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Single parents or married parents. Involved parents or hands-off parents.
How did we get to the point across the country, that mediocre or even bad students set the agenda at many schools? What happened to:
- disruptive students - you're put of of the classroom, and if it continues you're expelled
- students that can't keep up - you fail and go to summer school, or repeat the grade, but the speed of the classroom is not slowed down for their benefit
Teaching to the lowest common denominator helps no one.
Kids still go to summer school. But Discipline is gone out of the schools so far as I can tell.
Single parents or married parents. Involved parents or hands-off parents.
How did we get to the point across the country, that mediocre or even bad students set the agenda at many schools? What happened to:
- disruptive students - you're put of of the classroom, and if it continues you're expelled
- students that can't keep up - you fail and go to summer school, or repeat the grade, but the speed of the classroom is not slowed down for their benefit
Teaching to the lowest common denominator helps no one.
Better delete that while you still can, you’re going against the established politburo agenda and social justice gestapo has already dispatched a party van to take you to the nearest death camp of acceptance and tolerance!
Most schools have special classrooms for the 'bad' students or students causing problems dont they? Does BPS not to IEPs for students with learning disabilities?
I don't know if a lot of white people really understand that that type of dysfunction has been passed down from generation to generation from long ago. It didnt just start in the 1960s. A lot of black people are stuck carrying the trauma/dysfunction of their ancestors-yes from slavery. Our culture was never allowed nuclear families, wealth investment opportunity, and we were brought here and lived hundreds of years under violence If you go to African nations they're not putting up the same type of violence as you'll find in many African American households here.
I think this seems implausible to white people but it's legit what happens. It's obvious. You're talking about the core element of Black culture being beating whippings (leads to social dysfunction) and discouragement from education (from whites and then it became pervasive in the black community). These didn't just end in 1865, not at all. Indeed each passing generation has to do work to sort of offload this trauma. Our cultural/familial histories are extremely dark and quite frankly scary. Baby-Daddy culture always existed because of breaking families apart during slavery, emasculation of black men, chain gangs, or people just having to leave their families behind to find work or other relatives. Beatings are held up in black culture because the thought is if I don't do it the world will do worse to you. If you look at depictions of black fathers back in the day say the early 1900s-1970s most black fathers are depicted as physically abusive, rolling stones and frustrated by a lack of income to raise a family on (think Sonny Liston's Father, James Brown's father, Danny Glover in Color Purple). For the poor African Americans, you see in ghettoes today they've never had prosperity in this country at any point. So with each generation, they get deeper and deeper into this hole.
The reason "excellence and exceptionalism" is valued in the black culture over steady conformity (a very valuable asset in schools) is because it takes exceptional individuals to break these family curses we all have. Conformity generally got us not very far. If we all conformed wed all still be in small southern towns sharecropping and picking tobacco like Central American migrants do today.
Basically, people want to know why black people don't rise up. Well, we've got a lot of internal work to do before we can really compete economically. Given that was sort of the only people on earth with this sort of live with your oppressor/enslaver w/o trying to go to war with them- thing...I'd say we're right on schedule. I honestly dont know how much more you can really expect from people that got here and were treated as we were from 1600-1965. I think about all the time how my father likely had white teachers born in the 1800s teaching him (he was born in 1955) what type of effect did THAT have on him. Kinda makes me shudder. Indeed most older black people will straight up refuse to talk to you about family history/schooling due to shame/hatred/trauma.
And honestly, much of this can be said about other formerly enslaved populations throughout the Caribbean and Central/South America. it's one of the major things I learned in going to Africa and studying "Old World" countries. They're cultures arent based on exploitative greed and violence so levels of street violence are much lower in Europe/Africa/Asia than they are in the Americas. People want to point to a dysfunctional inner city or black culture but never actually ask why that culture exists...
This is an interesting read. You pulled it all together very well.
Most schools have special classrooms for the 'bad' students or students causing problems dont they? Does BPS not to IEPs for students with learning disabilities?
