs) or strengths of Latinx students: aspirational, familial, linguistic, navigational, resistant, and social. The majority of studies on Latinx community cultural wealth have been qualitative, located in the Southwest, and focused on Latinx graduates who attributed much of their academic success in obtaining a high school diploma or college degree to their CCCs. Thus, this study seeks to fill gaps in research by focusing on the Northwest region of the United States, using middle school Latinx students as the unit of analysis, and running correlations to quantitatively examine the relationships among their CCCs and academic achievement. This study also uses a hierarchical multiple regression to assess the effects of two moderator variables: teacher-student relationships and school climate.

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Keywords

Community Cultural Wealth, Latinx Students, Middle School, Strength-Based

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