Monday, December 13, 2010

Pasadena: Revised Images of Excellence

      Pasadena: Revised Images of Excellence is a descriptive account of Mike Rose’s time spent in Pasadena High School, specifically in the Graphic Arts Academy. Pasadena High School is a diverse school in California where students from all different social and economic backgrounds can be found. The school Principal, Judy Codding, created the Graphic Arts Academy as well as the Visual Arts Academy to combine academic and vocational work for students who might not see a point in strictly academic work. The programs set up internships for the students and gave them opportunities to take college classes as seniors. 
      I think that these vocational academies were a very smart idea. They give students who might otherwise drop out of school a reason to continue: the promise of an actual job. But beyond that, I think that the best thing about these programs is the way that all of the curriculum was intertwined. Chemistry, humanities, biology, and math are all taught in ways that make them relatable to graphic arts. The teachers of these subjects meet together on a regular basis to discuss ways to connect the material in successful ways. 
      Pasadena High School’s method of interdisciplinary teaching seems to be very successful, and I can see why. I know that I find it easier to pick up new information when it relates to something that I already understand or am interested in. One of the teachers that I have the best memories of is my fourth grade teacher, Mrs. Napalitano, because she was so good at making seamless transitions between subjects. There were times when I would go home and not even be able to distinguish between reading and science homework because everything was connected so well. I could never understand exactly how she did it, but I knew that it worked, and it made everything a lot easier. 
I think that all high schools should follow the example of PHS. By having teachers that actually communicate with each other, student needs can be more easily identified and learning, as well as teaching, can be made much more effortless. 

Tuesday, December 7, 2010

Idiot Nation

  Okay, I’m not going to lie, when I sat down to do this blog and saw that the reading was about twenty pages long, all I could think about was the insane amount of work that I have to do for this final week of classes and how there was no way that I would be reading Idiot Nation in its entirety. I figured I would skim the passage, write a quick blog, and move on to the rest of the books that I have to finish, papers I have to write, and art projects I have to complete. But when I started reading I found that I became very interested and really couldn’t stop. I expected it to be interesting since it was written by Michael Moore, (and I am a fan of most of his documentaries), but I didn’t expect to spend so much time reading and re-reading his work. 
  One of the big reasons why I enjoyed Idiot Nation was Moore’s sarcastic sense of humor, but above that I think I continued reading long after I had planned because it was so relatable. For example, I remember the “library” in my elementary school being very much like what he described most school libraries to be: a small room lined with bookshelves that were filled with outdated and water damaged books. I also see how teachers are constantly being blamed for all of America’s underachieving children since my mom is a teacher in the New York City public school system and the representative at her school for the United Federation of Teachers. I would hear horror stories every day of good teachers in jeopardy of losing their jobs because of low standardized test scores, or just because too much money was cut from the school budget to keep them. 
  Moore points out that the same people who are cutting funds for education are often the biggest critics of America’s teachers. Its obvious that more funding needs to be set aside for the public school system in order to prevent overcrowding, allow students access to up to date books, and keep good teachers in the classrooms. However, this funding doesn’t seem to be coming any time soon, and so many schools are looking to big name companies for money in exchange for advertising rights. People need to wake up and start trying to make a difference in the ways that schools are funded before the children of America are completely brainwashed with advertisements.

Wednesday, December 1, 2010

Savage Inequalities

     Jonathan Kozol’s Savage Inequalities describes the horrific conditions of Morris High, a public high school in the Bronx, New York. There are holes in the walls and ceilings, missing curtains, leaky windows, and even a colony of wild mushrooms growing in the corner of one room. While disgusted, Kozol does not seem surprised by the condition that the school is in. Morris High is a racially segregated school and a last resort for many children who can not get into, or fail out of, other high schools. Kozol mentions the specialized high schools in the New York City school system, and how they receive the best teachers and more funding, leaving the kids at high schools like Morris with very little. 
  While reading this I felt sympathetic with the children of Morris, but I was not very surprised by their story. I was enrolled in New York City public schools until the eighth grade, and I know from visiting different public high schools that the conditions are not always good. Up until the ninth grade, the public schools in my area were considered to be really good, better than the majority of the Catholic schools around. But for high school my parents and I knew that I would have to attend a private/Catholic school, because for whatever reason, the NYC high schools were much less successful. 
  If someone was planning on going to a public high school, they usually aimed to get into one of the specialized schools such as Brooklyn Tech or Stuyvesant by taking a qualifying exam. I remember how my friends would stress over that test because they knew that it could decide the rest of their lives. If they didn’t get admitted to at least one of the specialized schools, they could be put into a risky situation. 
  Jonathan Kozol’s ideas about having several schools in each city that are almost as good as the specialized schools to give kids more options seem very logical to me. They would eliminate the pressure that is put on junior high school students to do extremely well on the specialized high school exam. And no matter what, no student should be expected to be able to do well in a school as dilapidated as Morris High.