ISSN 1656-8788

INSIDE: Historical Objectives Education

PAASCU and PACUCOA Accredited

Background and of Multicultural

August October 2010

Trends and Transformations in Communication Technology

Ma. Andrea Fojas On Transformations The transformations that have taken place in Communication Technology have paved way to three Information Communications Revolutions, and the outcomes of these transformations have expansively impacted individuals as well as societies. During the olden days in Rome, people who wanted to know the news paid professional speakers a coin for the privilege of listening to the speaker announcing the days events. This was synonymous with the case of the First Information Communications Revolution wherein writing was invented, and Pictographs were developed into phonetic writing in 3500 BC and were used as symbols for sounds. Despite the milestone, information still belonged to very few people. The only literate people were either monks or members of the privileged classes, and scholars still had to painstakingly copy the information they wanted to keep, or pay a scribe to copy it for them. Indeed, knowledge- and the power it bringsbelonged to very few people during this era. On the other hand, societies grew more literate in the Second Information Communications Revolution. While scribes could produce only one copy at a time, Johannes Gutenbergs invention, the movable type printer, could produced ten times more than any scribe produce in an hour. This meant that the information, which belonged to the privileged few, would one day be accessible to everyone, and that technology will be the vehicle to improved communication channels and devices. Finally, the Third Information Communications Revolution brought about the development of digital computers beginning around 1951. Computers have become storehouses and transmitters of vast amounts of information that previously relied on the written word. Storability, portability, and accessibility of information are prominent features in this information communications revolution. If we look at the accounts and annotations presented above, the transformations that have taken place in Communication Technology are not only revolutionary in its technical aspect, but also life-changing in the manner the transformations have impinged on the vitality of relationships, on the diversity of lifestyle, on the operational functions of institutions and businesses, and on the value of human advancement. Communication Technology has become a powerful agent in the building of nations and lives; however, it has always been a matter of fact that changes or revolutions will always have twin children - the good and the wicked. Indeed, it is never clich to infuse the quotation with great power comes great responsibility in the discourse on the use of Communication Technology in todays trends and times.

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LCCM students using the communications technology equipment in the Mass Communication Laboratory.

On Trends In The Trendspotters Guide to New Communications cited in the book Death of Distance by Frances Cairncross, a collection of predictions were posited by the author with regard to the woes and wonders of Communication Technology. The author gave the following thirty trends that will take place in the future as Communication Technology invades our personal and professional transactions and relational dimensions: 1. The Death of Distance. Distance will no longer determine the cost of communicating electronically. 2. The Fate of Location. No longer will location be the key to most business decisions. Companies will locate any screen-based activity anywhere on earth, wherever they can find the best bargain of skills and productivity. 3. The Irrelevance of Size. Small companies will offer services that, in the past, only giants had the scale and scope to provide. 4. Improved connections. Most people on earth will eventually have access to networks that are all switched, interactive, and broadband.

5. More Customized Content. Improved networks will also allow individuals to order content for one. 6. A Deluge of Information. Companies will need new techniques to brand and push their information ahead of the competition. 7. Increased Value of Brand. Whats hotwhether a product, a personality, a sporting event, or the latest financial data- will attract greater rewards. This will create a category of global super-rich, many of them musicians, actors, athletes, and investors. 8. Increased Value in Niches. Niche players will increase, as will consumers demand for customized goods and services. 9. Communities of Practices. The horizontal bonds among people performing the same job or speaking the same language in different parts of the world will strengthen. 10. Near-fictionless Market. Many more companies and customers will have access to accurate price information that will curtail excessive profits, enhance competition, and help to curb inflation- making it easier to find buyers, but hard to make fat margins.

