Inner city schools....

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see this blog...
http://kristof.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/0 ... y-schools/

Thanks for the article I'll add it to my collection... that pisses me off.. but im not surprised that i'm pissed off about it, because everything the american gov does it stupid and wrong.. or the world gov...

No wonder why most American teens do not know much about their own communities: standardized testing.

Time to abolish it.

IF ...

... African civilisations has developed as far and as fast as European cultures, there would be more curricula of interest to African-American students.

... Classes fail to foster intellectual curiosity, students will lose interest in learning.

... Educators do not demand critical thinking, students will learn to believe any irrational idea that comes along, including those that perpetuate social myths.

... Educators do not offer materials that are relevant to the lives of the students or communities they live in, students will not learn to take pride in themselves or their communities.

... Educators do not understand why they are teaching certain material, they will lose their desire to teach and students will graduate high school with no academic abilities, critical thinking skills or social awareness.

... Lessons are unable to motivate students, students will stop going to school.

... Student did not attack and fight with teachers, the students would not get taken away in handcuffs.

... Students blame everyone but themselves for their own failures, they will never succeed.

... Students did not dress like prison inmates, they would not be told to pull their pants up.

... Students give up, they'll never control anything; not even their own lives.

... Students learn nothing in school, they will never become doctors or dentists, only common laborers and criminals.

... Students would conform and obey the rules, they would not get expelled.

... Students would learn everything they can, they would crack out of the ghettos.

... There were jobs that drop-outs could do for less money than an illegal immigrant, there would be a chance for them to succeed as drop-outs.

... Urban students would not deal drugs, carry weapons, and commit acts of violence, there would be no need for police in their schools.

And if education is no longer relevant, then education itself is pointless.

The situation is more complex than just a failing urban educational system. It involves teachers' unions that push experiments in "self-esteem" instead of critical thinking. It involves parents' groups that want school systems to conform to a set of standard that are narrowly defined to benefit a minority of students at the expense of education itself. It involves governmental bureaucracies that reward mediocrity and abhor real innovation and inventiveness. And it involves parents who deny the schools the authority to teach a science-based, common-sense curriculum, and who then blame the schools for turning out "graduates" who have no ide what critical thinking really means, and who have not even enough common sense to make a decision without the use of firearms.

The blog sounds about right for the middle school I went to, though mine wasn't nearly so bad. It was one of those social experiments gone horribly wrong, where they put the only advanced placement program available in the city in a school in a poor, crime ridden area. I think it was supposed to foster "diversity", but all it meant was that the advanced classes were still all white and Asian and the black kids in the regular program that lived in the area hated us. It wasn't much fun, I actually got kicked out in 8th grade cause I made one of those electric cigarette lighter into a shocker and they said it was a weapon. Turned out to be the best thing I could have done, I went to a normal middle school and was much happier, despite not being in the more advanced classes offered at the old school, it didn't feel like a war zone.

As far as fixing other schools go, I'm in favor of slashing the bureaucracy and handing out vouchers, give parents an alternative and force the public system to compete. As it is there is no accountability and no recourse if you live in the inner city, where under a voucher system the public system would have to shape up or face defections to privatization and a further shrinking budget. Competition would also help raise teacher's salaries, and thus bring more qualified applicants into the field, as well as making education a more viable career choice long term.

that's more of the American People (currently) and neglect from the government...but s**t like CIA crack, Katrina reactions and "all that" too..

Last edited by Warsie on 10 Oct 2008, 11:44 pm, edited 1 time in total.

HAHAAHAHAHAHAAHAHAHAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

to Timbuktu and Ethiopia's history and reports of the 13th tribe, and all sorts of other interesting things in Ethiopia, or the NATIVE AFRICAN CULTURES are NOT of interest, especially given Europe was in a backwards s**thole at the time muslim empires were in existence in northern africa and the middle east...that as well as sub saharan african empires
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/African_empires

not to mention examples like the Zulu warriors who defeated the UK in several battles



see the video linked from the articles?....



I'd like to see you survive in that environment.



not their fault other people-namely the society and those who deny people thsie culture and right of self-expression clamp down on it due to BS moralism...




heh...if you WANT to be a slave....



would you rather them continue the colonial mentality and 'paper bag parties' and whatnot? The stuff mentioned in the (admittedly not true) Willie Lynch Letter?

