Final draft

Since the civil rights movements in the 1960s, the multiracial population, in the US, has risen by 500% (Currently there are 6.1 million mixed race people in the US). The election of our first visibly multiracial president makes this gap in knowledge about a newly acknowledged portion of society, a field, which needs to be explored. More and more social figures espouse mixed race identity. Tiger Woods is usually the first to be mentioned in this context, but others notable figures like James Waters and Kerri A. Rockquemore belong to growing group of writers, academics and researchers focused on biracial identity and experience.
My thesis uses critical ethnographic methods to examine the myths surrounding mixed-race identity, its instability, mulitracial social unfitness and the tendency to label all students mono-racially. I examine how multiracial/ multiethnic high school students construct identity in school settings by looking at how race, socio-cultural norms and economic status affect students' development. The project seeks to give these students voice and to gain a deeper understanding of how they see themselves and how they understand other’s perceptions of them. It explores the implications of identity for academic achievement, post high school aspirations, and students social environment. I hope to not only gain insight into students' thinking regarding their identity but to engage them as integral researchers. By developing a deeper understanding of who they are and by explaining to others who they are, the project develops students’ self-authorship, by encouraging self-reflection, discussion and reflective writing.
An individual's identity is constructed from many pieces, including gender, race, family structure, and the student’s home neighborhood, and the culture of the schools that she attends. The time students and teachers spend together affects student maturation, intellectual development, social skills, academic achievement and identity development. Since students spend the largest portion of their waking lives in schools it is important to understand how they see themselves as budding adults. Current research on mixed-race minorities focuses on how they perceive themselves and believe they are perceived by others. As their identity matures and they develop a cohesive persona, understanding students perceptions and perspective in educational contexts and the impact this has on self-identification and success is still a developing field of inquiry.
This project includes an auto-ethnographic component since as both a researcher and a parent, I work to understand cultural issues related to ethnicity and race. Growing up in a mono-racial culture as a bi-cultural child, I struggled as an invisible outsider. The skills I developed as a child and an adult carried into my research interests leading me to combine auto-ethnography with ethnography. My interest in understanding the US racial divide began when I became the parent of a mixed-race child; the US racial divide is not normally experienced by a European American. However, my real wake up call came when my son began having academic issues in school. I realized that the problems he had been experiencing were not due to a deficiency of his home life or his ability to learn, but rather, based on how he was perceived in his school community. The parents of other mixed race children described similar experiences supported this conjecture. Suspecting a much greater problem, I decided to study this at an institution level. By focusing on multiracial teen identity, this project seeks to inform educators, administrators, researchers and parents on how students experience school, which can help to develop more appropriate educational environments for all students. Ultimately, this not about race or social fit, but developing a better and more just environment for students regardless of race, creed, color or gender.