An Exploration of the Impacts of a Community-Based Tutoring and Mentoring Program

This article reports on a qualitative case study of Ready, Set, Learn (RSL), a community-based tutoring and mentoring program. It examines stakeholders' perceptions of the program's impact on Portuguese-Canadian students. RSL aims to mitigate educational challenges faced by Portuguese-Canadians, as they relate to high rates of high school non-completion and corresponding low levels of post-secondary enrolment. Previous studies conducted into the Portuguese-Canadian population have focused specifically on problems of educational disadvantage and have not explored programs or practices adopted by the community to address these issues. This study contributes to research on education-focused community-based organizations, such as RSL, which have been shown to support atrisk immigrant youth through the provision of supports and services that enable improved educational outcomes. The findings of this study show that RSL provided its students with cultural capital to construct high academic and vocational aspirations, and to cope with discouraging experiences they had in schools. An Exploration of the Impacts of a Community-Based Tutoring and Mentoring Program Canada has consistently asserted that it is a country that provides opportunities for increased social mobility. Social mobility is largely said to be directly related to the extent and degree of educational achievement. Although education is guaranteed to all ethno-cultural groups living in Canada, certain groups, such as Portuguese-Canadians, have not had similar opportunities for increased social mobility given the disadvantages they have experienced with the education system (Ornstein, 2006). Previous studies on this minority group have shown how these disadvantages can stem from negative schooling experiences and can manifest in high non-completion rates, low rates of enrolment in post-secondary institutions, and social reproduction (Fonseca, 2010; Noivo, 1997; Nunes, 1999, 2003; Santos, 2006). Specifically, in his analysis of the 2001 census, Ornstein (2006) found that among Portuguese-Canadians aged 25 to 34, 33% had not completed high school and 22.5% were not in school full-time (p. 37). PortugueseCanadians appeared to have one of the lowest proportions of university graduates, at only 11.6% of the population (p. 37). In contrast, the average level of high school and university level completion among all ethno-cultural groups in Toronto was 82% and 31.5%, respectively (Ornstein, 2006, p. 37). These findings were echoed by the Every Secondary Student Survey, an initiative conducted by the Toronto District School Board (Project Diploma, 2006). This report highlighted a disproportionately low number of PortugueseCanadian students placed in advanced study and enrichment programs, and subsequently, a low number of students aspiring to professional careers. Overall, only 57% of the Portuguese-Canadian students polled planned to pursue post-secondary education (Project Diploma, 2006). Since many Portuguese-Canadian youth are not completing formal schooling, and are therefore limiting their marketable skills, many within the Portuguese-Canadian community are ill-equipped to participate fully in the advanced Canadian economy (Nunes, 1999). Given these challenges, the Portuguese-Canadian community of Toronto took concrete steps to attempt to address educational disadvantages experienced by their members, and to positively affect the low levels of high-school completion and low levels of post-secondary enrolment (Project Diploma, 2006). Through the creation of Ready, Set, Learn (RSL), a non-profit tutoring and mentoring program, members of the community sought to empower students and parents. By participating in the RSL program, these families became connected with mentors who provided them with information critical to their navigation of the school system and to advocate for their educational rights. Canadian Journal for New Scholars in Education/ Volume 5, Issue 2 Revue canadienne des jeunes chercheures et chercheurs en éducation Summer, 2014 60 This paper reports on the outcomes of a case study that analyzed the effects of the RSL program and its impacts from the perceptions of the stakeholders directly involved in its operation (Kwiczala, 2012). The effects and impacts of the experiences of the stakeholders who took part in RSL will be discussed. These experiences will then be compared and contrasted with their experiences in the school system. This will show that RSL has affected the stakeholders' experiences in school and acted as a positive intervention. While much of the research on PortugueseCanadians has focused on the various manifestations of the educational disadvantages they experience, this study takes a more positive approach in its examination of the work by members of this community to combat these issues. It therefore showcases the potential of community-based education to positively affect the