Progressives Engaged in Struggle Support Network

Eyes wide open; spirit fully engaged; hands ready for the work: On turning points and new (unwritten) chapters?

2008-11-30T11:40:00.000-05:00

It feels like it has been awhile. But, I couldn’t resist an opportunity to check in and challenge us as the first decade of the new millennium winds down; as the shocks that characterize it amplify: militarism, standardization, genocide, economic disenfranchisement, et al; as a president of color (finally) takes office; and as neoliberalism begins to flame out, helping many more see its impossibility as economic policy and offering the US (and the world) a choice of one of two directions: fascism and authoritarianism or humanism and democracy.

In this dispatch, I bring together friends of the PrESS Network, recent travelers to Jamaica, newer friends to the struggle, as well as a couple of others whom I also wish to communicate. In many ways this essay, this riff, this stream concludes a series of essays I’ve posted since our last trip to the Global South. In these essays, I imperfectly raised issues of economics, social difference, education, and religion. (Click on any of the links to peruse these essays; education probably the more important of any of the four.) More recently, I offered an essay on violence, which I am revising and will post soon at pucknation dot com. Whether or not you have been privy to these earlier essays, I offer this final one as a way forward—possible turning points and new (unwritten) chapters—for your consideration and critique.

Here is the short version: We have some decisions to make. A more democratic and humanizing future may be up to us; that is, those of us who struggle for what is right and good for humanity writ large. And, if you wish to be encumbered by any more of my ramblings down the road, I would suggest tapping into and signing onto the Rouge Forum.

Now, the longer version (which you knew was coming).

Keep writing in the dark: / a record of the night, or / words that pulled you from depths of unknowing / words that flew through your mind, strange birds / crying their urgency with human voices (Denise Levertov, Writing in the Dark)[1]
Since I realized a more critical consciousness was possible and necessary (when I began graduate school in 1996), I have consistently attempted to reconcile this consciousness and understanding of theory with more critical and constructive practice. Often, this has happened pedagogically, using the classroom as a sort of laboratory. But, it has also unfolded more concretely in my engagement with the world outside (the often times insular) school walls. At my (imperfect) best, I have sought to share this evolutionary reconciliation, openly—always coming to more critical consciousness and constructive practice based on your critique, questions, and nuance. I learned this praxis from many of you to whom I write. And, it has been energizing to see others engage this evolutionary praxis as a result of my teaching and learning with them/you. So, it is with this spirit that I offer what follows. Five, ten, twenty years from now we will return to these reflections and note how far we have no doubt traveled beyond these elementary considerations. Nonetheless, I present them as a marker to be imbibed, transgressed, and developed.

As we move ahead, I want to urge you to consider joining the work of the Rouge Forum. The PrESS Network, of course, is still a viable local resource and a possible grass-roots organizing location for regional issues that continue to emerge, as they have recently regarding budgetary issues in Kentucky relative to education. The PrESS Network can also be woven in easily as a regional chapter of the Rouge Forum—perhaps as an Ohio Valley Chapter connected to some other folks in the area who have expressed interest in our work. I want to encourage connecting to a broader national coalition with international possibilities and implications. This larger, connected body has an even better shot at confronting standardization, militarization, and the coming recession/depression with reason and passion.

Recently, I have accepted a post within the RF as the virtual community organizer, attempting to connect the various constituents within the Rouge Forum toward resistance of the above, as well as helping others launch a number of new and continuing projects, including: an edited text on more humanizing curricula, our annual conference (this year in Ypsilanti at EMU: see www.therougeforumconference.org for more details, and the following essay from Rich Gibson for some more background: http://richgibson.com/eeeecrossroads.html), a print edition of the RF News, etc. Simultaneous to this work, there are also some interesting stirrings emerging from the southwest relative to the formation of an institute for social justice, which may provide an apt space for education, training, and action. Finally, our work in the Global South continues to evolve with more critical possibilities, providing one of many potential international satellites for this work. More to come, for sure. In any event, my encouragement is to seek out this broader community, this wider theoretical agenda, and this growing movement for resistance and transformation.

Seeing usually / was a matter of what was / in front of my eyes / matching what was / behind my brain (Audre Lorde, Contact Lenses)
In the previous dispatches noted above I made several conclusions, pulling from recently read work and drawing upon ongoing discussions. I suggested paths that induce agency and/or demythologize reality, recognizing that roads which go through organized religion are often counter-revolutionary. I noted, simply, the need to collectively organize and become conscious, wrestling with our socialization/indoctrination/domestication, choosing to become political agents of hope, and recognizing education as a tool for domination by the rich). I pulled from Paul Farmer’s concept of “pragmatic solidarity,” highlighting that our words of concern must be matched by on-the-ground work that represents a “being with” not just a “talking about.” I also tried to wrap my head around Gustavo Gutierrez’s notion of a “permanent cultural revolution” in which our process motivates us to struggle against all the forces that oppress humankind. As well, related to process, I consistently attempted to recycle Rebecca Solnit’s ideas regarding “moments of creation” and “the politics of prefiguration.” Finally, I have tried to keep Milton’s concepts of “voice and visibility” in front of us, helping to re-imagine the struggle and to re-define what the terms of victory might, instead, look like.

Now my eyes have become / a part of me exposed / quick risky and open / to all the same dangers (Audre Lorde, Contact Lenses)
These considerations, of course, remain at play. We can use and reuse them in a recursive and reflective turn to make sense of our work. And, they can help launch us into renewed action. I consider, also, a few more concepts which may illuminate a way forward. Michael Lebowitz, very much considering a socialism for the 21st century, talks of the “revolution of radical needs”—that is, the interplay of self-change and systemic change. As well, he proffers a “democracy as protagonism,” which is a democracy of people who are transforming themselves into revolutionary subjects. In this way, then, we must conceive of history differently—not only as a “totality” (something our education fails to give us), but as something constantly to be written and re-written, lived not in the past but in the present as we imagine a future. In this history-in-the-making, then, we constantly make and re-make ourselves as subjects impacting this record rather than as objects dictated to by someone else’s narrative.

A few concrete projects may help cement the point:

For those of us who have been and are involved with the work in the Global South, this work has been an evolutionary process ( which Gina and I highlight here: http://www.richgibson.com/rouge_forum/2008/decadework.htm). Most of its history, certainly, is yet to be written. As we seek to launch a second decade of work there, many of us feel as though we have just gotten started and finally have a firmly articulated foundation which will help us implement new critical literacy initiatives with our ongoing partners as well as (hopeful) new partners. This process of reading the word and our worlds more critically will lead to a deeper consciousness, hopefully, on both sides. However, beyond the potentially reciprocal nature of this process, our desire is that the process actually become a generative one in which unimagined possibilities will emerge, conjointly and solidaristically, and from which an entirely new history—a new chapter—may take root. As well, we continue to envisage a more critical medical partnership, launched from a premise that health care is a human right. And, we continue to attempt contact with progressive movements within Jamaica, such as the International School of Bottom-Up Organizing, in order to partner and be led by grassroots groups within Jamaica.

More local to Louisville, work with the Volunteers of America Family Shelter continues into a seventh year. This winter season we’ll share in a fifth annual holiday celebration and next semester, with some new and former students, we’ll launch yet another partnership with the shelter. As I’ve written in the past, Louisville has a mostly unreported problem with poverty (a ranking of 3rd in the nation in concentrated poverty as well as a population of 7500 children who qualify as homeless, 8% of the total student population, attending its public schools). This issue of poverty and homelessness will only worsen given the economic downturn. While several of us have continued to raise awareness related to homelessness locally, nationally, and internationally through shantytown actions and ongoing service to this and other shelters, we still have miles to go—shifting from social service to social change. But, like the history of our work in the Global South, this partnership with VOA is a history-in-the-making—never quite certain when we may reach a turning point. So, we struggle on, making more critical sense of poverty and its root cause (capitalism), connecting our lives to those impacted by the inevitability of this system, and working together.

Even more local to many of our lives, several of us are taking this work to our classrooms in both university and K-12 environments. Even amidst rabid standardization, school to military/prison pipelines, and growing irrationalism (mysticism like Creationism taught in science classes), there are teachers doing the front line work of helping produce more revolutionary subjects. This work, as we know, is difficult because we as teachers must constantly re-educate ourselves based upon the mis-education we received for most of our lives. As well, we are consistently attempting to dislodge our consciousness from the slick socialization of a capitalist culture that attempts to turn us into unthinking consumers of our societal trappings. Though they attempt to keep us separate from each other, we must continually strive to ‘get together’: developing our own professional learning communities, making our unions work for us instead of for those who intend to oppress us, and taking action where prudent and necessary. We must continue to grow this mass base of front line workers who Rich characterizes as existing at the choke point of capital’s system. We have power. We need to harness it and be strategic in its use. This will lead to a turning point.

Aside from these particular projects or progressive pedagogical potentials, I know that each of us are also involved in several other projects and actions: from study groups to site-based decision-making bodies to community organizations. Where possible we need to link our actions. Resistive movements must be linked in order to mount the necessary action to overturn the status quo. We must make the time to seek out the intersections and, more importantly, engage these more conscious constituencies toward ameliorative action.

I think one rubric, under which we could connect this action is through the Rouge Forum, as it attempts to connect classrooms across the country in a more global attempt to resist standardization, militarism, and irrationalism. While there are a multiplicity of ways to formulate a calculus of resistance and hope, the Rouge Forum as only one such formulation, it seems as though we must get strategic, savvy, and together, as quickly as possible. While the symbolic hope of an Obama presidency has brought a certain suasion to some, we must know that our work today is the same as it was yesterday. What is most hopeful about Obama’s election is that folks demonstrated that they could still get together. The task for getting together for an electoral victory may be easier than getting together for systemic change, but folks got together, nonetheless. We know that improvements will be slight, if at all, since the rich still run the country/world. So, we must keep an objective reality clearly in focus. And, we must get about the business of mounting a commensurate resistance to the oppositional force that seeks to dominate truth and liberty, demolish hope, and dehumanize.

The killings continue, each second / pain and misfortune extend themselves/ in the genetic chain, injustice is done knowingly, and the air / bears the dust of decayed hopes (Denise Levertov, City Psalm)
We have choices to make. What Rich, Milton et al help to continue to remind us is that these choices are moral and ethical ones. These choices can point us toward what is right, humanizing, and just. And, we must think of it as a choice. This is a decision. To not make a choice for what is right, or to delay, or to remain silent, is to cast a vote for further oppression, marginalization, and disenfranchisement. To not consider it a choice, given our exposure, is to denigrate the legacy of resistors who have historically struggled for what was right, to find the right side of history. With a modicum of exposure to issues of injustice, everyone has always had a choice. Many, of course, have chosen the wrong side of history. Usually, it is the privileged that make this particular choice. And, we are also the ones who often sit, indignantly, with our perfect hindsight, castigating our less than enlightened forebears who chose slavery, who chose Jim Crow, who chose child labor, who chose the witch hunts, who chose to maintain a massive underclass to support our lifestyles. Aren’t these the same choices we have before us today? How will our posterity judge us? More importantly, how do those currently tread upon by the system judge us—the present-day privileged with our luxury of ‘choice’?

As I’ve noted quite ineloquently in the past, we need a massive systemic enema. I believe we are either working toward that or against that. Working toward that takes on many (imperfect) forms, but it must (inarguably) involve solidarity with other brothers and sisters who choose to struggle; it must (unquestionably) involve our self-change as we work toward and are informed by systemic change; and it must (at the very least) involve our voice—however shaky or initially soft—challenging the system. The oppositional force we face is strong. The only way to turn it is to mount a commensurate resistance that will eventually overcome this force. History tells us this is possible. This is, actually, the history to which we can contribute. But, we will have to choose to become producers of meaning rather than consumers of someone else’s propaganda. We will have to choose to become organic intellectuals rather than technicians for the empire. We will have to choose to become democratic and humanizing mechanisms for revolution and liberation rather than unconscious tools for the rich. I realize I am largely preaching to the choir, here. So, I look forward to the way we might make these choices together.

It is better to speak / knowing / we were never meant to survive (Audre Lorde, Litany for survival)

Or

The choice to speak / or not to speak. / We spoke. (Denise Levertov, Protestors)
The recipe for what we do is simple, involving three interactive and interdependent parts—something Milton and I have been messing with going on three years now. It necessarily involves both practical and reflective work. And, it involves commitment to its exercise and evolution. It is also not perfect, nor divine or dogmatic. Therefore, it involves the need for your reaction and voice. Only together can we get it right.

We must work together: community. This necessitates a movement toward each other, a tendency to privilege the collective over the individual, and an attitude of affirmation and critical constructiveness. Whenever possible, we have to think about how we can accomplish our tasks together—how could the PrESS Network help with this? What kind of resources might the Rouge Forum have? What other organization is also working on this issue?. We must consider who we trust and what side we want to take. We must see that our liberation and humanization is bound up and only possible in the liberation and humanization of others. We all know the ways we can better get together. We all know the commitment this will take. We know the in-the-moment decisions this will take as well as the long-term planning this will incorporate. There is no mystery to this work. It really just requires us to do it: to get together, to avoid our self-isolating tendencies brought about by narratives of competition or a socialization toward selfishness, and to be in solidarity against what is irrational, apathetic, and oppressive. In this way we renew our commitment to democracy; we focus on process and the evolution of relationships; and we believe we cannot be free until others are free.

Along with coming together, we must continue to wrestle with consciousness. We must continue to learn and relearn history, particularly alternative histories. If we don’t know where we’ve been, we can’t possibly know where we are or where to go. We must come to a clearer understanding of reality, particularly material reality which illuminates for us the very real disenfranchisement of billions of people. Recently, Gina, Sonya, Milton and I produced an essay we sent to Intercultural Education about the possibility of realizing a more reciprocal global education—particularly through our work in Jamaica. In this essay, which is contextualized against a backdrop of accelerating dehumanizing trends in our culture, Milton wove an intricate history which elucidates the formation and intimate interactions of patriarchy, racism, and Capitalism. Prior to our collaboration, I had been ignorant to much of the history he pulled from, offering a new moment of creation for me and providing a more critical conceptualization of the way I go about my own work. As the media-ting and socializing forces urge us to act in dehumanizing ways: getting dumber in front of TVs that conjure ‘reality’; purchasing products with plastic for which payment is a future, more costly, proposition; consuming commodities that we know were sown by or picked by the world’s poorest; we ultimately do so at our own peril. And, as we allow education to be dictated by the dogmatic divinations of the ruling elite, we sacrifice another generation of children to its grand delusion and doublespeak of ‘great equalizer’. Though we must be critical and strategic with the revelation and dialogical evolution of a different reality, we wait with great cost. So, we must get together, challenge our consciousness, and figure out the next move.

Finally, we will need to speak and act with courage. To move against the grain will require immense boldness and perhaps a little bit of counter-intuition (depending on the grip of our individual socialization). Audre Lorde and Denise Levertov capture it well above, I think. In the prior lines to Lorde’s conclusion, she enlists all the reasons we are typically afraid, even when silent. So, she suggests, why not speak? And, Levertov, helping provide a theme throughout this essay proposes that it comes down to choice. We can remain silent. Or, we can use our voice and speak. And, these voices must become a chorus. They should not be whimsical solo acts (though we may find, at times and in certain circumstances, that we are the lone voice). That voice should harmoniously resound alongside the historical echoes of others singing the same melody. The ready words are formed through conscious struggle and tireless practice in our shared communities. Those who speak are informed by movements which are driven by diligent study and liberating praxis. So, we get together to challenge each other toward a deeper consciousness. This challenge, then, offers the possibility of developing more critical, collaborative, and nuanced scripts—always ready to be shared and spoken, deconstructed and developed further, if necessary.

I recognize these are fairly elementary considerations and I’ve not said much that is new. I also recognize that I struggle with these reflections. That I find myself firmly implanted in a middle-class lifestyle and have become a poster-child of Paul Kivel’s “buffer zone” agents, signals that I have a long way to go toward consciousness and liberation. That I notice the hypocritical tendencies for which my practice does not match the theory I want to espouse, highlights the possibility that I may be closer to a turning point. That I more often make decisions which recognize that I have choice and agency in the matter, offers hope. That I seek out others with whom to share the work and figure out the process, presages a new chapter for the struggle—the chapter that we write as a community.

Eyes wide open; spirit fully engaged; hands ready for the work.

[1] Thanks, Gina, for bringing us this poetry and constantly providing us the metaphors to make more critical sense of our reality!

Jamaica Reflection, 2008

2008-06-11T12:47:00.003-05:00

The trip spanned May 15-June 5, 2008.

Five second-year and four first year physical therapy students, along with two physical therapy faculty and their partners (who are also PTs) worked in Jamaica from May 15-May 24, linking exclusively with West Haven Children’s Home (15 people in all). On May 20, we received a tour of Cornwall Regional Hospital, hosted by Ms. Pansy Brown. We also met two PT staff at the hospital: Forsyth and Hoofung.

One faculty member of the school of ed, her son, one retired professor/administrator, three classroom teachers (graduates of Bellarmine), two current education students, one business/communications major, and one arts administration major (12 people in all) worked in Jamaica from May 26-June 5, partnering with Blossom Gardens Children’s Home, West Haven Children’s Home, and Wee Care Basic School.

We also had a chance to meet with Judge Rosie Feurtado and Attorney Jeanne Robinson (chairperson of the board at Sam Sharpe Teachers College) on June 4 to talk about new partnerships: conflict resolution, literacy and special education initiatives in Jamaica, generally, and the Copse Place of Safety for Boys, particularly (which houses 70 kids ages 6-17 years old with one teacher).

The following reflection on the experience is subdivided into several themes, which no doubt have common threads throughout them. This is the way they came to me. The themes (hopefully) articulate questions that emerged during the trip, conversations held into the darkening evening hours on the deck of the Grandiosa, and experiences with our Jamaican partners. As well, they attempt to interweave the poetry that Gina so artfully collected for our reflection and use Farmer’s Pathologies of Power as foundational. Finally, they try to bring old theory to bear (Freire, hooks, Solnit, Carlson, Johnson, Marcos, Che, etc.] in light of more recent exposures (Gutierrez, Sartre, Fanon, West, Lukacs, Marx, Checkov, Lebowitz, Jamaican columnists such as Robotham and Levy, etc.).

Your feedback and reflections are welcome!

For some context, you may view "A decade of work in the global south," in which Gina and I summarize and critique our first ten years of work in Jamaica.

A world of fun on May Day?

2008-04-09T12:35:00.001-05:00

This year, the Pegasus Parade, one of the several festivities leading up toward the Kentucky Derby, has settled on the theme “A World of Fun.” The theme, while intended to highlight the good times forthcoming this spring seems odd and misplaced, if not wholly unconscious given that we are in the midst of a global war on ‘terror’ (fighting two wars in the middle East), increasing poverty (37 million in the US, 4 billion worldwide), rights reductions (the PATRIOT Act, wiretapping, and challenges to habeas corpus), and recent crackdowns on undocumented workers in the US (workers who are nearly forced to come to the US for work given so-called ‘free’ trade agreements with their countries). A world of fun?

As one response, the Kentucky May Day Coalition, a local organization composed of labor unions, religious groups, civil rights and immigrant rights organizations will assemble and organize on May 1 prior to the Pegasus Parade in order to provide mass public education on labor, immigrant, and civil rights.

May Day originated in the United States, based on the heroic struggles of US workers in 1886 for the eight-hour workday. According to the Rouge Forum (http://www.rougeforum.org/), a fourteen hour day, eighty-four hours a week, was the norm in the 1880s. Nine year old children worked alongside their adult counterparts. Child labor was cheap and those with fourteen hours days were envied. In 1886 a strike began on May 1 in cities across the US. On the third day of striking in Chicago, tensions reached a boiling point between workers and police (as well as the owners of industry). The police attacked the picketers, killing six and wounding many others. Subsequent rallies and protests were similarly dismantled by police and five organizers were ultimately hung, on trumped-up charges, for their advocacy.

