The Impact of Racial Identity and Social Spaces on the Academic Experiences of Biracial Students: A Phenomenographic Study for School Administrative Intervention

This study explored the identity and social spaces that affects academic performances, and behavioral difficulties of biracial students. As teachers have direct experiences with biracial students in every working days in school, these serve as an opportunity for the researcher to study the academic experiences of biracial learners. This research paper is qualitative research that used the phenomenographic approach. Phenomenography is investigative, and, explanatory as, it charts the different ways on how the participants understand, conceptualize, perceive and observe the different aspects of a phenomenon in the environment around them. The participants were grade school teachers wherein their experiences with the biracial students were explored. The researcher interviewed the participants, and the interviews were transcribed verbatim. As findings, five themes were drawn by the researcher from the interview. These are: classroom profile of biracial students, academic performances, behavioral difficulties, racial identity shaped by the parents and environment, and the intervention.


Introduction
The rise of biracial Filipinos raised and brought up in the Philippines are very evident in the last decade. Universe and other international beauty pageants is an honor that comes with the privilege, not only to smartly answer questions in front of millions of viewers, showcasing that the Filipino contenders have brains inside those beautiful faces. It is not surprising that Filipinos love the biracial beauties, which we locally called mestizas or mestizos, coupled with the desire to be one of them that boosts the skin whitening industry. The Philippine national football team, the Philippine Azkals, made name in the international football competition in the recent years, putting the Philippines in the world map of football or soccer. It can be observed that the Philippine Azkals team members are predominantly biracial, headed by a British-Filipino descent, Phil Younghusband (ABS-CBN News, 2018).
The existence of biracial or mestizos, dated back in the Middle Ages, when Europeans discovered the New World. Anzaldua (1987) described the Spanish conquest of Mexico headed by Hernan Cortes. At that time, before the Spaniards conquered and subjugated Mexico, there were twenty five million Indian population and in 1650 there were only one and a half million pure blooded Indians remained. The mestizos founded the new hybrid breed race and inherited Central and South America (Anzaldua, 1987).
The concept of mestiza is clearly explained in the book, Borderlands La Frontera by Anzaldua (1987).
Other than being a mixed breed, the mestizas cope by developing a tolerance for contradictions, a tolerance by ambiguity. She learns to be an Indian in Mexican culture, to be Mexican from an Anglo point of view. She learns to juggle cultures. She has a plural personality, she operates in a pluralistic mode-nothing is thrust out, the good, the bad, and the ugly, nothing rejected, nothing abandoned. A mestiza is cradled in one culture, sandwiched between cultures, straddling all three cultures, and their called every now and then by the Guidance Counselor, Class Advisers, Headmistress or at times to the Office of the Academic and Discipline Board, to settle the cases of their children.
It is not that there are no interventions provided by the Student Welfare Office, but these interventions seem to be inappropriate, as these provide no positive results on the emerging phenomenon.
This study looked into the experiences of Grade School teachers with biracial students. These experiences have impact on the students during the early years of experiences in schools. Elementary aged students are often ill prepared to proficiently negotiate the diverse cultures of home, and, school.
Constructive student-teacher relationships are fundamental to the positive development of students' school identities which may conflict with how they identify at home (Ann & Laszloffy, 2005). It is a concern, that the lack of skills of teachers to connect with biracial students is critical to racial identity development. It is true, that there is very few literature on the study of biracial students in grade school, but there are reports that teachers are incompetent in their understanding, and, management of issues concerning biracial students.

Review of Related Studies
There are very few studies about biracial students especially in the Philippines. Most of the studies pertains to what is it to be a biracial or multiracial, the constructions of their identity, and, most researches tackled only the issues of black and white races. To provide the understanding of the biracialism concept, the following sections provides the related studies of biracial and the social spaces.