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11. Increased Mobility. Every form of communication will be available for mobile or remote use. 12. More Global Reach, More Local Provision. While small companies find it easier to reach markets around the world, big companies will more readily offer high quality local services. 13. The Loose-knit Corporation. Culture and communications networks, rather than rigid management structures, will hold companies together. 14. More Minnows, More Giants. The cost of starting a new business will decline, but communication will amplify the strength of brands and the power of networks. 15. Manufacturers as Service Providers. New opportunities to provide services for customers will emerge. 16. The Inversion of Home and Office. The line between home and work life will blur. 17. The Proliferation of Ideas. New ideas and information will travel faster to the remotest corners of the world. 18. A New Trust. Since it will be easier to check whether people and companies deliver what they have promised, many services will become more reliable and people will be more likely to trust each other to keep their word. 19. People as the Ultimate Scarce Resource. They key challenge for companies will be to hire and retain good people, extracting value from them, rather than allowing them to keep all the value they create for themselves. 20. The Shift from Government Policing to Selfpolicing. Governments will find national legislation and censorship inadequate for regulating the global flow of information. As content sweeps across national borders, it will be harder to enforce laws; however, greater electronic access to information will give people better means to protect themselves. 21. Loss of Privacy. Protecting privacy will be difficult. Governments and companies will easily monitor peoples movements. 22. Redistribution of Wages. Income differences within countries will grow, and income differences between countries will narrow. 23. Less Need for Immigration and Emigration. Inexpensive communications may reduce some of the pressure to emigrate. 24. A Market for Citizens. The greater freedom to locate anywhere and earn a living will hinder taxation. Savers will be able to compare global investment rates and easily shift money abroad.

25. Rebirth of Cities. As individuals spend less time in the office and more time working from home or traveling, cities will transform from concentrations of office employment to centers of entertainment and culture. 26. The Rise of English. The global role of English as a second language will strengthen as it becomes the common standard for telecommunicating in business and commerce. 27. Communities of Culture. The declining cost of creating and distributing many entertainment products and the corresponding increase in production capacity will also reinforce local cultures and help scattered peoples and families to preserve their cultural heritage. 28. Improved Writing and Reading Skills. Electronic mail will induce young people to express themselves effectively in writing and to admire clear and lively written prose. 29. Rebalance of Political Power. Since people will communicate their views on government more directly, rulers will become more sensitive (and, perhaps, more responsive) to lobbying and public-opinion polls, especially in established democracies. 30. Global Peace. As countries become even more economically interdependent, people will communicate more freely and learn more about the ideas and aspirations of human being in other parts of the globe. The effect will be to increase understanding, tolerance, and ultimately promote worldwide peace. On Communication Technology Today It is incontestably true that technology has improved connections and multiplied information to an extraordinary extent in the present day. All of these wouldnt have been the case if not for the human capital that provided the procedures, systems, programs, physical and mental force, and purposeful initiatives in the enhancement of technological applications. Indeed, people have not only empowered technology, but people have, more importantly, empowered themselves through technological revolutions. This is exactly why people are the ultimate scare resource of a company. Individuals have realized their economic value, and a company will constantly need to convince its best employees that working for it enhances each

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involved. It is in this context that we can include issues about intimacy and distance, which are two factors to be considered in any interpersonal communication. Intimacy has different dimensions, and these are physical, intellectual, emotional, and shared activities. Given that technology can connect people despite the physical distance through shared activities like the internet, mobile phones, and other hi-end devices, technology still cannot cover the intellectual and emotional dimensions of distance. Despite the wireless channels provided by communication innovations, the intellectual and emotional dimensions are still founded on different aspects, such as education and social status for the intellectual dimension, and diversity and commonality for the emotional dimension.
Young businessman video calling colleague on laptop.
Source: http://www.gettyimages.com/detail/sb10069903q-001/Photodisc

individuals value. This is a challenge that every company is and will be facing as a result of peoples empowerment due to technological advancement. On the other hand, another major impact of advanced communication technology today is called Technostress. The exploding technology had produced various stressors for people in organizations at all levels, such as: Loss of privacy Information inundation Erosion of face-to-face contact Continually having to learn new skills Being passed over for promotion because of their lack of knowledge Hence, a company needs to deal with these stressors so that employees will continue being resources and not detriments to its economic performance. While most of Cairncross predictions are agreeable and true as they are already mirrored in todays corporate world, some of the predictions are controversial matters in the discussion of communication. Let us focus on Cairncross core assumption: The Death of Distance. In a qualitative sense, interpersonal communication occurs when people treat one another as unique individuals, regardless of the context in which the interaction occurs or the number of people

