Ironic - I finished the post on Antoine's memorial, picked up my notes to see what I'd been thinking about writing next, and found it was MN graduation rates.
According to stats from 2004-06, black students in MN are currently graduating at a rate of 62%. Antoine did graduate, as did all the boys I knew who were at his memorial today.
What did that get him? Or the rest of them? Two had gone on to college, but neither is going back. The rest - not so much.
Overall, MN is down to an 85% graduation rate, though 91% of the state's current workforce has graduated from high school. Why the drop? Why are kids opting not to finish? What does the diploma offer them that they can't get without it? What does it guarantee?
I'm getting like Melissa - all questions, no answers!
Sunday, May 25, 2008
Gun Violence in My Life
I attended a memorial today for Antoine, a former student who was killed this spring. In spite of the tragedy, I was glad to have the chance to see many former students - most graduates '06 or '07 - who I might otherwise have lost touch with. As I told the young man who organized it, sometimes bringing people together is the best we can do!
I was so proud of him: organizing any event when you're 19 isn't easy, especially a memorial service for a friend who shouldn't be dead! But it was lovely. We had a cook-out in the park, with a time for people to share their thoughts about Antoine, a prayer, and the release of a ton of balloons, each with a little message written & tied to it. Cool.
I remember vividly the moment I first heard about the shooting of a student of mine: fall of 1995. I was just starting my third year of teaching. We were in the copy room in the morning, and someone came in with the news, and I remember suddenly crying, and being embarrassed to be crying in front of colleagues. He was a 9th grader, shot while riding his bike - not an accident. I remember attending the funeral, and planning things at school to help our students process & grieve.
I don't remember where I was when I heard about the next student of mine who had been shot - it was after the fact so I couldn't attend the funeral, and it was a couple years after she'd moved on from our school, so not too many people were left who remembered her. But I did. She was killed because someone was playing with a gun in the next room and it accidentally went off & shot right through the door of the room she was in.
So this is the third student gun death - that I know of - of my kids. And, shockingly, pathetically, it actually does get easier. Maybe this is how we cope. If it didn't get easier, I guess at some point we would just stop functioning.
I was so proud of him: organizing any event when you're 19 isn't easy, especially a memorial service for a friend who shouldn't be dead! But it was lovely. We had a cook-out in the park, with a time for people to share their thoughts about Antoine, a prayer, and the release of a ton of balloons, each with a little message written & tied to it. Cool.
I remember vividly the moment I first heard about the shooting of a student of mine: fall of 1995. I was just starting my third year of teaching. We were in the copy room in the morning, and someone came in with the news, and I remember suddenly crying, and being embarrassed to be crying in front of colleagues. He was a 9th grader, shot while riding his bike - not an accident. I remember attending the funeral, and planning things at school to help our students process & grieve.
I don't remember where I was when I heard about the next student of mine who had been shot - it was after the fact so I couldn't attend the funeral, and it was a couple years after she'd moved on from our school, so not too many people were left who remembered her. But I did. She was killed because someone was playing with a gun in the next room and it accidentally went off & shot right through the door of the room she was in.
So this is the third student gun death - that I know of - of my kids. And, shockingly, pathetically, it actually does get easier. Maybe this is how we cope. If it didn't get easier, I guess at some point we would just stop functioning.
Sunday, May 18, 2008
It's Equality, Stupid
The Hillary Clinton presidential campaign has me thinking about and noticing sexism is ways I haven't in recent years. And it's not just me: two newspaper commentaries today echo my concerns:
The New York Times Magazine has a piece by Peggy Orenstein called The Hillary Lesson ruminating about what our daughters are learning from her candidacy. Is it "We've come a long way, baby" or "We've got a long way yet to go?"
Her statistics point to the latter: Only 16% of governors and 16% of members of Congress are female, and only 24% of state legislators are female. Only 12 out of 500 of the top executives of Fortune 500 companies are female - less than 3%.
Sigh.
Lori Sturdevant, in a political commentary piece in the Strib today called "Dont Despair", takes the opposite tack with the same info - stats in MN are better than the national average, so we have much to be proud of. Our current legislature is 34% female, with a female house speaker. She also cites several significant legislative accomplishments that happened because a woman or women were in power.
Amen.
But interestingly, it's not just the women writing on this issue: George Will, who we can always count on to make the sexist position sound practical and reasonable, writes about Clinton's run in "The Prize Clinton Isn't Owed" (reprinted in the Strib as "The Other Part of Equality is Losing".) The second half of the article is boring Clinton-bashing, but the first part is interesting. He makes the point that you know you're equal when you're treated badly:
When, in 1975, Frank Robinson became major league baseball's first African American manager, with the Cleveland Indians, that was an important milestone. But an even more important one came two years later, when the Indians fired him. That was real equality: Losing one's job is part of the job description of major league managers, because sacking the manager is one of the few changes a floundering team can make immediately. So, in a sense, Robinson had not really arrived until he was told to leave. Then he was just like hundreds of managers before him.
Thus, he asserts, Clinton should take the calls to bow out of the race as a compliment. I don't agree, but I am always impressed by his ability to make sexism (or racism - or whatever he's peddaling at the moment) not only palatable, but even seem logical.
