A Catholic concept of an asset orientation

As both public and Catholic schools across the U.S. have become increasingly diverse in their student bodies, scholars have called for K-12 teachers to abandon deficit discourses, which blame students of colour and students from low-income households for discrepancies in their learning outcomes as compared to those of white and middle-class students. Instead, educators are urged to adopt an asset orientation toward students, especially those from minoritized communities. The purpose of this manuscript is to explicate the dispositions that comprise an asset orientation; examine the secular theories of education from which they arise; and explore the extent to which these pieces align with a Catholic view of schooling. To illustrate what an asset orientation might look like, the paper also provides examples of asset-oriented reflections from Catholic school teachers who learned about and intentionally practiced these dispositions. The paper concludes by proposing a Catholic concept of an asset orientation.