2158 lines
127 KiB
Plaintext
2158 lines
127 KiB
Plaintext
ROOM 101
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by Justin Gorman
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2nd Edition
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Within two weeks the students exhibited glimmers of self empowerment,
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autonomy, equality, and creativity in an institution that is founded on
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control and order.
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INTRODUCTION
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From the acquittal of four police officers who beat Rodney King, a
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small yet powerful explosion ignited Balboa High School. King's ordeal was a
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catalyst for the students of Balboa to act on their own volition, addressing
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both the immediate problems within their school and the overarching inequity
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which permeates our society. The power structure, from the President of the
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United States, all the way down to the Principal of Balboa High School reacted
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accordingly. This project is intended to document the spirit of student
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resistance.
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The student movement at Balboa High was crushed before it could really
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make a substantial impact, yet to look at what took place, the inspiration
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and motivation of the students, and the results which they achieved, both
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literally and figuratively, can provide an invaluable framework for movements
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in the future.
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It is our hope that the brothers, sisters, cousins and peers can see
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the triumphs and mistakes using this experience to deal with struggles at
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both school and within the community. The key question to ask is, if the
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students can do what they did in two weeks, imagine the possibility and
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potential of a catalyzed youth with an entire school year to act upon?
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It is important to examine the environment of state run
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schools so we can understand the context within which the actions and
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reactions of the students occured.
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We can begin by looking at schools in the context of enculturating or
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socializing youth as its main purpose and function. In this light, schools
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can be seen as a convex mirror of society. What is transmitted, overtly and
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covertly in this environment is the culmination of U.S. socialization process.
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State education, an institution is founded on the whole uncreation of
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human beings. For a generation of people living in the very midst of complex
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social problems, homelessness, overcrowding, class and caste, disease and
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hunger, our schools are not training people to think critically and
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creatively to address these inequities. The finished "products" are people
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who are less and less capable of even thinking about the problems that plague
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us. In this light, schools can be seen as a factory which mass produces
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behavior;
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"by training vigorous bodies, (the imperative of health), obtaining
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competent officers while creating obedient soldiers (the imperative of
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politics); and to prevent debauchery and homosexuality, (the imperative of
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morality)" Foucault.
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Schools use rote, routine and discipline to shape functioning cogs
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for the state. In this light education is not about expanding the mind, it is
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nothing more than a thinly veiled pretext for social conditioning.
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This project is an oral "ourstory" as opposed to a "history". The
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entomological roots of the word history means, "a continuous systematic
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narrative of past events." Yet, the focus of the retelling the past has been
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dominated by great men, great wars, and great wealth reaped from progress. By
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calling this book an "ourstory", I want to employ a term which challenges the
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traditional notions of "his-story". As more ourstories are written we will
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have a chance of getting a fuller picture of the importance of what was, for
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all people.
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The revision based ourstory has been developing, narratives written by
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slaves, soldiers, workers, women and the oppressed. This book is an attempt
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to offer credence and credibility to another voiceless segment of our society,
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the student. Ultimately the intent of this project it to illustrate the
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potential of youth activism in social change.
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Ideally, an ourstory has both men and women sharing an equal part in
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telling their perspectives. The balance of interviews in this project is not
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equal, a result of the gender make-up of the students involved in the tutorial
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program from which this was born.
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--------------------------------------------------
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The majority of the information for this project was obtained through
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interviews, conducted over the Summer of 1992 I will cite a quote with the
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person's name. The philosophical critique of the institution is based on
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Michel Foucault's "Discipline and Punish, the Birth of the Prison", and John
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Taylor Gatto's "6 Lessons of a School teacher." And the information about the
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school district was obtained from the 1992-1993 San Francisco Unified School
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District (SFUSD) Student handbook and the 1992-1993 Teachers Union Contract.
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PART ONE
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THE INSTITUTION
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Balboa High School is named after the Spanish explorer, Vasco Nunez de
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Balboa, who was remembered, among other things, for encountering the Pacific
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Ocean. Balboa High School itself is located in the Excelsior District of San
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Francisco and primarily serves the Outer Mission neighborhoods. The student
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population is primarily Latino, Filipino, African-American and Asian-American
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in its ethnic make-up. There are 1,270 students, grades 9 through 12,
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enrolled at Balboa. 31.8 percent of the student body have been tested as
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Limited English Proficient (LEP) or Non English Proficient (NEP), and 81.6
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percent of the student body is classified as educationally disadvantaged.
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Because of the economic segregation which the San Francisco Unified School
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District is founded upon the students who were "fed" into Bal came from
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predominantly lower and working class neighborhoods of the city.
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In the district hand book it is stated:
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"The mission of the San Francisco Unified School District is to
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provide each student with an equal opportunity to succeed by promoting
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intellectual growth, creativity, self discipline, cultural and linguistic
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sensitivity democratic responsibility, economic competence and physical and
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mental health so that each student can achieve to his or her maximum ability.
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In order to achieve this mission, the Board of Education has adopted the
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following goals:
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1. To improve teaching and learning to enhance student achievement.
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2. To improve staff, parent and community participation in the educational
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process.
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3. To maintain school environments that are safe, secure and attractive.
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4. To achieve a school district that is fully integrated in all its programs
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and activities and provides equal opportunity for all students.
