|
|
Discussion Questions
1. How does Don Murphy use the example of Malcolm X's educational
experience to examine the public school system?
2.What does Bruce Hare mean by "commonality breeds consensus" and how does
he see it affecting African American and Latino students?
3.What does Bruce Hare mean by the phrase 'new discrimination'? Is this an
accurate analysis of the current education system in the US?
4.Explain the struggle that occurred in Harlem, New York during the late
1960's around the Community Control Movement. What was the result of the
struggle and what does it mean for public schools today?
5. Compare and contrast between Malcolm X's education and the education that young African American men and women seek in a
Community College.
6.How does Larry Rushing link liberation to education?
7.What was the purpose of comprehensive schooling in Great Britain and what was the result when it was imposed?
8.What does Gus Johns suggest is needed in order to change a school system
that does not work? Do you agree or disagree? Why?
Additional
Reading (webliography)
Rethinking Schools
http://www.rethinkingschools.org/
This spring Rethinking Schools celebrates 15 years as an independent voice for school reform and social justice. The current issue of our quarterly journal includes essays by a number of prominent educators and commentators on how public education has fared since 1986, and where we go from here.
Policy Analysis of California Education
http://www-gse.berkeley.edu/research/PACE/pace_about.html
Founded in 1983 as a cooperative venture between the schools of education at UC Berkeley and Stanford University, PACE is an independent policy research center whose primary aim is to enrich education policy debates with sound analysis and hard evidence. From issues around preschooling and child development, to K-12 school finance, to higher education outreach, PACE is dedicated to defining issues thoughtfully and assessing the relative effectiveness of alternative policies and programs. PACE provides analysis and assistance to California policymakers, education professionals, and the general public.
MIGHTY OAKS: FIVE BLACK EDUCATORS
http://www.udel.edu/BlackHistory/mightyoaks.html
Five Delaware citizens--Edwina B. Kruse, Alice Dunbar-Nelson, Dr. W. C. Jason, Pauline A Young, and George A. Johnson--for a period of almost 100 years (1866 to 1959) directed and shepherded the education of African American youth in Delaware. Their contributions were without equal. Indeed, it was only because of their interest, concern, and commitment that many African American youth were well- educated during those years of segregation and exclusion. More than anything, these "mighty oaks" teach us that individuals can and do make a difference.
The National Alliance of Black School Educators
http://www.nabse.org/about.htm
NABSE's compelling mission and purposes are achieved through three primary areas of focus: Professional Development Programs that strengthen the skills of teachers, principals, specialists, superintendents and school board members; Information Sharing around innovative instructional and learning strategies that have proven successful in motivating African American youth and increasing academic performance in critical learning areas; and Policy Advocacy to ensure high standards and quality in our public and private education systems.
Labor Discipline and the Returns to Schooling
Herbert Gintis and Samuel Bowles
http://www-unix.oit.umass.edu/~gintis/returns_abst.html
Many have interpreted the substantial economic returns to schooling as a return to the cognitive skills produced by schooling. We argue that schooling raises wages and labor productivity in addition by improving workers' responsiveness to incentives. This enhances the value of educated workers to employers, but are not `skills' that appear as arguments in a production function. We introduce evidence that the measured cognitive skills produced by schooling explain only part (rarely more than half, and usually considerably less) of the contribution of schooling to earnings. We then address the following question: why might employers pay more for workers exhibiting personal traits other than productive skills? We show that while paying more for non-skill traits is anomalous in conventional symmetric information models of the labor market, it is readily motivated in an asymmetric information model of the principal-agent relationship between employer and worker. The reason is that where contracts are incom
plete, characteristics of the parties to an exchange affect the level and distribution of gains from trade, even when these characteristics are not attributes of the goods and services being transacted.
