Schooling IV: Defiance

This installment of 'Schooling' was prompted by a teacher at the middle school where I am vice principal. She was compelled to rant after being faced with yet another bout of in-your-face student defiance that occurred during her lunch duty. Willfull disobedience disobedience best describes it. My collegue was justly exasperated from it. This problem can be so pervasive in some schools that it takes on a subculture of its own and it can be difficult to discern. It occurs all over the public school landscape, but it is a particularly a troublesome phenomenon on the middle school level when adolescent children began to assert their will more stridently. Teachers are mostly caught off guard despite the lessons on adolescent development we should know. Now let me not approach this topic sheepishly.

If it is true that public schools in general get a bad rap, then it is especially true that "urban" schools get maligned for the failures they manifest. Dozens of movies have been made with the theme that goes..."Predominatly Black and Hispanic schools are out of control." Dangerous Minds and Lean On Me are two of the most memorable examples of cinema depicting urban schools that are all but unsalvagable. Recent documentaries on Frederick Douglass High School in Baltimore Maryland, and Little Rock High School in Arkansas remind us that the problem is not purely ficticious. In fact the issues are prevalent and real. At the core of problems in most of these schools, weather they are large metro schools in Los Angelos or Chicago, or small urban villages such as the middle school where I am assistant principal, is an entrenched subculture of apathy and disrespect for authority connected to poverty.

Sometime we conveniently refer to a variety of societal factors in order to obsolve students for not engaging opportunities that public schools still hold for them. However, few people discuss the impact of individual will on a student's achievement or failure in school. I contend that the law of attraction manifests in school frequently. Just as water and dust find their own levels and collect to create a dominant environment, so to do poverty and apathy. People often over look, or disregard the fact the public school districts are the major employers -- if not the only employers in many low income communities. Consequently, the contrast between community norms and common middle class expectations of most America schools becomes blurred.

In as much as I am an adminstrator of public schools, and a Black person, I am not given over to apathy on the subject, nor am I motivated by self-loathing. Instead I feel compelled to explore answers to these all too familiar phenomenon, and address myself to their installation when I can. That brings me back to my collegue. When there exists in schools an unbridled inclanation by many students to do as they please, without regard to authority, your school has been seriously undermined by social norms that make educational success a virtual impossibility for the school's majority.

When aggregated, student defiance of routine direction from teachers, and their antipathy for rules constitute the majority of infractions in most schools. However, when schools are sizable and obstinance is so frequent that it demoralizes teachers, it can create a stagnant pool for negative norms to culture and grow. Norms that burden a school with the invisible pull of their gravity. In affect, it becomes likely that only a fraction of your most fortuitous students will succeed on par with pupils in schools where a traditional learning environment prevails. Until administrators hold truely high expectations for both the routine and infrequent conduct of pupils, and stand against the enabling behavior of some parents and staff, more lofty aims for academic achievement will be weighted under by a culture that works against them. Novel prescriptions like school uniforms and affirming speeches will never be more affective then a persistent expectation for mutual consideration and respect.

Many Ways to Pray

Somaly Mam is a true life heroine. A real super hero. What she has done, and is doing, is an utterly remarkable work of God manifesting in human beings. As a child in her native Cambodia, Mam was sold into sexual slavery and suffered the most vile cruelties. She survived, by the Grace of Allah and her own human resolve. She now operates a foundation and functions as a modern day Harriet Tubman.

Reading Mam's book, The Road of Lost Innocence, I am reminded of the truth of God: There are no chosen people. There is only triumph over evil by compassion through the universal principle of love. I will not review the book here. However, I encourage you to read it, if only as a hedge against your own complacency and self pity. I warn you, however. Although Mam writes a poignant account of her experience, free of the titillating details, her story will, literally speaking, pinch your heart.

Schooling Black Children, Part I

Addressing this topic is like running a gauntlet. The title alone is enough to peak interest, or cause one to dismiss it immediately. People seem only to want to discuss issues generically anymore. Despite the most earnest intentions, if you tinge the discussion with race, you immediately polarize readers. And not just along racial lines. Blacks as well as whites would rather not discuss these matters in mixed company -- no matter how strong their points of view. And other ethnic groups expect that the discussion simply does not pertain to them at all. So why bother?