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If the goal of the SFUSD is indeed to "provide an equal opportunity to
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all students", the ratio of Balboa's teacher ethnicity to student population
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presents a tangible barrier.
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STUDENTS CLASSIFIED TEACHERS UNCLASSIFIED TEACHERS
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Spanish (sir name) 33.0% 13.4% 30%
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Fillipino 29.4% 10.4% 20%
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Black 17.3% 10.4% 20%
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Chinese 8.7% 4.4% 0%
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White 4.4% 59.7% 25%
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These statistics were taken from Balboa's 1991-92 School
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Accountability report card, a yearly abstract issued by the district. This
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statistical breakdown shows the glaring ratio of white students to white
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teachers. The question is not whether white teachers are capable of reaching
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an ethnically diverse student body, rather, it is a question of the values the
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teachers will be transmitting, both consciously and not.
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Realistically, public schools cost the State a large sum of money to
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operate. It is in the State's best interest to put people in a position
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where they inadvertently present and enforce the State's agenda. This would
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in part explain the pervasive petty bourgeois supersturcture of state
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schools, characterized by its rigid bureaucracy, timid time servitude, and
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encouraged noveau-riche social climbing. But also, because a majority of the
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teaching staff at Balboa heralds from "dominant" US culture, coupled with the
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state defined curriculum, sensitivity to the cultural differences can easily
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be cast aside. The emphasis of teaching at Balboa is focused upon teaching
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the English language and transmitting "American" values, (i.e. white
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anglo-saxon) to the students.
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Of course the institution of education is a subtle and complex entity,
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and it is not without anomalies or exceptions. Fortunately, within it there
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are individuals who consciously refuse to perpetuate the States' agenda and
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actually subvert it in reaching the youth. Yet, the very design of the
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education system is to encode the values of the "dominant" culture upon its
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youth and this is was the case at Balboa High.
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"Most teachers are from one world and most of these kids are not going
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to experience it. It's implications saying "Look, you are never going to be
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where we are, you are just here for a little while, and so are we". Teaching
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becomes an emotionless exchange, the only emotion existing in the classroom
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being fear, in its most restrictive sense". Kevin Keany.
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A. THE ROLE OF THE TEACHER
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THE TRANSFORMATION OF THE PEDAGOGUE
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"In every society the body is in the grip of very strict powers which
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impose constraints, prohibitions or obligations in exercising its subtle
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coercion, this is the role of the teacher, whose primary responsibilities
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include 'taking attendance and being a cop'." (Eugene).
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From a mother showing her young survival skills, to the dialectic of
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Dyogenies, the concept of teaching has existed in many forms for centuries.
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To teach, is to show someone how to do something while providing knowledge and
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insight. Traditionally, the role of the teacher is to be a guide.
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With the dawning of the industrializing, urbanizing and the inital
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influx of mass immigration to the United States, compulsory state run schools
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came into existance. Idealists, such as Horace Mann, envisioned state
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education to be the mechanisim which our society would employ to create a
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truly classless society. Instead, public education has evolved into a weapon
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weilded by the state to shape the will and character of it's youth,
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conditioning them to be docile and obedient.
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The role of the teacher shifted from being a guide to being an "agent"
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of the ruling classes. Through using repetition and rigid instruction,
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teachers train students to obey, to learn passively and to compete against
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each other.
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Like a soldier, or a policeman, the teacher uses discipline, which manifests
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in a constant demand for silence and a refusal to allow pupils to dissent, as
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the tools to shape classroom culture and student behavior.
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A system of supervision, which regulates the activity of a whole
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class, has developed throughout the history of public education. The
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teacher's roles is defined by two distinct tasks. The first involves material
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tasks, such as distributing papers, giving out assignments, and lecturing the
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class. The second involves surveillance:
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"the observers must record who left their bench, who was talking, who
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did not have their books, who committed an impure act, who indulged in impure
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talk or was unruly in the street" Foucault.
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For the students who were unruly, or unwilling to submit to the
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authority of the teacher, a class of 'administrators' developed. Their
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primary purpose is to deal with discipline problems outside of the class room
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context. --------------------------------------------------------
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The areas which the school manifests its disciplinary practices are;
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-time- lateness,absences, interruptions of tasks, of activity
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-inattention- negligence, lack of zeal, behavior
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-impoliteness- disobedience,
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-of speech- idle chatter, insolence,
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-of the body
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-incorrect attitudes- irregular gestures, lack of cleanliness,
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-of sexuality- impurity, indecency.
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The control of activity is imposed through several mechanisms. The
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first is by establishing an artificial sense of time for the day. In state
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schools the division of time is carefully constructed and rigidly enforced.
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All phases of the school day are regulated by a series of bells.
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Classes are 50 minutes long. A student has 300 seconds to get their books,
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go to the bathroom and get to the next class. The first portion of the class
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is devoted to recording who is attending and punishing those who are late.
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The control of time in a learning setting transmits to the student
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that no work is worth finishing. Because when the bell rings the student must
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drop the work they are doing, no matter if it was intellectually stimulating
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or woefully incomplete and proceed quickly to the next work station. If
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nothing is ever completed, why care too deeply about anything?
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Most teaching methods are based around presenting the student a
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succession of simple elements which combine towards increasing complexity.