I have had firsthand experience with that. IEPs are a joke in many Boston schools. The special education system in the BPS has been too far hijacked and exploited for individual purposes. For instance, you can go so far as to write into a child's IEP that he/she must be allowed a dictionary at all times when taking an examination including MCAS because the child has a "disability" and that disability is explained in a 10 page document. Yet too many times no one is there to really guide the students to the level of ditching the aids such as dictionaries and instructors often have to stealthily perform "miracles" to get their kids to pass. It does no good to many children though because they are forever "handicapped" by a system that allows them to get a free pass. Administrators know some parents and families game the system but they don't do anything about it because when there is no accountability, pretty much anything is allowed. Again, outside of a handful of good schools including the examination schools, no one cares if you graduate without knowing how to read or write, add or subtract. That's not the purpose of the Boston Public Schools in the eyes of those in control of the system or else we would be discussing this entire thread starting with the thread title. Just like everything else, the goal is to keep kids off the streets and out of prisons because teachers earn less money than police officers and prison wardens and to keep schools open so that a whole bunch of people don't lose their jobs. Did you really think the BPS are there to educate your children and to make them better grownups? Until the BPS ditches that mindset and takes education and pedagogy seriously, not politics or economics, it can never reform itself, special education or not.
Special education by the way is a very contentious subject nowadays and there is much to discuss about how effective it is. There are both strong supporters and detractors to it and having taught special education in the past, I can tell you it will be very difficult to go either one way with it.
Last edited by Urban Peasant; 02-24-2022 at 06:31 PM..
Reason: add additional postscript about special education
I don't know if a lot of white people really understand that that type of dysfunction has been passed down from generation to generation from long ago. It didnt just start in the 1960s. A lot of black people are stuck carrying the trauma/dysfunction of their ancestors-yes from slavery. Our culture was never allowed nuclear families, wealth investment opportunity, and we were brought here and lived hundreds of years under violence If you go to African nations they're not putting up the same type of violence as you'll find in many African American households here.
I think this seems implausible to white people but it's legit what happens. It's obvious. You're talking about the core element of Black culture being beating whippings (leads to social dysfunction) and discouragement from education (from whites and then it became pervasive in the black community). These didn't just end in 1865, not at all. Indeed each passing generation has to do work to sort of offload this trauma. Our cultural/familial histories are extremely dark and quite frankly scary. Baby-Daddy culture always existed because of breaking families apart during slavery, emasculation of black men, chain gangs, or people just having to leave their families behind to find work or other relatives. Beatings are held up in black culture because the thought is if I don't do it the world will do worse to you. If you look at depictions of black fathers back in the day say the early 1900s-1970s most black fathers are depicted as physically abusive, rolling stones and frustrated by a lack of income to raise a family on (think Sonny Liston's Father, James Brown's father, Danny Glover in Color Purple). For the poor African Americans, you see in ghettoes today they've never had prosperity in this country at any point. So with each generation, they get deeper and deeper into this hole.
The reason "excellence and exceptionalism" is valued in the black culture over steady conformity (a very valuable asset in schools) is because it takes exceptional individuals to break these family curses we all have. Conformity generally got us not very far. If we all conformed wed all still be in small southern towns sharecropping and picking tobacco like Central American migrants do today.
Basically, people want to know why black people don't rise up. Well, we've got a lot of internal work to do before we can really compete economically. Given that was sort of the only people on earth with this sort of live with your oppressor/enslaver w/o trying to go to war with them- thing...I'd say we're right on schedule. I honestly dont know how much more you can really expect from people that got here and were treated as we were from 1600-1965. I think about all the time how my father likely had white teachers born in the 1800s teaching him (he was born in 1955) what type of effect did THAT have on him. Kinda makes me shudder. Indeed most older black people will straight up refuse to talk to you about family history/schooling due to shame/hatred/trauma.
