(Zeichner and Hoeft 1996). The result is a severe shortage of qualified teachers in urban school districts that have an increasing number of culturally diverse students (Gay 2000). School districts typically address these shortages by hiring unlicensed or full-time substitute teachers, creating a picture of urban schools as inferior because of poor teaching and over-populated classrooms (DarlingHammond 1999). This depiction, a deficit paradigm of urban schools, ignores a host of social, political, and institutional factors that can define success for students
