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This review has been accessed times since June 19, 2009
Reviewed by Christopher Emmerson-Pace
Marshall, Jeff C. (2008). Overcoming Student Apathy: Motivating Students for Academic Success. Lanham, Maryland: Rowman & Littlefield Education Pp. v + 135 ISBN 1-57886-853-X
Southern Connecticut State UniversityJune 19, 2009
Teachers across the nation struggle with incredible challenges that students bring into classrooms. One of the most disarming dispositions a teacher can encounter is the apathetic student—the child who does not engage in the educational process because of a seemingly careless attitude about learning and achievement. This attitude is difficult for teachers to encounter. The underlying causes of apathy in students are varied, complex and interrelated, particularly for students who are struggling with an array of socio-emotional and interpersonal conflicts as they navigate a difficult period of adolescence. Some of the root causes of apathy are intrinsic to students when they enter school, coming from past negative experiences with education, feelings of self-efficacy that have been ingrained in their psyches, psychological maturity, and their ability to form peer relationships. These factors are not typically addressed through curriculum and instruction.
However, some of the causes of apathy are extrinsic to students, grounded in the unique culture and climate of the middle school in which they learn and the teacher behaviors within than environment. For example, teacher incompetence, classroom environment, curriculum and teaching methods, teacher/student relationships and school climate all affect student interest in academic achievement. Research shows that student apathy often results from a combination of these intrinsic and extrinsic factors (Walsh, 2006). Therefore, there is no one solution to overcoming apathy in the classroom because each child is unique and responds to the educational environment uniquely. Despite this challenge, schools have a responsibility to accept the apathetic students and respond to their unique needs. Teachers who are ineffective in educating the apathetic student must find strategies and develop behaviors that will enable them to be effective educators of every child. As Elmore (2004) reminds us, the responsibility of a school is to consistently acquire new knowledge about instruction in order to continuously learn to do better by students. It is unacceptable to blame students for not learning because they do not care about achievement.
Jeff C. Marshall, in his book Overcoming Student Apathy, takes the position that it is time to stop making excuses for why some students are not achieving in schools because in doing so we avoid getting to viable solutions that can help the seemingly unmotivated students. Marshall’s book is not an indictment of all the things that teachers do wrong in addressing the apathetic students but rather an inspiration to those teachers who struggle with the very real challenges of the modern classroom in which every student is unique and has unique learning needs. Marshall normalizes the experience of confronting the apathetic student by immersing the reader in a series of situational case studies that are familiar to every teacher, novice and seasoned alike. While Marshall does not state his methodology anywhere in the book, it is assumed that the school he presents, Roosevelt High, is a composite school. The teachers and students are characters compiled from various real students.
Marshall fits these compiled characters into eight archetypes that he states represent the different forms of apathy: the Rebel, the Socialite, the Misfit, the Overachiever, the Player, the Overwhelmed, the Downtrodden, and the Invisible. The archetypes are presented in real-world scenarios in which the teachers and students interact in a common situation that any teacher would encounter in a school, and all voices are given equal importance in order to show the complexity of social contexts. For example, in highlighting the Socialite, Marshall presents this archetype in the context of a student-teacher interaction regarding an assignment due after a weekend on which an important school dance will occur. The Socialite is so consumed with the social event that she cannot concentrate on the project and prioritizes the dance rather than the assignment that is due on Monday. In this example, and each archetype scenario, the students’ and teachers’ voices are heard. In another example, that of the Downtrodden, Marshall illustrates how teachers and families often clash over common goals but misunderstand each other’s motivations and personal histories.
Marshall’s voice throughout the book is refreshing because he does not focus on standards and achievement accountability, which dominates too much of the conversation in education circles today. Nichols and Berliner (2008) have suggested that schools that focus so much on high-stakes testing to the point where it becomes part of the culture are responsible for creating reluctant learners. Instead, Marshall begins with simple questions that probe for deep answers—questions such as “Do teachers expect failure from students?” and “How do you effectively engage those who are different than you?” and “How do you teach angry students?” (pp. 6-7). Marshall recognizes that education is a pattern of social interactions that has a relationship with other social systems and other social aspects of society. Schools are complex social systems that affect and are affected by all of the individuals within the system (Brookover, 1949). Marshall’s implicit message is that teachers and administrators sometimes forget this and apathy, therefore, “is generally situational—not a chronic condition of one’s life” (p. 5).
Interspersed throughout each archetype’s story are reflective questions for the teacher. The placement of the questions disrupts the flow of the narrative a bit and has the same effect of a teacher stopping a video to ask pointed questions. However, the questions get to the complexity of situations in schools and drive home the point that teachers often make decisions instantaneously and that those decisions will determine the future behavior of the students. The questions ask the teacher to reflect on the adult behavior that affects the social situation occurring. It may not be overtly apparent how each question relates specifically to the apathy archetype being explored, but deeper reflection on the question reveals the complexity of the social dynamics that often go unaddressed by teachers.
