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Teaching for Multicultural Literacy, Global Citizenship, and Social Justice Dr. James A. Banks Professor & Director Center for Multicultural Education Washington State University In addition to teaching basic skills, a school needs to educate students for cultural and global citizenship and for social justice…(to provide) an education that teaches students to know, to care, and to act.

Dr. Banks started by saying that the narrow focus on basic skills and academic achievement through testing emphasized by the No Child Left Behind Act is leading to education that fails to prepare students to be citizens of a democratic republic. Students also need to develop skills in interacting with people from other racial, ethnic, religious, and cultural groups, and to develop commitment to democratic values, such as justice and equality, so that they can be reflective, moral, and active citizens. The schools need to address these issues. We need teach students to know, care, and act. In order to do that, we ourselves need to know, care, and act.

Dr. Banks put his discussion in the framework that the world’s greatest problems result not from people not being able to read and write but from people of different cultures, races, religions, and nations being unable to get along and work together to solve the world’s problems. Especially as the racial, ethnic, linguistic, cultural, and religious texture of the U.S. and the world become more complex, we need educational leaders who can raise the level of human conduct and aspirations of both the leaders and the led and have a transformative effect on both.

In relation to working with students, Dr. Banks stated that students need to not just learn knowledge but also how to challenge assumptions and reconstruct knowledge. They need to gain the ability to create, evaluate, and use knowledge thoughtfully and to bring in different voices and perspectives. As educators we need to think about whose history we are telling. Is it just the history of the people in power, or is it more inclusive?

Dr. Banks also discussed the importance of developing education programs that balance unity and diversity and that educate students not just to function in the United States but also to cross national borders, i.e., educate for multicultural citizenship. Nations need to help students develop cultural and global identification as well as national identification. To assist students in developing global identification we need to help them respect their culture and also develop an identity that cross-cuts specific group membership. We must teach them to see the other as ourselves.

During his presentation Dr. Banks suggested a number of materials that participants could read to gain more information on what he was discussing.

BIOGRAPHY

James A. Banks is Russell F. Stark University Professor and Director of the Center for Multicultural Education at the University of Washington, Seattle. He has published many articles and books in multicultural education and in social studies education. He is a past president of the American Educational Research Association (AERA) and the National Council for the Social Studies (NCSS). His books include Teaching Strategies for Ethnic Studies, Educating Citizens in a Multicultural Society, the Handbook of Research on Multicultural Education, and Diversity and Citizenship Education: Global Perspectives. Professor Banks holds honorary Doctorates of Humane Letters from the Bank Street College of Education, the University of Alaska-Fairbanks, the University of Wisconsin-Parkside, and DePaul University in Chicago. He is a member of the Board on Children, Youth, and Families of the National Research Council and the Institute of Medicine of the National Academy of Sciences. He is also a member of the National Academy of Education.