Systemic Approaches to Reduce Prejudice in Schools

Prejudice remains a pressing problem around the world. Scholars in numerous racially and ethnically diverse countries such as Canada, England, Germany, the Netherlands, and the United States study prejudice and prejudice-reduction in schools and the workplace (e.g., Aboud et al., 2012 ; Johnson & Johnson, 2000 ). Prejudice involves holding negative feelings toward a group and its members, or exhibiting hostile or negative treatment directed at a group and its members ( Raabe & Beelmann, 2011 ). Prejudice is multi-dimensional and multi-determined; accordingly, there are many theories about the development of prejudice and the reduction of prejudice that address factors at many levels (for reviews, see Aboud & Spears Brown, 2013 ; Killen & Rutland, 2011 ; Levy & Killen, 2008 ). Children as young as five years old express prejudice, suggesting that prejudice may begin to develop in some children before or as they enter school and that prejudice-reduction efforts should begin in childhood ( Aboud et al., 2012 ; Raabe & Beelmann, 2011 ).