Distance can be physically wiped out by technology, but technology cannot abolish the need of people for distance. Indeed, distance is part of human communication. Why? It is impossible to have a close relationship with everyone; we simply do not have the rations of energy and luxury of time to attain intimacy with everyone. Moreover, even the strongest of interpersonal relationships requires some distance. Indeed, technology can create wireless cords of connection all over the globe and can improve on the profitability and performance of businesses, but technology cannot totally eliminate distance in the purest form of human communication. References Adler, R. B., & Rodman, G. (1999). Understanding human communication. New York: Harcourt Brace College. Cairncross, F. (1997).The death of distance: How the communications revolution will change our lives. Boston, MA: Harvard Business School Press. Luthans, F.. (2005). Organizational behavior. (10th Ed.) New York: The McGraw Hill Company.

Ma. Andrea Fojas

Faculty, Department of Mass

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Historical Background and Objectives of Multicultural Education

Ma. Cecilia O. Sanidad

power and income among diverse groups. Thus, school curriculum must directly address issues of racism, sexism, classism, linguicism, ablism, ageism, heterosexism, religious intolerance, and xenophobia. Multicultural education advocates the belief that students and their life histories and experiences should be placed at the center of the teaching and learning process and that pedagogy should occur in a context that is familiar to students and that addresses multiple ways of thinking. In addition, teachers and students must critically analyze oppression and power relations in their communities, society and the world. Bennett (1999) defined multicultural education as an approach to teaching and learning that is based upon the democratic values and beliefs, and affirms cultural pluralism within the culturally diverse societies and an interdependent world. It is based on the assumption that the primary goal of public education is to foster their intellectual, social and personal development of virtually all students to their higher potential. Multicultural education is composed of four interactive dimensions: the movement towards equity, curriculum reform, the process of becoming culturally competent, and the commitment to combat prejudice and discrimination, especially racism. Perhaps, another development in the area of multicultural education is the emergence of a broader concept of global education. Diaz, Massialas, and Xanthopoulos (1999) differentiate multicultural education and global education by defining multicultural education as one framing global concepts and topics within the context of the nation in which the students reside. They see global education, on the other hand, as one examining the perspectives of other countries regarding the different global concepts and topics other than the students nation of residence. It typically uses references to the students nation of residence in the form of cross-cultural comparisons. Global education focuses on global issues while multicultural education emphasizes issues that are indigenous to the country in which students and their teachers live. It is important to note that multicultural education is an important element of global education. Swiniarski, Breitborde and Murphy (1999) defined global education as the teaching of perceptions of the world in terms of unity within diversity. The goal of this type of education is to

About Multicultural Education Multiculturalism may be considered as a form of political compact: an agreement that affirming and promoting distinctive group identities produces social value for both the group and society as a whole (Ovando & McLaren, 2000). This concept applied in education is not a new concept. It is merely a relatively new name for concepts that have existed since the 1920s, when educators began writing about intercultural education and ethnic studies. Numerous definitions of multicultural education have been proposed or espoused by scholars, researchers and organizations over the past 30 years. According to the National Association for Multicultural Education (n.d.) they define multicultural education as a philosophical concept built on the ideals of freedom, justice, equality, equity, and human dignity as acknowledged in various documents, such as the U.S. Declaration of Independence, constitutions of South Africa and the United States, and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights adopted by the United Nations. It affirms the need to prepare students for their responsibilities in an interdependent world. It recognizes the role schools can play in developing the attitudes and values necessary for a democratic society. It values cultural differences and affirms the pluralism that students, their communities, and teachers reflect. It challenges all forms of discrimination in schools and society through the promotion of democratic principles of social justice. Multicultural education is a process that permeates all aspects of school practices, policies and organization as a means to ensure the highest levels of academic achievement for all students. It helps students develop a positive selfconcept by providing knowledge about the histories, cultures, and contributions of diverse groups. It prepares all students to work actively toward structural equality in organizations and institutions by providing the knowledge, dispositions, and skills for the redistribution of