A New Vision of Educational Democracy?
http://www.ed.uiuc.edu/EPS/PES-Yearbook/1998/sears.html
Since the foundation of America's first public schools, educators have been engaged in a perennial struggle to establish and sustain a balance between societal and individual educational needs and goals. The authors of "Models of Educational Democracy" have suggested a promising means of resolving this familiar dilemma
The Algebra Project: Organizing in the Spirit of Ella
http://www.cpn.org/sections/topics/youth/stories-studies/algebra_project.html
This article is by Robert Moses, Mieko Kamii, Susan McAllister Swap, Jeffrey Howard.
At the heart of math-science education issues, however, is a basic political question: If the current technological revolution demands new standards of mathematics and science literacy, will all citizens be given equal access to the new skills, or will some be left behind, denied participation in the unfolding economic and political era? Those who are concerned about the life chances for historically oppressed people in the United States must not allow math-science education to be addressed as if it were purely a matter of technical instruction.
A Brief History and Philosophy of Magnet Schools
http://www.magnet.edu/history.html
Magnet schools are based on the premise that all students do not learn in the same ways, that if we find a unifying theme or a different organizational structure for students of similar interest, those students will learn more in all areas.
http://www.chronicleworld.org/
Selected from a national panel of teachers, Alf, science head teacher and former chemist in industry, was asked to help make a difference in Internet-assisted school learning. Over more than a year, Alf and his project colleagues visited primary and secondary schools, set up writing workshops and won co-operation from parents, teachers and education officials. They got children to interview their families, friends, celebrities, local dignitaries, MPs, and newspaper editors. Finally, they helped shepherd the kids to specially equipped company stores and centres to upload thousands of pages of their work on to the Tesco SchoolNet web site.
Massachusetts Education Reform
http://www.wgbh.org/wgbh/eyeoned/reform/meier.html
Deborah Meier is currently the principal of a new Boston K-8th grade public school, The Mission Hill School. She founded and directed the Central Park East Schools, a network of small public schools in East Harlem serving students in both elementary and secondary school, from 1974-1995.
She is vice-chair of the Coalition of Essential Schools, a national reform network, and the author of several books--The Power of Their Ideas (1995) and Will Standards Save Public Education" both published by Beacon Press. In 1987 she was the recipient of the MacArthur Fellowship, sometimes known as the "genius award." She is also on the editorial board of The Nation, Dissent and the Harvard Education Letter.
Our schools have grown too distant, too big, too standardized, too uniform, too divorced from their communities, too alienating of young from old and old from young. Few youngsters and few teachers have an opportunity to know each other by more than name (if that); and schools are organized so as to make knowing each other nearly impossible. In such settings it's hard to teach young people how to be responsible to others, or to concern themselves with their community. The consequences of this are critical for all our youngsters, but obviously more severe--and often disastrous--for those less identified with the larger culture of success.
Annenberg/CPB
http://www.learner.org/exhibits/dailymath/
Join us as we explore how math can help us in our daily lives. In this exhibit, you'll look at the language of numbers through common situations, such as playing games or cooking. Put your decision-making skills to the test by deciding whether buying or leasing a new car is right for you, and predict how much money you can save for your retirement by using an interest calculator.
In 1991, the mandate of the Annenberg/CPB partnership was expanded. The Annenberg/CPB Math and Science Project was created to improve K-12 math and science education. In the mid '90s, with the advent of the Web and digital satellite technology, this new project began to provide workshops and other educational programming to schools via satellite on the free channel. The Channel allowed teachers from around the nation to see into each other's classrooms and learn from each other.
Black Women in Mathematics
http://www.math.buffalo.edu/mad/wmad0.html
Less than 1% of all mathematicians are Black. 25% of these are women. This website is dedicated to them.
Urban Education Web
http://eric-web.tc.columbia.edu/
Search engine of different articles based on urban education. This is a site meant to assist students, parents and teachers.
African Fractals
http://www.rpi.edu/~eglash/eglash.dir/afractal.htm
African Fractals introduces readers to fractal geometry and explores the ways it is expressed in African cultures. Drawing on interviews with African designers, artists, and scientists, Ron Eglash's book investigates fractals in African architecture,
|