Chapter 15: Multicultural Education

Multicultural education is a vibrant field in education that developed out of the U.S. national values of equality and democracy. Two major goals of the field are to provide all students with equal educational opportunities and to eliminate the achievement gap between majority students and youth from underrepresented communities. Through great effort of many educators, the field has identified goals, values, policies, a knowledge base, and a research base (Ball & Tyson, forthcoming; Banks, 1970, 1984, 2005, 2009, forthcoming; Banks & Banks, 1995; Bennett, 2001, 2003; Gay, 1994, 2000; Grant, 1988; Grant & Gillette, 2006; Irvine, 1997; Nieto, 1996; Pang, 2005; Sleeter & Grant, 1987; Suzuki, 1979).