Concessions were won, however. Since then, May 1 has been internationally recognized as a worker’s holiday for celebrating and organizing. Interestingly, of course, May Day is not recognized, nor celebrated in the US.

Many of the workers who fought for the eight-hour day were immigrant workers who understood they were fighting for the rights of workers in all countries, regardless of their race, religion, nationality or country of origin. In that spirit the May Day Coalition calls upon citizens and workers to support:

(1) the right to organize—improving wages and working conditions, as well as ending so-called ‘free’ trade agreements,
(2) comprehensive immigration reform in Congress—that confers legal status on undocumented immigrant workers and ends raids and deportations, and
(3) the restoration of the right to vote when debts are paid to society—upholding the Voting Rights Act of 1965.

These rights and reforms stand to impact and improve the lives of workers everywhere. They represent the promise of economic justice. A world of fun is only possible in and is fully dependent upon a world of justice.

As we consider how we might live out an international mission, I would advocate in the spirit of Thomas Merton that we consider the more promising potential of global cooperation, global collaboration, and/or global compassion. Indeed, specific support for the work of the May Day Coalition or more general support for labor, immigrant, and civil rights will more likely lead (both locally and globally) to an “improved human condition;” perhaps, even, a world of fun.

Should you be interested in supporting or partaking in the work of the May Day coalition, please contact me.

Critical Literacy PD for the Rouge Forum

2008-02-20T09:37:00.001-05:00

Friends, feel free to use this space to begin pulling together your PD session on Critical Literacy for the Rouge Forum conference.

Summer Proposal for Professional Development in New Mexico

2008-02-20T09:35:00.000-05:00

Friends, we can use this space to begin crafting a proposal for our PD Session in New Mexico, July 7-July 18, 2008

Rules for Radicals, Chapters 2 & 3: Of means and ends

2008-02-03T12:58:00.000-05:00

In reading these next couple of chapters of Alinsky, the following passages/citations stood out to me. As always, I would love to know your response on my take and what else stood out to you.

“Action is for mass salvation and not for the individual’s personal salvation” (p. 25). This strikes me as the heart of solidaristic work and reminds me of the aboriginal proverb, “If you have come to help me you are wasting your time, but, if you have come because your liberation is bound up with mine, then let us work together.” Our work is neither evangelistic nor missionary, which Matt Masucci and I describe in other work as serving one’s own needs and serving perceived needs, respectively. Rather, our work should be about dialogical and reciprocal action—with, not for. Alinsky is calling us, it seems, to make sure our work is done collectively, which requires us to move outside that rhetorical noise that Rachel and Milton have referred to. A question for us is, how can we better connect for this more liberatory movement? And, how can we better link our liberatory struggles? What will draw us into closer solidarity with those with whom we claim to be doing our work?

“The most unethical of all means is the non-use of any means” (p. 26). Here Alinsky takes another shot at the “do-Nothings.” How can we avoid getting lumped into this category? We know the stakes for kids in our schools, parents in our community, friends in our churches and other organizations. We see the systems (racism, classism, sexism, heterosexism, nationalism) that structure their/our lives. What are we ready/willing to do about these? What movement away from our safe harbor can we make? What moment of creation are we ready to crack open? How can we find the right side of history?

Under the fourth rule of means and ends, “In the politics of human life, consistency is not a virtue” (p. 31). This speaks to me about the imperfectness of our actions, the impreciseness of our work. It also speaks to me in a similar way that Cornel West describes the “jazz freedom fighter”—we must be improvisational in our work, open to change. There is not one way to do our work—and because the systems we struggle against are so fluid, we must avail ourselves to improvisation and accept the imperfectness and imprecision of our actions. Thus, praxis is crucial to our attitude and philosophy. We must be ready to reflect on our work, theorize anew, and then jump back in with retooled and rejuvenated action.

“It is the power of active citizen participation pulsing upward, providing a unified strength for a common purpose. Power is an essential life force always in operation, either changing the world or opposing change” (p. 51). Along these lines, Paul Kivel suggests that change happens when people get together. So, our work is not work of leadership, but of organization, organizing ‘active citizen participation’: “The ego of the organizer is stronger and more monumental than the ego of the leader. The leader is driven by the desire for power, while the organizer is driven by the desire to create” (p. 61). What are we, as organizers, ready to create? Outside of our support for one another in the needed work we do, individually, what will characterize our collective action with the marginalized/disenfranchised/oppressed? What are the choke points of the systems we resist that we can exploit and expose in order for others to see the blatant injustices foisted upon us—that constrain all our lives, limit our human-ness, and keep liberation at bay. The Rouge Forum attempts to accomplish this through resistance to standardized tests and delinking schools and the military. Rethinking Schools attempts to do this through curriculum. Ed Action wants to take on NCLB (finally). Kentucky Youth Advocates has gone the way of research, exposing the problems to local and state school boards, and a focus on legislation in order to help families who are poor. Where does the PrESS Network fit into this calculus? How might our local work coalesce with these state and national movements?

PrESS Network paper for the Rouge Forum

2008-01-20T13:22:00.000-05:00

We can begin constructing our paper for the Rouge Forum here.

All Native Alliance--Teaching Voices "Ask an Indian Event"

2008-01-05T16:20:00.000-05:00

January 15, 2008
6-9PM (MST)
Sumner & Dene Gallery
517 Central NW
Albuquerque, NM
(505) 944-5298

As a virtual addition to the live event at the gallery, the PrESS Network blog will be happy to host questions from an (inter)national audience. These will be answered in real time by panelists at the event. Please click the comments link below and ask your question. (If this is your first time using blogger, you will be prompted to briefly establish an identity for yourself.)

We look forward to the discussion.

In solidarity,

Adam and the PrESS Network

Rules for Radicals: Prologue and Chapter 1

2008-01-05T15:11:00.000-05:00

I remember why I like Alinsky's work so much. Although his patriarchal language can be cumbersome to work through at times, the richness of his revolutionary spirit is palpable and exhilirating.

I was struck by a few of the passages and concepts in these opening pages.

Building a powerful organization and seeing revolutionary change takes time. Nonetheless, we must organize (for power). And, "Radicals must be resilient" (p. 6).
Revolution necessitates a prior reformation: "A reformation means that the masses of our people have reached the point of disillusionment with past ways and values. They don't know what will work but they do know that the prevailing system is self-defeating, frustrating, and hopeless" (p. xxii). I guess I am also led to think more about my entry below on seeking our "collective responsibility." What are your thoughts on the connections or disconnections between reformation and revolution? I also like how he differentiates between revolution and evolution.
Beware of dogma. "Dogma is the enemy of human freedom" (p. 4). What are the dogmas we need to shed? What will help us ask newer and deeper questions? Can we become comfortable with doubt? With complexity?
"The prerequisite of an ideology is possession of a basic truth" (p. 10). What are some of our basic truths?
"We must first see the world as it is and not as we would like it to be" (p. 12). This reminds me of Lebowitz's "revolution of radical needs," for which we understand both that the world must change and we must change. It also reminds me of bell hooks' when she suggested that if we do not change our consciousness we cannot make change or demand change from others. Alinsky is asking us here, on my read, to continue to demythologize our world--see it as it really is, so we know what has to change. Simultaneously, though, I think he is asking for Lebowitz's and hooks' self-change. What can we do as a Network to continue this demythologization? What can we do to help each other with self-change? (I think his example on p. 13 is perfect.)
Beware of the Do-Nothings: "[They] profess a commitment to social change for ideals of justice, equality, and opportunity, and then abstain from and discourage all effective action for change" (p. 20). Can we think of any examples of Do-Nothings in our lives? Why are they, perhaps, the most dangerous among us? "Change means movement. Movement means change" (p. 21).
I was also taken by his Trinity--finding myself firmly implanted in the Have a Little Want More group. I'm reminded of Kivel's concept of the buffer zone--where the middle class resides between the privileged elite and the masses of oppressed. Our work (as teachers, social workers, nurses, etc.) serve to assuage the immediate needs of the oppressed, but does little to overturn the system set up by the elite (and complicitly approved by the middle class--thinking that one day maybe we'll have a shot at the big time). Where do you find yourself? (for more information on Kivel, you can check out his longer piece on social service or social change?)
We must understnad that our freedom and welfare are intimately connected to and dependent upon the freedom and welfare of everyone else.
We must find the low road to morality: "the most practical life is the moral life and the moral life is the only road to survival" (p. 23). I'm reminded here of Marge Piercy's poem The Low Road: it goes on one at a time/it starts when you care/to act, it starts when you do/it again after they said no,/it starts when you say We/and know who you mean, and each/day you mean one more. I'm also reminded, of course, of Johnson's caution to avoid the path of least resistance.

What else stood out to you? What questions are you left with?

A winter reflection redux: Seeking a (truer) "collective responsibility"

2007-12-25T09:55:00.000-05:00

Two years ago, I began a reflection that, for all intents and purposes, has remained an evolving story (a winter reflection). Here, again, I sit in the front room of our now 108 year old shotgun (still chilly) house with the Christmas tree aglow behind me and the space heater at my feet. I continue my reflection on the state of things, sipping coffee, mesmerized by beads of rain suspended from the magnolia tree in the front yard.

These dangling beads provide an interesting background against which the Christmas tree lights reflect in the window, looking themselves like little droplets on the outside tree branches. This switching foreground/background provides an apt metaphor for my frame of mind—the perspective of inside/outside. Upon which canvas do I most want to do my work? That of reform from within or revolution from without? (And, figuring out where or if the two possibilities overlap.)

My impetus for expanding this reflection now stems from a panel I co-moderated not too long ago on the connections between religion and the war in Iraq. I have been helping construct a series of teach-ins, entitled Beyond the Sound Bites, in which we seek to hold deeper and more meaningful dialogues about the war through the lens of such issues as history, US foreign policy, religion, energy (consumption and policy), veteran’s affairs, media, etc. At this particular discussion, one panelist, who fervently favored the war, was asked to comment on his faith’s perspective on the death of innocents in war, what we have come to term, quite innocuously and unfortunately, as “collateral damage.” This panelist suggested that a nation’s people assume “collective responsibility” for their leaders. So, in the process of having a leader deposed (as the US war of aggression in Iraq has accomplished), that some innocents are murdered is ultimately the fault of the people who perished, since they did not oust said leader themselves. Taken to its logical conclusion, then, this line of reasoning claims that the seven-year-old incinerated by the indiscriminate US bomb is culpable for his/her own murder, since s/he did nothing to depose the dictator who seized power in their country. This also suggests that the seven-year-old Israeli child who is blown up by a Palestinian suicide bomber or the immigrant janitor who died on September 11 in the world trade towers are somehow “collectively responsible” for their own deaths. To the extent that we are able to democratically choose our leaders and have input into our foreign policy, I can agree with some responsibility. But, to uncritically suggest it is each of our responsibilities, equally shared, is preposterous (mean-spirited, really), and misses the oppressive and rigid systems constructed to minimize our democratic participation and input (in Iraq, in Israel, in the US)—keeping us relatively ignorant and distracted by meaningless minutiae.

Our preoccupations and lack of access to (or desire for) information leads, then, to a more dogmatic dependence on someone else’s truth; a more simplistic, un-nuanced understanding of complexity; and (I mean to argue) a growing disconnectedness from the humanity of others.

During these last two years, my reflections have led me to ponder issues of community and its relative lack in our nation and world. More recently, I have begun to view this lack through the lens of five major events (what Naomi Klein would call “shocks”) that have marked the first decade of this century—the Iraq War, Hurricane Katrina, the genocide in Darfur, the No Child Left Behind Act, and the expansion of neoliberalism/globalization—which I believe successfully narrate the collapse of community in our world.

The “shock doctrine”—disaster capitalism
That we ever had community is a matter for considerable debate. But, as the new millennium gains momentum, a focus on rekindling this concept of community is central to the thesis of social justice. One need only look at the signposts of our new epoch, ruptures and upheavals that punctuate injustice: the Iraq War, Hurricane Katrina, the genocide in Darfur, the No Child Left Behind Act, and corporate globalization. While these events find their roots in years that precede the 21st century, I want to position them as pivotal points that dot the landscape of this first decade and possibly foretell the trajectory of this yet young era. I also mean to suggest that their occurrences/unfolding/aftermath are linked to an overall breakdown of community—that, counter-intuitively, as we have developed the technologies to reach out to nearly anyone in the world at any time and have access to more information than at any moment in history, we find ourselves (at least in West/Global North) more disconnected from others and with less understanding of what is happening to our brothers and sisters down the street, in our nation, and in our world.

In an earlier column (the revolution) I etched out initial thoughts related to these ruptures. Unfortunately, their impacts continue to be felt and, in most cases, worsen.

Coupled with this concept of community (or lack there of), I have more recently been influenced by Naomi Klein’s latest book: The Shock Doctrine. In it she develops the concept of “disaster capitalism,” which Klein claims forecasts and promotes the further breakdown of community and general destructiveness given that the economic structure helps create the disasters from which it can profit. In the October, 2007 Harpers Magazine, Klein argues, “After each new disaster [tsunami’s, hurricanes, war, etc.], it’s tempting to imagine that the loss of life and productivity will finally serve as a wake-up call, provoking the political class to launch some kind of ‘new New Deal.’ In fact, the opposite is taking place: disasters have become the preferred moments for advancing a vision of a ruthlessly divided world, one in which the very idea of the public sphere has no place at all. . . .Every time a new crisis hits—even when the crisis itself is the direct by-product of free market ideology—the fear and disorientation that follow are harnessed for radical social and economic reengineering. Each new shock is midwife to a new course of economic shock therapy. The end result is the same kind of unapologetic partition between the included and the excluded, the protected and the damned.”

Let’s consider the shocks that have befallen the first decade of this century:

The Iraq War
As the war gets ready to enter a 5th year of its devastation for Iraq, the greater Middle East, and the world, there are few signs of its let up. As President Bush continues to ask for more money (and the Congress rolls over and gives it to him); as the democratic presidential hopefuls trip over each other with minimally different strategies for our exit; as liberal journals like Mother Jones cynically ask “out of Iraq, how?”; as we continue to support dictator Musharaff in Pakistan (declaring martial law then reconstituting his Supreme Court to make sure he can stay in power, indefinitely); as we give Turkey unfettered access to the PKK rebels in the Kurdish areas of northern Iraq; as military demographics continue to indicate that our armed forces are disproportionately made up of troops of color; and as the US decided to appoint and approve a new Attorney General who isn’t sure whether water-boarding is torture, but that expanded executive powers which stand outside the Constitution might be okay, we begin to understand the concept of a “ruthlessly divided world” and the “partition of the included and excluded” as global red and green zones get constructed in which some will be protected and most will not.

Genocide in Darfur
As the echoes of “never again” become fainter and fainter; as more and more Darfurians are displaced; as more and more Darfurians are murdered by state sanction; and as the world community drags its feet (and considers who might get Sudan’s oil), one already imagines the horrific narratives that will be written about this era—wondering how it could have happened, why no one stopped it, and what we will do to make sure this time it never happens again. The (ultimate) breakdown and disconnect of community, indeed—a world in which the relative wealthy receive the technical bread and circus of reality TV and the latest electronic gadgets while thousands of our brothers and sisters are murdered by relatively simple and unsophisticated implements: knives, machetes, and rifles.

Hurricane Katrina—an aftermath that refuses to recede
As the poorer sections of New Orleans continue to lie in ruins; as HUD prepares to destroy more public housing; as insurance companies figure out ways to deny losses resulting from the rain and/or the flood; as the public education system is dismantled in favor of charter schools (with less public oversight and more selective criteria); as the Saints demonstrate the revitalization of (or is it the evisceration of) the New Orleans spirit in the house (the Superdome) that served as tenement/morgue/refuge for the disenfranchised, symbolizing simultaneously the resiliency of human beings and the disregard for human life; as the public is quickly and quietly usurped by the private, creating residential red and green zones; and as the federal, state, and local governments (perhaps purposefully) perform grotesque political theater in which our faith in the public withers, we batten down the hatches, hoping our communities are not visited by such ‘natural’ disaster. And, with the subsequent incompetent response, we watch as the metaphorical midwife of corporate interests write their new prescription for “economic shock therapy.” Klein, in fact, speaks even more directly to this: “Not so long ago, disasters were periods of social leveling, rare moments when atomized communities put divisions aside and pulled together. Today, they are moments when we are hurled further apart, when we lurch into a radically segregated future where some of us will fall off the map and others ascend to a parallel privatized state, one equipped with well-paved highways and skyways, safe bridges, boutique charter schools, fast lane airport terminals, and deluxe subways.”

The No Child Left Behind Act—the decline of democracy
As No Child Left Behind continues to reveal its significant imperfections and its implausibility as educational policy (removing money from the kids who need it most); as critical thinking is routinely sacrificed at the alter of rote memorization and regurgitation of factoids; as the military gains unfettered access to the kids designed to fall through the cracks; as we avail ourselves to more and more police state like operations and tactics, characterized by cameras, rights reductions, prison-like discipline policies, and accrediting bodies who limit the potential of teaching and learning through heavy-handed, goose-step standards; and as we watch idly as the Supreme Court returns us to a state of educational Apartheid, we witness the spiritual demolition of perhaps the last place that might bring/assure us a viable democracy: public schools.

Corporate Globalization
Finally, as corporate globalization, aka “neoliberalism,” seeps its way into poorer and poorer countries; as the promises of revitalized economies in the Global South ring empty under the weight of structural adjustment policies which take from the poor and give to the rich; as the environment is raped of its resources and clean air is replaced with pollution the Global North would rather not have in its back yard; as we know the ‘people’ are continually duped by the global powers to jump on the corporate globalization bandwagon against their better interest (see Costa Rica); and as our attention is diverted from recognizing the link between producer (child in maquiladora making $0.50/day) and consumer (professional family living in 108 year old shotgun making $100000/year combined), we witness an evolving and cataclysmic economic crisis of free market ideology in which we/I have failed in our/my “collective responsibility.”

Shouldn’t we/I, as the relative privileged, shoulder more of the responsibility for this injustice than the relative oppressed? Should we blame the victims of systems constructed to create victims for their own oppression? Shouldn’t we expect (and actually hope for) resistance?

Well, where is the hope?
These shocks that jolt our 21st century consciousness could certainly render us hopeless. Indeed, it leaves me cynical. Yet, I hold onto some thread of hope—some moment of creation that might yet be born despite the concerted efforts of the shock therapists. In this moment, perhaps we can begin to (re)write some of the narrative—turning it around, flipping it over—recognizing that history is not already determined, that it is constantly being made.

Practically, and more locally, I think about the continuously evolving work of the PrESS Network in which we create a supportive circle of students, teachers, social workers, and community activists, launching professional developments on critical literacy and green education, serving the local community, and promoting a more critical consciousness about the system of injustice that structures schooling in America.

I think about the work my partner and I have developed in the Global South over the last decade, particularly in schools and children’s homes in Montego Bay Jamaica. Specifically, I reflect on the work of one of our close teacher friends who has just begun full time coursework for her official teaching credentials (and how she balances full-time schooling, full-time teaching, and full-time parenting as the mother of four children). Our financial assistance pales in comparison to her strength and tenacity to overcome conditions of extreme poverty and deprivation in the world of corporate globalization I described above. As well, I consider the possibilities of the forthcoming partnership we have forged between the physical therapy school at my university and one of the private (under-funded and under-resourced) children’s homes in Montego Bay, which houses and serves children impacted and disfigured by physical disabilities.

I think about my fall 2007 students and their blossoming potential—(1) graduate students who demonstrated the real possibilities of an educative community: discovering and constructing knowledge together, serving the local community, and committing to the ongoing struggle in their future classroom, and (2) undergraduate students who helped launch the second Beyond the Sound Bites teach-in, who had a voice in the development of their university community and who inspired fellow students to respond so critically (with their own voices at the teach-in and in follow-up reflections/editorials) to the relatively uncritical comments of some of the panelists.

