ABSTRACT

In American classrooms in the late 1990s, educators have identified a new and growing population of students. Presently, the predominate label ascribed to these students is “at-risk.” The first question we must ask ourselves as educators is, At risk of what? The most general answers seems to be failure: academic failure, social failure, economic failure, and cultural failure. And who are these students? How do we identify them? There is certainly no shortage of tests; however, the pragmatist need only look out over the classroom and detention hall to see that they are easily identifiable. They are the slack-shouldered and the rowdy, the very timid and the dangerous, the latch-keys and the left alones, the black and the white, the rich and the poor, the intelligent and the dull. They are a broad mix of individuals, but over the years, what has marked these students without exception is their finding no value in our educational system and not, by any means, being impassioned by it.