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promote the knowledge base, skills, and attitudes that permit the young minds to see the world as a community, while appreciating the mosaic of cultures in his /her immediate neighborhood, town, or city. Historical Education Background of the Multicultural

As conceptualizations of multicultural education evolve and diversify, it is important to revisit its historical foundation. Weil (1998) accounts the origin of this movement in the United States. The multicultural movement in education originated in the radical challenges put forth by progressive forces in the 1960s and 1970s. The movement towards a multicultural curriculum originated largely with those of Americas culturally subjugated and marginalized, as African-American, Mexican-American, NativeAmericans and women. These groups have historically taken the lead in pursuing the inclusion of ethnic studies programs at the university and K-12 levels. In the 1960s, multicultural proponents criticized schooling for its restrictive admission practices regarding people of color; they condemned the academic establishment for its subservience to business interest; they reprimanded schooling for its racist, sexist and culturally-biased curriculum; they deplored hiring practices for women and minorities; they exposed the pernicious practice of tracking; and they labored to achieve such beneficial entitlements programs, such as bilingual education and innovative education programs. Sensing progress by groups of color and women in their struggles for human rights and social and educational change into the early 1970s, other traditionally oppressed groups found growing support and energy for their movements. Through the 1970s, gay and lesbian groups, the elderly, and people with disabilities organized visible and powerful pushes for sociopolitical and human rights. As K-12 schools, universities, and other educational institutions and organizations scrambled to address the concerns of these and other historically marginalized groups, a host of programs, practices, and policies emerged, mostly focused on slight changes or additions to traditional curriculum. Together, the separate actions of these various groups who were dissatisfied with the inequities of the education system, along with the resulting reaction of educational institutions during the late 1960s and 1970s, defined the earliest conceptualization of multicultural education.

The 1980s saw the emergence of a body of scholarship on multicultural education by progressive education activists and researchers who refused to allow schools to address their concerns by simply adding token programs and special units on famous women or famous people of color. James Banks, one of the pioneers of multicultural education, was among the first multicultural education scholars to examine schools as social systems from a multicultural context (1981). He grounded his conceptualization of multicultural education in the idea of educational equality. According to Banks, in order to maintain a multicultural school environment, all aspects of the school had to be examined and transformed, including policies, teachers' attitudes, instructional materials, assessment methods, counseling, and teaching styles (1981; 1989). By the middle and late 1980s, other K-12 teachers-turned-scholars including Carl Grant, Christine Sleeter, Geneva Gay, and Sonia Nieto provided more scholarship in multicultural education, developing new, deeper frameworks that were grounded in the ideal of equal educational opportunity and a connection between school transformation and social change. In order to move beyond slight curricular changes, which many argued only further differentiated between the curricular norm and the marginalized other, they built on Banks's work, examining other structural foundations of schools and how these contributed to educational inequities. Tracking, culturally oppressive teaching approaches, standardized tests, school funding discrepancies, classroom climate, discriminatory hiring practices, and other symptoms of an ailing and oppressive education system were exposed, discussed, and criticized. Meanwhile, the United States continued to become more and more of a melting pot of culture and more visibly rich with cultural, racial, ethnic, and religious diversity, underscoring the necessity for everyone to develop a set of skills and knowledge that the present system was failing to provide all students. These included creative and critical thinking skills, intercultural competence, and social and global awareness. The education system was not only plagued by unequal treatment of traditionally oppressed groups, but was also ill-equipped to prepare even the most highly privileged students to

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La Consolacion College Manila has culturally diverse students.

competently participate in an increasingly diverse society. So as the 1980s flowed into the final decade of the twentieth century, multicultural education scholars refocused the struggle on developing new approaches and models of education and learning built on a foundation of social justice, critical thinking, and equal opportunity. Educators, researchers, and cultural theorists began to further deconstruct traditional models in both the K-12 and higher education arenas from a multicultural framework. Today, literally dozens of models and frameworks for multicultural education exist. While theory and scholarship has moved from small curricular revisions to approaches that call for full transformations of self, schools, and society, many implementations of multicultural education still begin with curricular additions of diverse sources. But with a fuller understanding of the roots of the movement, we are better equipped to follow the transformative path laid by many educators, activists, and scholars. And it is important to remember that multicultural education is a relatively new concept that will continue to change to meet the needs of a constantly changing society.

