Arizona ban on ethnic studies.

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   mikelongposted 13 years ago

   So many people speak about education, but it is obvious that few here are educators, or evidently know any.
   
   As and educator, coming from a family of educators (my mother and cousin both work for the LAUSD, my sister for the Richmond District in Bay Area) I speak now about where education funds go....
   
   Publishers make a killing....
   
   Just by removing their leech-like strangle-hold on district budgets would loose all kinds of funds...
   
   And then there are the construction contracts....and the vast sums handed over to developers.....like at my sister's school, for example.
   
   The Richmond District is one of the poorest, and most dangerous in the state, it has just recently (past 10 years) come out of bankruptcy, and one of its schools is on the nation's most underperforming schools list....
   
   And it is freshly built....it looks new, but uninspiring on the outside and fails on the inside...
   
   My sister's school itself recently replaced the bullet-ridden windows with "bullet-proof" glass....or so they were told...
   
   And then someone broke into my sister's classroom and took her best computers and other equipment...by breaking one of these windows...
   
   The windows were specially crafted, and now all this work has to be redone so that the originally purchased glass can be set....of course, all this construction is going on while the youth are sitting in the classrooms.....there is no waiting until the end of the school day...
   
   My sister's school is the best performing in the district....and somehow it ended up on the top of the list of schools to be closed....with the youth to be distributed to locations further away, often across gang boundaries, forcing youth of elementary school age to walk through streets that are, on a nearly daily basis, combat zones.
   
   It was only through my sister's undying efforts through the local media, city council, and school board that the money was found for them to continue on a limited basis...what if they can't raise the money again?
   
   
   The administrators and politicians who create policy (while taking hefty salaries) can, in many cases, care less about changing for the better....
   
   They see development contracts...they see money and "buddy systems".....the youth see drug abuse, prostitution, and may very well end up behind bars or worse.
   
   It is one thing to sit back in a nice, quiet neighborhood and ponder on what it must be like elsewhere...but, it is another to be in the trenches...
   
   Too many political armchair generals these days..... I want to see dirty hands before I hear the "great advices."

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      Piniksposted 13 years agoin reply to this

      I am also an educator.  Having worked for a couple years in LAUSD, I am not surprised by your stories.
      You obviously must already know then how a significant portion of the student body in that school district performs/does NOT perform.
      You are right, though, it costs a lot of money to provide school buildings and books for the kids. 
      I think a lot of the kids we see today need to stick to the basics and do not need any excuses or distractions.  Every time there is any type of protest that has anything to do with Hispanics kids from the LAUSD skip school to attend.  You must know that most if not ALL of those kids really can't afford to miss a single day of school there.
      Anyway, nice to talk to a fellow educator.  Sorry, if I went off topic.

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      Sab Ohposted 13 years agoin reply to this

      "So many people speak about education, but it is obvious that few here are educators, or evidently know any."
      
      
      Oh, brother...

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   mikelongposted 13 years ago

   I disagree with you fully.
   
   I attended San Fernando Middle School followed by Van Nuys High School....there was a completely different quality of teachers, a different relationship built between the majority of the students and the adminisration....kids would talk about what it must be like to go to a "white" school...they weren't told anything..this segregation was obvious to them even at that early age...
   
   My sister went to Sepulvida Junior High (it hadn't been converted to a middle school yet)...and I compare her experiences to my own...
   
   I teach youth in the LAUSD, Santa Clarita District, as well as in private schools.....and I see the differences in quality...
   
   From the changes in school years...from traditional to tracks, from junior high to middle school, back to traditional calendars, and then some back to tracking.....and the discrimination of the track system itself.....
   
   I see much inherent structural problem and waste....and now that San Fernando Middle School is going to be run by a company from out of state (government subsidizing private industry) we shall see what happens.... I have tutored youth from that school, my dear alma mater, over the past year, and have interviewed them regarding how this whole process is effecting them. 
   
   Real life....and disparity
   
   I must go, but will continue later...