The American people?.. are you saying literally the people? yeah to a degree, but they are victims more so.. if they were awake to know what is going on perhaps they could stop it.. but america is dead, their life is drained from them

A friend of mine was a teacher in an inner-city school for a couple of years; her comment was that education is seen as 'white,' so getting educated is seen as cowing down to 'the man.' She thought that what we need is head start "starting prenatally," to teach kids to value education and value learning and break out of the cycle that says one is lying to oneself if one succeeds.
Another friend, who is a social worker with extremely troubled children, agreed with the above theory when asked about it. She said basically that the current situation is seen as 'ok' or at least 'normal' by the majority of the people trapped within it, and that kids often see getting out as somehow admitting that their parents were failures.

If you want to change someone's behavior, you're far more likely to succeed if you can find a way for them to do it without losing face.

^^ That's pretty much it. Excuse me ... Word, yo!

Shockingly enough, black immigrants from the Caribbean and Africa earn quite a bit more than native born African Americans on average. And it isn't through decrying the whiteness of things like an education and moderately professional behavior, my experience would suggest.

I think public education would be a lot better if it was controlled more by state/city governments, because the giant federal bureaucracy's one-size-fits-all approach is obviously failing us. Not to mention the obvious faults of standardized testing...

I definitely agree with the blog's point about school not being engaging. I've always hated school so much, and I've found it so boring. It was rarely ever challenging to me and the other smart kids who were put under this glass ceiling. They seem to be caring more about teaching to the lowest common denominator these days as to "not hurt anyone's feelings" and all that malarkey. There really isn't much leeway for people to proceed at their own pace. When I was in 4th grade, you wouldn't believe how long we spent on doing long division when I was ready to move onto new things after day 2 (I think we spent a few months on it, if I'm not mistaken). It got to the point where I just started trying less and less, because it seems so nil. I felt like I was held back for so long that it just entirely killed my spirit to learn. I'd like to hear other "above average" peoples' thoughts on this.

Primary, secondary, or post-secondary school?

I actually didn't learn how to do multiplication beyond times tables until I was in, IIRC, 5th grade. I recovered, of course, but I'm surprised they let me slip through the cracks like that.

I don't remember much at all from middle and high school wrt academics. It wasn't a really good learning environment for me, for whatever reason. The only reason I got good grades was because I knew things from earlier and, to be quite honest, the same has extended to my college experience. I'm not learning a lot that's new here, although the situation has improved somewhat as the semesters go by and I take more specialized classes.

given they were pretty damn complicit in the genocide of the natives and enslavmement of African, yes a LOT of it is, for lack of a better term, WHITE AMERICA. Granted the government participated in a LOT of this too



I really don't think too much of White America cares about what happens in the Afro-American community. Granted this depends, etc.



given the BS they teach in History (see christopher columbus, for example). YES it IS from a PREDOMINATELY WHITE VIEW. You rarely hear things like the FOUNDING FATHERS OWNING SLAVES in the history books or the Mexican-American War..



arguably that's Euro-centric views on behavior.



incorrect. Euro-centric education that has no practical use for their current predicament is 'white'; especially given what the purpose of that outdated-style of education is. Compare that with parts of the city that are, for lack of a better term; "better" (Chicago Debate League is a prime example of that; so glad we didnt have to go against those Single A bastards from (majority) North Side schools...




given what a lot of that 'education' is....also see the video by Dead Prez 'they schools'

http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=w ... evwBBwbn6A

EDIT: part of what you said is arguably very true...what with people adjusting to their environment and not knowing other places...

Well, a hell of a lot of Americans aren't even descended from the slave owners. They're Germans and Russians and Poles and Czechs who came through Ellis Island during the Gilded Age. They were exploited too-the conditions in a Gilded Age factory were pretty similar to an urban plantation, and Europeans considered American workers to be de facto slaves who were paid just enough to keep the lid on. Ever wonder WHY there's a public education system in the US where one is required to vow allegiance to the country every morning? It's because the moneyed elites worried that all the immigrants they were bringing in would eventually get the idea to topple them, and since they had little allegiance to "Americanism", there was nothing to stop them from doing so. There was considerable fear of rampant fifth columns being sown in the cities, and as late as the early 1920s there were cells of foreign anarchists running around.



Well, ok, but only because they've been socialized into American racism. Sadly, the bad Americanisms spread faster than the good ones.





Ok, I have to give you this one. Even the white kids think education is boring, and they're the ones being catered to! I grew up in a wealthy white area, and all of the kids thought that education had no point. The point was to earn a degree to work at Daddy's firm. They already knew that they could waltz in and be VP due to family connections, so the rest was superfluous. Those of us whose dads weren't Masters of the Universe were viewed as lesser beings. I had my tires slashed in HS, repeatedly, and the molding stolen off my car. [/quote]

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News flash: the WT I went to school with didn't see the relevance of history to their lives just because they have the same color skin as the people being talked about.