Consciousness, guilt and shame should tell us it's inappropriate for some children to be disproportionately left behind from education. One fact stands out as particularly outrageous: 2.3 million Americans are behind bars and 40 % are blacks (mostly males) and blacks make up just 13 % of the population. Here is an article which shows how black teachers feel disrespected — they who should be especially encouraged and celebrated in trying to help this left-behind population. Black teachers feeling tolerated, not celebrated http://citizen.education/index.php/2016/11/21/black-teachers-feeling-tolerated-not-celebrated/ I sent a comment to this article as below:
I Like Your Bottom Line
That you commit to not giving up is so heartwarming!
I subscribe to your blog and also to a lot of other education sites. You’re one of the best! Your insight comes across as very enlightened and informed by much experience. Please keep asking these questions, bringing forth good research and keeping up-to-date on the statistics. I’m sure there also must be good news about how black children and black teachers and black families can achieve the best possible results from good education opportunities.
I’m a granny now but when I was active in school reform it was on behalf of parent rights. We used to quote Ron Edmonds often, especially his 1978 quote: “We can whenever, and wherever we choose, successfully teach all children whose schooling is of interest to us. We already know more than we need in order to do this. Whether we do it must finally depend on how we feel about the fact that we haven’t so far.”
He developed an 8-point checklist, which if it were seriously applied, would, I’m sure, have contributed much to good schools for everyone. Perhaps the one point most seriously ignored was the one about avoiding pitfalls: “Retain awareness of good educational practice plus keep current in the field concerning promising and discredited practices.”
Much of today’s schooling deviates from proven practices. Perhaps Edmonds can again be an inspiration today! We do need to celebrate good teaching!