I think about the Rouge Forum and their work to keep alive discussions of the war and to hold unions accountable for the protection and promotion of workers. This March, students, scholars, teachers, performers, activists, and others who work on the better behalf of their local and global brothers and sisters will descend on Louisville for an international conference which investigates whether (and/or to what extent) education in America can/should be reformed or revolutionized.

Internationally, I think a lot about the examples of solidarity provided by our neighbors in the Global South, particularly the block of nations that Hugo Chavez is coordinating. I am particularly reminded here of President Correa’s recent comments. In a November edition of The Nation, Naomi Klein reported: “In less than two years, the lease on the largest and most important US military base in Latin America will run out. The base is in Manta, Ecuador, and Rafael Correa, the country's leftist president, has pronounced that he will renew the lease ‘on one condition: that they let us put a base in Miami--an Ecuadorean base. If there is no problem having foreign soldiers on a country's soil, surely they'll let us have an Ecuadorean base in the United States.’” May we all possess such clarity and such courage.

Working for reform or revolution (am I inside or outside?):
Alongside these practical considerations and possibilities (of which I know there are numerous additional examples), I also want to reflect on more theoretical potentialities and frameworks toward which we can articulate our future work and trajectories. This work is not random. It is coordinated and intentional. To this end, then, I propose three possible concepts/frameworks which might help direct our future intentions: Paul Farmer’s “pragmatic solidarity,” Michael Lebowitz’s “revolution of radical needs,” and Paulo Freire’s “dialogical action.”

Farmer, in Pathologies of Power, develops a mode of living which he terms “pragmatic solidarity”—the desire to make common cause with those in need. In his development he suggests we must connect sentiment with work, that goods and services must accompany our claims of solidarity with the oppressed. Thus, how do we balance a “being with” and a “doing for?” And, how do we ultimately bring ourselves closer—economically and spiritually—in the ways we live and struggle together?

Lebowitz, in Build it Now, evolves his thesis of the “revolution of radical needs”—the simultaneous changing of (structural) circumstances and self-change. He argues, “By simulating the solidarity that comes from an emphasis upon the interests of the community, rather than self-interest, a model based on this radical supply side theory rooted in human development will allow a government to move forward with the support of the community”—that the free development of each equals the free development of all. So, how does/can our work lead to self-change (consciousness, life-style, etc.) and to a change in material conditions (that improves the economic and spiritual lives of all)?

Finally, Freire, in Pedagogy of the Oppressed, talks about the concept of “unity for liberation” as an integral component of dialogical action. He pleads, “In order for the oppressed to unite, they must first cut the umbilical cord of magic and myth which binds them to the world of oppression; the unity which links them to each other must be of a different nature. To achieve this indispensable unity the revolutionary process must be, from the beginning, cultural action.” That is, the oppressed must first recognize themselves as subjects in the historical process rather than objects of a history that someone else constructed and has foisted upon them. The relative privileged must come to this same consciousness, as well. Therefore, how do we shed our socialization to demystify our existence and understand the structure? How do we deconstruct the narrative myths created to distract us and domesticate us into believing our resistance is futile?

Toward a truer collective responsibility
What I want is to reshape our understanding of a “collective responsibility.” What I want is for us to stop blaming the oppressed for their oppression and to begin to find ways to make more meaningful solidaristic connections that might bring about lasting change. What I want is for us to coordinate our efforts, challenge ourselves away from too-easy-dogma and away from fundamentalism toward criticality, nuance, and an appreciation of complexity. What I want is to attack injustice at its source—not in the actions of individuals, but in the mechanics of systems that are (1) designed to render a few fortunate and many disenfranchised, (2) manufactured to justify the imbalance, and/or (3) made to keep our attention on some future life rather than on the immediate needs of our brothers and sisters. What I want is some moment of creation in which we can act as midwife to something more beautiful, more humanizing, more liberating.

As the Christmas tree lights and the beads of rain continue their dance in the window, I remain unsure of my desire for an inside or outside position. I recognize that most of my work is that of reform and, thus, work that emanates mainly from the inside (in the PrESS Network, in Jamaica, in the Rouge Forum, as a professor, etc.). This work has meaning, but I wrestle with its effect and (usual non-)immediacy of results. Then, I consider the work from the outside (where those with whom I desire to be in solidarity almost always perform their work) and wonder what type of revolutionary spirit I might muster given my relatively privileged life. What will make this solidarity more pragmatic? How can I at once work inwardly on my own consciousness and outwardly on the dismantling of unjust structures? How can I seek a truer collective responsibility for which our accountability is more dependent upon our ability to preserve life than to take it, to unlock the human potential of all than to bind it up in fundamentalist narratives that ultimately serve the interests of the elite, and/or to bring about an emergence (or renewal) of community than to help tear us into further disconnected neighborhood and individual silos? Whether we can do it through reform or revolution makes little difference (although I’m getting a better idea which is more promising). That it must be done is more compelling and is, indeed, our collective responsibility.

Educational Apartheid

2007-07-01T21:33:00.000-05:00

In a not-so-shocking development, the Supreme Court by a (not all that surprising) 5-4 margin voted to overturn Jefferson County’s four decade old desegregation plan on June 28, 2007. I mean to argue here, as a result, that educational Apartheid is just around the corner. Re-citing an excerpt from Justice Roberts plurality opinion, which appeared in the Courier Journal, our local Louisville newspaper, he argues, “The parties and their amici debate which side is more faithful to the heritage of Brown [v. Board of Education, 1954] , but the position of the plaintiffs in Brown was spelled out in their brief and could not have been clearer: ‘The Fourteenth Amendment prevents states from according differential treatment to American children on the basis of their color or race’ What do racial classifications at issue here do, if not accord differential treatment on the basis of race?” And, later, “The way to stop discrimination based on race is to stop discrimination on the basis of race.” Said another way, the way to handle racial injustice is to ignore that racial injustice happens. If we don’t think about it, maybe it will go away.

Of course, this is ridiculous, and mean-spirited. Aside from the fact that the plaintiff in this case ultimately won her appeal in the Jefferson County system, getting her child into precisely the school she wanted, demonstrating that the system worked, Justice Roberts and the other concurring justices have taken drastic steps now to erode the civil rights of the marginalized/disenfranchised/oppressed in order to serve the interests of the dominant racial group. It took just a little over 50 years to get a case (Brown) to the Supreme Court to overturn Plessy v. Ferguson (which began “separate, but equal”)—the Brown case, by the way, having probably more to do with attempting to win the Cold War, convincing Global South nations, who are predominately non-White, to join with the capitalists who demonstrated their racial tolerance with this decision, rather than any kind of racial justice for Black school children. Now, it has taken the conservatives just a little over 50 years to scale that decision back with the overturning of Jefferson County’s desegregation plan.

Jefferson County
In Jonathan Kozol’s latest sobering profile of American education, Shame of the Nation: The Restoration of Apartheid Schooling in America, a lamenting follow-up to his earlier work, Savage Inequalities, he illustrates the retrograde process many public school systems have undergone related to an imbalance in racial composition. His critique of these pre-Brown-like-segregation systems was balanced, ironically, by rather effusive praise of the Jefferson County system, which attempted to keep this balance in check. I doubt Kozol’s next profile will offer as much ebullience since history has demonstrated the path Jefferson County will likely take.

Though this course is not pre-destined, it seems a likely course to me and others since the status quo and the path of least resistance will lead toward racial separation. While hope still exists, which I will talk about below, many critical and uncomfortable discussions need to follow this decision—discussions which we have been reluctant to have, complicated, and perhaps illustrated by, de facto residential segregation in Louisville. Since we generally choose to segregate ourselves into neighborhoods based on race, we tend not to shop together, go to church together, meet each other on the street while we’re out walking the dog, etc. School, then becomes one of the only formative places by which folks might mix, racially. Perhaps, no longer.

Before outlining the proposed solutions offered by the talking heads in Louisville, it is important to understand one other issue about Jefferson County, which has not entered the public debate, at least that I have seen. After Hurricane Katrina, The Brookings Institute compiled a report on neighborhoods of concentrated poverty. A neighborhood is characterized by concentrated poverty if 40% or more of the families in that neighborhood live at or below the poverty line. Berube and Katz, who completed the study, identified New Orleans as ranking 2nd in the nation in concentrated poverty. Louisville was ranked 3rd. This is a crucial piece of demographic information that I sense has been swept under the rug. This is perhaps best evidenced by statements made by the director of student assignment in JCPS in the July 1 Courier Journal. Quoting the article, “Such plans [involving assignment by socio-economic status] might be hard to manage, partly because family incomes change.” As well, “Those plans are less effective in districts like Louisville’s, where most students are middle class.” I think the sentiment and the mis-read of the situation in our county speaks to why a broader discussion must be held. Aside from the director’s non-recognition of concentrated poverty in our community, the same article goes on to show that 61% of elementary students, 56% of middle schoolers, and 45% of high school students receive a free or reduced price lunch. You might also guess that a disproportionate number of Black students in our county, 71%, receive free or reduced lunches as compared to 31% of their non-Black peers. (For a closer look at statistics, you might visit www.courier-journal.com/desegregation or www.jefferson.k12.ky.us/).

Proposed Solutions
On June 29, the day after the decision, the Courier Journal ran a series of articles about possible ways forward. Four propositions were offered:

-Neighborhood schools: Students could attend a school close to them as long as it has enough space.
-Socio-economic plan: Schools could cap the percentage of students on free and reduced-price lunches.
-Choice plan: The district could basically maintain its current system of elementary school clusters, magnet schools, and specialized programs—but simply remove the racial guidelines. Admission to schools could be based on a lottery system.
-Multiple-criteria plan: Officials would consider a handful of factors when assigning students—such as school choice, geographic diversity, whether the student qualifies for subsidized lunch and test scores—to ensure no school has an overwhelming number of low-scoring students.

On paper, of course, each proposition has its possibilities. The problematics should also be apparent, particularly given the lack of critical discourse around social justice (specifically as it relates to social difference) and the hidden-in-plain-sight issue of poverty in our community. To claim that we care any more about kids who are poor than children who are Black is to begin from a faulty premise. As much as we claim to be “colorblind” (which I don’t believe most people are) or that we want to live in a “colorblind society” (which only ultimately serves the “color in power”), we also fancy ourselves as a “classless society,” one in which everyone is middle class (evidenced, in part, by the director’s statement above). 37 million people officially living in poverty (at a poverty line of $18000 for a family of four, so more likely 1/3 of our total nation living in poverty if we were to use more realistic figures), 46 million people uninsured, tens of millions more underinsured, a growing amount of upside down mortgages, and steamrolling consumer credit debt should speak to us otherwise. We live in anything but, nor anything close to, a “middle-class society.”

Why aren’t we morally outraged? What we are not talking about
As I shift from the reporting and the research into a more critical and reflective analysis based on my own research and experience, I want to ask why we are not more morally outraged at decisions such as this. While it is possible that we may still surmount considerable protest to this decision and the general malaise within which we find our country and no-child-left-behind education system, I remain worried when the school system, who thought they would win this case, claims the decision as a victory for our county. (I wonder what a loss would have looked like?) As well, I remain worried when some powerful members of our Black community attempt to create a rosier picture of the situation than I am able to see.

What I know is that our academic achievement gap in Jefferson County mirrors the widening academic achievement gap across the country. While all students are performing better (a debatable improvement to say the least given teach-to-the-standardized-one-size-fits-all-test practices in many school systems), studies indicate (Educational Trust, 2001; Holloway, 2004; Lee, 2004; Billig et al, 2005; Cronin et al, 2005; Dobbs, 2005; Snipes and Waters, 2005; Johnson and Kitsonis, 2006; Mayer, 2006) that Black students are performing better slower than their White peers; thus, in effect, worsening the gap. Likewise, studies also show the widening gap along socio-economic lines. All of this is exacerbated by the current trend to privilege the economic purposes for receiving an education (making our kids more “globally competitive”) and to devalue the socially responsible purposes of becoming a critical citizen (making our kids more “globally cooperative”). Jefferson County is no different in this trend, having just received $30 million dollars from General Electric to prop up math and science in our school curricula. Of course, there is nothing wrong with improving math and science in school, but if this is not met with a commensurate amount of the arts, social sciences, and the like, then I think we have done our future a disservice. In any event, given that one’s economic viability in the future is closely tied with educational achievement and attainment, a worsening achievement gap for children of color or children who are poor, predicts a widening (already despicable) wealth gap.

Along with not talking enough about the achievement gap and the structures/systems that perpetuate racially- and class-based inequality, school systems prefer to promote anecdotal books like Ruby Payne’s A Framework for Poverty, which explains what poor people are like and how we can get through to them, rather than requiring research that shows how poor folks were made poor and how the waning middle class might help keep them there. (See the winter, 2006 edition of Rethinking Schools for one critique of Payne.) Part of the reason we don’t want to hold conversations about race and class is because we may become implicated, if only by association, with the oppression of others. Since we want to hold onto the notion that we might be a good person, it becomes much easier to blame the victim for their poverty or the injustice caused them rather than understanding that oppression and oppressive conditions are connected to privilege and privileged conditions. If you live in a privileged condition, you are connected to someone who is not (here and abroad). You cannot be privileged if someone is not oppressed. What would the word privileged mean, then? There cannot be a middle class if there was not a poor class. What would middle class mean, then? And, why would we strive to be middle class?

As well, white has no meaning, unless there is black. So, to ignore race can only benefit those who hold racial privilege. Of course, it is interesting that race is completely arbitrary. It is a socio-political construction that has no basis in biology. Thus, the system, and the people within it, come to a negotiated understanding of race and what it will mean socially and politically. Race is made up, then, but we treat it as if it is real. And, it has real implications for those who are not White. Individually, we want to consider the content of one’s character. But, structurally/systemically we are socialized to understand race (and class) with a priori assumptions (that we take as fact) that are imported by a capitalistic system that privileges (and is run by) White folks. Until we can understand and acknowledge, as my friend Dr. Milton Brown suggests, that we might still be good people who work in a bad system, then our progress to treat this as an individual, case-by-case matter, will do little to overturn a system that does not work in the favor of non-White and poor citizens. This Supreme Court decision has hampered this possibility even further, voting for something closer to Apartheid schooling rather than socially-just education.

Reasons to hope
One might think, based on what has preceded this final section, that this is an odd heading with which to conclude. Nonetheless, I do remain hopeful. Cornel West draws a distinction between optimism and hope. West argues there is no historical evidence related to matters of social justice about which to be optimistic for the future. Instead, he claims we should be hopeful because hope requires our fullest, most critical participation to bring about the change we want to see in the world. Count me in as hoping.

Undoubtedly, at worst, this decision could prove to be a harbinger for (among other similar decisions and current issues) the death knell of our waning democracy. Without a compelling public education that helps all our children become critical consumers and citizens, we might as well live in a fascist state (which some argue we are tantalizingly close to). At best, this decision could marshal the sensibilities of a critical cadre of educators, social workers, health care workers, activists, attorneys, business leaders, etc. to stand in resistance to the injustice that is becoming our nation’s public school system. We need not suffer one additional setback to make the picture any clearer. What is happening to our children—both rich and poor, white and black—is transparent enough. To claim this decision as anything but a resounding defeat to racial justice in this country is to make a mockery of the struggle that has led to this historical moment. To think that some socio-economic system of school assignment will do anything more than the system we already have in place, without some serious truth-telling and willingness to engage our deepest core around racial and economic justice, we are fooling ourselves. The data suggests that we don’t really care about children who are poor, either.

While critical, I am hopeful about our new superintendent, Dr. Sheldon Berman. Although the hiring process was somewhat contentious, Dr. Berman, nonetheless, brings a sensibility of social justice (as a founding member of Educators for Social Responsibility, www.esrnational.org) to the system. We could use a heavy dose of some of the tenets of ESR As well, we also have a wonderful example of a majority Black high school in Jefferson County, which provides a compelling education for both non-Black and Black students. Whether or not we will be able to create several such successful high schools is a matter for considerable debate. Also, along with my partner, I currently work with a burgeoning group of progressive educators, social workers, and community activists who are already engaging this struggle in our classrooms and in our communities. I would gladly link our work with any other groups who are enjoining this same struggle. (Likewise, I would also invite conversation from folks who might find no fault with the current status quo in order that we may both listen and be heard; hopefully, then, expanding the dialogue.) Finally, I am also buoyed by my affiliation and work with international groups such as the Rouge Forum (www.rougeforum.org) and The Pedagogy and Theater of the Oppressed (www.pto-web.org), who are working diligently for a more equitable future for all the world’s citizens.

In an LA Times opinion piece a few days before this decision, Edward Lazarus argued, “Although they may have disagreed about Brown’s parameters, most Americans coalesced around the decision as a national symbol for our belated rejection of racism and bigotry. Using Brown as a sword to outlaw affirmative action of any kind would destroy that worthy consensus and transform it into just another mirror reflecting a legal and political culture still deeply fractured over race.” As Allan Johnson, in Privilege, Power, and Difference, claims, there can be no healing until the wounding stops. Likewise, paraphrasing Malcolm X’s provocation about so-called progress, he reminded us that although the knife in the back of African-Americans may once have been six inches, that it has only been removed a couple inches, means several inches of knife blade remain in the back. This decision makes a mockery of Brown and may shove the knife in further.

Therefore, count me as a protestor in resistance to any decision we come to as a community or a nation until we can begin to dialog more critically about the injustices that plague us. Rearranging the furniture in a racist or classist box may change the scenery, but it does not change the box or the ideology that informs it. It’s time to recognize that educational Apartheid may re-visit Jefferson County if it hasn’t already. It is time to begin the difficult dialogues and critical conversations with the entire community. It is time to better understand privilege and oppression. It is time to be honest with ourselves about racial, economic, and residential segregation in our city. While I’m sure we can point to instances and particular places where this is not true, it is not true, generally. Until it is, all our children will suffer. I resist this with everything I have as an educator, recognizing my own hypocrisies related to race and class privilege. I challenge others toward this resistance and invite the dialog and possibilities, understanding that how and what we teach, along with how we organize our schools may have to change, drastically. Social justice, once again, resides at the back of the bus. I cannot accept that dehumanizing condition any longer.

To conclude, in order to move beyond a theoretical call to action, permit me to offer a few suggestions for how to move forward (presuming that we have one year before we must change the school assignment plan):

-Hold an ongoing and regular series of community conversations with parents and students in order to create feedback mechanisms in all sectors of the county: surveys, qualitative interviews, focus groups, etc. These could easily be arranged by an articulation of university social science departments, data management companies, and neighborhood community associations and churches.
-Arrange meetings among schools of education to talk about our practice of educating the educators. We need to ask how we are co-opted in and mediated by this system (through our own accrediting bodies, the Educational Testing Service, granting agencies, the state and federal government, etc.) What could we do differently that more appropriately and more critically trains teachers? My university, I am sure, would be happy to host the first of these meetings.
-Coordinate meetings among business and civic leaders, as well as community activists and the faith community, to discuss appropriate skill sets for graduates in order that they become contributing economic and critical citizens. Community centers and churches would be the most appropriate settings for these meetings.
-Offer opportunities for lectures in town hall settings (in school auditoriums) by leading social scientists on race and social class—being sure to include as a broad a spectrum of ideas as possible. Perhaps city wide reading circles around a diversity of texts, hosted by local schools, churches, or libraries would be of additional benefit.
-Make the process as transparent as possible for the media (using embedded reporters to report on the progress), local citizens, and interested citizens across the nation and world—who want to see democracy (at last) at work.