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This teaching method is found in the subjects of math, sciences, English and
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foreign languages. Large concepts are broken down, and are taught so if a
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student doesn't understand one piece they will not understand the next. This
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method obscures the larger picture of what is being learned. By focusing on
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parts of knowledge, much like an assembly line worker, the student is not
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connected to the larger picture. The tedious repetition overshadows the
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larger relevance of the task. Also when the student discovers the sum of the
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parts of knowledge it is not in their words or language further obscuring the
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larger meanings and relevance.
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"If it is going to be French, you cannot teach just the mechanics you
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have to include the way people are, the culture, the life and breath of the
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language, the ourstory, the food and literature. The way most language
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classes are taught are more or less useless because most people cannot speak
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the language when the get out. So they have taken 4 years of French, and if
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and when they go to France they are in culture shock. There is nothing that
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has prepared them for it". Kevin Singleton, Senator
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In a larger sense the curriculum is determined solely by the teacher
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(or rather they enforce decisions transmitted by the people who pay them). Of
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the millions of things of value to learn the teacher decides what will be of
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interest to the mass. To reach 30 students in 50 minutes curiosity can have
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no place in the classroom, only conformity.
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With the decision of what is to be learned already being made for the
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students the teacher can determine the "good" kids from the "bad" kids. The
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good kids do the tasks the teacher appoints with minimal conflict and a decent
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show of enthusaism. The bad kids fight against this, and try, openly or
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covertly to make decisions for themselves about what they will learn.
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Ultimately what teachers are transmitting when they make up the minds for a
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large group of youth is dependency. The "good" students wait for a teacher,
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and later in life other state appointed experts, to tell them what to do. We
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learn that we must wait for other people, better trained than ourselves to
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make the meaningful decisions of our lives. Our entire industrial based
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socitey is based on people doing what they are told becasue we don't know any
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other way.
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Senator, Kevin Keany's classroom experience sums up this
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condition,"There is no real guidance or mentoring in teaching, just open the
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sluice and let the students flow through. It is a nice current while they are
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in your classroom, open the door a let them flood out and the new flood come
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in. It is the impersonal nature of the structure, reinforced by the rote
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learning relationships between the teachers and the students in the classrooms
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I was in".
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"I made ditto pads for learning, a sheet of work that I passed out at
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the beginning of class. It was supposed to be done by the end of the period,
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then the student gets credit. The teacher doesn't leave the front of the
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classroom. The kids would sit in their seats, or jump around in the their
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desks, scream, rant and rave and go copy the work from each other. In the
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classroom the generation gaps, cultural gaps and socioeconomic gaps that were
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seemingly unbridgeable".
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"I worked with two teachers, two completely different people with
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different approaches, yet they both had that, consistent hold on self respect
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and an ability to get it across. There is no secret of mystery to it, you go
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into a room where a teacher uses a regular voice and shows an interest in the
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student in the students, or the teacher is a quivering, cackling mass of white
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jelly, it is two different worlds, either hellish zoo or the other is a slow
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process of learning with two different people helping each other out".
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"It all hinges on a fundamental lack of respect. It really gets back
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to the atmosphere of of control and intentions. Be it the principal's
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bullhorn messages over the P.A. system, teachers bursting into the study room
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to yell at a student to take off their hat, the lack of intelligence in
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responding to crisis, knee-jerk clamping down on students, never having any
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leeway or flexibility with the students or the quick exertion of overpowering
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force on a 16 year old kid. My question is how do they sleep at night?"
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B. THE LEARNING ENVIRONMENT
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To graduate from the San Francisco Public School system a student
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must complete 220 credits with a host of mandatory classes. English must be
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taken for 4 years, Laboratory Science for 2 years, World Civilizations and
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United States History for 3 years.
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Predominantly what we learn is to classify the world through
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measurement and rational categorization of living beings. By arranging the
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world in such a manner, with a emphasis on traditional Western conceptions of
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human functioning, the concepts of hierarchy and patriarchy are indellibally
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encoded into our collective pysche. This rigid classification also serves to
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reduce individual characteristics, which do not neatly fit the models, into a
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seemless mass.
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This is most apparent in the teaching of science. In learning to
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separate mammals, reptiles and insects, into the hierarchy that exists in the
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ordering of species, (remember King Philip Chooses Only French Girl Scouts or
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Kingdom, Phylum, Class, Order, Family, Genus, Species). What is impressed
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upon a student is that the individual living or non living thing is ranked.
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There is a top and a bottom, grounds for delineation. This theory focuses on
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differences instead of similarities, creating boundaries, justifying
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superiority and more specifically , specieism.
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Having students learning this year after year only creates the
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hegemony of such ideas, leaving no room for non"scientific" or non"western"
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interpretations. Ideas and concepts that are often already part of the
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students heritage, only being delegitimized within the classroom.
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In the teaching of history, these same kinds of ideas are
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transmitted by the simple fact that the one who won the war gets to tell the
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story. This conscious process of mythicizing the perceived threats to
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national interests has enabled the US industrial machine to expand and
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multiply. Where this retelling has been most effective in the schools is by
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instiliing the Horatio Algeresque myths of success into the consciousness of
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poor and working classes. We are trained to be willing participants in
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fighting imperalist wars abroad and fighting against each other at home as
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part duty and process of obtaining the American Dream.
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Asking the students about how they felt about their classes these
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replies were typical:
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ML: They are easy for me. I feel they are a waste of time.
