Professionalism as white property: a racial history of paraprofessionals

Using critical race theory, this article excavates the racial history of paraprofessionals. Research and policy on paraprofessionals, starting from the 1950s, reveal that the race and class position of paraprofessionals were deliberately designed and served to reinforce racist and classist ideologies against paraprofessionals and students of colour alike in special education. Moving beyond paraprofessionals’ demographics, much of which have been effaced from research, this article unearths the field’s ideological constructs of race and class, which still linger in ability indices given about paraprofessionals. Stratifying ability, in the form of professionalism, between paraprofessionals and teachers masks not only that the two do similar work, but also that paraprofessionals’ work can produce the same, if not better, results in students’ achievement. By misinterpreting such research findings, however, special education researchers create and enforce a structure by which professionalism, and all the ideological and material benefits therein, is withheld from paraprofessionals.