If critical conversations similar to or such as these, however, are deemed more than our school system or civic leaders are willing to engage in, then I must question their motivation related to racial and economic justice. If more of the same is to be foisted upon our children and families then our only option is protest, resistance, and a work stoppage among teachers, teacher educators, and all other citizens concerned about the future of our children and our nation. We must work toward constructive solutions with a moral outrage, accepting nothing less than the dismantling of educational Apartheid.

My brother is love

2007-05-16T10:28:00.000-05:00

This piece is a testament to the life’s work of my friend and colleague, Dr. Milton Brown, who retires from 40 years of educating, May 18, 2007.

Milton Brown is a mirror
who helps us see our better selves
Milton Brown is a teacher
who teaches who he is
and lives what he teaches
Milton Brown is a part of the Great Circle
who connects us
with something larger
My brother is love
My brother is love
Because he is direct
Because he can connect
The dots
of our inner self
And asks
What do you see?
Who
can
you
be?
What would you choose?
if you could
just
breathe
To be
Still
until
There is no time like right
now
How much of the present do we fight
And waste on the future?
How much of now
do we capture
when we are
living
in
then?
My brother is love
Because he is direct
Because he can connect
The dots of our inner self
Milton Brown is a mirror
who helps us see our better selves
Milton Brown is a teacher
who teaches who he is
and lives what he teaches
Milton Brown is a part of the Great Circle
who connects us
with something larger
My brother is love
My brother is love
Because he digs beneath
To find out what’s underneath
The thick veil of our socialized lives
I have worshipped alongside my brother
In the sanctuary
that is our classroom
Watching him pry open minds
Through inquiry
Never knowing what we might find
In this process of discovery
It is not racists--
It is racism
It is not sexists--
It is sexism
We
must
break
the system
Craft new lenses
For the people
To rebuild our humanity
To rework the insanity
That says
one
person
can’t
make a difference
His defiance
His resistance
Says
That’s simply bullshit
(a rationalization for inaction)
I have struggled alongside my brother
Improvising a harmony
Between an unlikely jazz duo
Sure he might miss a note or two
Forget to attach a document to an email
But the music
Yes
the music
Will continue to play
Even as the Sandias call him west
An opus
Of impeccable quality
That he has composed
That he has supposed
Leads to
consciousness
My brother is love
Because he digs beneath
To find out what’s underneath
The thick veil of our socialized lives
Milton Brown is a mirror
who helps us see our better selves
Milton Brown is a teacher
who teaches who he is
and lives what he teaches
Milton Brown is a part of the Great Circle
who connects us
with something larger
My brother is love
My brother is love
because he beckons us
To redefine victory
Voice
and visibility
Are the new terms
of social justice
Process process process
Nothing less
This is the action
That calls us out of the dark
Out of the contradiction
Of words written on a page
Easily spoken
Not often lived
Righteous rhetoric
Of the
hyperbolic heretics
Who missed it
It
Is
process
Not an arrival--
A departure
Not salvation--
But survival
If we think we’re there
We’re not
We’re lost
We have lost
Justice demands
that
we
remain
visible
And vocal
Hoarse
Though we may be
Lonely as we might feel
It
is
too
soon
to go home
My brother is love
because he beckons us
To redefine victory
Voice
and visibility
Are the new terms
of social justice
Milton Brown is a mirror
who helps us see our better selves
Milton Brown is a teacher
who teaches who he is
and lives what he teaches
Milton Brown is a part of the Great Circle
who connects us
with something larger
My brother is love
My brother is love
Because he teaches us
Because he beseeches us
to draw the circle large enough
to include us all
The staff
The faculty
The students AND
The neo-nazi
The homeless and dispossessed
A conservative right-wing republican on occasion
Even
The administration
He provides
a pedagogy
of community
Instructing us
To find out
Where we overlap
Sure
his message might come in the form of a 20 page email
With big words
And
Something like
“You might think I’m being confrontational
But I’m not”
Yet this is his confessional
His laying himself out to us
Leaving no stone
(That his students created in community)
Unturned
It is his testimonial
To the constructiveness
Of dialogue
And the potential
Destructiveness
Of silence
That wreaks violence
On the potential
of a new cultural ethos of
Community
My brother is love
Because he teaches us
Because he beseeches us
to draw the circle large enough
to include us all
Milton Brown is a mirror
who helps us see our better selves
Milton Brown is a teacher
who teaches who he is
and lives what he teaches
Milton Brown is a part of the Great Circle
who connects us
with something larger
My brother
is love

Plans for the future

2007-03-08T11:45:00.000-05:00

If you’re here, then you’ve at least decided to dig a little deeper into the future possibilities of the PrESS Network.

As a result of last summer’s retreat, we decided that NCLB would be a focus for our network. To that end, my fall research students did a great deal of background work on NCLB, which they have posted on this site. See some of the more recent archives from the fall for this information. Additionally, Drew has continued his research on the achievement gap, for which I know he would gladly share. All along, my thought has been to hold a couple/series of community conversations with parents related to NCLB. Currently, Gina is checking into two sites for possible conversations: Americana community center, and the KY Alliance headquarters in the West End. I think it may also be appropriate to hold another meeting in the East End, perhaps at some place like Rev. Dean Bucalos’ Douglas Blvd. Christian Church. We’d like to hold these conversations yet this school year.

Next, I would like to hold a couple/series of professional developments this summer for teachers interested in learning more about NCLB and what they can do in their classroom. Indeed, two issues strike me as fundamental for resistance as a result of NCLB: hyper-standardization of curriculum and thinking, and the military’s contact with kids in school who are being (necessarily and consciously) left behind. In these workshops, I would also like to involve JCTA or broader union help, so that we can be clear on what we’re up against and how the union can support us. We might also bring to town folks from Rethinking Schools and the Rouge Forum to assist in these efforts.

Next, we need to take on NCATE, AACTE, and ETS, and be a visible school of education in this struggle.

Finally, we need to work together on curriculum and supporting each other’s efforts in the classroom. Drew has launched some amazing work at Fairdale that we can tap into. I know others of you are doing equally outstanding work and we want to help.

Other ideas?

revisiting the mission

2007-03-07T10:00:00.000-05:00

The PrESS Network is a critically-engaged, hopeful, and supportive voice for change. It's members are dedicated to affirming the basic rights of and creating realistic solutions with children and families who are disenfranchised by an unjust socio-economic structure. This empowering partnership seeks to facilitate system-wide change through respect for social difference, humanistic teaching, service to others, transformative dialog, and an ever-evolving journey toward connectedness.

the revolution

2007-03-07T09:50:00.000-05:00

In a recent column at pucknation.com (http://www.pucknation.com/index.php?mod=3&id=154&article=1478&indiv=18), I outlined five essential issues/concepts confronting the organic intellectual. Recall, organic intellectuals are those with access to the knowledge/information of the elite who use it to work with and for the masses of dispossessed/marginalized/oppressed. This access might come through education (just 1% of the world’s population ever achieves a bachelor’s degree) or it may come through some privileged status related to race, class, gender to which advantages are often given rather than earned. Recall, also, that these five issues/concepts revolve around love, peace, solidarity, courage, and hope.

In this reflection, which comes more from the gut and heart, and less from theory and my academic training, I want to focus on why the struggle for justice is so necessary, why the role of the organic intellectual is needed, and how these issues/concepts might/should be lived out.

Why the struggle is necessary
Over the last two weekends, I have traveled to New York City and Detroit for academic conferences. The New York City conference was a complete joke and waste of time. I got a much greater education from my travels around NYC with Milton, feeling at home among such a great diversity of humanity. The conference that I traveled to in Detroit, however, with Gina, was quite different—learning a great deal from the radical, intellectual, and courageous group of teachers, students, professors, and cultural workers gathered there.

Over both weekends, I had long periods of time to reflect whether traveling by plane or car. As well, there were also long periods of dialogue over food, beer, and wine with critical colleagues and friends. In my reflections and discussions, I was constantly drawn back to four events over the last 5+ years that demonstrate capitalism’s oppression over most of the world and why we are in such deep shit.

The Iraq War
On September 11, 2001 the United States experienced a phenomenon that many places around the globe were familiar with: terrorism. Many nations, in fact, have been familiar with the US’s own versions of terrorism—whether that be eastern encroachment onto native lands in the US; dropping atomic weapons on civilian sites in Japan to end WWII; military interventions/coups throughout Latin America, the Caribbean, and South America during the Cold War; or economic colonialism through our coercive management of the World Bank, International Monetary Fund, and World Trade Organization. In any event, terrorism inevitably found its way to the US and resulted in the unfortunate and despicable loss of life of thousands of people. In response, rather than going after the source of the offenders with the full force of our military, we used that to attack Iraq—and sent a much smaller contingency to Afghanistan (where we have yet to be successful in tracking down the architect of 9/11, Osama bin Laden).

Of course, the evidence is now clearer than ever that we are in Iraq with such force given its rich oil reserves and our inability to get off the sauce that is this exhaustible natural resource. We were lied to. And, even give the resistance of many here at home and most people around the globe, we went to war. Now, between one hundred thousand and six hundred thousand innocent civilians have been murdered.

While the world was shocked and awed at the hubris of the lone empire in the world to exert itself upon another nation, unprovoked, I continue to be shocked and awed at our apathetic response to one of the most illegitimate wars in history. Indeed, a massive anti-war movement existed in the US prior to the invasion. But for a few groups such as MoveOn.org, the voices are now silent. At best, they are quiet, even in the face of more and more evidence that we were duped.

Do we not want to admit we were duped? Do we value the life of an Iraqi child less than that of some other nation’s child? Do we secretly agree with the over-arching reason for the war, recognizing that we will ultimately benefit from the oil coming our way? Do we devalue life so easily? Do we really see no other option than capitalism? In a system in which Exxon makes record profits from oil, while children die in Iraq, more countries hate us, and the poor, working, and middle classes of our own country struggle to fill up their gas-guzzling American-made automobiles?

Hurricane Katrina: An economic and political nightmare, as well as a harbinger for global warming
In a previous column, I reported on the way Hurricane Katrina challenged an ‘American’ way of life, as it pulled back the covers on racism and poverty in our country. Now, more than a year and a half after this ‘natural’ tragedy, New Orleans remains a shell of what it once was. Many of the poor and people of color are still gone; cushy contracts with private building corporations are signed to bolster profits for shareholders during the reconstruction; most public schools have been disbanded and teachers fired in favor of charter schools, which use public money for private interest and prevent the formation of unions; and the president can’t even mention the city—the site of the worst ‘natural’ disaster in recent US history—in his State of the Union address, given that he promised to rebuild it. (The State of the Union would have been an appropriate time to report on his progress, or lack there of.)

No doubt you’ve noted that I bring attention to ‘natural’ in the paragraph above. Mounting evidence suggests that this disaster may actually have a more human cause, related to global warming as a result of our use of carbon-emitting fossil fuels. Nearly every scientist, who has done the research, supports the premise that humans are the cause for the current global warming. But, you’d be hard-pressed to know it sometimes given the media’s fascination with wanting to hold a debate on the subject. If 99 people feel one way and 1 person feels the other, can you call it a debate? Also, getting accurate information to our students is also proving complicated. For instance, BP Oil recently paid Albuquerque schools $500,000 to use their curriculum on energy conservation. Also, recently, the Seattle school board denied local teachers the possibility of showing An Inconvenient Truth in their classes because it only provided one perspective on the global warming story. So, they concluded, it would not be appropriate to only give the students one side. And, what is the other side exactly? Does a rogue scientist or two make a side? What about BP Oil’s curriculum? Fair and balanced? Why are we afraid to admit and tell our kids that we are responsible for the glaciers melting, the thinning of the permafrost, the rise in ocean levels, and the damn hot summers (springs, and falls)? What connections can we draw to the Iraq War above? Why do we continue to refuse to sign on to the Kyoto Protocol (that most of the rest of the world is signatory to)? What role does capitalism play in our blinding path toward destruction? Who is profiting from this path? Who loses?

Darfur: Genocide again
Genocide is the spectre haunting Africa, again. In the Darfur region of Sudan, somewhere between 200,000 and 400,000 people have been killed, several hundred thousand more are on the run, and the conflict is spilling over into neighboring countries. This time, unlike Rwanda in the 80s, we’re actually calling it genocide. But, our response has been as (a)pathetic. Essentially, we are doing nothing to stop the killing. Indeed, we are working through diplomatic channels with the African Union, but the progress is slow. Criminal indictments have been handed down from the International Criminal Court (an international body we do not belong to for fear our own leaders would be charged with war crimes), but this has not stopped the bloodshed.

Does anyone seriously believe that if we really valued the lives of the innocent people who are being mutilated, we wouldn’t do more to stop it? The US has shown it will attack another nation unprovoked. What makes Sudan any different? Is it racially motivated—because African lives matter less than American or European lives (remember what we did about genocide in the Balkans)? Perhaps. Is it because there is nothing there we want? No. In fact, Sudan has quite a bit of oil that we would be very interested in. However, the Sudanese have close contact with the Chinese, as the Chinese find themselves needing more and more oil (based on their new capitalist agenda). My guess is, we don’t want to cross a country of 1.3 billion people and a government that holds the purse strings on quite a bit of American debt—a debt we really can’t afford to pay back. So, we are challenged militarily and economically (and selfishly) by the genocide in Sudan.

Have we lost our moral compass? Have we put some lives ahead of others? Have we put profits above human life? After this genocide is over and claims, perhaps, a million lives, will we once again chant, “Never again,” and watch while another genocide ensues in some other poor corner of the world (coming up with all sorts of new excuses)?

NCLB: Killing our own kids
The killing is happening here at home. Day after day we kill our children intellectually, spiritually, and emotionally through educational policies like No Child Left Behind. Indeed NCLB has, in essence, been an unprovoked war on our nation’s poor children and children of color as the achievement gap continues to worsen. Additionally, we subjugate poor children and children of color (who are increasingly becoming more and more segregated in schools) to new types of classroom management strategies that are akin to ones used in drug rehabilitation and the prison system. Moreover, we subject all our kids to a more corporatized curriculum that prepares their minds for markets, breeds consumptive desire, and limits critical thinking.

This hyper-standardization focuses nearly entirely on the economic purposes of getting an education, rather than the more aesthetic purposes of becoming a more complete human being or critical purposes for how to live in a democracy. Moreover, the rigidified testing mechanisms employed go to great lengths to divide rich and poor, pre-stratifying a future workforce, ensuring the poor stay poor and the rich stay rich. And, we have places for the poor and working class, as we have created a profit-driven prison industry that is looking for residents and a war that needs more soldiers.

Unfortunately, this is not a Republican issue or a Democratic issue, since both parties support policies like NCLB. This is a corporate-driven, privatizing issue that seeks to undermine the foundation of a democratic society: public schooling. Do we like kids this little that we would subject them to such un-researched, unrelenting, and unconscionable policy? Should capitalism play any role in education? Should children be viewed as investments (objects) or humans (subjects)? What should be the purpose of education? Whether it is 2nd grade or graduate school?

Why the role of the organic intellectual is so necessary
This is a question for the organic intellectual and reveals why their role is so necessary. Teachers, professors, students, cultural workers, and community activists (those who can fulfill this role) must seek to answer these questions and recognize the disturbing trends occurring all around us. No longer can we accept blissful ignorance, nor pretend we do not see it. We must endeavor to make sense of the present, however complicated or imperfect, through the lens of the past in order to begin considering the future. If those with the potential access to this information do not do it, who will?

The oppressed/marginalized/disenfranchised bring a lived experience that is necessary to the revolution. It is their experience and oppression that must provide the moral momentum. The organic intellectual, though, provides the ethical direction: connecting the historical dots, solidaristically affirming the need for monumental change, and using the knowledge of the elite to suggest something better, something that benefits all, something more profoundly human.

We will not do this without struggle. We will not do it without feeling alone at times. So, we will need courage.

Being, living, and becoming
This courage will necessitate us merging our economic, political, social, and spiritual lives toward a more ethical and moral existence. We will need to find these contradictions in our own lives and attempt to reconcile them toward a more purposeful and powerful direction of social change. We cannot allow history to continue to slip by, not noting its similarities to the present, however imprecise. We cannot observe the confluence of the Iraq War, Hurricane Katrina, Darfur, and NCLB and ignore the role of capital in exploiting the lives of those put at the margins. Something healthier, more beautiful, and more human must be possible.

Thankfully, we have models we can look to for our direction. We can look to the recent Detroit teacher’s strike, for which hundreds of urban public school teachers stood together with parents on behalf of their kids (until the union sold them short and the suburban teachers and others would not stand with them). Globally, we might look to the continued struggle of the Oaxacan teachers in Mexico, constantly fighting for the educative rights of their kids. But, we don’t even have to look that far. We can look at the struggle being taken up everyday by resistant and revolutionary teachers, professors, cultural workers, and community activists. While they have been socialized in the same individualistic and consumeristic culture we have, they have somehow managed to shed its seductiveness toward something better, more authentic, and just. This is my dispatch that applauds and enjoins their struggle. Our kids and our future can’t wait much longer.

A search for the superintendent

2007-02-04T16:42:00.000-05:00

Friends. Just wanted to share the letter that Dr. Brown and I crafted and sent to the school board related to their search for a superintendent.

A Search for the SuperintendentAn opportunity for a “moment of creation”

In her wonderful and contemporary treatise on social justice and hope, Rebecca Solnit proclaims for those interested in improving the human condition that there is no need to save the world; rather, this work should involve keeping alive moments of creation. For Solnit moments of creation are those opportunities/experiences/events in which social justice, freedom, and democracy take one step forward. The goal, then, involves stringing these moments together toward a more profoundly just, improved, and extended condition.

The search for a superintendent of Kentucky’s largest school district is such a possible moment. Traditional perceptions of institutional need often reflect an unconscious will to make change without changing much. When confronted with the need for leadership change, we often focus more on individual personality rather than perform a critical review of the criteria we use to define requisite leadership qualities. Tying our leadership boat to institutional moorings within a safe harbor of tradition precludes us from venturing out, raising the sails of possibility, and catching the winds of hope. Moments of creation become less available to us in known waters without waves.

We have a compelling opportunity to seek a superintendent who is poised to navigate the
boundaries of tradition and who has the courage to lead us into the dark where hope can be transformed into reality. We risk little selecting a leader who will righteously tweak the edges of past ineffectiveness. We have much to gain selecting a leader whose spirit propels us toward a different idea of ourselves and a re-conceptualization of the daunting mission with which we are charged. It is no longer acceptable to spew platitudes of progress into tornado-like winds of destructive and demoralizing failure. It is time to stand against the wind united in collective thought and action and with resolute courage to redefine failure not as progress but as hopelessness rooted in sameness.

We conceptualize our vision for a superintendent around three main ideas: community, consciousness, and courage.

Community
Louisville has great potential for social and economic prosperity based on the diverse and deep talents of its population. Unfortunately, it is a community divided by race and class. According to a 2005 Brookings Institution report, published after the Hurricane Katrina disaster, Louisville ranks 3rd, nationally, in concentrated poverty. That is, our city ranks third among all major communities in the US for neighborhoods that possess more than 4 out of 10 families living at or below the poverty line. Often, these communities of concentrated poverty are also racially identifiable. While the school system has attempted to stem the tide of reproducing poverty through integration practices over the last thirty years, progress has been slow. This condition may only be worsened by an anticipated adverse decision from the Supreme Court regarding the system’s race-based admissions practices. One need only read the first few chapters of Jonathan Kozol’s lamenting follow-up to Savage Inequalities to see that the return to “apartheid schooling” in many cities is, indeed, the Shame of the Nation.

A more specific and broader institutional concern with which the new superintendent will be confronted is the dehumanization of the teaching/learning experience that the federally mandated No Child Left Behind Act has imposed. The new superintendent must have the courage to stand up for that which makes teaching a profession and that which makes learning a reality. A candidate who is not willing or prepared to struggle for the humanity and dignity of the teaching profession, the civil right of competitive equality of our students, and the responsibility of our profession to make the world better through a caring and educated citizenry, is an individual unworthy of consideration for the position of superintendent of the Jefferson County Public Schools.