I am going to muse openly about educating black children -- not only because it is a topic dear to me, but it is an area where I can claim some expertise. I am a public school teacher and administrator, and father of two school-aged children. And, yes, I am African-American. This little fact is not only important for full disclosure, but I have had occasion to find myself in a pivotal role as the single black figure in a predominately suburban (white) school, where minority children look to me with optimism. Or, like presently, I routinely lay down the discipline in a predominately black middle school.

Next, I want to make some statements of truth that I have come to learn in my experience. Black and white children have equal learning ability across the board. Despite the much vaunted "learning gap" their is no innate advantage I can discern. [Variables such as quality teachers, competent administrators, and supportive environments outside of school cannot be discounted in the equasion.] White teachers do not routinely and openly discriminate against black children in the way of the Little Rock Nine, or in the manner described by figures like Malcolm X in his autobiography (i.e, "You should do something more reasonable for a person of your race...") -- at least it is not commonplace anymore. Public schools still posses huge possibilities for economically disadvantaged students and their families to gain a leg up -- even in poor inner city communities. Finally, there is an educational deficit facing urban (black) youth that cannot be denied.

Rather than report the numerous deficits experienced by black children in various quality of life indicators, I'll refer you to the published work by the Smiley Group (The Covenant), or the National Urban League's annual report. Or you can refer to the May 16 issue of The Economist magazine (Black America). My objections is not with the facts, or with the perspectives commonly espoused; it is with the assumptions, platitudes and covert discrimination that predominate education for black children, especially those from families who are poor and unable to navigate their way through the system.

One peeve of have is with the inevitable comparisons of black students to whites. Whatever indicator you choose to measure achievement among students -- state assessments, SAT scores, drop-out rates, etc. -- there is an objective level of attainment that spells success, despite how well white children do comparably. All of the research mentioned routinely uses racial comparisons to dramatize the failure of black children. If black students under perform against white students, then, is it true that once the "achievement gap" is somehow closed, we can again sing Cum-by-ya?" Or will black students next have to surpass Asian students who are increasingly outperforming white students now-- in math and science? In fact, if there is to be any comparison at all, should not black students be measured against those in first place...not in second? You see...That story is not sexy enough for the race-based superiority complex in America.

Children of all races need to be made ready to compete in the best college enviroments they can afford and, ultimately, at the highest rungs of the national economy they can ascend. There is an objective standard of achievement they need to meet --irrespective of how another ethnic group is performing. That is the best way to know you are getting an education.

Education

There is much to say on this topic. In fact, because the term is so broad, it implies an almost unlimited number of possible subjects. For my purposes I am referring, specifically, to the subject of formal (public) education. And, generally, to the subject of education derived from individual, self-driven study. I make a life for myself as a public school administrator. So naturally, I have a perspective on education that manifests in a number of opinions on how our schools work for, or against, the pursuit of education. However, I thrive in this life as a result of my own self-driven pursuit of "true knowledge of self," and the peace and understanding that comes from that pursuit.

I must admit that I came into public education aimlessly. After a prior "career" on the fringes of public administration, I decided to cash in my certificate of eligibility from the New Jersey Department of Education and 'go into the classroom.' I was motivated by a latent activist spirit and the need to create a stable lifestyle for my yet unborn children to join in with me. The only real training I had were the models afforded me by a handful of my best teachers from elementary and secondary school. However, I was full of idealism from the charge to go forth and 'give back to your community' gotten from my HBCU experience. This, layered with a considerable survey of black nationalist literature, formed my approach to working in public education -- in the beginning.

In the past ten years, I have gone from an idealistic classroom teacher in an urban (IE., predominately black) school with almost missionary zeal, to an administrator in a suburban (predominantly white) school and back again. I now work in one of New Jersey's thirty plus "Abbott Schools." The state's supreme court ruled that Pleasantville, NJ is one of dozens of municipalities in the state that cannot provide a 'thorough and efficient' education to its residents do to economic inequalities that form the basis for school funding. Basically, the school district is on welfare so that it can educate its children to meet the state's standards. The students attending this school are overwhelmingly black and Hispanic. Not surprisingly, these experiences provide me an advantageous perspective on the topic of education which I plan to expound upon in subsequent installments. However, I will close this entry with a series of guiding questions derived from the experiences I've had so far in my career.

What is an education? What is the goal of public education? Are racial factors contributing to the (comparative) underachievement among blacks and Hispanics?...or is it a red herring? What should children be learning?