For example, in exploring the Overachiever, Marshall presents a student who is completely focused on grades and completing every assignment and becomes emotionally despondent over grades less than As. Marshall poses the question, “How can teachers help students become more self-reflective about their school work?” (p. 61). While initially the reader will wonder why this question wouldn’t be applied to all students, deeper reflection reveals that this question is especially important for the teacher of the Overachiever. Marshall states that the Overachiever is unique from the other archetypes because it is not about academic performance. The Overachiever can clearly perform, but the desire to learn is missing and the “brain remains largely disengaged” (p. 64). According to Marshall, teachers may tend to misunderstand this type of student because the Overachiever will divert attention to grades and away from learning.
Marshall’s book is a valuable resource for teachers because he identifies the characteristics and behaviors of the apathy archetypes, offers suggestions of practice that teachers can use, describes the philosophy behind the suggestions, and finally relates the expected outcomes of the implementation of the strategies so that teachers can quickly gauge if the methods are successful in addressing the different types of apathy. Marshall also presents frequent analogies to business and industry to remind teachers that the skills taught in schools are the skills that will be expected of them in the work world after school– skills such as collaboration, innovation, and communication.
Overcoming Student Apathy is primarily anecdotal and based in solid education theory. If Marshall conducted a formal research study for this book, he does not reveal his methods. Rather, it is a compilation of his years of experience in working with students and teachers. Marshall cites some of big names in education writing, which schooled teachers will be familiar with, so the book is user-friendly and easily accessible. However, there is an abundance of research in each of the different learning challenges that Marshall describes, and the book would have benefited from a look at some of this research. For example, particularly for his archetype of the Downtrodden, there is an abundance of research on structural violence and critical pedagogy that does not inform Marshall’s own research. Even though Marshall asserts that he uses archetypes to illustrate teacher and student behaviors, and that no one student will completely fit the archetype, readers may be tempted to see students through these limiting lenses. Teachers should beware of reducing children to overly simplified archetypes when the sources of their apathy are various and shifting.
Schools that focus on a standards-driven curriculum and the results of high-stakes testing may need to address critical components of student achievement: the student’s belief that an education is intrinsically rewarding and meaningful to life outside of the classroom, and the student’s feelings of self-efficacy. Children who do not see personal meaning in the classroom and/or believe that they are not capable of classroom performance tend to become apathetic towards school (Schweinle, Meyer & Turner, 2006). Student apathy toward education is endemic among students who live in poverty, lack family structures that value education and likely have had disagreeable experiences with education by the time they reach middle school (Freire, 1992; Darling-Hammond, 2004; hooks, 1994; Matute-Bianchi, 1986; Rothstein, 2004). As Marshall shows us, apathy is a learned response to education, and schools and teachers that ignore individual student needs may actually be reinforcing student apathy as they believe they are educating children.
References
Brookover, W. B. (1949). Sociology of education: A definition. American Sociological Review, 14(3), 407-415.
Darling-Hammond, L. (2004). Inequality and the right to learn: Access to qualified teachers in California’s public schools. Teachers College Record, 106(10), 1936-1966.
Elmore, R. (2004). School reform from the inside out: Policy, practice, and performance. Cambridge, MA: Harvard Education Press.
Freire, P. (1992). The pedagogy of hope. New York: Continuum Publishing Company.
hooks, b. (1994). Teaching to transgress. Education as the practice of freedom. New York: Routledge.
Matute-Bianchi, M. (1986). Ethnic identities and patterns of school success and failure among Mexican-descent and Japanese-American students in a California high school: An ethnographic analysis. American Journal of Education, 95(1), 233-255.
Nichols, S. L. & Berliner, D. (2008). Testing the joy out of learning. Educational Leadership, 65(6), 14-18.
Rothstein, R (2004). Wising up on the black-white achievement gap. Education Digest, 70(4), 27-37.
Schweinle, A., Meyer, D., & Turner, J. (2006). Striking the right balance: Students’ motivation and affect in elementary mathematics. Journal of Educational Research, 99(5), 271-293.
Walsh, F. (2006). A middle school dilemma: Dealing with ‘I don’t care.’ American Secondary Education, 35(1), 5-15.
About the Reviewer
Christopher Emmerson-Pace is a doctoral student in Educational Leadership at Southern Connecticut State University. His research interests include social inequities in education, technology in teaching and learning, and the role of authentic voice in addressing student apathy.
Copyright is retained by the first or sole author, who grants right of first publication to the Education Review.
Editors: Gene V Glass, Gustavo Fischman, Melissa Cast-Brede
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