Further, the new superintendent must work to build community in our city.Moving away from the economic purposes of education to consider the social is paramount to helping us realize how we might better live democratically and justly with one another, nationally as well as globally. Economic globalization and a competitive race for the bottom are not inevitable as Thomas Friedman and others conceive. If we more importantly focus on issues of community, collaboration, and consciousness, we could better ensure a process of educational equity and a more socially just nation and world for our children. The superintendent plays no small role in this possibility.

Consciousness
Regarding consciousness, the new superintendent will hold tremendous responsibility as an educator-leader, poised to activate an intellectual and social evolution in Louisville’s metropolitan community. The school system possesses access to tremendous resources both in the business and college/university sectors of the city. Her/His outreach to these local resources could have profound impact on the success and future of our children. As well, the new superintendent must be willing to act on and promote proven methods and best practices that are not ideologically driven or politically motivated.

Particularly related to colleges/universities, we are sure we speak for our colleagues at other institutions that we are ready and willing to democratically collaborate with the new superintendent and the school system. We at Bellarmine University are fortunate to work with some of the best and brightest teacher candidates in the region. As we have done in the past, we look forward to any opportunity through which we might communicate, collaborate, and/or co-design programs, activities, and partnerships. These joint ventures will allow the school system to reveal its latest initiatives or to demonstrate needs it has for future teachers and would permit us to share our latest research and to demonstrate the type of teachers we seek to construct. The majority of our graduates proudly, authentically, and critically give of themselves daily in Jefferson County Schools. We would look forward to an opportunity to find out how we might better prepare them to help serve our children’s needs and to demonstrate how they are ready, willing, and able to help lead change toward hopeful possibilities.

These hopeful possibilities and the ability to serve our children’s needs will be significantly enhanced through researching, discovering, and abiding by proven methods and best practices that have been shown to reach all children. While the No Child Left Behind Act calls educators to use only scientifically-based research to drive practice, its own websites and bulletins offer little to no experimentally-designed research studies. Instead, we find ideologically/politically/corporate-driven data that irresponsibly focuses on standardized, inauthentic assessments and provides weak evidence of educational improvement for a yearly assessment that compares one group of children one year with another group of children the next year. Recognizing that funding is tied to these annual assessments, whether or not they are rigorously analyzed or proven, it will be necessary for the new superintendent to exhibit sufficient moral resolve to resist this (little) carrot and (big) stick approach and begin to formulate alternative possibilities with the community of principals, teachers, students, parents, scholars, and business leaders, who s/he serves.

Courage
Finally, this new superintendent will need to demonstrate great courage at this historical moment. While the opportunity to work with a wonderful community presents itself, we cannot also ignore the many challenges before us (some of which have been outlined above). As we suggest in our introduction, the answers to these persistent challenges do not lie in the comfort of the safe harbor, doing what we’ve always done. Rather, the future for our children and our community will lie in uncharted waters, doing something different. To activate a moment of creation, the new superintendent will need inspirational vision, an innovative and fresh strategy, and a firm conviction in social justice. To extend this moment of creation, the new superintendent will need to surround himself/herself with critical colleagues, staff, principals, teachers, professors, and business leaders who share this vision, can offer constructive criticism when necessary, and can capably carry out its strategy toward the improvement of all our children’s lives, educationally, socially, and economically.

Gandhi once remarked to a visitor as they looked out upon the people, “There go my people. I am their leader. I must run to catch up with them.” Gandhi was an ordinary man under extraordinary circumstances doing what was necessary if he wished to give full moral authority to the worldly charge he had been given. He rooted himself in the people’s cause as a selfless servant to their needs, their hopes, and their dreams. The new superintendent need not be a Gandhi, but s/he must be guided by Gandhi’s modeling of prophetic leadership needed to bring a transcendent vision of a way out of our historical public educational morass.

Those who will coordinate the search, those who are empowered to select our new superintendent, and all of us who will live the consequences of the choice that is made for us have an even greater responsibility to walk in front of our leader so that s/he may receive essential and continuous critical affirmation of the path on which his/her prophetic wisdom leads us. In the spirit of John F. Kennedy’s challenge to all Americans to fulfill their responsibility to their country, we must do so as well in the service of our schools, our community, our children, and our future.

If we choose to stand shoulder to shoulder with our superintendent, as one people, then we will have won.

An Open Letter to Citizens

2006-11-09T11:59:00.000-05:00

Citizens,

After the 2004 election, I posted the following collection of thoughts on this blog:

“Clearly, things didn’t go the way many of us hoped last night. That said, I would argue the work ahead of us today is the same irrespective of who won the election. This campaigning season and election last night stand as a stark indictment of our education system and the nation’s inability to think about issues, critically….

”Nonetheless, I have hope. Not a post-election-maybe-next-time-grin-and-bear-it sort of a hope. But, a critical sort of hope. Voting is not the only way we participate in democracy. It may, in fact, be the smallest factor in it (although, we are certainly led to believe it is our highest, if not perhaps our only, duty). Democracy requires the kind of day-to-day action towards transformation/revolution/liberation similar to Freire’s dialogical action….

”As [my friend] Milton points out frequently and quite provocatively, we need to begin to define our successes. We, now more than ever, need to have voice and we need to be visible. We can no longer allow the oppressor to define success for us. As transformative agents, we can and will make change. My commitment to this change and to you and our community is steadfast. I look forward to our community growing ever closer and ever outward.

”Our struggle has been defined
Its re(s/v)olution is up to us.”

Now, a couple days removed from, what I would consider, better results in our 2006 election (locally—the ouster of a long term Republican Congresswoman who voted the president’s wishes nearly 100% of the time; nationally—that the house and senate are no longer Republican complicating the ability of the president to spend his political capital so easily and categorically; and internationally—the world might have some idea, now, that we are human beings aware of more than just the US, maybe) and the long-awaited news that Secretary Rumsfeld has been fired/retired, I still come back to the same thoughts as two years ago: “We, now more than ever, need to have voice and we need to be visible.” A democratic victory hardly spells relief for the poor and disenfranchised. These democrats need to be held accountable for our support. Nothing less than:

a significant raise in the minimum wage toward or above a living wage (37 million US citizens live in poverty);
universal health care for all our citizens (46 million now without, 9 million of these children—and 90% of these children are in families who are working);
a more diplomatic plan for Iraq that brings the world and Iraq’s citizens to the table to discuss the way forward;
the complete dismantling of NCLB and serious attempts (with input from educators, not bureaucrats or corporations) on how to close the black-white achievement gap;
signing on to the Kyoto protocol (as most sensible countries in the world have done); and
a renewal of our commitment to human rights here in the US and abroad

will be viewed by me as a significant failure of will and courage—and will not garner my vote in the future.

Toward this end, I plan to continue my part in this battle (well, war, really) for justice, directing my resources (spiritual, educational, emotional, financial, physical) to these ends. Indeed, the poor/dispossessed/oppressed/disenfranchised in our classrooms and communities need us now more than ever. Our middle class sisters and brothers need better options than the media and our education systems are feeding them. They need models of hope, examples of humility, and options from the consumer life-style. And, the rich need to be freed of their oppressive ways. It is only us, in concert with the oppressed, that can humanize them.

This dispatch is my siren call to you, friend, citizen.

In peace and solidarity,

adam (from a blue dot in a red state, wishing it was green)

P.S. I wonder if we need to begin humbling ourselves to follow the lead of mass democratic movements in other countries. Perhaps we need some help in developing our own ideas about democracy, since Title IX withstood a recent challenge, Affirmative Action (which has helped white women the most) is under a tight time limit now, and the Prison Industrial Complex is exploding (as more and more private prisons make more and more money by filling more and more beds in poorer and poorer communities)

P.S.S. I should have added the dismantling of NAFTA to my list above, working for fair, not free trade.

P.S.S.S. I’ve got someone in mind for 2008…

NCLB--Formulating a Survey

2006-10-05T18:22:00.000-05:00

For those choosing a survey for their research proposal, please post here regarding who you would like to survey, what strand of the NCLB act you would like to tackle (stronger accountability, proven methods, local freedom, or parental choice), and what kinds of questions you would like to ask.

NCLB--"local freedom" discussion

2006-08-09T16:05:00.000-05:00

In this section, we will be providing information on the NCLB strand: "local freedom." In its review we will talk about "what it says," "what it says vs. what the reality may be (based on critique, evidence, experience, etc.)," and what it really says (connecting it to a larger structural reality). Information on NCLB can be found at http://www.ed.gov/nclb/landing.jhtml. A starting place for constructive critique can be found at www.rethinkingschools.com. Feel free to help in the research of this area or feel free to comment on what's here.

NCLB--"choices for parents" discussion

2006-08-09T16:04:00.000-05:00

In this section, we will be providing information on the NCLB strand: "choices for parents." In its review we will talk about "what it says," "what it says vs. what the reality may be (based on critique, evidence, experience, etc.)," and what it really says (connecting it to a larger structural reality). Information on NCLB can be found at http://www.ed.gov/nclb/landing.jhtml. A starting place for constructive critique can be found at http://www.rethinkingschools.com/. Feel free to help in the research of this area or feel free to comment on what's here.

NCLB--"stronger accountability" discussion

2006-08-09T15:58:00.000-05:00

In this section, we will be providing information on the NCLB strand: "stronger accountability." In its review we will talk about "what it says," "what it says vs. what the reality may be (based on critique, evidence, experience, etc.)," and what it really says (connecting it to a larger structural reality). Information on NCLB can be found at http://www.ed.gov/nclb/landing.jhtml. A starting place for constructive critique can be found at www.rethinkingschools.com. Feel free to help in the research of this area or feel free to comment on what's here.

NCLB--"Proven Methods" discussion

2006-08-09T15:51:00.000-05:00

In this section, we will be providing information on the NCLB strand: "proven methods." In its review we will talk about "what it says," "what it says vs. what the reality may be (based on critique, evidence, experience, etc.)," and what it really says (connecting it to a larger structural reality). Information on NCLB can be found at http://www.ed.gov/nclb/landing.jhtml. A starting place for constructive critique can be found at www.rethinkingschools.com. Feel free to help in the research of this area or feel free to comment on what's here.

Education Action

2006-07-09T16:40:00.000-05:00

This post will be used as a follow-up to our first annual PrESS Network retreat. Here we will begin planning our work to explore No Child Left Behind with the Louisville area and decide how we might best partner with Jonathan Kozol and Education Action.

Jamaica

2006-07-09T16:34:00.000-05:00

This section will be dedicated to an ongoing discussion of work in Jamaica, particularly with the Barrett Hall Basic and Care Centre. Along with planning a service experience for summer, 2007, we invite reflections related to service in and partnerships with the Global South.

PrESS Network Retreat

2006-05-09T13:41:00.000-05:00

A thread to discuss the possibility of a PrESS Network retreat!

Reading/Theory Group

2006-02-15T20:07:00.000-05:00

Will focus on theoretical issues related to social difference and social justice, will provide educational materials to the Network, and will coordinate conference presentations and publication of materials related to our work.

Slow Food Group

2006-02-15T20:02:00.000-05:00

This group will explore environmental and ecological issues toward finding more sustainable possibilities/opportunities for our schools and communities.

Service/Mentoring Group

2006-02-15T19:59:00.000-05:00

Will seek out service opportunities for the Network and work with local like-minded schools/teachers to develop professional development opportunities involving social difference and social justice.

Policy/Connections Group

2006-02-15T19:57:00.000-05:00

This group will monitor structural/policy issues and apprise the Network of issues/groups/politicians in need of letters, meetings in need of attendance, like-minded groups/individuals with whom to connect, etc.

IEP/SBARK Group

2006-02-15T19:55:00.000-05:00

This group will focus on connecting with parents, specifically regarding advocacy for their children in IEP/SBARK meetings.

A winter reflection

2005-12-23T11:26:00.000-05:00

“If society cannot be changed under any circumstances, if there is nothing that can be done, not even small and humble gestures toward something better, well, that ends the conversation. Our sense of agency shrinks, our choices diminish, and our obligation to our fellow human being ends” (Ayers, 2004, p. 151).

As I write from the study of our old shotgun house in a more progressive neighborhood of Louisville with the scent of pine emanating from the glowing Christmas tree behind me and the warmth of a space heater rising up my legs from a position near my feet, I reflect, yet again, on the hopeful struggle and my place in it. I write to make better sense of my position as a college professor—how I can help my students (soon to be teachers) craft new lenses with which to view the world, come to a more critical consciousness about the structure of injustice that exists, and to harness the courage to do something about it; how I can best help my service partners (emerging from service-learning relationships tethered to my college courses) meet the needs of their constituents in the local community; and how I can most strategically help my friends and service partners in the Caribbean (whom I have worked with in their schools and children’s homes since 1998) either escape their grinding poverty or carve out a more dignified existence and lead progressive change in their communities. Generally, I want to (re)examine how I can best leverage my privilege toward a more socially-just condition.

Recently, I have witnessed a renewed sense of agency and solidarity (and, frankly, “obligation to our fellow human beings”) through a recent struggle at our university involving a student who professes belief in the national socialist movement (a neo-Nazi organization). While the controversy is far from over I am emboldened by the way so many faculty, students, and staff (mostly of color, but some white) have stood together, withstanding critique from mostly white and male faculty, and demanding that the university begin to reassess the situation as more than one regarding free speech, but also one that involves issues of community and safety.

I have also been encouraged by the way so many friends, faculty, and staff have worked to help a young man whom Gina and I brought to the university from the Caribbean. Their outpouring of assistance to him has greatly eased his difficult cultural transition and helped him perform quite well, academically, his first semester.

I’m also heartened by the work of my teacher friend in the Caribbean who continues to tirelessly fend for the youngest members of her community, trying to build a respectable and sufficient educational facility for them. This young woman, without a high school degree, continues to advocate locally in her community, with the Ministry of Education, and with the government to make sure these children receive the kind of education they deserve.

Finally, my spirit was reinvigorated once again as my friend and musical co-conspirator, Will, engineered (with his partner, Kristin) another holiday party at the Volunteers of America Family Shelter. Members of the PrESS Network, former BU students, friends, and family coalesced with Will and Kristin to bring a little more brightness to 36 of our most vulnerable members of the community.

So, I remain hopeful. Transformation is possible and it is happening. In my recent reflections, I’ve focused much on how our market brand of capitalism creates the sense for a need of instant gratification. If we can’t get it now, we must be doing something wrong or we need to take another course or manufacture a new desire. I reject this. My experience in this struggle (about eight years now) suggests that I should look in the near opposite direction that our consumeristic culture would point us toward. We’re convinced resistance won’t work because there is no easy answer and there are no instant results. So, why would it be worth it? I look to a close friend and teaching comrade, Milton, who has been in the struggle for forty years. And, he is still in it. That is my inspiration. To walk arm and arm with him, my brother. And, it is to walk arm and arm with my avowed partner for life, Gina, who has chosen to engage this struggle with me. We strengthen and empower each other. And, it is to walk arm and arm with my brothers and sisters who helped organize a recent teach-in intended to examine the social implications of Hurricane Katrina. A renewed solidarity that crossed several forms of differences emerged from this event. We created a broad-based, multi-issued grassroots cooperative poised to better understand and combat oppressive social forces.

We are always struggling in the tension between reality and possibility. This tension is the contested terrain upon which I try to toil: sowing labor, critique, and reflection, and reaping courage, hope, and possibility. Ayers argues, “Teachers in an open democratic society must learn to think freely and without fear, to have and to use minds of our own to discover and to make sense for ourselves without any connect-the-dot formulas, without bowing or genuflecting to any authority, and without any absolute guarantees whatsoever” (p. 10). There is no there. It is the journey—the hopeful struggle to make the world just a little more beautiful; to crack open a wider creative space; to pursue more peaceful possibilities.

Teaching Toward Freedom

2005-11-28T13:24:00.000-05:00

Ayers opens his newest, most provocative text, Teaching Toward Freedom, with Kafka’s sentiment that literature is an “ax that breaks open the frozen sea inside us” (ix). I think you will find, as I did, that what Ayer’s borrows here foreshadows what is to come for you and I, the reader, in the next 160+ pages.

Seeming to capture the spirit of the PrESS Network, Ayers defines “freedom” as “the possibility of looking through your own eyes, of thinking, locating yourself, and, importantly, of naming the barriers to your humanity, and then joining with others to move against those obstacles” (xiii). Teaching, then, and any work in the service of humanity, is the practice of freedom, “when it is guided by an unshakable commitment to working with particular human beings to reach the full measure of their humanity, a willingness to reach toward a future fit for all” (xi).

I am confident this is our work.

I am constantly emboldened by your courage to shine forth this path toward freedom in your daily work as teachers, social workers, students, colleagues, and friends. I hope, like Solnit, Ayers inspires and reassures you on your journey. I hope his words provide the ax that provides an even more expansive fissure in the objectifying, dehumanizing, and, oftentimes, tyrannical contexts in which we find ourselves.

While Ayers will reassure us, he will also challenge us to define the tension within which we exist: between subject and object, between “free and fated” (xiv), and in “that special spot between heaven and earth” (xv). I look forward to sharing this journey with you.

Future Directions for the PrESS Network

2005-10-28T09:54:00.000-05:00

Below, I have included the minutes from our 10-27 meeting, which discuss possible future directions for the network. Please feel free to share your feedback.

PrESS Network meeting
10-27-05

How can we involve our families?
It may be easier to involve our families once we identify service projects (e.g., Boys and Girls Club reading program) or events (e.g., The upcoming teach-in on Hurricane Katrina mentioned below) with which they can become involved. Meeting times probably aren’t the time to involve children or partners/spouses not involved with the Network.

How can we stay in tune theoretically?
We do need to take up another book. I would suggest Bill Ayers’ Teaching toward freedom or Kozol’s new book The Shame of the Nation.

How can we best be of service to the local and global community?
Globally, our work could take us to Jamaica—this year, we'll be travelling between June 18 and June 28

More locally,
Holding training meetings for families on how to advocate for children during SBARK and IEP meetings. If time, perhaps we can even plan to be present at some

Starting a mentoring program at a local school (Drew and Brent have already held some discussions about this at Fairdale)

Working with parents on how to talk about sexual involvement, sexually transmitted diseases with their children

Becoming involved with the slow-food movement, as mentioned at the end of Solnit’s text. Linking education and nutrition—talking about food’s relatedness to ADHD, behavior, health, etc. Challenging JCPS to provide healthy food for kids. Linking with local farmers and parents.

Building peripheral curricula that neatly fits around (and, then, broadens and deepens) the core content. Perhaps we could generally focus on elementary, middle, and high, building sample curricula, and/or we could at least begin sharing our lessons with each other on the blog (Is there a way to upload files to the blog, Jon?)

Although we did not talk about it last night, I’d be interested in working toward a Teach-In on NCLB, the standards movement, high-stakes testing, etc.

How can we grow our group to other constituencies?
Bring a student and/or another teacher to the next meeting

Allow the PrESS Network to act as a service laiason

Developing tailored service learning programs for schools, teachers, classes

Acting as a connecting point between stated community needs (e.g, Volunteers of America Study Buddies, Newton Learning, etc.) and teachers seeking out service learning experiences—perhaps even linking students from different schools together to work on common projects

Link up with the Breakthrough collaborative: http://www.summerbridge.org.

Providing PD to schools/teachers

Providing programs to teachers/classes on issues of multicultural education and social justice

AESA Symposium Paper

2005-09-22T15:22:00.000-05:00

Enclosed within are the reflections/narratives we will share at the annual American Educational Studies Association conference on November 5 regarding our work in the PrESS Network.

