Tenth Grade American Indian/Alaska Native Students' Feelings of School Belonging, Instructional Alignment, and Math Performance

Abstract

This study compares tenth grade American Indian/Alaska Native (AI/AN) and non– AI/AN students’ sense of belonging in schools. AI/AN students are then compared with “other race” students (Black and White) regarding whether they feel they can understand a difficult math class, with math performance controlling for student sense of belonging. Data from the Education Longitudinal Study (ELS 2002–2013) are used. Our findings indicate that there was little difference between students’ belonging constructs. The variable “can understand difficult math class” was positively associated with improved math performance among AI/AN and non– AI/AN students. However, AI/AN students showed lower levels of math performance than non– AI/AN students overall. This suggests that, after accounting for the belonging constructs, other important factors influence AI/AN students’ math performance. These finding support the findings of Matthews and López (2018) that teacher expectations are a necessary but not sufficient requisite for mathematics learning. Critical awareness of cultural content integration is also necessary.