Deficit Paradigm

The Deficit Paradigm has been used to explain why students misbehave in class and underachieve.

Essentially it means that the reason students perform badly is because they have problems with their families, their backgrounds, their community and/or their culture. They lack certain elements and the theory goes that to raise their achievement levels they need to have those missing elements put back.

This is often contrasted with deficiencies in teaching and teachers.