Reflections on the new school year

2005-09-18T09:55:00.000-05:00

As the new school year gets started, I wanted us to open up an area of the blog (at Bob's urging) for reflections from the classroom. Many of you have just begun your first year in a school--hopefully, we can use this space to support each other as we try to get a handle on our teaching/pedagogy.

History and the Future at a Crossroads: Milton Brown

2005-09-16T09:49:00.000-05:00

Like many of you, I have been glued to the television screen witnessing in biblical fashion the moral unraveling of U.S. American cultural mythology. The graphic and telling images of human carnage have forever shredded the socially constructed masks of Christian and Constitutional fealty to a belief in the sanctity of all human beings we have worn since 1776. We stand naked now without the rhetorical makeup of “one nation under God,” “government of the people, by the people and for the people,” and justice for all. We have “flipped the script” on the political illusions of First, Second, and Third World self-serving international rankings. Maybe Tom Friedman is right after all about the world being flat, but for the wrong reason. The fiasco in New Orleans has made it clear to all that there are no more superpowers—real or imagined.

Hurricane Katrina and its aftermath is not a New Orleans and Gulf Coast tragedy alone, it is a uniquely U.S. American one. In fact, Hurricane Katrina is not the real tragedy at all. The lack of what bell hooks calls a “caring community” stewarded by truly compassionate leadership is what defines the source of the real tragedy. That old communist nemesis, Fidel Castro, just a few years ago provided such immediate and effective leadership in the face of a category five hurricane that he evacuated over 1.3 million Cuban citizens without losing a single life. All Cubans were Castro’s people, no matter their color, age, infirmity, or political disposition. In the wealthiest, resource-rich country on the face of the earth we allowed hundreds of thousands of our people to suffer the most egregious human indignities and what may ultimately be thousands to die needlessly. George Bush, a christianist conservative failed to save a single person. Hurricane Katrina victims survived in spite of him and others of both political parties and at all levels of government who failed them and the rest of the U.S. American people. The contrast could not be more telling.

For far too many Americans, only certain human beings stand at the top of the cosmological pyramid, individualized and sustained by God’s grace. That those human beings of power and privilege are more often than not self-identified as having been made in God’s New Testament, Reformational image—white, male, heterosexual, Christian, and of propertied and monetary means—is the asili, or motivating force, for the human denigration and social disgrace that has occurred recently in New Orleans. That those who deem themselves to be superior—and their racial and gendered surrogates—believed their own delusional hype and acted accordingly is the cultural fabric of the real tragedy in all of this.

My truth is that they just didn’t care! They didn’t care about the poor, differently abled, and elderly people of all colors who they knew for decades would be subject to the direst of human circumstances if a hurricane of sufficient force ever crossed their path. I believe they cared even less knowing that most of those who would suffer the brunt of the devastation were not only poor but Black. As Jesse Jackson so profoundly stated in rejoinder to a reporter’s query about the role of race in the unconscionably slow federal rescue and recovery response “Americans have an infinite capacity for Black pain.” Jesse’s comment, while prophetic, was too narrow in scope. The historical and contemporary evidence is clear that those made in God’s New Testament, Reformational image have an infinite capacity for anyone’s pain who is different from them. While they are not alone in their indifference to human and social injustice, they stand alone, at least momentarily, at the pinnacle of universal moral and spiritual shame for all the world to see..

It should be obvious that I do not speak here of Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld, Rove, Wolfowitz, et al, alone. To focus on them to the exclusion of the U.S. American social/political ideology of a “will to power,” a Manifest Destiny, if you will, that encompasses us all—republican and democrat, womyn and man, Jew and gentile, Black, white, and all other racial designations—is to skew our perception and focus and to inexorably chain us to the culturally socialized patterns of scapegoating and moral obfuscation. We, the American people, elected Bush and Cheney and with conscious acceptance embraced their henchmen of draconian politics and practices. We, the American people, excused their absurd misdirection of truth that propelled us into accepting their predetermined plan to invade Iraq. We, the American people, swallowed whole their lies about Saddam Hussein’s involvement in the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. We, the American people, even continue to misguidedly embrace Colin Powell who sold his soul to a corrupt political ideal rather than fulfill his moral duty of allegiance to the U.S. American people. We, the American people, countenanced it all in the name and spirit of the U.S. American way—republicanism as democracy; illusion as reality; racism as history. Where are you, H.L. Mencken, when we need you most?

O.J., Michael Jackson, Minister Louis Farrakhan, young Black men in urban centers, and even liberals—who by definition must be white since Blacks are almost always only Black—are momentarily shelved as the coded images of colorblind racism and other forms of social injustice. The “God’s image boys” have taken their rightful place alongside Pat Robertson, Jerry Falwell, Trent Lott and Bill Frist, whose collectively muted and temporary retreat gives even greater emphasis to the magnitude of their shameful pretense. Robertson’s call to have one of U.S. America’s perceived political enemies assassinated seems to have been answered. In an ironic twist, he and the “God’s Image Boys” became the target when the sinister union of whiteness, maleness, privilege, power, and Christianist fundamentalism, camouflaged in conservative Republican ideology, was exposed to national and international observers. Jesus, my Sephardic Jewish brother of color and poverty, must finally be smiling. After five hundred years, he just might get his religion back.

In light of the U.S. Americaness of the tragedy continuing in New Orleans today, we cannot continue to be above it all at our “old alma mater on the hill.” We cannot merely take in a few discarded souls, feel good about ourselves, and continue to do what we have always done. The social masks of indifference have come off us as well. We, too, stand naked and ultimately accountable to a mission statement of high ideals that require and demand sufficient will and resources to make it real.

The under-reinforced levees of cultural competence and social consciousness at BU are no more sufficient than the physical ones along Lake Ponchartrain to hold back the surging waters of insidious racial ignorance and historical social indifference. Bellarmine, in some striking ways, is like the French Quarter and the Garden District in New Orleans—a cultural respite for far too many educational tourists habitually oblivious to “human suffering in the world” that exists around almost every corner they so arduously choose not to turn. Caps, gowns, and degrees, momentos to be cherished as unfortunate reminders of a time unfettered by a clarion call to consciousness, speak poignantly to a mere symbolism of educational excellence and the inevitable exploitation of race and class privilege. The Princeton Review’s ranking of BU as the eleventh least politically active university in the nation should be less a cause for dismay than a call to reality, conscious reflection, and purposeful action.

Hopefulness lies in the fact that more of my colleagues at BU than I can recall at any other institution where I have been, from the President all the way across the campus, are truly committed to the noble ideal of social justice. Though their voices are most often muted by institutional culture and tradition as well as by the deafening silence of others for whom social difference and social justice may be less compelling ideals, these conscious activists are a testament to the inordinate possibilities of hope and dream. From the most senior member of the Board of Trustees to the youngest freshmyn, we must galvanize our resources in a struggle to transgress the debilitating push of fear of that which we think we know about the unknown (not the unknown itself) and the tranquilizing pull of the socially reproduced status quo. We must resist excessive institutional politics of propriety (e.g., Bellarmine’s traditional image) and boldly sail from our “safe harbors” toward a new reality, toward a new Bellarmine. It is not that the old Bellarmine is not good enough; it is that the old Bellarmine is not nearly enough.

If we are to shore up the cultural levees within Bellarmine as we most certainly must do in more geographical ways around New Orleans, then it must be done with the most critical and comprehensive thought and planning possible. Bellarmine’s Strategic Plan for 2006-2111 cannot be like the myriad studies done for decades before Hurricane Katrina visited the Gulf Coast—a well-crafted document that lacks the will of leadership at all levels to provide the funds and human resources needed to ensure that the life-centering and life-sustaining provisions within the plan be fully implemented. An unfunded and under-resourced mandate is no mandate at all. To do so would be to render those different from the dominant group at BU to an experience of marginalized indifference of Katrina-like proportions. If that happens, it will be on our watch and on our consciences.

It is our duty to bring soul to BU. Not the racially trite notions of soul that limit our spirituality to stylistic rhythmic expression, but the kind of soul that flows from a union of institutional mind, body, and spirit. The kind that inspired that six-year old boy in hurricane-ravaged and government-neglected New Orleans to, with blind faith, lead five other children, all younger than him and some who were even strangers, toward an unknown destiny. His innocent courage speaks eloquently to that which is possible if we seek our own salvational innocence and moral courage by just letting go. The door of hope and possibility has been opened for us. We have no choice but to walk through it with conscious determination and unrepentent resolve. If not, then we have no one to blame but ourselves for what Cornell West warns “awaits us in the 21st Century.”

Milton Brown is an adjunct faculty member of the School of Education at Bellarmine University and Chair of the Multicultural(ism) Task Force

Reflections on Katrina: Adam Renner

2005-09-05T18:27:00.000-05:00

I had hoped to be able to include more coherent thoughts by now, but I still haven't reflected all the way through this issue yet. I preface my comments with these thoughts in mind to acknowledge they are evolving and that I am seeking constructive feedback.

It's been awhile since we, as a country, have faced such a natural disaster. From here, it is difficult to really gauge its effect, only able to live it vicariously through the media--a pretty helpless feeling, given that we rarely ever get the whole story through our news outlets.

I want to be critical of the relief efforts; I want to be critical of the evacuation efforts; I want to be critical of the preparation for the hurricane, but I first want to acknowledge that other than sending money (which I will do through collections here at BU), I've not done much, personally. Second, I want to acknowledge the incredible acts of courage and, no doubt, selfless compassion that have (and will continue to) occur throughout these unfolding events.

This second issue, I guess, provides as good a jumping off point as any. Because what it does is highlight is the difference between the structural and the individual. While the individual acts of courage and compassion will comfort many; while the US citizens will rally around each other in the face of a disaster (as we also did on 9/11/01); and while these individual actors will only see people (not color or class or citizenship) in the face of immediate, dire need, much of this could have been prevented had more structural considerations been made ahead of time.

It is becoming pretty evident that no evacuation was possible for the city’s poorest (who also tended to be the city’s people of color). People with cars could get out of town. People with families out of town or credit cards had places to go to safely sit out the storm. In a recent editorial by Michael Parenti, he recounts Cuba’s experience with last year’s hurricane that devastated the island. The Cuban gov’t was able to evacuate 1.3 million people (10 % of the total population) from the wrath of the hurricane before it hit, losing no lives in this natural disaster. Why didn’t we have the same plan in place? Our death toll will probably top 1000.

It also appears the relief efforts have been feeble, ill-planned, and disorganized. Certainly, a plan must have been in place. While getting supplies to some in the matter of a few days, given the circumstances, may seem like good turn-around time, I certainly wouldn’t want to the be the one waiting. Some are still waiting more than a week afterward.

Finally, it is clear that city planners had been worried about this levy situation and had continued to seek more money from the federal government. As Parenti and Maureen Dowd (in today’s CJ) points out, their budget continued to be cut. It was so sad to hear from an engineer in the Netherlands (which has a vast portion of their land below sea level) talk about the kind of money they have spent on their infrastructure, figuring that its better to spend the money now then spend so much later in dollars and lives if the big one hits. But our country falls easier prey to the nature of the market economy, often gambling—and it has often been at the expense of our most vulnerable, those without a voice in the gambling decision. Now, as we watch the poor and black faces on the news, will we be moved to do more structurally (once the news coverage dies down) after we give, individually? I was left with a hope after 9/11/01 that we might all take stock and make some changes. I’d be foolish to say I have seen any kind of substantive change. Am I foolish to think change is possible this time?

Dr. Renner is the Chair of the Graduate Education Program at Bellarmine University

Reflections on Katrina

2005-09-01T12:54:00.000-05:00

by Tamara Butler

Last night in Berkeley, at a gathering of poets and attentive listeners, an elder Black man, "one of Berkeley's most beloved Slam Poets", took the stage and with a quivering yet eloquent voice spoke of his family, of his home in New Orleans. Baritone and raspy this voice spoke of his solitary state here in Berkeley while his many children, brothers, and sisters were dealing with the the woeful ramifications of the hurricane. He reckoned himself "a solitary pecan tree" whose branches have "spread far and wide". He said when he first heard of the evacuations he called his sister and asked, "What are you going to do?" She replied, "We're gonna stay. We're gonna ride it out." He told us that she takes care of their elderly and enfeebled step-father, 87 years of age, who insisted, "We've survived hurricanes before. I'm not leavin!" He called one of his sons and asked "What are you going to do?" The son, his youngest, replied "I'm goin g to the airport." He said,"Everybody laughed at my son; said "He crazy!". But that's just what he did. He went to the airport. And you know what? He was the safest out of all of 'em. Let them laugh, I said but he was the safest 'cuz once the storm hit they couldn't throw him out." For three days after that he couldn't get any news of his family because phone lines were down. He was beside himself with worry for three days. Until finally he received a call telling him that his family was alright.
You could feel a collective, "Thank God" rise from the hearts of those listening. As he walked off stage a young Caucasian woman ran up to him and threw her arms around him. He accepted this comfort graciously. As he drew near me, I extended a hand to him. He grasped it with the same urgency that one would a life-saver. I was too overcome with emotion to utter a word. I simply enclosed his hand between both of mine and held and with sympathetic eyes, tried to fill the space between us with as much love as possible.
The ironic thing is that the storm hit the day I had decided that it was time to plan a trip to New Orleans. Now, I fear, it is as Frederick Smock wrote, that the New Orleans of our imaginations is lost to us, forever. I grieve for the city and for the people I will never know.

Best,
Tamara

First Reflections

2005-09-01T12:52:00.000-05:00

by Lynn Bynum

New Orleans is my home. It is where I was born, where my sister was born, where my parents were born, where my grandparents lived most of their lives. It is where much of my family still lives – or did until a few days ago. It’s where I visit at least once a year – where my son, husband and I spent the 4th of July weekend so we could visit family, especially elderly aunts and uncles.

The New Orleans I know is different than that of a tourist. Certainly, we enjoy the pleasures of the French Quarter and the Garden District, of the restaurants and the shops. But it’s a schizophrenic city, too, for it is truly a city of “haves” and “have-nots.” The vast majority of the have-nots are the African Americans who have been displayed on television in such stark circumstances, the “forgotten” people who are still just a heartbeat away from the centuries of slavery followed by segregation that I so vividly remember as a child and my parents fled so that we would have greater opportunities to achieve. So many of these folks you’ve seen on television are just simple people who lived in abject poverty that makes the eastern hollers of Kentucky and West Virginia look like the suburbs.

My family is safe, thank God, but they have lost their homes and businesses for the foreseeable future. They have the resources to rebuild. Most people will not. Imagine people who have lost what little they had managed to accumulate and who do not have the resources to re-build. Think about the fact that the city and state issued “voluntary” evacuation orders days in advance so that the “haves” could leave town. Not until Sunday were the “have-nots” told to evacuate – and the city/state knew all along that 100,000 did not have the means to evacuate. And where were FEMA and Homeland Security? Did they stock the Superdome, the site of last resort, with necessities like water, food and toiletries? No, after all, this was for the “have-nots.” Where is the justice and righteousness in that?

The city I know and long for has nothing to do with buildings and ambience. It’s the people – American refugees – that I think of and pray for. They have lost so much.

Lynn Bynum is the Chief Human Resources Officer at Bellarmine University

Hurricane Katrina - First Reflections

2005-09-01T12:48:00.000-05:00

Friends:

As I feared the first day the levees broke, Hurricane Katrina will turn out to be the worst environmental catastrophe in modern American history, far dwarfing Hurricane's Andrew and Camilla and equaling, if not surpassing, the San Francisco earthquake of
1906 in its destructive impact. The flooding, and physical destruction of a historic American city, coupled with the complete destruction of homes, stores, businesses, roads and bridges along 80 miles of Mississippi coastline presents a humanitarian challenge of unprecedented proportions, with consequences that will be felt for years by those who lost loved ones, homes, businesses, jobs, and any sense of comfort or security.

But this catastrophe also reveals, far more than September 11, how deeply divided our nation is and how far our social fabric has been strained, not only by the war in Iraq, but by
policies which have widened the gap between rich and poor and left many poor people in
American feeling marginalized and alienated

When the fully tally of the dead from this storm and its aftermath, which includes those who will die from diseases contracted due to heat, starvation and contaminated water as well as the storm itself, we will see what TV photos of rescue operations are revealing-that the greatest loss of life, and the greatest suffering, was occurring among Louisiana and Mississippi's black poor. Look who we see wading through the floodwaters in New Orleans streets, look who we see lining up to get into the Superdome, look who we see being taken off roofs. And look who we see being arrested for "looting" Unlike September 11, which revealed a city united in pain, and grief, and determination to rebuild; this crisis reveals communities which are profoundly divided by race and class, and in which the black poor in particular, bear levels of hardship which far exceed those of any other group.

Not since the great Mississippi River Flood of 1927 have the economic and racial isolation of the black poor been revealed in such stark relief by an environmental catastrophe. What the images Americans on the evening news reveal about who is dying, who is trapped, who is without food, who is drinking contaminated water and yes, who is looting, should give all of us pause. Is this what the pioneers of the Civil Rights Movement fought to achieve, a society where many black people are as trapped and isolated by their poverty as they were
by segregation laws

One other thought comes to mind. If the American armed forces, including the National Guard and army corps of engineers, were not bogged down in a needless, unprovoked war
in Iraq, would the response to this catastrophe have been quicker?. Would the levee repair have taken place more quickly and effectively, more food and medicine delivered, more troops sent to preserve order?. When all is said and done, many Americans will question whether the response to this catastrophe was hampered by the strain the Iraq war has exerted on our military's rapid response ability in the United States.

I make these observations not in any way to detract by the heroism of tens of thousands of rescue personnel and ordinary people who have saved, and continue to save lives through their actions. Every one of us needs to give them, and the people of the affected states, or complete support, economically, politically, spiritually, and by any act of personal generosity that can ease someone's suffering.

But we also cannot shrink from what this tragedy reveals about us as a nation at this stage in history. If September 11 showed the power of a nation united in response to
a devastating attack; Hurricane Katrina reveals the fault lines of a region, and a nation, rent by profound social divisions

Dr Mark Naison
August 31, 2005

New Orleans: A Requiem

2005-09-01T12:44:00.000-05:00

by Frederick Smock

The other day, I saw storm-clouds brightened by the evening sun, their bruise-purple and -gray formations briefly illuminated, on the underside, just before the sun set and rain settled in for the night. This was a luxury of weather, in a season of hurricanes, of unearthly winds and supernatural tides – for Hurricane Katrina has just laid waste to the once-lovely city of New Orleans.
I remember visiting a college friend New Orleans years ago. Becky worked as a barmaid in the French Quarter – the only European district of America – and she had somehow acquired the sobriquet “Bubbles.” In a few short years she had become a true denizen of the city. We spent a long night drinking, in bars where comic Dick Van Dyke got his start, where legendary blues guitarists still played, and where jazz history was still being made. Come morning, Becky and I grabbed some strong chickory coffee at the Café du Monde, in Jackson Square. It was a supremely cosmopolitan event, unlike anything else the country has to offer.
New Orleans has been a city of the sacred and the profane. The county itself is organized Catholically, into parishes, even for political purposes. And yet a licentiousness rules – a tolerance for alternative lifestyles, sexualities and philosophies. Such an openness often characterizes port cities, but New Orleans has been supreme among them. One evening during my visit, a young woman in a nun’s habit approached, on Canal Street – she suddenly lifted the black skirts over her head, flashed us her naked body, then walked on. Only in New Orleans!
I worry that moralists might weigh in on this disaster – as some of them did in the early days of the AIDS epidemic, and during the tsunami disaster in Asia – saying that it is a punishment from heaven for sinful ways. Such a judgment would be wrong-headed, of course, if for no other reason than that New Orleans is much too various to be characterized by any venal sin alone.
New Orleans is a storied city. Truman Capote, Lafcadio Hearn, Shirley Ann Grau, Walker Percy, Kate Chopin and many others have written about the city’s unique Southern charms. The Big Easy has figured into many a detective novel. John Kennedy Toole’s comic masterpiece, A Confederacy of Dunces, was set in New Orleans, and could have been set nowhere else.
It grieves me to contemplate New Orleans in the past tense. But, in the wake of Katrina, I am afraid the past tense is the only responsible one. Witness the sobering facts: At least a million homeless. The city underwater, a toxic swamp. Coffins exploding out of their crypts. Thousands newly dead. Looters rioting. Officials are saying it will take years to rebuild, and who knows what the rebuilt city will be? Very possibly it will not be the New Orleans we have known. A little bit of us would die with the death of this great city, for New Orleans occupies a significant place in our collective imagination.
The warnings for Hurrican Katrina were dire, but not dire enough, evidently. Even President Bush ignored it. On the second day of the disaster, he was in California talking about Afghanistan. On the third day, he did a fly-over of New Orleans on his way back to Washington D.C. We are entering the fourth day of the disaster, and federal aid is only now beginning to move into the area.
Many private citizens did not heed the warnings seriously, either. Perhaps they did not have the resources to flee. We have watched their dramatic rescues, from rooftops, and from highway overpasses, on the news over the past couple of days.
This disaster is so much larger than September 11. New York still exists, after all. And the New York of our imagination still exists. I worry that the New Orleans of our imagination does not exist anymore. And, as much as I grieve for the people of New Orleans, I also grieve for the lost idea of New Orleans.
Let us hope that the city can rebuild, and that it can rebuild to its original design – an uproarious city, multicultural and multilingual, a mardi gras of the mind.