The Rise of the Biracial Children
Educators understood that the basic education years are essential, and critical in the development of the students as individual. It is during these foundation years that the student's individuality is defined, and formed, specifically between ages 5 and 15. The school setting is a fertile ground for personal exploration and growth. Growth, is determined by the students' ability to navigate the "crisis" or challenge (Chickering & Reisser, 1993). In this study, the researcher limits the definition of biracial as those children who are offspring of a Filipina or Filipino and a foreigner.
The influx of foreigners to the Philippines started with establishment of American naval and air bases in Subic and Clark, Pampanga, right after the Second World War. During this time, Angeles City, Pampanga became the center of prostitution as several Filipinas engaged in sex-trade. As a result biracial children became a phenomenon in the area. Today, Angeles City, has populace which is unique as the influx of foreigners has led to the city's demographic diversity, as well as to the birth of biracial children. Since World War II, this area has been a birthplace for Amerasians, or children who were fathered by American servicemen and whose mothers were Asians. Amerasian is a term that was coined by the American writer and human rights activist Pearl S. Buck (Lavides & Waring, 2018). their future to unite. This situation is very evident in many social spaces these days. The result is the rise of biracial children.
Considering the 2015 census, of the total number of marriages which occurred in the Philippines in 2015 about 3.6 percent involved foreign nationals. American nationals were preferred by Filipino brides (0.75%) and Australians (0.07%) by Filipino grooms. Other common nationalities of the groom are Japanese (0.39%), Australian (0.23%), and, Korean (0.22%). On the other hand, Filipino grooms also preferred to marry American (0.06%), and, Canadian (0.04%) (Philippine Statistics Authority, 2017).
The census records though, did not consider those marriages of Filipinos to foreigners occurred abroad. It is interesting to note that, these interracial marriages produced biracial children who are born and brought up in the Philippines.

Understanding Social Spaces
Space, may either be geographic and virtual, is a basis for identity. A social space is physical or virtual space such as a social center, online social media, or other gathering place where people gather and interact. Some social spaces such as town squares or parks are public places; others such as pubs, websites, or shopping malls are privately owned and regulated (Dyer & Ngui, 2010). Home are also considered social place, a place of identity. In this paper, the researcher considered school as a social space, as this is a place where everyone interacts, moves, affiliates, and relates. One's school is an indicator of values, and a sign of socioeconomic position. A person can be identified what school he or she is educated, how expensive the school is, and the quality of education it provides.
A social space is not simply a docile area for predestined behaviors, but, an active means for the construction of identities, subjective or objective. It is said that, socialization constantly occurs in educational institutions, as early as foundation or grade school level. A lot of teachers have this concept that, grade school students are incapable of operating at advanced stages. How these teachers response to children regarding races are still to be explored, and, studied.

Rationale of the Study
The study analyzed and examined the identity, and, social spaces that affects academic performances, and, behavioral difficulties of biracial students. As the teachers experience the school lives of the biracial students in her every working day in school, the phenomenon serves as an opportunity for the researcher to address this concern.
This study also explored the experiences of the participants with the biracial and appropriate interventions are clearly identified that help biracial students increase their performances in school. The study also be of aid to other schools in the community that have similar concern.

The Research Questions
With the identification of the problem, this study anchors on the following research questions: (1) What are the classroom experiences of teachers with biracial students?
(2) What are the conceptions of the teachers on the racial identity of the biracial students? www.scholink.org/ojs/index.php/fet Frontiers in Education Technology Vol. 2, No. 4, 2019 (3) How are the biracial students currently being engaged and encouraged by teachers in developing their social spaces in school?
As a student in a Doctorate Programme in Education, the researcher hopes that the result of this study will aid the teachers who are involved in the lives of biracial students and who are endeavoring to develop healthy and well-adjusted individuals with a healthy resolution of mixed-race identity (Root, 1996).

Significance of the Study
Biracial students may have different struggles as the non-biracial students in the classroom. However, with the development of new classroom approaches, such as, culturally relevant pedagogy, the academes are working on creating an effective learning strategies for all students, regardless of race, gender and creed. Will these learning strategies that are created be effective to all students? The racial demographic in schools today are changing and educators must do some paradigm shifting in their thinking to include biracial students into the argument. To effectively serve the increasing biracial student population we have to pay attention to the academic performances, the educational experiences and social spaces of these students. Teachers and school administrators will have better understanding on how to provide support to these students for them to attain success in their studies. For the parents, so they will also understand the uniqueness of children of interracial marriages and the need to address issues relating to biracial children. And for the future researchers who will venture into similar studies, this paper will serve as one of the related studies.

