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60 4 Separate Worlds, Separate Concerns AP versus College-Prep Track at Comprehensive High Comprehensive High’s Academic Performance Index (API) score at the time of my research was slightly higher than 700 but nearly a hundred points below California’s goal of 800 for all its schools.1 By comparison, the state’s average API that year was 687, meaning that the school’s standing was a bit higher than average, although it remained well beneath the state goal. As I mentioned in chapter 3, the school is close to state averages in terms of racial composition , percentage of the student body that is socioeconomically disadvantaged, and percentage of the student body that comprises English language learners. In other words, Comprehensive High is an average California school, which may contribute to students’ resounding concerns about the notion of average. In their interviews with me, I learned that, for them, C grades are outward markers of average academic performance. They mark an average person who has average aspirations and who will achieve average success. And average success is acceptable at Comprehensive High. The Average Joe Identity Story When I arrived on campus to begin fieldwork, the administration, not surprisingly , did not tout the school’s average characteristics. Rather, the principal emphasized the progress it had made in increasing its API score and the structural changes implemented to enhance learning and academic performance. Nonetheless, in interviews, students at Comprehensive High continually returned to the notion of average, using it as a reference point for talking about school success. In 2012, six years after my classroom observations and interviews , I ask the principal about this tendency. She responds, SEPARATE WORLDS, SEPARATE CONCERNS 61 That is very interesting because one of the things I noticed when I did this needs analysis [in 2003–4, just before she became principal], it was so obvious everywhere, . . . in the events that they put on, in the attitudes of the kids, in the expectations of the teachers and the parents, that average or mediocre was okay. “That is what we are; we are a mediocre school.” . . . That was one of the impetus to make a lot of the changes. . . . The image that was being projected to the community was “we can’t really do any better than this. This is about as good as we can get.” In interviews, students use average to gauge individual success but do not apply it to their school as a whole, which is how the principal describes her first impression of Comprehensive High. Some tell me it is important to demonstrate that one is at least average and not below average. For others, it’s more critical to prove that one is above average rather than simply average. In all cases, however , the point of comparison is with an identity story that I call Average Joe. This identity story features a student who receives Cs but not Ds in her academic classes. Ds indicate that a person is below average. Thus, an Average Joe doesn’t carry an overall C average (a 2.0 GPA), which would allow a student to receive a few unacceptable Ds counterbalanced with a few As and Bs. In his discussion of the low-performance report card (figure 1.1), Doug, a white junior in collegeprep classes, explains this distinction: DOUG: He’s passing all the classes at least by minimum, but it’s not what you’d normally want to pass by. LISA NUNN: What would you normally want to pass by? DOUG: At least a C. L. N.: Why is a C better than a D? DOUG: Because it shows that you are average. Even average at least shows you’re not one of the people that doesn’t try. It’s better being average than below average; that’s logical. Doug’s attitude is very common at Comprehensive High. In fact, when he says that the minimum desirable grade is a C, he expresses a more precise threshold than I at first recognized. I had assumed that he was referring to all variations of a C, including C-plus and C-minus, which is why I contrasted Cs and Ds in my follow-up question. However, I came to discover that at Comprehensive High the dividing line between acceptable and unacceptable grades lies precisely between Cs and C-minuses. Kristie, a white freshman in honors classes, is instructive on this point. Responding to the same report card, she asserts, “A D in English...

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