Frederick Smock is poet-in-residence at Bellarmine University.

Reflections on "Reading is Life" Program at the Boys and Girls Club

2005-08-03T09:52:00.000-05:00

After your work at the Boys and Girls Club feel free to leave some thoughts and reflections here.

Summer Reading Program at the New Albany Boys and Girls Club

2005-04-20T12:48:00.000-05:00

Please enter our discussion here regarding your ideas for the summer reading program at the New Albany Boys and Girls Club.

We have it scheduled from August 1 to August 5, 1-3 PM each day. More than likely not everyone will be able to make every hour every day given our busy schedules. That's no problem. Any help you can give is appreciated, even if it is just on the planning end.

Reading is not my thing (although I can read), so your ideas are needed! We're talking about children, ages 3-18. We can split them up in any number of ways in order to target specific grade ranges.

AESA Symposium Proposal

2005-04-20T12:34:00.000-05:00

PROGRESSIVES ENGAGED IN STRUGGLE SUPPORT (PrESS) NETWORK: SEEKING SOCIAL JUSTICE IN PUBLIC EDUCATION

This symposium focuses on the critical need for progressive educators to join together in the struggle to protect and promote public schools/education. Believing that they are one of the last (if not the last) bastion/possibility of democratic thinking/ideals, a fledgling coalition of professors, teachers, students and social workers have created a network of concerned citizens poised to connect with vulnerable constituents in our schools, support each other in our educative work in the community, and to propose more critical possibilities for schooling and education. We call this partnership the Progressives Engaged in Struggle Support (PrESS) Network. On our website (http://pressnetwork.blogspot.com) we claim the PrESS Network is

“a critically-engaged, hopeful, and supportive voice for change. It’s members are dedicated to affirming the basic rights of and creating solutions with children and families who are disenfranchised by an unjust socio-economic structure. This empowering partnership seeks to facilitate system-wide change through respect for social difference, humanistic teaching, service to others, transformative dialog, and an ever-evolving journey toward connectedness.”

The following presentations chronicle the formation of the PrESS Network, discuss the work that we do in and out of the classroom, what we think we have accomplished so far, and what is next for our partnership.

Presentation 1: Formation
This presentation focuses on the formation of the PrESS Network by a group of graduate students in the spring, 2004. These graduate students were part of a cohort in Bellarmine’s Master of Arts in Teaching Program. The second module in this program centers on issues of social difference, social justice, and service-learning. Realizing that this would, perhaps, be the last time these students would ever receive such in-depth information on social difference, progressive pedagogies, etc., they consulted with the professor, Adam Renner, regarding the possibilities of creating a group that could continue the conversations and information-sharing beyond the semester. This paper explores the early days of the PrESS Network: what we thought we were getting into, the struggle to get started, and the importance of coalition-building.

Presentation 2: Support through Stories
This presentation chronicles an integral part of our life in the PrESS Network: supporting the progressive work we do in the classroom and in the community. At each of our meetings, we begin by sharing stories of the issues/struggles we face in our work. Realizing that we are often one of the lone proponents/actors of progressive pedagogies in our classrooms, we frequently find few people with whom to critically discuss issues of social difference and social injustice. Our Network serves as a place to reconnect with others facing the same struggles and who view the issues through a similar critical lens. These stories, though, can also spark inspiration and innovation. Particularly for new teachers in the Network, they have an opportunity to learn from others who are implementing a more progressive approach, providing them with lesson ideas, assessment possibilities, and a whole range of teaching strategies. This paper focuses on some of these stories and the issues we’re facing in our schools and communities.

Presentation 3: Reading Circles and Professional Development
This presentation details another integral part of our life in the PrESS Network: our professional development. Similar to Freire’s (1987) concept of culture circles, we spend a part of each meeting “reading the word and the world.” As reflective practitioners, we find it necessary to continue to stretch ourselves for more nuanced and complex understandings of social difference and social justice. To date, we have shared in the reading of hooks’ (1994) Teaching to Transgress, Freire’s (1970) Pedagogy of the Oppressed, and numerous articles from such publications as Rethinking Schools. In fact, a portion of our website is now dedicated to reading material and professional development.

In addition to the reading circles, a portion of our partnership had an opportunity to present at last years AESA conference regarding some of our research into issues of social difference. This served as an opportunity for graduate students (pre- and in-service teachers) in the PrESS Network to discuss some of their work with the wider academic community and to engage in dialog with other like-minded folks. This paper focuses on the importance of stretching ourselves and to continue toward Gramsci’s notion of the organic intellectual.

Presentation 4: Service and Action
Moving from the theoretical to the more practical, this presentation reveals our attempts at engaging with the wider community on transformative projects ultimately aimed at facilitating the system-wide change we call for our in mission statement. Outside of the individual service we provide as educators and social workers, we have attempted to come together on particular projects that focus our efforts on a particular issue. This summer, we have an opportunity to engage in our first such service partnership with a local boys and girls club. This partnership will involve an intensive reading program for the children at the club to help prepare them for return to school at the end of the summer. This paper examines the experience/partnership at the boys and girls club and outlines other work we hope to take up in the future.

Presentation 5: What is next?
This final presentation explores what might be next for our PrESS Network. Along with continuing with our reading circles, professional development and service activity, we also know that we must widen the circle within the network to encompass more community members, particularly parents. With this expansion other possibilities/needs might surface that will provide more definitive direction for our evolving partnership. Additionally, we have plans to investigate the possibility of getting several members of our Network hired in the same public school in order that a more concentrated effort might be made in a single building toward more progressive possibilities. Finally, we are also exploring the feasibility of creating our own anthology of progressive teaching strategies from the front lines of the classroom.

In any event, we look forward to sharing these possibilities with friends and critics at the AESA conference. We also hope to spark interest in the PrESS Network with conference attendees in order that we might also expand our partnership across the country. Given the assault on teachers and public education, this sort of coalition building is critical to the future of the teaching profession and public education as a democratic ideal. We look forward to the affirmation and critical feedback we know we can count on from the AESA community.

PrESS Network Mission Statement

2005-04-01T12:58:00.000-05:00

Hope: Participating in moments of creation

2005-03-15T10:28:00.000-05:00

“The question, then, is not so much how to save the world as to know how to keep alive that moment of creation” (Solnit, p. 108)

Rebecca Solnit, in her book Hope in the Dark (2004), endeavors to promote the idea of hope for activists by chronicling several recent “moments of creation” whereby social justice took one step forward toward a better world. Solnit recalls the protest in Seattle in 1999; the collapse of the WTO talks in Cancun, blown up by the Group of 21; the stalling of the FTAA talks in Miami; the Zapatista movement to subvert NAFTA; and the worldwide peace demonstrations against the war in Iraq on February 15, 2003.

Solnit’s work was particularly inspiring to me on our recent trip to Jamaica as Gina and I (along with two close friends) had an opportunity to participate in our own moment of creation by bringing news of a full Bellarmine scholarship to a young man in Jamaica we have known since he was 10. Before it is all said and done, Franklyn, now 17, will receive close to $150,000 in aid towards his bachelor’s degree, for which he is deciding between secondary science education or pre-med.

Another moment of creation, which occurred while we were away, involved the victory of the Coalition of the Immokalee Workers in their struggle with YUM! Brands. Gina and I have worked with the Coalition since last year, demonstrating with them during their march to YUM! last spring. This year I have also supplied them with graduate service learning students to help orchestrate this year’s Taco Bell Truth Tour and march, and helped to facilitate speakers for Bellarmine professors. In the short term the Coalition has secured a penny more per pound of tomatoes picked, a code of conduct for treatment of the workers, and a seat at the table with Yum! and the growers. Perhaps, not coincidentally, it was one of the Coalition organizers who recommended Solnit’s book to me not so long ago over tea at a local coffee shop, as we grappled with the social justice struggle. Little did we know, we were acting within a moment of creation.

And, so it is, the struggle toward justice—a hopeful struggle in which we seek a more democratic process, improvisational possibilities, and intuitive entryways. Solnit likens hope to a door—not always open to all people at all times. Yet, she points out immigrants, for example, seem to have a knack for finding doors, while the self-proclaimed spokespeople for the poor have a tendency to bang their head against them.

Sonit’s words are clear, but my forehead is bruised. While participating in these two moments of creation, I’m also scrambling to find the door with my other Jamaican partners, who are gasping for breath under the iron heel of global capitalism; poor on poor violence, propagated in the ghettos and countrysides of this 3rd World nation; land officers bilking money from squatters; parliamentary officials joking about structural adjustment; underpaid workers building walls for the hotels along the Queens Highway by day, obscuring their view of the Caribbean by night; four killings in two days in the community in which we were organizing last week; etc. I return home with these issues heavy on my heart and head, missing our partners already, but partially (sadly) relieved to return to our 2-story shotgun in the relative safety of our semi-urban community and the sweet life (to coin a Jamaican phrase) of being a university professor.

Yet, the work continues here on our town and adjoining communities as well, as we struggle for the educational lives and social well-being of 96000 JCPS students, along with their private school and surrounding county peers. Our work here is critical (and heavy) as well. What is the moment of creation toward which we evolve? In what creation will the PrESS Network participate? Towards these moments, Solnit challenges and encourages us with her “politics of prefiguration”: if you embody what you aspire to, you have already succeeded. If your activism is already democratic, peaceful, and creative, then in one small corner of the world, those things have triumphed. Activism, then, is not only a toolbox to change things, but it is also a place to take up residence. It is process. As we endeavor to define a mission, struggle toward justice, and participate in moments of creation, let us reside in this hopeful, democratic, and creative process, courageously defying the status quo and removing our head from the door. Let’s charge through the door together.

The changing blog...

2005-02-28T22:05:00.000-05:00

Friends,

I encourage you all to submit any interesting articles, links, etc... in 'posts' which are different from 'comments.' You will gain the ability to 'post' by joining our blog's team (let me know your interest in joining by sending an Email along to jlee@bellarmine.edu).

In this way we can each 'comment' on individual 'posts' and in doing so, maintain a record of our thoughts and responses to a wide range of concepts and ideas. This process is known as 'threading' or maintaining 'threads.'

You will also notice a 'links' section in the sidebar of our main blog page. I am happy to add any links you think may be supportive to our efforts and of interest to our blog visitors (again, send along an Email to jlee@bellarmine.edu with suggested links)

Thanks to all those who attended the February 27th meeting! For those of you who came and to those of you we missed - you are always welcome in our home, please visit soon!

Readings for the 27th

2005-02-17T11:34:00.000-05:00

Please follow the comments below, which will provide some food for thought for our upcoming meeting.

PrESS Network Mission Elements

2005-02-10T14:22:00.000-05:00

Let's begin to compile a list here of what we're about as an organization: What are our beliefs? What do we do? What do we hope for? What are we working toward?

As you consider your own personal contributions to this task, please review previous posts (listed in the archives on the right), which contain the thoughts and ideas shared by Adam and others.Please feel free to post your comments for all to read under the thread: PrESS Network Mission (listed on the right).

Next meeting Thursday, February 10 at 7:30 in Lenihan Hall

2005-02-07T11:23:00.000-05:00

Friends,

Just a reminder that we have a meeting next Thursday, February 10 from 7-9 in the conference room in Lenihan Hall.

We had about 13 folks at our first meeting of the semester and had an opportunity to begin evolving our action plan as an organization:

It appears we are moving forward with gathering some more information about becoming a limited liability corporation: PrESS Network, LLC? Bob informs us this is a relatively pain-free process (of about 6 months) and relatively inexpensive: $350-$400. It does require that we pull together a charter of sorts so we will probably have some work ahead of us as far as this goes.

In relation to this, we also began to try and articulate what our commitments are as an organization. This may be a good topic of conversation for our next meeting and some email chatter. What are we, as an organization, committed to?

We also discussed service opportunities for our organization. Rachel reported on the Study Buddies program at Volunteers of America. In the interim, Bob has also informed me of another possible service opportunity at VOA that we can talk about at the meeting. Beth is also investigating some possible service work with the Urban League.

Since our last meeting, Jon has entertained us with the interesting idea of beginning a PrESS Network WebLog, or blog. Many members have responded that they’re not sure what that is (or can spell it J). It seems this may be an excellent way to get our information out to a wider audience and to provide an environment of free exchange. Jon, could you talk to this a little more at the next meeting?

Finally, we also talked about some attending and presenting at some upcoming conferences. In terms of attendance, the Choices and Changes conference here in town is coming up on March 29-March 31 (www.kycid.org). Please bring your calendars along so we can talk about attending a few sessions together if you’re free any of those days or afternoons. We also talked about preparing presentations abut our group/work for the Rouge Forum conference in Syracuse this summer and for the American Educational Studies Association in Charlottesville, VA this fall. No info about these conferences is available yet.

For next weeks meeting, along with treating the above issues, why don’t we begin with your reactions to the reading material we’ve been trading over the last two weeks. Thanks, Angela and Mark, for already beginning this discussion!

See you soon. Peace. adam

1. http://nationalcatholicreporter.org/fwis/fw012005.htm

2. http://nationalcatholicreporter.org/fwis/fw012705.htm

3. Racial achievement gap 'a national tragedy'
Author, lawyer speak at U of L

By Nancy C. Rodriguez
nrodriguez@courier-journal.com
The Courier-Journal

The achievement gap between whites and minorities is the most important educational and civil-rights issue in the United States, said Abigail Thernstrom, one of two members of the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights who spoke in Louisville yesterday.

And the problem can't be fixed by public schools alone, she said.

"When you look at the numbers, you want to cry," said Thernstrom, noting national test scores that show that African-American students graduate from high school with an eighth-grade education.

"You're talking about a national tragedy -- a tragedy for which there are no good excuses," she said.

Thernstrom and Peter Kirsanow, a Cleveland attorney, spoke at the University of Louisville's Louis D. Brandeis School of Law.

Their speeches were presented by the McConnell Center for Political Leadership, School Choice Scholarships and the Bluegrass Institute, a Bowling Green think tank.

Kentucky, like other states, has a persistent achievement gap among racial groups.

Overall scores from the 2004 Commonwealth Accountability Testing System show that black and Hispanic students trail white students at all grade levels. Asian students outscore whites at all levels.

Kentucky students performed at similar levels on the 2003 National Assessment of Educational Progress. For example, in eighth-grade math, 62 percent of African Americans scored below basic vs. 32 percent of white students.

Thernstrom is the author of a recent book, "No Excuses, Closing the Racial Gap in Learning," with her husband, Stephan Thernstrom, a Harvard University history professor. She also serves on the Massachusetts Board of Education.

During her talk at U of L, Thernstrom stressed her belief that public schools -- with their bureaucracies and contractual restraints -- cannot solve the achievement problem.

Rather, she said, charter schools, where principals have the latitude to extend the school day, manage budgets, hire and fire teachers, and make immediate curriculum decisions, are the answer.

"There is no way of running good schools without the freedom that accompanies choice," she said.

Kentucky and Alabama are the only two states that do not have a charter-school law.

Kirsanow agreed with Thernstrom, saying that without any competition through charter schools or voucher programs, the gap never will be closed.

"There isn't any true incentive to make sure that you get better and better and better," he said.

"Sending more money to a school that is performing poorly is a travesty."

PrESS Meeting Agenda for January 20, 2005

2005-01-13T15:28:00.001-05:00

Friends,

Below is a tentative agenda for our meeting next Thursday. I have suggested two short readings from Rethinking Schools with their appropriate links as conversation starters for the evening.

In the spirit of “Not one damn dime day”--a nationwide, economic protest to the inauguration for which we are urged to not purchase anything on 1/20--I will not be purchasing coffee for the evening, but will do my best to get some made here and have some on hand. If you choose to and are able to bring a dessert, might I suggest one that is homemade and not purchased (at least purchased that day). J

I’m really looking forward to reconnecting and getting started with you in this new year.

Peace. adam

PrESS Network
1-20-05
7:00 – 9:00
Lenihan Hall

Welcome Back
Intros
Discuss Readings and what’s happening in our work
Where we might begin with teaching (William Ayers, v19, #1):

Taming the Beast (Stan Karp, v18, #4):
PrESS Network Action
Beth and Rachel—Service project
Angela—linking with SUNY, book project regarding progressivism within standards-driven education system (“Struggling together”?)
Website
LLC status
http://www.fairtest.org/
Conferences
Choices and Changes (registration begins 1/3/05, http://www.kycid.org/)
IERG (Vancouver, July 13-16, proposals due 2/4/05, http://www.ierg.net/)
NCEA (http://www.nceaonline.org/)
Rouge Forum (http://www.rougeforum.org/)
AESA (Charlottesville, November, proposals due April)
Next meeting: 2/10 in Lenihan

Adam Renner, Ph.D

Vision for Spring 2005

2004-12-22T13:27:00.000-05:00

Friends,

Thank you, Alex, for your recent conversation starter as well as your energy and motivation to continue to grow the PrESS Network, attempting to expand its reach beyond the borders of our meeting spaces to local/state/national/global communities. Interesting to think that it was just about one year ago that I would meet many of you from the spring, 2004 Mod II, which would eventually launch what has come to be known as the Progressives Engaged in Struggle Support Network. Thanks to your courage and drive, we now number more than thirty-five, with many more eager to learn about and join our struggle. I’m encouraged by the steady path we have traveled to come to this moment—sharing with one another, strengthening one another, learning from one another—poised, now, to act in the broader community.

Yesterday, Gina and I had a chance to share the evening with a number of folks—first, an appreciation/holiday dinner with a family she works with and, next, a solstice party with some friends from Bellarmine. As we ushered in the longest night of the year and prepared for the impending snow, it was clear (from our discussions at dinner and at the party) the impact we have on our world as social servants and the strength we are able to draw from others who share in our struggle. As always, the world needs social servants, critical and radical; prepared to lead, prepared to struggle, prepared to serve. We now confidently and consciously, alongside many others (historical and present), assume this role.