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      Piniksposted 13 years agoin reply to this

      We might be talking about different time periods.
      However, within the past 20 years one of the administrators admitted that many those kids should have been held back but there was no room for them in the schools.
      I also recall during the Prop 189 protests so many kids were skipping school that the Daily Bulletin even ran pictures of some of these kids running wild and free in the streets, screwing around with shopping carts, etc. and they even wrote about it.  I remember them running an editorial which basically told the kids: you need to stay in school and get an education.  You don't fool us cutting class.  Protest on a Saturday--when school is closed--then you'll impress us. 
      I was not taking a personal shot at you.  I remember how the pay scale was influenced by WHICH parts of the LAUSD you worked in back in '89-'91.  Two of my kids now attend schools in that district and ONE of them is making sure she does her work and is getting straight As.
      I'm not sure where we disagree really.  As a fellow teacher you know we only have so much time to teach.  Perhaps,as I said, we are talking about different time periods.

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   mikelongposted 13 years ago

   You might be referring to Proposition 187 (when I was in 11th grade) and Prop 209 more recently...
   
   But I didn't know that people (regardless of age) who politically express themselves counts as "skipping school."
   
   Additionally, for those two days of protests amid the 30 plus years that I have been in Los Angeles.....I think that is pointing at the pin puncture wound while ignoring the slit wrists...
   
   At Van Nuys High School (the multi-ethnic, multi-racial-though mostly white and Korean-magnet school with the perfect SAT scores and Medical, Math-Science, and Performing Arts programs envied by others...I witnessed more delinquency...
   
   At San Fernando Junior High we didn't even have lockers....they were there, but they were surrounded by fence and locked off because of the "drugs and guns"...which I no doubt existed...I had a friend who still brought a gun to school, and when I was involved in gang life we would carry clubs underneath our jackets, and others would carry switchblades..
   
   At the same time, at Van Nuys there was privilege....lockers...you could wear whatever clothing you liked (unlike San Fernando)....and you could carry water bottles...
   
   I can't think of how many times I knew magnet students walking around and going to class drunk because their bottles had Vodka in them... I was introduced to weed (though I didn't try it at the time), all kinds of other drugs, students having sex in the bathrooms after schoolstrip clubs, as well as sexual misconduct by teachers....
   
   I had several teachers at Van Nuys who would openly talk about their support of marijuana, s&m sex....I had a math teacher who called me "Long Mike" and asked me if I lived up to my name...
   
   I'm not saying that problems are confined to certain schools, but I am saying that students are treated differently based on the campus that they are on.
   
   I'd write more, but I'm running late...take care.

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      Piniksposted 13 years agoin reply to this

      I see!
      You thought I meant the only kids in LAUSD that needed to learn the basics and not worry about distractions were the Hispanic students.  Sorry.  No, that's not what I meant.
      I just used Hispanics as an example because of the Prop 187 issue.
      Cutting class, skipping school, being truant--for any reason is not acceptable.  If they wanted to attend and not be truant they could have discussed the issues with their parents and had a legal day out of school to protest but that is not what happened in a lot of cases.  It was disgraceful behavior on the part of many of the students in that district.  I'm am happily surprised you missed it.  it sounds like you did the right thing and went to all your classes.

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   mikelongposted 13 years ago

   No. I realize that you meant youth as a whole.
   
   I agree.
   
   I just wanted to ensure that certain groups of students weren't being targeted over others.
   
   Truancy issues have a variety of causes. But, with diminishing social services across California, it will be harder for those who work to protect youth to do their jobs.
   
   There is one case of truancy that I have been made aware of, involving a man who within the last year lost his wife. He lost the motivation to get up in the morning and take his daughter to school....and he has received a citation and has to appear in court.
   
   There are many reasons for truancy....and to point to two protests that lasted single days and try to depict the whole of students in this way is very skewed in my opinion.
   
   What did you teach, by any chance?
   
   As for the protesting....I think if one looks at the media reports the images can be slanted to whatever end one wishes.
   
   If you can point to specific things/acts that students did that bothered you your comment could be more effective...and I'd appreciate a response to this.
   
