Think Radical Reconstruction

In the hunt for a job, I kept seeing a posting for an English teacher at a charter high school in one of the worst communities in the country:  Englewood.  So, I applied, over and over again.  Finally, an HR person responded and said she didn’t want to waste my time because I fell outside their salary range.  I asked her to state the pay; she did; I accepted and was granted an interview which consisted of teaching a class of sophomores at the end of the day, at the end of a week, which was at the end of a semester, and they had already run off one teacher.

Even though, as a veteran teacher from the projects, I walked into that classroom thinking I was ready.  I informed the class that the lesson was one of self-discovery, taken from the 7 Habits of Highly Effective Teens.  However, on that late Friday afternoon, they didn’t give a damn about self-discovery.   The department chair, a young white man in blue jeans, came in  with a lap top and sat focused on it; until at one point he got up and said: “While most of you are working, there are a few of you being disruptive”; then he sat back down and attended the lap top. But I begged his pardon and stated, “NO. MOST OF YOU ARE NOT FOCUSSED.” Then, I asked the chair about their discipline policy. Of course, 90% of discipline is handled by the classroom teacher, yet there was detention. Consequently, I asked the day-to-day sub to go get detention slips. She inquired did I want just one; “NO,” I replied, “ I’LL NEED SIX OR MORE.” That’s when the room quieted and we finished the lesson.  (If I had it to do again, I would spend that hour just getting to know them.  Only at the end would I introduce a more structured approach to self discovery)

Note, the average urban classroom consists of students who get up and walk around for no apparent reason; some who shout out; others who don’t listen, and some who are fearful, so they disrupt: gossiping, hitting, cussin’ & fussin’.  This is the reality. Yet every inner city school changes its name to “college prep” or “academy” and installs a curriculum designed to prepare students to take tests.  In areas plagued by poverty, violence, and broken families, a course of study that reveals talents and the wonders of life should be tried.  Reading, writing, arithmetic, and critical thinking skills can be taught within the wider context of political, cultural,  environmental, and spiritual AWARENESS.

Here is my recurring point:  More choice among equally challenged schools is no choice at all.  And a longer school day of more test preparation is not an improvement.  Think radical restructuring of what we teach and how we teach it.  Think travel; think cyber exploration; think student experimentation, creation, and decision making.  I hear you saying, “ This will never happen, will never work.”  Well, never say never.  Didn’t think you’d see a Black president either, did you? 

A Case for Nonresistance

If I had known then what I know now, my actions would have been heroic, maybe.  Minus the crystal ball, however, my fall was merely the consequence of a fatal flaw: the inclination to fight.  Graduation day in the spring of 2002, I was awarded a doctorate in education.  I cried.  The tears signified a battle I was going to lose.  

Three years after that fateful day, and scores of Friday nights venting with colleagues, I decided to run for teacher representative on the local school council.  My campaign speech was one sentence only: “If you elect me, I’ll convey the truth as I know it.” Well, I won. My first report to the LSC declared: “The school is toxic.  The administration is rehiring retired cronies who are collecting a pension in addition to a salary. Furthermore, the principal keeps a hit list targeting those she dislikes. And, team teaching is a debacle, since special education teachers are paired with “regular” teachers without rhyme, reason, or preparation.  Last but not least, the school is only concerned with appearances. Teachers and staff are required to sing and dance to the same tune in a bad show called No Child Left Behind.  We paint our faces and shuffle our feet.”  It goes without saying; this report put me on the hit list.  I sued the Board of Education: fought the law and the law won.

 I didn’t ponder the repercussions of challenging a principal who had patently and deliberately waited 40 years to be queen on her throne. No, I reacted to the oppressive environment, the meaningless meetings, the show.  I was outraged that higher test scores represented a god to whom we were to pay homage, a god that hijacked 90% of the curriculum. I was moved by the frustration and demoralization of my friends and colleagues, who did what demoralized individuals often do—take their  frustrations out on those less fortunate—the students.  However, 21^st Century youth retaliate.

Inner city students perceive hypocrisy with the acuity of those who have been lied to.  They respond to condescension and contempt with disregard and violence.  Teachers were regularly threatened and assaulted. But more than this, students turned on themselves.  Fights occurred frequently, girls being particularly violent. One day, as a group of young women fought from the first floor to the third. I tried to stop it. Turning a colleague’s sarcastic suggestion into what I regarded as a plausible rationale for a return to sanity, I declared: “Boys don’t like girls who fight,” and was calmly informed, “My nigga like a bitch who’s got his back.” Given this kind of thinking, it’s ridiculous that urban schools main goal is to raise test scores.  Change hearts and minds.

   I wrote letters to Arne Duncan, then CEO of CPS; Michael Scott, the President of CPS; Donald Pittman, acting head of high schools; and Linda Perzchalski, the Area Instructional Officer; I even wrote to Mayor Daley!  I begged them all, “Look at what’s really going on; look at our communities, look at the misogyny; look at the self-hatred, look at the violence and destruction.  Raise consciousness,” I argued,  “and test scores will follow.   Where is the courageous, unselfish leadership that will actually put children first?” I asked. The answer was the Chicago Board of Education is a circulatory system that feeds and protects itself at the expense of those they are supposed to serve.

So, I left that system and began working as an administrator in a new high school run by a charter company.  Guess what? They were even worse.  Teachers were allowed to kick out students for any reason whatsoever; some sending half or more of their classes to in-school-suspension. The long term answer to discipline problems became transferring the worst students to neighboring high schools.  The solution to closing the achievement gap became changing grades and test scores. 

Determined to do better, I brought together teachers, administrators, parents and community.  I proposed an all girls school of performing arts, grades 6-12, on the West Side of Chicago, funded through Mayor Daley’s Renaissance 2010 Program.  But, after much work, my design team discovered our efforts were wasted from the start.  A top official at CPS central office had already selected the curriculum and the school to be established.  That defeat was the beginning of my stupefying search for employment, documented in an earlier blog.

Finally, regarding nonresistance, rather than challenging a bad principal, No Child Left Behind, and Chicago politics, I should have kept my mouth shut.  Yet, that’s the thing about fatal flaws: they are part of your character, what makes you you.  I couldn’t tell my students to fight for what they believe in if I wasn’t willing to fight.  And if I wasn’t willing to fight, who would I be?