I was sent this link by Nick Hyatt and would love to know what you all think.
Archaic? Or effective? Can it be both?
- Dave
Lahti
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I am in Lahti, Finland, to give a talk at the Lahti Symphony's Sibelius
Festival. I've been wanting to visit since I encountered Osmo Vänskä's
revelatory B...
2 years ago
I'm impatient. Here are my thoughts.
ReplyDeleteI read the Harlem Children's Zone (HCZ) Executive summary. It seems like the things that HCZ is doing are things that public schools should be doing. Here are some highlights:
5 Principles:
Neighbourhood-based approach; "Pipeline" of support (i.e. supporting kids at different stages of development, and including unrestricted community programs); Building Community; Evaluation (integrating it and using it as a tool for self-improvement); Culture of Success (HCZ’s organizational culture emphasizes accountability, leadership, teamwork, and a deep, shared passion to improve the lives of poor children.")
Overall:
"We attempt to create a community of selfreliant families working together to build a common future through their own best efforts" (p.5)
These educational goals should apply to every system, including the public system. However, one of HCZ's suggestions for people trying to implement the HCZ model in their own communities is: "Make sure that a community-based organization, not government, is the lead entity, with full accountability for the program. Government can have a major role as a partner, but politics typically do not allow politicians to wait ten years for outcomes." It suggests SPECIFICALLY looking outside of the government for funding. Why? Because politics and policy-makers bog everything down. You know your government has failed you when...
I think the public system may have lost its grip on its role as a community-builder. It is integral. You want to end poverty? You want to help kids succeed? You need to help their communities provide them with the tools they need. It's the old give a man a fish vs. teach a man to fish scenario. Public schools have to step up and fill this role. People should not have to step outside the Public School system to teach kids well - "holistically" as is mentioned on the HCZ website.
I'll be reading "Whatever it Takes", the book written on the HCZ, over the next couple weeks. I'll keep you posted.
Very interesting. There is a section in Malcolm Gladwell's latest book, "Outliers" that talks about a similar schooling system.
ReplyDeleteThe premise of Gladwell's book is that success is never an overnight thing. It depends on many external factors- economic, cultural, who you know, your geography, etc. But ultimately it comes down to who works the hardest, who puts in the 10 000 hours to become an expert.
I think that aggressive school systems like this are incredibly effective at combating the external factors such as poverty, racism, geography- simply by working the hardest. We know from being music students, the "talented" performers are the ones who practice the most over their life; they simply work the hardest.
As you may have guessed, I'm a fan. Even though the schools seem extreme, and when you read accounts of how hard these kids work I sometimes think, "where did their childhood go?". But you can't argue with the results; these kids will end up with much greater opportunities because of the aggressive program.
It would be interesting to see how these students fare, say, 10 years from now.
- Sarah Neiman
The book is alright so far - 70 pages in, to be precise. I'm intrigued by two issues raised thus far:
ReplyDelete1. Evidence cited in this book (Lareau being a significant source. See "Unequal Childhoods", 2003) suggests that middle-class parenting methods tend to give kids a head start on life in the American world. "The emphasis on reasoning and negotiation in their homes gives middle-class children a natural advantage when dealing with institutions, whether banks or hospitals or schools. Middle-class children look at their teachers as a resource from whom they can demand attention, help and praise; poor children are taught by their parents to see teachers as authority figures to be deferred to in person and resented at a distance." Even things like how middle-class parents involve their kids in sports and music and such activities gets kids used to adults taking them and their concerns seriously and thus "They grow up with a sense of entitlement, rather than a sense of constraint, and that gives them confidence in academic settings."
Overall though, it seems like the philosophy of this book (and of Geoffry Canada, the founder of HCZ) seems to be that good parenting is the way to set kids up for success. Yes, money and other Maslovian resources are important, but changing poor peoples' parenting methods is what will drag them out of their social class.
Kristen and his Friereian influence is nagging me at the back of my head. The second you claim to want to change people, you have to be careful you're not oppressing them. Mind you "poor" is not a culture but I think white-washing people with middle-class values tends to wash out a lot of cultural differences too, which is something to be wary of. However, the fact remains that these kids are being brought into capitalist America and need to be taught how to live in that environment.