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WS: It is something you have to do. They say you have to do them. Just
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like the subjects they teach. You really don't have to do too much work.
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Things that don't relate, they give to you.
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Q: Like what?
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WS: My senior year I had to take European Lit. I really don't give a fuck
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about literature. Not right now.
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Q: What do you give a fuck about?
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WS: Learning a trade in high school. That would have been nice.
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ML: They closed down all the auto shops and everything because of the
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violence. My first year there they closed auto shop because there was a fight
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in it, it hasn't been open since.
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WS: They also shut off home economics too.
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ML: It was when they tried to close the school last year.
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JS: They got money for fucking baseball.
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Another way hierarchy is enforced through teaching is through testing.
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The examination combines the technique of observing and individual and
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instilling a "normalizing judgement". The "normal" or average is the
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established form of coercion in standardized education. It is an instrument
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of power because it blankets cultural, economic and language differences while
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establishing a numerical means to judge performance of the whole.
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The exam is a type of surveillance that makes it possible to quantify,
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to classify, and to punish individual students. It establishes a numerical
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visibility within an institution, and can be the basis for making distinctions
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among students. The examination, graded on the curve is the foundation for
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competition between individuals. The subsequent grades and the Grade Point
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Average become the motivating force for students to fiercely compete amongst
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each other, for only one can be the top of the class. It also teaches that a
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student's self respect should depend on an observer's abstract measure of
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individual worth. To reinforce the fact they are constantly evaluated and
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judged, a monthly report is sent into students' homes to spread approval or to
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mark, exactly down to the percentage point, how dissatisfied with their
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children parents should be. Self evaluation, the staple of every major
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philosophical system that has ever appeared on this planet is never a factor
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in these decisions.
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The state defines the aptitude of each individual and situates their
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learning level and other abilities which also transmutes into an articulated
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form of surveilance. In California this is determined by the Comprehensive
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Test of Basic Skills (CTBS). It is given twice a year, and is used as the
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foundation for subject level placement. The CTBS tests are a larger
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reflection of a curriculum which teaches students things that are not relevant
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to their lives.
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WS: A lot of students at Balboa are really not prepared to take those
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tests. They make you take them, it is almost like a joke. Because it is. We
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don't even have some of the subjects that are on the test.
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JS: And that is not your fault. It is the schools fault for not preparing
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you. It is there duty to do that.
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Q: Did you know that is how the funding is determined, for the California
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Education system is based on CTBS test results. The scores are indicative of
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who gets what.
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JS: So the ones with the highest get the most? I think the lowest need
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the most. For better teachers, facilities and supplies.
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For individuals, the scores of the tests determine class placement and
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the curriculum a student is eligible to take. Those who do well on the test
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get placed in "college track" classes. The fundamental fault of the CTBS, and
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other "standardized test given in the realm of public education lies is in its
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inherent cultural and class bias" (Radical Teacher, June 1986 #31, pg 3 ).
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The questions on the CTBS are primarily geared towards comprehension and
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vocabulary. This presupposes that the student is trained in reading skills
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and overlooks the fact that a majority of students who attend Balboa do not
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speak English as a first language or take into account the different emphasis
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of cultural communication between an oral tradition versus a written
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tradition. A majority of students are going to be at a disadvantage when
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being judged by the average established by this broad based test.
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The concept of surveilance also extends into the home through assigned
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"homework". As if 6 hours of rote and routine in at school aren't enough?
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So extra work is assigned to be finished in the home. It would be a grave
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threat to the state if the students might otherwise use the time to learn
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something unauthorized, perhaps from a father or mother, or by apprenticing to
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some wise person in the neighborhood. The larger lesson of constant
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surveilance is that no one can be trusted, and that privacy is not legitimate.
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Surveillance is an ancient urgency among certain influential thinkers; it
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was a central prescription set down by Calvin in the Institiutes, by Plato in
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the Republic, by Hobbes, by Comte, by Francis Bacon. All these childless men
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discovered the same thing: Children must be closely watched if you want to
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keep a society under central control.
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|
C. ARCHITECTURE
|
|
Discipline in the schools is directly linked to the distribution of
|
|
individuals in space. To achieve this end, the architecture of schools
|
|
employs several techniques.
|
|
The structure of schools is founded on an isolated location, a
|
|
standardized class set up. From kindergarten to college, the design of the
|
|
school is founded upon an enclosed space.
|
|
|
|
"The origins of school design harkens back to military barracks, where the
|
|
vagabond mass had to be held in place, looting and violence must be prevented,
|
|
the fears of the local inhabitants, who do not care the 'troops' passing
|
|
through their towns must be calmed; conflicts with civil authorities must be
|
|
avoided, desertion must be stopped, expenditures controlled. The whole
|
|
structure must be enclosed by an outer wall ten feet high from all the sides"
|
|
Foucault.
|
|
|
|
This idea survives at Balboa in the form of a chain link fence that surrounds
|
|
the campus.
|
|
The aim of this architecture is to derive the maximum advantages and
|
|
to neutralize the inconveniences, i.e. thefts, interruptions of work, and
|
|
other 'cabals'. The school design concentrated the forces of production to
|
|
become more integrated, while to protecting materials and mastering the labor
|
|
force.