Objectives of Multicultural Education According to Lynch (1989), the goals of multicultural education as seen within a global context may be described as follows: 1. To develop empathy with other human beings, an understanding of human diversity, similarity, difference and interdependence and to foster society, including the intercultural competence to feel creatively at home with the diversity of human cultures; 2. to be aware of the reasons for human conflicts at interpersonal, intergroup and international levels and, where possible, to be able to contribute to their resolution; 3. to develop a commitment to combating prejudice and discrimination, and solidarity for human rights at home and abroad; 4. to value worthy achievements of all individuals and human groups, and to seek and make a significant contribution to them; 5. to internalize agreed moral bases for behavior within a culturally diverse society and world, including a critical appreciation of ones self, ones community and society;

6. to

develop an appreciation of humanenvironmental and economic interdependence, the role, aims and limitations of different economic systems, both within a particular 7

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society and internationally, and to foster responsible pursuit of economic satisfaction; 7. to acquire practical abilities, knowledge, skills and attitudes appropriate to responsible individual, familial, community, citizen, worker and consumer roles within a democratic culturally pluralist society; and 8. to develop qualities of imagination, inquisitiveness and rationality, both judgmental and communicative, and their application to responsible cultural, social and environmental activity. To achieve the objectives of multicultural education, teachers should make their classroom models of democracy and equity. To do this, it requires the educators to: 1. place the students at the center of the teaching and learning process; 2. promote human rights and respect for cultural differences; 3. believe that all students can learn; 4. acknowledge and build on the life histories and experiences of students microcultural memberships; 5. critically analyze oppression and power relationships to understand racism, sexism, classism, and discrimination against the disabled, young and aged; 6. critique society in the interest of social justice and equality; and 7. participate in collective social action to ensure a democratic society. As educators, we must teach all children. The ultimate goal of multicultural education is to meet the individual learning needs of each student so that all students can progress to their fullest capacity. References Garcia, E. (1994). Understanding and meeting the challenge of student cultural diversity. Boston: Houghton Mifflin. Gollnick, D. and Chinn, P. (1994). Multicultural education in a pluralistic society (4th ed.). USA: Macmillan College Publishing Company. Gorski, P. C. (1999). A brief history of multicultural education. Retrieved from: http://www.edchange.org/multicultural/papers/ed change_history.html

Lynch, J. (1989). Multicultural education in a global society. London: Falmer Press. National Association for Multicultural Education (n.d.). Retrieved from http://nameorg.org Miller, S. P. (2002). Validated practices for teaching students with diverse needs and abilities. Boston: Allyn and Bacon. Ovando, C. J. & McLaren, P. (2000). The politics of multiculturalism and bilingual education: Students and teachers caught in the cross fire. New York: McGraw-Hill Companies. Weil, D. K. (1998). Towards a critical multicultural literacy: Theory and practice for education for liberation. New York: Peter Lang Publishing.

Swiniarski, L., Breitborde, M. L., & Murphy, J. A. (1999). Educating the global village: Including the young child in the world. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Merrill/Prentice Hall.

Ma. Cecilia O. Sanidad

Guidance Counselor College Department

LCCM Research Digest is published by the Research and Publications Center (RES) to serve as a sounding board of up-to-date ideas and actions related to research, classroom management, and delivery of the faculty in the different schools of the College. It encourages and welcomes condensed versions or a short summary of research or review essays, conference papers, lecture notes, teaching guides, and other classroom materials for its quarterly publication. Editorial Board: Sr. Imelda A. Mora, OSA, President Dr. Divina M. Edralin, Consultant Dr. Jennifer S. Florida, Director

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Venancio N. Santos, Jr.

The Research Digest is now accepting contributions for the November 2010 January 2011 Issue. Feel free to visit us for inquiries.

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