This morning, as I sit in the quiet of Lenihan and watch the snow fall outside my window, sobered by the dark night of solstice, I know that the days now will become longer and longer, little by little—and that much work lies ahead. Measuring my thoughts this morning, I break from writing to read the two small posters from the Rouge Forum, hanging just beyond my computer screen—The System: The Pyramid of Capitalism and The Chains of Iniquity. My (re)reading and (re)interpretation of these posters are reinforced by new historical knowledge I am gleaning from reading Howard Zinn’s, A Peoples History of the US, 1492-Present. I know that these injustices we struggle against are a historical construction. As the coming-to-conscious Network we believe ourselves to be, it is critical that we work to deconstruct/break these Chains and to continue to deconstruct/reveal the System. We, as social servants, can join with others at the ground level of this change. We have both the access (as teachers, social workers, graduate students, professors, etc.) and the agency (knowledge, self-confidence, self-actualization) to make this change.

In the course of less than one year, we’ve come together formally a dozen or so times, took part in reading two pivotal and foundational pieces for critical and engaged progressives, Teaching to Transgress and Pedagogy of the Oppressed, spoke at an international social foundations conference, and, perhaps most importantly, strengthened one another with powerful stories of the work we do in our classrooms and communities.

Now, looking ahead to 2005, I’m sure we can look forward to much of the same and more.

For the spring semester, I’d like to propose the following meeting dates:
Thursday, January 20 (7-9 in Lenihan)
Thursday, February 10 (7-9 in Lenihan)
Sunday, February 27 (7-9, place TBA)
Thursday, March 17 (7-9 in Lenihan)
Thursday, April 14 (7-9 in Lenihan)
Sunday, May 1 (7-9, place TBA)

Like previous meetings, the foundation and bulk of our meetings will be spent sharing stories and encouraging one another in the progressive work we do in our classrooms and communities. In terms of reading, rather then proposing another book, I’d like to suggest (upon the advice of a couple of PrESS Network members) that we focus on an article per meeting. These articles can come from a variety of sources and can focus on a variety of issues. This way, no one will feel like they’ve gotten behind in the reading and it will also provide you much more input into what we read. Thus, I would encourage you to please send me articles (web-based) that you think would be appropriate reading for the group. I will compile these and about a week prior to our meetings, along with the announcement/reminder for the meeting, will send out one of them for us to discuss.

Beyond these meetings, though, I know that there is at least a core of individuals that Alex referred to in his email that really want to begin an action phase for the PrESS Network in the spring.

Here is a list of the items we’ve discussed for the short and long term:

Short
Become an official organization through obtaining non-profit status (or LLC, as Bob suggests)
Develop a website and, perhaps, a regular e-newsletter
Engage in some type of service activity (I think Rachel’s suggestion of tutoring is a very good one. Recently, I’ve struck up a relationship with the Urban League, who is looking for tutors on Tuesdays and Thursdays for one hour any time between 3-6)
Attend and present at conferences. Possibilities include
Attending the Choices and Changes conference that Gina has sent information on at the Galt House, March 29-31
Prepare a proposal and present on our work at Imaginative Education Research Group in Vancouver, July 13-16 (Proposals due 2/4/05)
Prepare a proposal and present on our work at the Rouge Forum in Syracuse, sometime in July (proposals probably due by 3/1/05)
Prepare a proposal and present on our work at the American Educational Studies Association in Charlottesville in November (proposals normally due by mid April)
Encourage other progressives to come to our meetings

Long
Take on some type of research study regarding the education/socialization of children today
Develop a FairTest (http://www.fairtest.org/) affiliate for Kentucky
Put on PD workshops in local schools regarding progressive pedagogy
Create opportunities to work with parents and other progressive community members
Try to take jobs in schools with other PrESS Network members
Investigate the possibility of creating a charter school or taking over a failing public school

What we need are probably some members of the group who want to commit to heading up or sharing the responsibility for one of the short term goals (i.e., achieving non-profit status, launching web-site, creating e-newsletter, coordinating service activity, coordinating scholarship, etc.). Obviously, the amount of time we can give to the Network will vary from member to member based on, among many other things, our schedule for the spring and other important commitments that constantly tug at us. So, if you think you might have some time and would be interested in teaming up with others on one of the short term goals, please let me know and I’ll try to choreograph the initial activity for these groups as we get started for the spring.

I think our short term list provides us with useful benchmarks for the spring in determining our ongoing growth. Our long term list will receive more clarity as we achieve these shorter term benchmarks and flesh out the possibilities in our six spring meetings.

I look forward to seeing all of you soon. I hope that this holiday provides you with the rest and reinvigoration you need for the start of a new year. Come back to us safe.

Peace. adam

Progressives Engaged in Struggle Support Network Meeting November 10, 2004 Bellarmine University

2004-11-17T17:25:00.000-05:00

This reflection/recap on our last gathering is, again, an evolving document for which I invite feedback/additions/other perspectives.

12 present were present at the meeting as we gathered around the conference room table in Lenihan, sipping on tea and coffee.

We began the evening discussing some of our Network’s provocative experience at the American Educational Studies Association Annual conference. Each participant shared a portion of their experience and/or what they’ve taken away from the conference. Mostly these comments centered on the power of story; caring for our students, ourselves and others; and our very powerful role as healer. Given the broken nature of many of our children today and the diseased culture from which they come, it seems incumbent upon us as professors, teachers, and social workers to begin to privilege our role as healer, to privilege connectedness over competition, and to bring emotion, creativity, and critical inquiry to the same level as rationale, logic, and rehearsed knowledge. To say the least, our Network members who presented represented exactly, as practitioners and theoreticians, Freire’s concept of “praxis.”

We moved on in our discussion to talk about how we work with parents, getting into Freire’s complex idea of Cultural Synthesis. For our work in schools and communities to have any momentum, we will need to work with parents/families. For this movement to take hold, we will need to figure out, as a Network, how we will reach out in order to get this sort of broad-based support. For a little inspiration as far as radicalization (and remember, according to Freire, Organization requires consistency between words and action, boldness, radicalization, courage to love, and faith in the people), Gina and I would highly recommend The Motorcycle Diaries, the story of Che Guevara’s 8000km trip around South America as a young man. His story is so compelling, the scenery so magnificent, and his movement toward revolution so provocative.

We concluded the evening with more good sharing about the incredible work we do with our kids in the classroom and the battles we are fighting in our faculty meetings and professional development seminars.

As we have completed our reading of Pedagogy of the Oppressed, our final two meetings will focus on the future of the PrESS Network.
We’ll decide on meeting dates for the spring semester
We’ll decide if we’ll use a book, again (and which one) as a focusing point for our meetings
And, perhaps most importantly at this stage, we’ll talk about what action steps we’ll take as a Network. Several action steps have already been proposed in the past and new ones have surfaced lately. A short list includes:

Obtaining non-profit status
Creating a web page
Offering PD in schools
i. How to conduct student-led conferences
ii. Workshop material from the School of Unity and Liberation
iii. Social justice clubs
Working with small groups of teachers who may be of like mind with the PrESS Network
Creating our own political (educational) party
Taking on a broad-based action-research study of students in our classrooms, parents, and community members
Joining http://www.fairtest.org/ and creating a KY chapter aimed at transforming standardized testing in KY and nationwide
Creating our own “full-service” school
Inundating Jeff County public schools with members of the PrESS Network
Joining other organized groups to fight local/global injustice
i. Peace Education
ii. Coalition of Immokalee Workers
iii. Other progressive professors/teachers across country/world
Presenting at conferences, publishing our work, writing letters to the editor
i. http://www.rougeforum.com/
ii. http://www.ierg.net/
Inviting the community to be a part of the Network

These final two meetings of the semester will be held:
on December 1 at 8:30 in the conference room of Lenihan Hall
on December 12 at 7:00 in the home of Professor Jon Lee (directions forthcoming)

peace. adam

The Election

2004-11-03T13:44:00.000-05:00

Friends,

Clearly, things didn’t go the way many of us hoped last night. That said, I would argue the work ahead of us today is the same irrespective of who won the election. This campaigning season and election last night stand as a stark indictment of our education system and the nation’s inability to think about issues, critically. Fear-mongering, castigations from pulpits, smugness, and transparent lies have apparently won the day. Freire’s anti-dialogical theory has proven in the short term to be prophetic, once again, as it does in all totalitarian forms of governments, like our two party ‘democracy’ is becoming (or, just is).

Nonetheless, I have hope. Not a post-election-maybe-next-time-grin-and-bear-it sort of a hope. But, a critical sort of hope. Voting is not the only way we participate in democracy. It may, in fact, be the smallest factor in it (although, we are certainly led to believe it is our highest, if not perhaps our only, duty). Democracy requires the kind of day-to-day action towards transformation/revolution/liberation similar to Freire’s dialogical action. The poor/dispossessed/oppressed/disenfranchised in our classrooms and communities need us now more than ever. Our middle class sisters and brothers need better options than the media and our educations systems are feeding them. They need models of hope, examples of modesty, and options from the consumer life-style. And, the rich need to be freed of their oppressive ways. It is only us, in concert with the oppressed, that can humanize them.

As Milton points out frequently and quite provocatively, we need to begin to define our successes. We, now more than ever, need to have voice and we need to be visible. We can no longer allow the oppressor to define success for us. As transformative agents, we can and will make change. My commitment to this change and to you and our community is steadfast. I look forward to our community growing ever closer and ever outward.

Our struggle has been defined
Its re(s/v)olution is up to us.

Peace. adam

Progressives Engaged in Struggle Support Network Meeting October 24, 2004 Bellarmine Universtiy

2004-10-28T12:59:00.000-05:00

This reflection/recap on our last gathering is, again, an evolving document for which I invite feedback/additions/other perspectives.

14 members of the Network were present and were graciously hosted by friend and colleague, Doug Gibson, along with his partners at Austins.

After turning down the AC and ordering, we, once again, introduced ourselves as a couple of new members joined us and a couple of long time members, busy with new positions and everything else that is going on in the world, returned to us. We talked about why we do what we do, as teachers and social workers, and knowingly or unknowingly talked about the change we want to be in the world, foreshadowing Milton’s theorizing regarding our need to revolutionize consciousness.

Our initial conversation focused on the upcoming vote on Tuesday and whether or not the candidates (the only two who have received any coverage) are really all that different when it comes to education. Of course, they both support NCLB—one just favors funding it. Arguments were made that perhaps Kerry could be persuaded that the legislation and the research that went into it are flawed, since he has shown a proclivity to actually think about things and shift his position based on counsel. Additionally, it was suggested that Kerry might assuage some of the peripheral injustices/hardships/issues that directly impinge on our lives as teachers and the lives of the children (and their families) in our classrooms: jobs, health insurance, security, welfare, etc. While the choices may not be all that exciting (between the two candidates), I, along with most, believed the choice to be pretty clear.

We skirted around issues of Freire’s chapter 4, but certainly dealt with the spirit of what he was after in terms of his concept of anti-dialogical action. It was pretty clear that critical thinking is generally frowned upon in schools (and society) today. While those teachers present certainly, subversively perhaps, work to bring critical thinking into their classrooms, it tends to go against the manipulative grain of focusing more on dress codes, whose going to the bathroom, and delivering the core content.

According to Freire, “People are fulfilled only to the extent that they create their world and create it with transforming labor” (p. 126 in my text, in Divide and Rule Section). Sounds like critical thinking and teaching students to “read the word and the world.” However, Freire continues, “Dividing in order to preserve the status quo, then, is necessarily a fundamental objective of antidialogical action. . . The dominators try to present themselves as saviors.” Sounds like bringing freedom to the Middle East or creating NCLB to fix all of the problems of society: jobs, healthcare, etc. Even further, Freire argues, “Since it is necessary to divide the people in order to preserve the status quo and thereby the power of the dominators, it is essential for the oppressors to keep the oppressed from perceiving their strategy. So the former must convince the latter that they are being “defended” against the demonic action of marginals (e.g., Michael Moore, activist judges, MoveOn.org, etc.), rowdies, and enemies of God” (p. 127). They do this through propagating the myths (a list of 15 of them in the Conquest section), delivering “prescriptions” (as Freire calls them), resulting in Gramsci’s “hegemony.”

And, sadly, we still also buy into some of these prescriptions, myself definitely included, because, as the middle class, we are torn between allowing the “dominators” to get away with what they get away with (maybe a $300-$1000 tax cut is pretty good, huh? Or, maybe I’ll be rich someday. Or, how else could we do things? Or, …whatever), and knowing, as part of that way less than 1% of the world’s population—Gramsci’s organic intellectuals or Freire’s revolutionary leaders—that change is necessary, can happen, and may begin with us. It’s a tough spot to be in, but our consistent striving for conscientization, our evolving revolution of consciousness as teacher, mother, father, sister, brother, partner, world’s citizen, etc. is critical to that change we want to be in the world.

We, again, returned to the idea that we need to begin implementing some of these ideas, in the form of our own school, or one that is inhabited by a critical number of us.

This said, we need to begin to look ahead to the remainder of our meetings this semester and beyond.

For our next meeting, November 10, we’ll plan to finish chapter 4 in Freire and discuss his dialogical action. For our next meeting, let’s plan to meet in Lenihan at 8:30. We’ll probably meet in the conference room, here, or a bigger room, if necessary.

For our final two meetings of the semester (December 1 in Lenihan and December 12 at Jon Lee’s house), I would really like to begin looking ahead to our action as a Network: linking up with FairTest and other organizations to challenge NCLB and standardized testing writ large, becoming a non-profit, creating a blog, forming a local educational political party, creating a full service school, letter writing campaigns, conferences, papers, etc.

In the meantime, if you haven’t checked out the latest issue of Rethinking Schools, I would highly recommend it—lots of good pieces in there. And, we should still talk about the profile of a progressive, considering, if we created or inundated a school with like-minded folks, what would those like minds/personalities/agendas be like?

Adam Renner, Ph.D

PrESS Network Meeting October 6, 2004 Bellarmine University

2004-10-12T10:13:00.000-05:00

This reflection/recap on our last gathering is, again, an evolving document for which I invite feedback/additions/other perspectives.

12 members of the Network were present, many, again, worn-out from a long day and a long first six weeks in the schools.

Informal conversations quickly converged into a whole group discussion on the issue of the impending strike. There tended to be some mixed feeling on the strike, not necessarily in terms of issues of occupational justice, but rather the issue of leaving our community of children in the classroom. We also did, though, problematize the issue of occupational justice, sifting through the various public perceptions of teaching, teachers, and education; thinking about how much (and, in some cases, how well) teachers are paid; considering our level of education and the professional status that would be awarded in other professions; and empathizing that health care costs are going up for everyone. Since I still find good benefits (health and retirement) to be part of the implicit social contract with teachers—our negotiation in accepting lower wages given society’s patriarchal control over the profession—I fear an outcome that does not strongly challenge the governor on this issue. Teachers will never recover these benefits if they lose them now. (I’ve included a link here to a recent piece from Rich Gibson of the Rouge Forum: http://www.pipeline.com/~rougeforum/justicedemands.html, regarding teaching and justice. You might find Rich to be a little radical for your taste, but I think he is a pretty engaging guy and have published in his Rouge Forum Newsletter. At the very least, he provides some food for thought.)

We moved from here into a discussion of one of what Freire would term this historical moment’s “generative themes:” governmental spending. This is clear from the presidential debates. One party favors more social spending (in terms of health, education, and welfare) and the other favors more corporate spending (military, corporate tax incentives, and large tax cuts for the wealthy). Our decision in this election (both at the presidential level and at the congressional and local level) will very much be about spending and about how we will support the (to varying degrees) democratic institutions of education, health, and social welfare.

We also dipped into, then, one of my favorite issues: purposes of education. It is pretty clear that the purpose today is an economic one, focused on getting a job. Since we can’t all have big corporate jobs, a system has been created to stratify the workforce. Tracking and de facto segregation of schools (through magnet programs and the like) are pretty clear indicators that economics is the agenda. We also talked about NCLB and critical thinking and wondered to what extent critical thinking still takes place in school (and if it is even valued). What would happen if we educated students to think critically?

Finally, and interestingly, our conversation circled back to the original impetus of the group, suggested by Alex and Jason: maybe we should start our own school. Or, at the very least, we thought about how we could get a critical mass of progressive educators into one school in order to help transform it. We reflected on the possibility of a charter school, but seemed to have general agreement that the best scenario is to do this in the public arena. We also threw in the idea of a full-service school, to which I have included a link (http://www.saee.bc.ca/art2000_2_2.html) that talks to what these schools are up to. To carry forward, it was suggested that we begin discussing the profile of the progressive educator and, in the spirit of full service schools, other community actors (social workers, counselors, etc.). What is the philosophy and pedagogy of the progressive educator? What are the qualities of teachers and other cultural workers with whom you’d like to be engaged in the struggle? Your feedback is strongly encouraged on this strand before we meet again.

Nothing was discussed regarding obtaining non-profit status, but it is something we should continue to look into.

Our next meeting is Sunday October 24. The time and place are yet to be determined, but I will get back to you shortly. We’ve decided to read the first part of Chapter 4 through Freire’s section on anti-dialogical action. We should continue to read Freire, particularly this section of the text, in light of the upcoming election and the tactics of the oppressor to divide and conquer. (And, this tactic is bipartisan.)

We’ll conclude Freire at the 11/10 meeting and then I suggest we use our last two meetings of the semester, 12/1 and 12/12, to begin mapping out an action plan for the PrESS Network.

Adam Renner, Ph.D

PrESS Network Meeting September 15, 2004 Bellarmine University

2004-09-23T12:11:00.000-05:00

This reflection/recap on our last gathering is an evolving document for which I invite feedback/additions/other perspectives.

15 members of the Network were present, many bleary-eyed from a long day of teaching and class, myself included. It did not take long, though, to become energized by the discussion.

After (re)introducing ourselves, we opened the floor to discussion regarding the first two chapters of Paulo Freire’s Pedagogy of the Oppressed. We commented that Freire condensed quite a bit of information into these two chapters and the metaphor of choking (on the quantity of what was there) surfaced more than once. Nonetheless, we also marveled at Freire’s clarity and his call to us as progressives to make change in our schools and community. In terms of critique we examined the duality of the banking method and problem-posing pedagogy and wondered if it was possible to seek some trajectory (or, perhaps better, tangent) that does not depart from an origin related to the banking method or the continuum upon which it lies. We pondered whether Freire’s problem-posing pedagogy was purposefully devised with the banking method in mind, providing us with a reality check of the present condition of schools (given that is where education was for the twenty years prior to Freire’s writing and has been for much of the thirty-four years since—if we use the US as a frame of reference. The case for this problem-posing approach was even more pressing in Brazil under dictatorship).

This led us to think about our lives as educators and/or as change agents in our communities. How tenable is Freire’s plan? How risky? We wondered whether our job would be on the line if we implemented these progressive tactics in our classrooms. We thought about whether we knew of anyone who had been fired for the sole reason of implementing a progressive pedagogy in the classroom. No names came quickly to mind. Practicing teachers in public schools shared provocative stories of their own progressive attempts in the classroom. Freire’s theory came to life. These same teachers also shared emotive stories about the children that inhabit their classroom—both successes and perceived failures. No matter, the group was encouraged and emboldened by the power of these stories as we all felt the struggle inside to seek justice, make change, and care about children and our communities.

Finally, we thought about our future. We wondered how technically we should organize. We consulted Freire and knew we should be cautious, but shouldn’t throw the idea out altogether. We wondered who else we should invite. We are professors, graduate students, undergraduate students, student teachers, teachers’ of record, social workers, Bellarmine University, and the University of Louisville. How big should we become? If we are truly to become a progressive movement, how and with whom should we organize in our respective communities? We considered the possibility of forming a non-profit corporation. We again considered letter writing campaigns to the media and to politicians. And, we also, again, instigated the idea of forming our own local political party. Regardless, there was a palpable sense that we are onto something here and we want to move it forward.

Our next meeting will be held on Wednesday, October 6 at 8:30 in the couch area of Horrigan Hall (next to the Café) at Bellarmine University. We plan to begin our meeting with a discussion of Chapter 3 of Pedagogy of the Oppressed. Please feel free to pass this on to any and all who may be interested. I look forward to sharing with all of you again soon.

Peace.

adam