|
|
|
|
"Within the classroom setting each individual has their own place and each
|
|
place has its individual. This avoids distributions in groups; breaks up
|
|
collective dispositions and allows the teacher to analyze confused, massive or
|
|
transient bodies of student. Disciplinary space tends to be divided in as
|
|
many sections as there are bodies or elements to be distributed" Foucault.
|
|
|
|
At Balboa, a student is assigned a desk in each class, and a locker
|
|
for the duration of the year. More importantly there is no private spaces,
|
|
nor private time allowed to students.
|
|
|
|
"The organization of serial space was one of the great technical
|
|
mutations of elementary education. This innovation made it possible to
|
|
supersede the traditional system. By a pupil working, for a few minutes with
|
|
the master, the rest of the heterogeneous group remained idle and unattended.
|
|
This problem of idleness and unsupervision was transformed into a system where
|
|
assigned individual places made it possible for simultaneous supervision of
|
|
each individual and the work of all in the classroom" Foucault.
|
|
|
|
By arranging students to sit in rows, facing the teachers desk,
|
|
organized a new economy of time and of apprenticeship. It made the
|
|
educational space function like a learning machine, but also a machine for
|
|
supervising, creating hierarchy, rewarding. In learning classroom management
|
|
techniques a teacher must eliminate the effects of imprecise distributions,
|
|
i.e keep "problem" students apart, and eliminate the uncontrolled
|
|
disappearance of individuals. These aims are most feasable to obtain with a
|
|
linear set up of the classroom.
|
|
Within the architecture of the classroom the teachers duty is to:
|
|
"take role, to know where and how to locate individuals, to set up useful
|
|
communications, to interrupt others, to be able at each moment to supervise
|
|
the conduct of each individual, to assess it, to judge it, to calculate its
|
|
qualities or merits" Foucault. With these expectations, the opportunity for
|
|
the teacher to actually teach is severely hindered.
|
|
Drawing from an old architectural and religious method, the monastic
|
|
cell, the disciplinary space of the school is always cellular. From this idea
|
|
the layout of schools is divided into a series of workshops. Each room is
|
|
specified according to its broad type of operation, be it teaching science,
|
|
math or English.
|
|
By walking up and down the central aisle of the workshop, it is
|
|
possible for a teacher to carry out a supervision that was both general and
|
|
individual. They can observe the students presence and application, the
|
|
quality of their work while comparing students with each other, and classify
|
|
them according to skill and speed within the successive stages of the
|
|
production process. All these steps formed a permanent grid or curriculum.
|
|
In schools, individual bodies are centralized by the location, yet the
|
|
individual is not given any sense of permanence. Schools distribute and
|
|
circulate students in a network of relations. The student has 6 scheduled
|
|
classes of 50 minute periods, with 6 different teachers. Each teacher has
|
|
their own standards for respect, communication and grading. Because school
|
|
years are only nine months long, with a three month break, it is common that
|
|
once a student/teacher relationship is developed the year is almost over.
|
|
When the student returns the next year they have to re-establish a whole new
|
|
set of teacher/student relations.
|
|
|
|
"Schools are mixed spaces: "real because they govern the disposition
|
|
of buildings, rooms, furniture, but also ideal, because they are projected
|
|
over this arrangement of characterizations, assessments, hierarchies. The
|
|
first great operation of the discipline, which is the main function of schools
|
|
is to transform the confused, useless or dangerous (youth has the potential to
|
|
be any of the three) multitudes into ordered multiplicities" Foucault.
|
|
|
|
Asking the students what they think of the school environment some
|
|
reply:
|
|
ML: A Prison.
|
|
WS: First of all you should see our quad. That is where everyone was
|
|
supposed to go for lunch. The school is built on three levels around the
|
|
square. You can see the quad throughout the school. There are security
|
|
guards throughout the quad and on the stairs. It is just like if you have
|
|
ever seen a prison.
|
|
Q: Did they have guns? Pointed down?
|
|
WS: They don't have guns. They have walkie talkies. And they walk around
|
|
the top level looking down at you.
|
|
Q: Do they have sticks?
|
|
WS: They bring in professional security guards. They don't have sticks
|
|
but they wear badges.
|
|
Q: They have walkie talkies so they can call someone quick. Do you call
|
|
them rent-a-cops?
|
|
WS: We teased them.
|
|
|
|
Prison, as defined by Stepen Wollett, is "an institution used to
|
|
warehouse a population of people who have broken the law or gone against the
|
|
government. Life in prision is structured through controlling movement,
|
|
speech and correspondance. If a person breaks a rule they are punished
|
|
through extra work or confined to a segregation unit. Security is placed as
|
|
the highest priority with guards in every living unit. Most inmates are
|
|
uneducated and ignorant to their rights and what the government is about. We
|
|
are given propaganda through the news, and the library is very
|
|
limited".Prisons also act as a mechanism to keep people without political
|
|
power. Prisons are designed to hold people down, to keep them down and give
|
|
them nothing. In prison the incarcerated becomes a producer, whose free labor
|
|
creates a commodity to be sold. It is the same thing with public schools
|
|
except the commodity of the incarcerated is the energy and creativity of
|
|
youth, being honed and shaped to become wage slaves, competing in the job
|
|
market when they get out. Mr.Wollet compares the two:
|
|
Prison Public Schools
|
|
1) Structured time X X
|
|
2) Controlled Movement X X
|
|
3) Security Guards X X
|
|
4) Violence and Drugs X X
|
|
5) Controlled Information X X
|
|
|
|
But we must examine the training and options the students are
|
|
receiving from state run education. As San Francisco shifts into the 21st
|
|
century, the options for students to find employment in limited, especially
|
|
if the student is not on the "college track" (i.e. being trained for entry
|
|
level white collar employment). The demise of the manufacturing sector in the
|
|
city is evidenced by the closing of John O' Connell High, SFSUD's vo-tech
|
|
school. The district said it was closed due to lack of funds, more
|
|
importantly there is no demand for skilled, unionized labor in the Bay Area.