Method
This research paper is a qualitative research that used the phenomenographic approach.
Phenomenography is exploratory, and, descriptive as it maps the qualitatively different ways the participants experience, conceptualize, perceive, and, understand various aspects of a phenomenon in the world around them (Bowden, 1996).
Phenomenography is a research approach aimed at the study of human experiences of phenomenon in the world. It is about description of things as they appear to us. The object of phenomenography is the variation of human experience of the world. Phenomenography implies a study of variations in capturing various dimensions, or facets of a phenomenon as it appears to a number of people. A way of experiencing something constitutes the research unit in phenomenographic, which means, that, the research takes its points of departure in human individuals (Sage Publication, 2008).
As pointed out, the focus of the research is human experiences of a phenomenon, the researcher looked into the second-order perspectives or perspectives of the participants, who have experienced with biracial students. The phenomenological approach was utilized to identify the "essence" of human experience described by the participants in the study (Creswell, 2013).
In collecting data, the methods used by the researcher were interactive, and, intrusive in which the researcher must be considerate to the role of the participants. This research is evolving, that, as data are collected and analyzed the problem are altered or revised, and, the research questions are also revised and improved.
The researcher becomes an interpreter, and, must withhold her concepts about the phenomenon under study, and, to draw conclusions about the meaning of the categories of themes identified.

Interview
Interview was used by the researcher in gathering data. The interview questions are guided by the research questions as its framework, and, are semi-structured, meaning, the questions are open, allowing new ideas to be conveyed and generated during the interview. Based on the three research questions and as the interview progress sub-questions were developed as the result of the researcher's in-depth questions that facilitates the development of rich data or materials.
The purpose of phenomenographic interview is for the participants to think about, reflect on, and, articulate ways of experiencing a particular phenomenon. In this study, the researcher recorded the interview, and, transcribed it word for word. The names of the biracial students mentioned by the participants in the interview are altered to hide their identity.

The Participants
The participants of the study are the selected grade school teachers with direct experiences with biracial students. Purposive sampling was used to select the teacher participants. Ten teachers participated in this study. The qualification of the participants is, that, all have direct experiences with biracial students as class advisers, or subject teachers in grade school. However, in the course of the gathering data, one participant was added by the researcher, the Guidance Counselor for Basic Education. The purpose of adding the Guidance Counselor, aside from having a direct experience with the biracial students, she was always mentioned by the teachers during the interview. The researcher conducted the interview two participants at a time or when they are available. The Guidance Counselor was the last one to be interviewed. Other than the participants' data shown in Table 1, the researcher also provided brief narrative description of each participant. To maintain confidentiality, all participants are identified with their aliases.  Jess, also joined CIE about 2 years ago. She is a Year 6 General Science teacher and a class adviser.
She had an experience in teaching children with special education needs during her practice teaching days.
Grace is a full of life and energy teacher of Year 7 with 6 years teaching experience. She holds a bachelor's degree in Secondary Education and currently in a master program. She is responsible for teaching mathematics to all Year 7 students.
Jill joined the CIE teaching force 4 years ago. She is teaching Science to Year 8 students. She is one of those few teachers that received positive feedbacks from parents since the start of her teaching career.
Lorie has been with CIE for 5 years. She is teaching Mathematics to Year 6 and 7 students. She is a very good Mathematics teacher as she was able to bring the students to achieve high marks in the international examinations in Mathematics. She has a very good classroom management.
Kim, an Art teacher who joined CIE 2 years ago. At first, she was only a substitute teacher in Art subject, but, a year later she was absorbed as full time Art teacher. She gives art classes in lieu of Physical Education class to students who cannot execute strenuous physical activities for health reasons.
And, Carol, the Guidance Counselor, has been with CIE for 12 years. A licensed Guidance Counselor, she graduated with the degree of Bachelor of Science in Psychology. She is currently pursuing her master's degree in Psychology. Carol's direct experience not only with biracial students but also with other students, lead her to become the most knowledgeable about the personal profile of the students, their academic performances and behavioral issues.

Results
There were five main themes that were drawn by the researcher from the interview. These are: (1) the classroom profile of biracial students; (2) academic performance; (3) behavioral difficulties; (4) racial identity shaped by the parents and environment; and, (5) the intervention. These findings are discussed in the following sections:

Classroom Profile of Biracial Students
The first research question, "What are the classroom experiences of teachers with biracial students?" identified the classroom profile in terms of nationalities of the students. It also identifies how many biracial students are there in the class. When asked this question, all teachers did not answer the are their nationalities or races? Table 2 showed the summary of the students and their nationalities based on the interview with the teachers: Of the total 151 students in CIE grade school, 57% are Filipinos, 20% are biracial students, 13% Koreans, 8% Indians and other nationalities, 2%.