   I didn't miss anything.  In protest of Propostion 187 students walked off my campus...
   
   As for the more recent walkouts, I knew members of student organizations at the college level that were involved in motivating the younger students to walk out and protest.
   
   As for my participation, in high school my views were very conservative...based off what I had been taught by my family...
   
   I thought "illegals" should be thrown back where they came from...in those types of words...and this was what my father and grandfather would say....and when I got home I would watch Rush Limbaugh on prime time t.v....
   
   
   I had a close friend who was equally conservative...and we would talk against undocumented all the time....
   
   Of course, living in the Hollywood Hills, it was funny how his family had an undocumented woman living in their home as a domestic servant...cooking and cleaning for them....
   
   I noticed this hypocrisy....but justified it in my own way...
   
   I did stay in class.
   
   Over time, however, as I have learned more and expanded my experiences through the military, education, travelling, and just getting to know people who move about me my views have changed.
   
   
   I hear Rush Limbaugh today and I wish someone would take some of his blood for analysis...
   
   I see youth activism, though it isn't always organized the best, as clear signs of willingness to become involved in American society, as well as demonstrating an understanding about how to communicate with larger society in a non-violent, at least semi-organized way.
   
   There could have been real problems, am I not right?
   
   What if youth were angry, and had weapons, or had sought to destroy and riot?
   
   But they didn't.
   
   And Sab is useless as usual..  What a waster of time and energy.

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      Sab Ohposted 13 years agoin reply to this

      "Truancy issues have a variety of causes. But, with diminishing social services across California, it will be harder for those who work to protect youth to do their jobs."
      
      Well then, I guess CA shouldn't have F-ed up their economy, huh? I wonder how they did that?

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   mikelongposted 13 years ago

   Sab...you comments show that you have very little understanding of the Californian economy.
   
   Make sure you keep your day job, or whatever it is you do to keep yourself fed, clothed, and housed....for an  economic, political, or social commentator-role is definitely out of your league.

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      Sab Ohposted 13 years agoin reply to this

      "Sab...you comments show that you have very little understanding of the Californian economy."
      
      
      Is that what me comments show? Me sorry. Me guess California's economy is doing just great then.
      
      

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      Sab Ohposted 13 years agoin reply to this

      "Make sure you keep your day job, or whatever it is you do to keep yourself fed, clothed, and housed...."
      
      
      I guess your Mom and Dad make sure you don't have to worry about all that, eh?

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   mikelongposted 13 years ago

   Pathetic as usual Sab.
   
   It seems you have a hard time keeping on topic..
   
   Then again, when you have nothing actually to say that is of substance you kind've have to scrape for anything.
   
   When it comes to useless comments and scraping to avoid substance you win the grand prize.

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      Sab Ohposted 13 years agoin reply to this

      "Pathetic as usual Sab."
      
      
      It's disappointing that you feel the need to fall back on personal insults so often.

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      Sab Ohposted 13 years agoin reply to this

      "It seems you have a hard time keeping on topic.."
      
      
      This coming from YOU?! wow

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   wingedcentaurposted 13 years ago

   In order to have a fully integrated society we must have a fully integrated curriculum. What is the study of history today: white, male, heterosexual, upper class, political triumphalism - little more than kings and popes lists and lists of great battles. We still have a segregation of history in terms of "race," ethnicity, class, sexual orientation, and gender. This is why people feel the need to get niche validation: African-American Studies, Women's Studies (now called Gender Studies, I think), Gay Studies [not to mention that youngsters from wealthy families go to exclusive private schools to get elite class validation], and so forth.
   
   As a result of this general failure of our educational system, we don't really know how to be together across these lines. We keep things light, we talk about sports, shopping, and movies but there are certain places we don't "go" because we have gotten no support from our schools on how to deal, interpersonally, with the complicated legacy of the United States of America.
   
   Let me just close by saying, the sad irony about this ban on ethnic studies in Arizona, is that it may very well lead to the balkanization of American society, that these opponents of "multiculturalism" seek to avoid.
   
   wingedcentaur

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