educational achievement of minority groups (Villiani & Atkins, 2000). In the following sections, the literature review, theoretical framework, methodology, and findings of the study are outlined. The implications of the findings of the study will also be considered. This study demonstrates that the RSL program is a community-based effort that positively affects the landscape of Portuguese-Canadian educational achievement. Theoretical Framework Many newcomers to Canada strive to become economically successful and to have equitable access to all aspects of social and political life (Fernandez-Kelly & Portes, 2008; Nunes, 1999). Despite their attempts at social engagement and participation, Portuguese-Canadians have faced disadvantages in Canadian society, primarily through encounters with the education system (Nunes, 1999). Literature on cultural models, the effects of a lack of cultural capital, and experiences with persistent negative social reproduction, will be reviewed as a means of explicating and interpreting the plausible causes of the educational disadvantages experienced by Portuguese-Canadians. The focus will then shift to specific experiences with educational disadvantages and how these have manifested in the Portuguese-Canadian community. Finally, this article will consider the theories of community-based education and its potential in combating educational disadvantages. These sections constitute the basis of the literature review and underscore the importance of examining the Portuguese-Canadian community's attempts to address the educational disadvantages faced by its students, in the specific form of a tutoring and mentoring program. Overview of Cultural Models, Cultural Capital, and Social Reproduction Each cultural group in Canada has a unique model that provides its members with a framework for interpreting, among other things, educational experiences (Ogbu, 1991). These cultural models subsequently guide behaviour in the schooling context. The cultural model of a particular group is therefore connected to the degree of relative academic success or failure among its members. More academically successful groups, for instance, tend to have an understanding of the workings of the larger society, its institutions, and of their place within that working order (Ogbu, 1991). Bourdieu and Passerson (1977) refer to this as cultural capital and argue that groups who possess greater degrees of cultural capital have a greater likelihood of succeeding within educational and other realms of society. Cultural capital is largely transmitted from parents to their children through varying child-rearing activities and is highly dependent on socio-economic status (Lareau, 2003). The transmission of cultural capital in this way might result in social reproduction of inequality: the process by which each generation fulfills their inherited social, educational, and economic practices, leaving the group essentially unchanged (Bourdieu & Passerson, 1977). The Educational Disadvantages of Portuguese-Canadians While Portuguese-Canadians have high educational and economic aspirations, Coelho (1977) argued that their cultural model conflicted in relation to the adjustment and relative success of their descendants within Canadian schools. Coelho (1977) discussed a lack of fluency in English among Portuguese-Canadians and a limited number of Portuguese-Canadians who speak English as a first language. She argued that these language difficulties, together with challenges in adjusting to the local social and cultural contexts impeded the integration of early PortugueseCanadian immigrants into Canadian society (Coelho, 1977). This, in turn, placed increasing disadvantage onto the Canadian-born second generation as they lacked the social and cultural capital necessary to navigate educational institutions (Coelho, 1977). As a result, second-generation Portuguese-Canadians had increasingly negative schooling experiences lending to high rates of high-school non-completion and low enrolment in post-secondary Canadian Journal for New Scholars in Education/ Volume 5, Issue 2 Revue canadienne des jeunes chercheures et chercheurs en éducation Summer, 2014 61 institutions (Coelho, 1977). Noivo (1997) has argued that this trend has continued with the third generation of Portuguese-Canadians and further contended that members of this generation are not acquiring higher education or marketable skills. As a result, she predicted a significant decline in their socio-economic standing (Noivo, 1997). Portuguese-Canadians have been shown to have substantially lower education and average income levels compared to other immigrant groups (Ornstein, 2006). This has resulted in a social reproduction within the PortugueseCanadian community.Nunes (2003) describes this as a disproportionate number of youth entering into the same marginalized socio-economic roles as their parents. It has also resulted in ongoing marginalization of PortugueseCanadians and the exclusion from varying social, politic