Academic Performance
The findings in the interview conducted is that, all participants identified that 52% of the biracial students in their class are academically-at-risk, and, 31% are both at-risk, and with behavioral problems.

Behavioral Difficulties
This paper explored the behavioral assessments of biracial students as reflected by teachers' experiences instead of actual improvements in behavior.
The participants also identified the behavioral problems that the biracial students manifested in their respective classrooms. The teachers have varied experiences on this particular issue. It was found out that: (1) those students who are academically-at-risk do not manifest bad behavior; and, (2) those who are surviving in academics have behavioral problems. However, there are five biracial students manifested both poor academic performances and behavioral problems.

Racial Identity Shaped by the Parents and Environment
This fourth theme was the result from the research question on the conceptions of the teachers on the racial identity of the students. The interview conducted generated the following: (1) profile of the parents in terms of race; (2) the profile of the biracial children in terms of physical features; and, (3) the parents' involvement of these students in school. The researcher concentrated her findings on the sixteen biracial students or 52% of the total biracial students in CIE grade school, who are academically-at-risk and with behavioral problems. The dominant physical features of the biracial as experienced by the teachers are, that, of mestizos or mixed-features. However, five biracial students reflect the physical features of their foreign parents, in which, it is difficult to identify whether they are, biracial or mono-racial. Except for two students, majority are born and brought up in Cebu City. Table   3 showed the summary of the data generated from the interviews of the participants about the racial identity of the biracial students. The table also showed the involvement of parents in school.

The Social Spaces of Biracial Students in CIE
On the research question How are the biracial students currently being engaged and encouraged by teachers in developing their social spaces in school? The participants did not dwell much on how the social spaces of biracial students was engaged, and, encouraged by them, during the interview. There are no incidents on bullying against the biracial, they were not excluded in any school activities, nor do they feel that they are being discriminated by the teachers, and students. The third research question was clearly explained by the Guidance Counselor, one of the participants in this study, and supported teachers' responses on the interview.

The Intervention
Based on the interview of the teacher and Guidance Counselor, the researcher was able to identify the interventions that the teachers do, and, what they recommend to the parents. All of the participants recommended tutorials, or provision of tutors to supplement the learning of biracial students. Most parents responded to the recommendations of the teachers, some do not.

The Importance of Parental Involvement
In CIE British School students come from a higher-income level family, however, it can be noted in Table 3, that, majority of the biracial students have only one parent who is involved in school activities, and, makes follow-up with their children. Some of these students, based on the interview from the participants, have parents with high level of marital discord. Most of these academically-at-risk students have difficulties in reading which caused delay in cognitive language.

Differentiated Instruction
This researcher found out that some biracial students are not successful in school through classroom instruction alone. Most of the biracial students identified are struggling learners in the classroom, and, need remediation or reinforcement, and, an intervention to succeed in their academics. One of the teachers identified a differentiated learning as one of the interventions.

