test2
Computer Science
Is that New York City is a district where progress is being made, where I see clear evidence of a lot of improvement in schools. I see fewer dysfunctional disorganized goals than I've had before. But no, I say fewer. This function is our high school still exists. And I'm like some people. I'm going to name it, okay? And talk about the fact that we're not there yet. The key question we need to be able to answer is what is there about being black and Latino and male in this country that results in these higher rates of failure? And the question is important because how you answer the question is going to influence how you respond. If you think the problem lies in the kids, that they are damaged somehow. Or in their parents who have failed to raise them properly, then you're going to respond one way. If you think the problem lies in the lack of support provided to them, or the kind of environment that's been created for them, then you can respond in another way. Since you are focused on three different areas to try to understand what's happening and also how to respond. I look on the one hand at the way our society is structured at the way our communities are structured and even the way our schools are structured to understand how opportunity. Is either promoted or denied to certain people. If you live in certain neighborhoods, your chance of getting a job is limited because there are no jobs in that neighborhood. Your chance of getting exposed to drugs at a young age is high because drugs is probably your chance of being killed is high because a violence in the neighborhood. That has to do with structure largely. The way in which our society has limited opportunities to certain kinds of people simply because of where they live and who they are. On the other hand, we have cultural forces, which also shape attitudes and beliefs and behaviors in very powerful ways. And by culture here, I'm not simply talking about black cultural Latino culture, I'm talking about American culture and specifically talking about corporate culture. Nikes plays a role in this. A few years ago, Nike's declared that LeBron James was the next king. And if you went down 34th and 8th, you saw a huge hundred foot billboard of LeBron James sitting on a throne. The new king has arrived. And what made him a 19 year old king that he could play basketball well? Well, that sends a powerful message, that's it to our kids about what they can be, what they should aspire to. And then we wonder why kids get killed over a $150 sneakers. We also know that rap music that TV, that video games, also play a role in shaping attitudes towards violence, shaping attitudes towards women, shaping attitudes towards self. And that these cultural forces often have an effect of teaching our kids that may not be cool to be smart. At least not smart in traditional ways. Linguists have called this code switching. That is the need to learn how to adjust to different settings. But even more importantly, the need to be aware of the fact that you're being judged. Our kids need to know when it's time to pull up their pants. When it's time to take the hood off, how to speak standing in English or when standing in there is required. They need to know that, but they need to hear it from someone they respect and they know cares about them because if it doesn't come from someone they know cares about them, when we correct their speech, what do they do? They get offended. They were putting them down. We were talking to pop the pants, if it comes from someone they think does not care. They take it down lower. They're going to show you the whole backside now, right? Because all the relationships, what makes this kind of learning possible. But these life skills are vital skills for helping young people become successful in life. To change behavior, if the behavior doesn't change, it suggests what? It's not working. And we have to ask ourselves, why would we expect that kids who don't like school would change their behavior because we sent them home to watch TV? But so many of us who are so stuck is only one way to do this, that we stick with this approach, and most of our discipline starts with humiliation. And then we work our way to exclusion. And neither strategy is focused on changing behavior. Much less, get to get the roots of the behavior problem. So we've got to have strategies that focus on character development that focus on reconnecting kids to learning, the hardest kid to discipline is a kid who knows who cares about their education. They know the care anymore. None of the things you do to them will affect them. Not a one. You got to get much better at early intervention systems with kids. Being able to identify kids who are not making progress and provide them to support they need early. The signs of trouble usually appear early for kids. Not coming to school, acting out, not doing the work. It's much easier to address it early than it is to wait until the problem has gotten so bad that now we have to retain the child or we move the child or take some other more extreme action. Many of our kids come from a family with no one's gone to college, college is a total mystery for them. As I said before, we have some kids who think they may want to end up end up in prison. We've got a plant the seeds early to give them a different light pattern, a different trajectory. So we've got to be not just talking to them about college. We need to take them on tours. We need to bring college students who come from their neighborhood and look like them back to the school to tell them I did it, you can do it, to make it accessible to them. I really want to emphasize the point that we've got to find ways to get kids to create a culture in our schools that affirms the importance of learning that challenges the anti intellectualism that is pervasive in this country. Not just I'm not sure if he's here tonight, John mcquarrie's John here. I heard he was here last. That's a friend of mine. We debate this issue all along. He thinks that's particularly a black problem. Anti intellectualism I said, no, that's an American problem. Remember, we just said, George Bush, as president, he was very proud about being a C student. This is not uniquely African American. But it is true. If you look at the data, African American kids watch more TV than other kids. And many African American parents have lower expectations with respect to grades than other parents. So we've got to work on these issues, and part of what we've got to do is we've got to create a culture in our school that is so powerful. It's more powerful than the streets. And even if necessary more powerful than what's happening at home, schools that have a powerful culture can create an environment that can break the stereotypes. That can make it possible kids to imagine themselves to be and to do something else.