A number of people have argued that academic failure and the dropout rate are intrinsically linked to poverty and attempts to impact it are doomed to fail. They conclude that the only solution is to eliminate poverty itself.
I believe that such arguments run counter to historical evidence and educational research. Historically, educational success has provided upward mobility to successive waves of immigrants and their descendents. Empirically, it has been shown that it is possible to eliminate the effects of poverty though high quality educational programs. Pragmatically, there are school districts that do a better job than Minneapolis and there are charter schools in Minneapolis that do a better job with "poor" students than the District. How much evidence do we need to be convinced that you can teach poor children? I believe that the assumption that the effects of poverty are untreatable serves the same function as previous claims that Blacks cannot be educated because they are intellectually inferior. It justifies a policy of inaction and maintains the status quo. The MPS are structured to fulfill the desires, needs, and expectations of middle-class Whites. This becomes blatantly obvious when people respond to calls to reform the system with, "The obvious question is: how do we fix this problem without destroying the successful functioning of schools..." Well, the schools are not functionally successfully for 47% of their students. They are functionally well for Whites in South and Southwest Minneapolis. That's the successful functioning that people don't want destroyed when they rationalize keeping the system the way it is by claiming that changing the system will not help the 47% of students who are failing. Shame! Shame is the honest emotion that should be felt by the citizens of Minneapolis. Steve Cross wrote: > I think that it's quite a revelation that all the MPS are > doing is to "throw up their hands and say that there's nothing they > can do." I've never seen nor heard of anyone from the MPS > even implying that the present results are acceptable. To say that > they are "throwing up their hands" insults a lot of good and > dedicated people. It's not unusual for the truth to insult a lot of good and dedicated people and it's not unusual for good and dedicated people to be blind to systemic changes that are beneficial. Indeed, Mr. Cross seems to be blind to the fact that there are reforms that have been proven effective by other school districts and yet the most the MPS can come up with is schools-with-schools. A "reform" that is tailor fit to maintain inequalities (you end up with the same racial imbalances in the schools by just rename them and creating virtual boundaries). So...where is the data on the impact of the MPS latest reform? Please recall that their previous reform, small class sizes, resulted in little creditable progress and also maintained the status quo by "keeping everyone in their place." Robert P. Goldman wrote: > The obvious question is: how do we fix this problem without destroying > the successful functioning of schools that have teams that have worked > together well for years? Why is this the obvious question? Maybe the answer is that you don't. Maybe you reform the system in order to achieve a high level of social justice. > I'm all for seeing this problem addressed, but I'm worried that the > obvious "solution" will be a ham-fisted scattering of the existing > body of experienced teachers across the whole system. That would just > create a system-side disfunction in place of a localized one. I've > worked with the government (and large businesses) long enough to know > that easy solutions to fairness issues often involve leveling down, > instead of leveling up. Leveling down just leaves everybody worse > off. Remember, if you're inclined to be ok with leveling down, that > you can easily just move your accomplishment gap into a public > school/private school gap, and THAT one is a heck of a lot less > amenable of solution, since you aren't going to be able to level up OR > down across that one, and it's likely to rip away a big hunk of the > tax base needed to do any improvements to the MPS. Interesting, this was one of the arguments against desegregation and equal opportunity programs. :-| > ... Michael's point was that we're not going to eliminate > poverty, so we've just got to fix (and blame) the schools. But that's > like saying "I'm never going to be able to afford a wrench, so I'll > just have to hit this bolt harder with my hammer." This statement misinterprets mine. I never accepted the position that poverty is the only factor limiting academic acheivement. I suggested that, even if we assume that it is, we should institute reforms to evaluate whether they result in improvements...just in case it turns out to be untrue. If Mr. Cross' assumption is false, then failing to take action accomplishes nothing, other than the perpetuation of an unjust system. I believe that I've already provided enough evidence to show that there are viable reforms that disprove the poverty/society assumption, but you are not countering those arguments, you are just ignoring them. Michael Atherton Prospect Park REMINDERS: 1. Be civil! Please read the NEW RULES at http://www.e-democracy.org/rules. If you think a member is in violation, contact the list manager at [EMAIL PROTECTED] before continuing it on the list. 2. Don't feed the troll! Ignore obvious flame-bait. 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