|
|
For the majority of students at Balboa carreer choices are limited at best.
|
|
The service sector, which provides low paying, high pressure, ununionized work
|
|
readily welcomes youth with a high school diploma. Another option for a
|
|
student is to become a "player" and sell drugs. The option with the highest
|
|
visibility at Balboa was to join ROTC. Whenever uniformed students marched in
|
|
the quad at school I could only see the cannon fodder for the "new world
|
|
order" (and why wasn't ROTC a visible option for the students at the middle
|
|
class, suburban high school I attended? Because college was the way to leave
|
|
home for the middle class, and for the inner city youth who come from working
|
|
classes and the poor, the Army is the only way out.)
|
|
|
|
D. THE SENATORS
|
|
|
|
The San Francisco Senators is a non-profit organization which provides
|
|
a number of community services for youth in the Bayview/Hunter's point area.
|
|
One of their programs which the offer an on-site tutoring program for "at
|
|
risk" high school students.
|
|
Traditionally, the scope and purpose of a tutor in a pedagogical role
|
|
was to teach the pupils reading, writing and math skills in small groups.
|
|
This expectation was similar for the Senators at Balboa.
|
|
When I started working in the "one on one and small group tutorial
|
|
program", it was a skeleton structure. There was one Senator working with
|
|
four students one day a week in room 112, our home base for our program.
|
|
Howard Blonsky, a vice principal and coordinator of special programs,
|
|
introduced the program to Balboa only a month earlier. The core group of
|
|
tutors hired by the Senators consisted of Kevin Singleton and Kevin Keany and
|
|
myself.
|
|
The purpose of the program was to work with "at risk" students,
|
|
meaning individuals who were in danger of not graduating. The program was
|
|
most effective for the student who was attending school regularly and was
|
|
attempting to do the work. Because the tutor only worked with a student for
|
|
an hour a week, this period could be most effectively used to answer questions
|
|
about key concepts that were not being understood. The students that would
|
|
benefit most were "C" or "average students" who were "adequately" completing
|
|
the task, but needed extra attention. Unfortunately, most of the teachers
|
|
felt this category of student was passing their class and didn't need the
|
|
extra attention.
|
|
The students that were also eligible for the program were pulled from
|
|
the "D,F and Incomplete" list, a compendium of the students who received at
|
|
least one of those marks during the last grading period. I estimated that it
|
|
had well over 1000 names on it for the previous semester.
|
|
The students that were approved to our programs were the "discipline
|
|
problems", the students that the teachers didn't want to deal with. How a
|
|
student becomes a "discipline problem" is varied, anything from acting out for
|
|
attention, boredom, to legitimate learning disabilities.
|
|
We based our initial impressions of the individual student not on
|
|
personal contact, but on their CTBS scores. When we first started going
|
|
through the permanent school files of the students, we found portraits of
|
|
negativity. Each folder stored an individuals punishable actions dating back
|
|
to the beginning of their school career. The referrals were loaded with words
|
|
like "aggressive", "confrontational" and "uncooperative", these descriptions
|
|
left an indelible mark on us, tainting our initial impressions of the
|
|
students.
|
|
|
|
"Permanent school records, surrounded by all its documentary
|
|
techniques, makes each individual a 'case'. For a long time ordinary
|
|
individuality remained below the threshold of description. To be looked at,
|
|
observed, described in detail, followed from day to day by an uninterrupted
|
|
writing was a privilege. Permanent school records are no longer a monument
|
|
for the future memory but a document for possible use" Foucault.
|
|
|
|
Initially our expectations were all completely unrealistic. With
|
|
20/20 hindsight, Kevin Keany explains, "I was kind of groping for reference
|
|
points before the experience began. I realized how isolated I had been from
|
|
teenagers, for such a long time. Like being a teenager, I remember that as
|
|
being a really intense part of my life. That is why I say I didn't see
|
|
anything in my head as far as when I got in there. I had seen kids before,
|
|
and I had grown up with the kids more or less the same archetypes. My
|
|
expectations were so vague".
|
|
We attempted to set a program that was founded upon the ideals of
|
|
independence, equality and the autonomy of the individuals involved. We very
|
|
quickly learned not to look at a student as a statistic or a test score. The
|
|
Senators set up their own schedules and researched the students they wanted to
|
|
work with. When a student decided to participate in our class we stressed the
|
|
individuals choice to participate or not to. We attempted to make our
|
|
expectations very clear and address the students wants and needs.
