Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI), Multicultural Applications
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Magnet schools are a type of public school that offer students a curriculum that is centered on a specific theme. Examples of curricular themes may be: environmental studies, technology, performing arts, or international studies, to name a few. The curricular themes are often reflective of a local community’s needs and wants. The themes are designed to attract particular students whose interests and/or aptitude match the theme of the school. By offering such a choice, it is thought that improved achievement will result, because of improved satisfaction and a school more suited to one’s individual needs and interests. Magnet schools are funded publicly both from federal and local sources. The history of magnet schools can be traced back to the federal government’s order to desegregate public schools after the Brown v. Board of Education decision. Magnet schools are one form of school choice (with vouchers and charter schools). The concept of school choice was first brought to the forefront not by educators, but by economists who thought that education should be considered part of the free marketplace where learners and families as consumers would be able to choose a school most suited to their child. In addition, it was thought that choice would help to equalize opportunities for impoverished families by giving them a choice beyond their neighborhood schools. The forerunners of today’s magnet schools were called ‘‘alternative schools,’’ which opened during the late 1960s and early 1970s. The first alternative school opened in Tacoma, Washington, in 1968. This school was an elementary school called the McCarver School. It aimed to reduce racial isolation by offering choice to parents beyond their segregated neighborhoods. In 1969, the nation’s second magnet school opened in Boston called the William Monroe Trotter School. This school’s theme was a showcase for new teaching methods and hoped to attract White children to a predominantly Black school. In 1970, the city of Minneapolis, Minnesota, initiated an alternative school program in its southeast section that consisted of four elementary schools and one high school with different organizational designs. All were considered successful because teachers and students wanted to be there by reason of their own choice. Then, in 1971, the
term ‘‘magnet’’ began to catch on, with an alternative school in Houston, Texas, called the Performing and Visual Arts School. School officials there had referred to it as acting like a ‘‘magnet in attracting students,’’ and hence the term was born. Before the early 1970s, the federal courts had routinely ordered school systems to desegregate themselves (after Brown v. Board of Education) through busing. However, busing became a major controversy, resulting in much opposition. It was within this climate that magnet schools began to be viewed as a solution for desegregation. The city of Detroit, Michigan, pioneered this solution on a large scale by voluntarily desegregating its schools through the use of magnet schools instead of busing a
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