Discussion
The few researches that had been conducted on the achievement outcomes of multiracial students, focused on testing an 80-year old theory, the "marginal man", developed by sociologists (Park, 1928) and (Stonequist, 1935). This "marginal man" theory suggests that mixed-race people are more prone to low self-esteem, and, its attendant problems because they are marginalized, and isolated from mono-racial groups (Herman, 2019). Based on the interview, the teachers met with parents every grading period, and, they have common experiences about the parents of these biracial students, as: (1) the parents do not care about the academic performance of their children; and, (2) they did not provide full support to their children with regards to the academics or studies.
When behavioral problems occur in the classroom, the biracial student is referred to the Guidance Counselor by the teacher. During the quarterly conduct deliberation, the teachers meet, and, discuss their classroom experience with the students with the other teachers. The researcher was permitted to www.scholink.org/ojs/index.php/fet Frontiers in Education Technology Vol. 2, No. 4, 2019 observe in one of the deliberations made in CIE, and, it was noted that the teachers have similar experiences with biracial students in terms of academic performance and behavior.
It is further noted in this study that, majority of these biracials speak the native tongue, Cebuano. The significance of this is that, they have no difficulty in communicating with the members of the households, classmates, and those whom they encounter within their social spaces. Four students cannot speak Cebuano because of the presence of their foreign parents who are residing and living with the family in Cebu. The language used in their household influences the language usage of these students.
All students are treated alike in the CIE community. Most of them are born in Cebu, thus, can speak Cebuano well and communication is not a problem. Majority of these biracials started in CIE at an early age of three, as Toddler. Hence, majority of these biracial learners have no problem in adjusting to their social spaces in school. The researcher noted in the interview that some of these biracial students are outcast because of their undesirable attitudes towards their classmates. It is also noted in the interview with the Guidance Counselor that, the teachers in grade school provides assistance and reinforcement to biracial students who are academically-at-risk. In terms of behavioral problems, these students are being referred to and monitored by the Guidance Counselor. However, teachers also refer the students who are academically-at-risk to the counselor, especially if, they need to talk to the parent so they will be aware of the performance of their children.
As part of the CIE academic program, remediation or extended classes are provided to all academically-at-risk students, and, included in the schedule of classes. Because the remediation and extended classes are part of teachers' duties and functions, the teachers did not consider this as an intervention during the interview. But the Guidance Counselor was very specific that, because of remediation and reinforcement done by the teachers, the academically-at-risk biracial students, are able to achieve promotion to the next year level. The recommendation of the teachers for tutorials is another intervention supported by the Guidance Counselor. However, with regards to behavioral problems, the involvement of parents is the critical issue that may provide solutions. Another intervention identified in the course of the interview is the differentiated instructions.
It is noted in the case of Georgina, according to Teacher Mar, he gave Georgina different tasks so she will not disturb other students, and, prevent her from going in and out of the classroom, and loiters in the hallways. The tasks are totally different from the classmates, hence, the teacher provided a differentiated instruction to Georgina. However, the task is still within the same lesson, or unit of study as with the other students. The result is that, the behavioral problems of the Georgina lessen. Even other learners can benefit from the differentiated instructions. Differentiated instructions may be more complex, but, it provides learning opportunities for students who are struggling in the regular classroom setting. Most teachers believe on differentiated instructions to assure improvement on academically-at-risk students, but, for them differentiating instructions may be difficult to do, because they have to split instruction time between the academically-at-risk, and the good students, much more for one-on-one instruction, or individualized instruction. There is a need to have a small group of learners for academically-at-risk students to succeed in their academics.
The involvement of parents may be one area that deserves further research and on how they will be actively involved with the schools in the development of their children. This is an intervention which is significant to all learners. Further, this intervention could be implemented throughout the grade school, so that there will be an evaluation for its longer-term effects.
The researcher also noted the resource room mentioned by the Guidance Counselor in dealing with students having reading difficulties, can be of help. This can be set-up, and, implemented in schools, and may form part of the intervention for slow readers, or even slow learners.
Based on the results and discussions, there are several interventions that can be done, to help the academically-at-risk students to successfully attain academic achievements. These interventions may not be 100% successful for these biracial students, but there are features in these interventions that, can help them in catching up with their classmates, and, attain good academic performance, and provides solutions to some behavioral problems.
There are several researches that helped academically-at-risk students to succeed, but, there is a need for further research that needs to be done to find ways to help these students, to continue to be successful as they go to higher level, especially, the biracial students. Future researches may include other schools in Cebu City that have biracial students and explore the similarities, and, differences on the teachers' experiences. It is not a problem that can easily be solved, while we have a lot of answers to the problems on how to help them, it is a topic that needs continuous research and study.
As a conclusion, though there are several interventions that can help the biracial academically-at-risk students with behavioral difficulties to succeed, one important thing here is the parental support and involvement.
This research paper showed the effects of parental involvement that are consistent, and, showed good relationship between parents' engagement, and, encouragement in their children's education, and outcomes. The outcomes may not be on grades alone, but also applies to the behavioral, and social success of the students. If parents are deeply involved in the education of their children, they can provide aid to the teachers on how they can be of help, and they will understand what they will do to challenge, and, encourage their children of interracial marriages.
There is a need to detect the students who are struggling academically, so that intervention can immediately applied. They can even be applied as early as pre-school, so that they can have smooth transitions to higher level. Interventions are only successfully when they are designed and implemented well.