|
|
The ultimate goals of Kevin, Kevin and myself were very similar. In
|
|
our environment we attempted to erase the hierarchy and distance between adult
|
|
and youth. Our attitude was founded upon a fundamental respect for these
|
|
individuals, but our sense of respect was not based upon the fact that we are
|
|
in a position of authority but because the individual, with their emotions,
|
|
wants, needs and fears, matters just because they are alive. We attempted to
|
|
teach by opening up our hearts. Our main emphasis was to shift teaching by
|
|
using rote, memorization and repetition, to using tangible examples and life
|
|
experience.
|
|
As Kevin Keany puts it, "the whole thing is that you express your
|
|
ideals or believe in them, or tell yourself that you believe in them. Is that
|
|
you bring your ideals down and they become secondary to your interaction, a
|
|
tool instead trying to make an interaction. The challenge in a school like
|
|
Balboa, between the put downs and the barbaric attitudes the adults have
|
|
towards the kids, is your attempt to get across to students that you don't
|
|
feel that way. You don't think it is going to be that way. It doesn't have
|
|
to be that way, and get them to believe that. That becomes the daily work in
|
|
the life at school. You have got to bring that into the kids needs".We turned
|
|
the Senetors tutorial program and Room 112 into a laboratory. From the onset,
|
|
we started asking the students why they were getting "D's" and "F's". We
|
|
found that it was not because the student couldn't comprehend the subject
|
|
matter it was because the presentation of the subject had no relevance to
|
|
their lives. If a student is not compelled to learn, forcing them to study
|
|
will ultimately have negative repercussions.
|
|
Every Senator had their own individual method and approach.while
|
|
trying to consistently connect the relevance to the subject. The purpose of
|
|
our approach to teaching a subject wasn't to twist a student around but to
|
|
pull the subject apart and allow the students to rename each part and
|
|
reassmble the whole on thier terms and language.
|
|
We took the basic approach in our program of combining a fundamental
|
|
respect towards human beings while transmitting life knowledge. What we
|
|
talked about was bullshit unless we made a connection to reality of the world
|
|
the students came from.
|
|
It became clear very early on that we were working with a
|
|
disproportionate number of males who lacked basic math or reading skills. I
|
|
found one of the most effective techniques to be the ones that maintained
|
|
relevance and one of the most appropriate tools was the sports page. There,
|
|
students applied division, multiplication addition and subtraction skills
|
|
without realizing they were doing math. They were figuring out how many
|
|
points Michael Jordan averaged last season, and how well their favorite team
|
|
was doing, but not math.
|
|
Another effective way of reaching the students was to make the
|
|
connections between their interests in the present and see the similarities
|
|
from the past. One of the most memorable sessions was when a group of
|
|
students were complaining about how stupid poetry was. It was subtly ironic
|
|
because almost every student I worked with was into rap music, which in itself
|
|
is an appropriated form of lyric poetry. What I did was to have the students
|
|
pound out a beat on the table and have students take a turn at telling their
|
|
own rap to the beat. I broke out the English textbook and read Shelly, Keats
|
|
and Dickenson to the beat. It was energetic exchange and showed the
|
|
traditional poets in a whole new light to the students.
|
|
In high school, students are on the verge of adulthood but are not
|
|
encouraged to embrace or develop to their potential. In our class room
|
|
settings we encountered points where our questions lead the student towards a
|
|
decision or direction. But more importantly we found because students are
|
|
individuals, a teacher cannot be an enforcer, but more of a facilitator.
|
|
Individual attention is next to impossible when one person must cater to the
|
|
needs of thirty individuals in 50 minutes.
|
|
Kevin Keany reflects, "besides being tutors, what we took out of this
|
|
experience is the youth spirit. Being around the youth taught me about being
|
|
myself, and being an adult. These kids, who are caught in the ebb and flow of
|
|
our societies cultural influence, challenged every ideal I hold. For the
|
|
first few months they were so cool and accepting, you could make mistakes and
|
|
be all right with that, most of them. It was just a sense of acceptance, a
|
|
casual acceptance of other people is something I had lost. I realize that
|
|
they would flip right back into cappin' on you and never admit to being
|
|
gentile people, but they really are. They would hate to be labeled that for
|
|
the most part. I got this gentleness from then, almost this heartbreaking
|
|
vulnerability from them. It is hard, because it was almost a spiritual
|
|
experience, a rekindling of a spirit, something that was lost a long time ago
|
|
living in a city."
|
|
"The students who are engaged in the socialization process that our
|
|
schools offer are inevitability contaminated. They are teenagers, they are
|
|
crazy, fucked up in a lot of ways, they are not pure people. But they got a
|
|
lot going for them, more going for them than Balboa High school was ready to
|
|
acknowledge. I guess that is one of my biggest sources of anger. The whole
|
|
design of school and curriculum is to consciously stifling the life source of
|
|
youth. Young people are one of the most positive aspects of our society.
|
|
Teenage perspective, teenage maturity, it is the beginning of adulthood, each
|
|
individual has capacities that are maturing and they are trying to express
|
|
them. There is a hell of a lot, as in all aspects of aging, of really unique,
|
|
honest truth in what the youth say and what they see. High school could be
|
|
the place that fosters that. Balboa is a place that stifles it. At its least
|
|
malignant form it stifles it and tries to squeeze as much conformity into the
|
|
hallways and shut out the vision and the creativity and the honesty out from
|
|
the kids, or at least push as much back in as they can."