And honestly, much of this can be said about other formerly enslaved populations throughout the Caribbean and Central/South America. it's one of the major things I learned in going to Africa and studying "Old World" countries. They're cultures arent based on exploitative greed and violence so levels of street violence are much lower in Europe/Africa/Asia than they are in the Americas. People want to point to a dysfunctional inner city or black culture but never actually ask why that culture exists...
I typically disagree with the vast majority of your takes. But this is pretty spot on.
The required cultural change is unfortunately going to be generations in the making.
I typically disagree with the vast majority of your takes. But this is pretty spot on.
The required cultural change is unfortunately going to be generations in the making.
One issue is were being compared to some of the most economically successful and powerful people ever to walk the planet in White Americans (but they did it in large part off the backs of us). It gets loss how much progress has actually been made in terms of education, income, material wealth, and representation of Black people since say 1960- let alone before. Even our neighborhoods just look much better than they did in 1994. Our teen pregnancy, crime rates, and education levels are better too.
Compared to Mexicans who weren't enslaved here but have been here longer we are not far behind at all and on balance given everything are probably doing better. Or just compare Black Americans QOL to the average person in Eastern Europe or even Greece/Italy. Especially in terms of soft power/culture/influence.
People act like we're so destitute and doing so bad when given context I think we're doing alright. I don't know how some people expect a dozen generations to be rectified in 50 years. Or people think its a "black" thing when we all see blacks from Africa come here, get educated, and thrive because they're not bound by the same traumas.
Back to the topic at hand: BPS is better now than it was in 1994 before Payzant. I think this only regressed since Marty was in charge and just truly had no connection to BPS and didn't care. I really don't think he cared. I feel like he treated BPS like hot potato/burden. Connoly (RL alumni) would've been better for education but no one really votes on that because most people dont have kids in Boston. Anecdotally BPS students seem a bit more "up to speed" now than they did when I was a kid. At least in terms of basic reading/math.
One issue is were being compared to some of the most economically successful and powerful people ever to walk the planet in White Americans (but they did it in large part off the backs of us). It gets loss how much progress has actually been made in terms of education, income, material wealth, and representation of Black people since say 1960- let alone before. Even our neighborhoods just look much better than they did in 1994. Our teen pregnancy, crime rates, and education levels are better too.
Compared to Mexicans who weren't enslaved here but have been here longer we are not far behind at all and on balance given everything are probably doing better. Or just compare Black Americans QOL to the average person in Eastern Europe or even Greece/Italy. Especially in terms of soft power/culture/influence.
People act like we're so destitute and doing so bad when given context I think we're doing alright. I don't know how some people expect a dozen generations to be rectified in 50 years. Or people think its a "black" thing when we all see blacks from Africa come here, get educated, and thrive because they're not bound by the same traumas.
Back to the topic at hand: BPS is better now than it was in 1994 before Payzant. I think this only regressed since Marty was in charge and just truly had no connection to BPS and didn't care. I really don't think he cared. I feel like he treated BPS like hot potato/burden. Connoly (RL alumni) would've been better for education but no one really votes on that because most people dont have kids in Boston. Anecdotally BPS students seem a bit more "up to speed" now than they did when I was a kid. At least in terms of basic reading/math.
Another interesting post. It's good to see some open discussion rather than just being bombarded with consistent talking points that are misleading.
Your assessment is pretty optimistic actually. We all know these problems can't be turned around overnight, but all we ever hear is that no progress has been made since the 1950s and that isn't true either.
A few years ago, I was in the South Bronx doing a community service project connected with my job. After a little while there, I really noticed the difference from how a neighborhood like that felt in the 1980s. I said to a (black) work colleague "The 'hood isn't what it used to be." I didn't feel threatened as I did when I was there in the 1980s; I actually felt relatively safe. We went by a school that had no bars over all the windows.
We all have to understand that wherever we have come from, we are on the same team now. The way blacks were suppressed in the south led to the south being poor for a century. It's as if some players on a football team broke the legs of some of the other players because they wanted all the glory, but it only resulted in the team losing. That type of approach is beyond stupid.
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