Gee thanks - not much there to advance the discourse. Orenstien, on the other hand, gives us genuine food for thought as she points out that framing gender as something to be "overcome" is not necessarily in a young girl's best interest:
Right now, my daughter doesn’t know about the obstacles she may face someday, and I’m not sure of the wisdom of girding her in advance. Even the supposedly “girl positive” picture books, designed to address this very issue, pose a dilemma. Take “Elenita,” a magical-realist tale, given to my daughter by a family friend, about a girl who wants to be a glass blower. Her father says she can’t do it: she’s too little, and besides, the trade is forbidden to women. The lesson, naturally, is that with a little ingenuity girls can be glass blowers or stevedores or [fill in the blank]. Nice. Still, I found myself hesitating over the “girls can’t” section. My daughter has never heard that “girls can’t be” or “girls can’t do.” Why should I plant the idea in her head only to knock it down?
Indeed, I think this relates to my concerns about how we kids teach about slavery in America - even telling the stories of overcoming, we are still laying out the paradigm of inequality as the base from which all else grows. What would happen if we quit framing our culture in those terms and just taught our kids what it takes to get ahead?
Food for thought!
The New York Times Magazine has a piece by Peggy Orenstein called The Hillary Lesson ruminating about what our daughters are learning from her candidacy. Is it "We've come a long way, baby" or "We've got a long way yet to go?"
Her statistics point to the latter: Only 16% of governors and 16% of members of Congress are female, and only 24% of state legislators are female. Only 12 out of 500 of the top executives of Fortune 500 companies are female - less than 3%.
Sigh.
Lori Sturdevant, in a political commentary piece in the Strib today called "Dont Despair", takes the opposite tack with the same info - stats in MN are better than the national average, so we have much to be proud of. Our current legislature is 34% female, with a female house speaker. She also cites several significant legislative accomplishments that happened because a woman or women were in power.
Amen.
But interestingly, it's not just the women writing on this issue: George Will, who we can always count on to make the sexist position sound practical and reasonable, writes about Clinton's run in "The Prize Clinton Isn't Owed" (reprinted in the Strib as "The Other Part of Equality is Losing".) The second half of the article is boring Clinton-bashing, but the first part is interesting. He makes the point that you know you're equal when you're treated badly:
When, in 1975, Frank Robinson became major league baseball's first African American manager, with the Cleveland Indians, that was an important milestone. But an even more important one came two years later, when the Indians fired him. That was real equality: Losing one's job is part of the job description of major league managers, because sacking the manager is one of the few changes a floundering team can make immediately. So, in a sense, Robinson had not really arrived until he was told to leave. Then he was just like hundreds of managers before him.
Thus, he asserts, Clinton should take the calls to bow out of the race as a compliment. I don't agree, but I am always impressed by his ability to make sexism (or racism - or whatever he's peddaling at the moment) not only palatable, but even seem logical.
Gee thanks - not much there to advance the discourse. Orenstien, on the other hand, gives us genuine food for thought as she points out that framing gender as something to be "overcome" is not necessarily in a young girl's best interest:
Right now, my daughter doesn’t know about the obstacles she may face someday, and I’m not sure of the wisdom of girding her in advance. Even the supposedly “girl positive” picture books, designed to address this very issue, pose a dilemma. Take “Elenita,” a magical-realist tale, given to my daughter by a family friend, about a girl who wants to be a glass blower. Her father says she can’t do it: she’s too little, and besides, the trade is forbidden to women. The lesson, naturally, is that with a little ingenuity girls can be glass blowers or stevedores or [fill in the blank]. Nice. Still, I found myself hesitating over the “girls can’t” section. My daughter has never heard that “girls can’t be” or “girls can’t do.” Why should I plant the idea in her head only to knock it down?
Indeed, I think this relates to my concerns about how we kids teach about slavery in America - even telling the stories of overcoming, we are still laying out the paradigm of inequality as the base from which all else grows. What would happen if we quit framing our culture in those terms and just taught our kids what it takes to get ahead?
Food for thought!
Friday, May 09, 2008
Post from the East Coast
In 15 years in education, I have never taken more than a long weekend off, so 4 whole days is a radical thing for me! My kid has finished her freshman year & I'm going out to help her move out of the dorm, then we're going to hang out for a few days, then she'll come home with me for a couple weeks.
Whirlwind!
I leave tomorrow and won't post on the trip, but here's to the blessing of being mobile and able to go to her when she needs me. We are so blessed.
Whirlwind!
I leave tomorrow and won't post on the trip, but here's to the blessing of being mobile and able to go to her when she needs me. We are so blessed.
Tuesday, May 06, 2008
Cinco de What?
Racism pops up in funny ways. This year it's all about illegal immigration. In 14 years of working in public schools, I never heard anyone say anything negative about Cinco de Mayo. Folks may not know the history of what it's celebrating, but hey, a party's a party!
But this year, I actually heard two co-workers complain about celebrating it at school, even though 1/4 of our kids are Latino. The gist of the concern is that we should be teaching American history, not Mexican history.
And then I saw this cartoon, by Scott Stantis. Perfect!
But this year, I actually heard two co-workers complain about celebrating it at school, even though 1/4 of our kids are Latino. The gist of the concern is that we should be teaching American history, not Mexican history.
And then I saw this cartoon, by Scott Stantis. Perfect!
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)