POBLANO HIGH SCHOOL: Signifying the Possibilities of Silent Partners

Schooling experiences of students can be mediated by various inputs from schools and its agents. Often misrecognized are silent partners, including schools’ artifacts, that confer ideologies, beliefs, and values held by schools and those that work in them. For poor, Mexican-origin students in the United States, these have not often been flattering in terms of the schools’ attitudes about and expectations for its students. However, such need not be the case. In this case study, I describe how a segregated Mexican-origin school not far from the U.S. Mexico border engages silent partners in the (re)creation of representations of its students. Using photo, document, and content analysis, I detail how one school uses silent partners in terms of the school’s mission and vision statements along with its signage to positively orient its students. I include an analysis of factors that are essential in the creation of the school’s positively-oriented silent partners and conclude that crucial to this work is the authentic will of its leadership.