According to Rondila and Spickard (2007), discrimination can be defined as; beliefs, attitude, institutional arrangement, as well as, acts that tend to denigrate individuals or groups due to their phenotypic characteristics or their ethnic group. Gregory (2011) also argues that discrimination simply mean favouring certain groups of people because of certain qualities in them over other people. In this paper, we analyse discrimination in the institutions of learning laying emphasis on discrimination
Considering discrimination factor is fundamental when it comes to making choices about education and classroom. Tobler (2005) notes that the discrimination of an individual poses a great threat to an individual in the classroom to the point that he or she may fail to cooperate with others and hence generally fail. Several disadvantages of discriminating a person in a school setting have been discussed in brief herein.
In keeping with Gregory (2001), the potential effects of discrimination are different for different people. Notably, the effects can be physical, emotional or a combination of both. Gregory (2001) argues that pupils with disabilities may be denied the chance to corroborate activities by other pupils. The main reason is that others think that disability prevents them from engaging in various activities. Resultantly, it makes the discriminated pupil feel very different from others.
Rondilla and Spickard (2007) indicate that the discrimination results in a low self-esteem. Rondilla and Spickard (2007) argue that a child's success academically is determined by following what the teachers teach and the pupils' self-esteem. Correspondingly, pupils with a low self-esteem always see him or herself as being incapable of doing whatever others are doing. According to Rondilla and Spickard (2007), when an individual develops such a feeling, it becomes difficult to reach their academic goals. As such discrimination stands out as an important element that ought to be looked at when dealing with education and classrooms.
In a classroom setup, a student may develop a very low self-esteem depending on how the fellow students and the lecturer interact with him or her (Tobler, 2005). Notably, when each and every time the lecturer keeps looking down upon a student, then the performance of such a student is vastly affected. Fellow students might also intimidate a colleague thus making the person have a low self-esteem.
Another important reason that makes discrimination a critical factor to address in the institution of learning is because it makes a person feel withdrawn from the society (Tobler, 2005). Everybody feels nice when they are considered part and parcel of each and every activity that goes on around them. Gregory (2001) indicates that when certain groups of people are now being considered very special and important as compared to the rest, then those who are not being considered special starts to feel they are not members of that group any longer. In a classroom setup, it becomes an imperative factor. Students cannot learn well in an environment where they feel they are not wanted. Arguably, for learning to be successful, the participants must fully accept the conditions around them and be ready to identify fully with the place. When a particular individual in the group now feel as if they are not members of the entirety, then they fail to produce the required results.
Another important aspect looked at when talking about discrimination is that discrimination has long term effects like there is limited access to services (Gregory, 2001). When a tutor decides to discriminate a particular group of individuals based on certain characteristics then it means that those people will not be having access to some of the most important factors within the classroom. A professor, for instance, may decide to favour a particular group of individuals might at times give privilege to a certain group over others on class resources access. In the case where different students are treated differently due to certain aspects learning becomes distorted and concentration is diverted to the discriminators' behaviour. The overall results of the class might be very low depending on how the tutor handled that particular group. Reasonably, denying certain groups of people based on some aspects makes learning a very difficult process. For example, if a student is denied access to some facilities like the library simply because they do not meet certain criteria might not perform as expected.
According to Gregory (2001), discriminating others lead to difficulty in communication. A classroom without proper channels of communication is compared to listening to a favourite channel in a noisy environment. The success in class heavily depends on how well the information received responded to. Discriminating others leads to lack of proper communication that in return affects the performance of a student adversely.
Gregory (2001) notes that the discrimination results from diverse backgrounds where some students are assumed to have social privileges over their fellow scholars. In many schools, poor students get assigned middle-class teachers and in such a class, cluelessness becomes rampant. Other factors that leads to discrimination are age, race, as well as, class performances. In a classroom setting, it becomes very hard to achieve the main goal when discrimination is brought involved. Arguably, proper measures must be considered to curb the discrimination.
References
Gregory, R. F. (2001). Age discrimination in the American workplace old at a young age. New Brunswick, N.J.: Rutgers University Press.
Rondilla, J. L., & Spickard, P. R. (2007). Is lighter better? skin-tone discrimination among Asian Americans. Lanham: Rowman& Littlefield Publishers.
Tobler, C. (2005). Indirect discrimination: a case study into the development of the legal concept of indirect discrimination under EC law. Antwerpen: Intersentia.