|
|
Kevin Keany encapsulates the ultimate success of the program by
|
|
saying, "We reached kids because they are out there reaching too. The are out
|
|
there, with hands extended. Whenever a kids light bulb went on. When they
|
|
understood something it was like a door had opened up and there was a light
|
|
going on around them illuminating everything, and understanding, it was
|
|
beautiful."
|
|
|
|
E. THE BIRTH OF THE POLITICAL RADICAL: The Birth of BBCT
|
|
|
|
Started by Dr. Bruce Collins, the Black Brothers Coming Together
|
|
(BBCT), was initally a "retention" program ran in conjunction with San
|
|
Francisco City College to help black males to graduate from high school. The
|
|
BBCT intended to develop positive role models by assisiting students in
|
|
graduating from high school. The way they did this was to enroll BBCT
|
|
students at city college, which would give them a head start on receiving
|
|
college credits and eventually have them come back to Balboa High School to
|
|
help younger students.
|
|
Senator Kevin Singleton, who worked with the program felt, "the BBCT
|
|
had a positive effect on the students. They attended class, developed a sence
|
|
of untiy amongst themselves, built a community with a strong group dynamic
|
|
which constantly went on."
|
|
Singleton sites the methods and leadership of Dr. Collins as the main
|
|
ingreident of success for the BBCT program. "I remember one time he came in
|
|
to class and talked about his mother. She was sick. In my high school, in
|
|
all my schooling I never encountered something like that. He was totally
|
|
levelling with them, totally human. He went into this long dialouge about
|
|
her, and how she had always been there for him. I was just blown away. Some
|
|
of the kids were crying, others were looking away, trying not to let it hit
|
|
them."
|
|
From a base of emotional honesty among peers, the BBCT became the
|
|
foundation for an awakening and articulation of political conscientousness.
|
|
What was intended to be a class for students to catch up on homework, became
|
|
an arena for organizing.
|
|
Earlier in the year the NAACP filed a suit against the SFSUD for
|
|
choosing a Hispanic from outside the district, rather than a person of color
|
|
from within the district to become the next Superintendent. The BBCT staged a
|
|
series of walkouts at Balboa. This is when the administration, who was
|
|
roughly indifferent to this program began to engage in a more virulent form of
|
|
harassment.
|
|
Will Smith, president of the BBCT retells his experience,"They didn't
|
|
want to give the program to us because they felt it was just going to be a
|
|
bunch of niggers upstairs, makin' noise. They didn't want to give us a room.
|
|
They said if they did, it would cut back on another teacher. She (Principal
|
|
Montevirgin) played us up front, but she played us closely. It wasn't a trust
|
|
issue, to me she really didn't care if we succeeded or not."
|
|
Kevin Singelton posits why the BBCT got the reaction it did by saying,
|
|
"the administration really didn't care about the kids, and they didn't think
|
|
the program was going to do much, positive or negative. There are probally
|
|
tons of programs in the school system and the way the system is set up is
|
|
like, 'we will put a little money here and a little money there', without
|
|
really caring if things improve for the students, as long as we have a report
|
|
at the end of the year which allows us to get more money."
|
|
To squelch the political radical is the fundamental purpose of the
|
|
state run school. A political radical in a school is a person who disrupts,
|
|
questions or challenges the authority of the teacher and larger power
|
|
structure. A student who sabotages the classroom is singled out and punished.
|
|
More often than not, they will be made an example of to keep the multitude in
|
|
line. As the BBCT became stronger as a student group, individuals or even the
|
|
entire group was blamed when a disruption occurred on campus.
|
|
As Marcus Lewis says,"They frontin' themselves."
|
|
|
|
PART 2
|
|
THE SIMI VALLEY AQUITTAL
|
|
|
|
For what was never made entirely clear, on March 3, 1991 Rodney King
|
|
was traveling over 100 mph to evaide 10 police cars who were in pursuit. When
|
|
he was pulled over 20 miles North of San Fernando, he was ordered to get out
|
|
of the car and lay face down. An officer used a Taser to shock him into
|
|
submission. The officers proceeded to beat him for more than a minute.
|
|
George Holiday videotaped the event from his apartment which was
|
|
located accross the street. According to Holiday, "before they started
|
|
hitting him King was cooperative."
|
|
He was hospitalized for 2 days than, taken to jail where he was
|
|
eventually booked for evading police officers and for investigation of parole
|
|
violation. King was held for three days before being released from county
|
|
jail.
|
|
King, an unemployed construction worker, relates his experience. "I am
|
|
glad I'm not dead, that's all, I'm lucky they didn't kill me. When I stepped
|
|
out of the car they handcuffed me, shocked me and struck me across the face.
|
|
After they shocked me they paused then struck me across the face with a billy
|
|
club and shocked me again. After that they continued to pound on me and beat
|
|
me all over my body".
|
|
He sustained a broken right ankle, a boot mark in his chest, a cut on
|
|
his right cheek, a black eye and bruised arms and legs. He received between
|
|
53 to 56 nightstick blows and 7 kicks.
|
|
What made this beating unique was not its intensity but the fact
|
|
that it was caught on video tape. It showed the Untied States police
|
|
brutality in its rawest form. Although a commonplace occurance for the poor
|
|
of the urban infrastructure, to the rest of the country it became symbolic of
|
|
the chasm between police officers and the communities they are supposed to
|
|
protect.
|
|
|
|
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
|
|
3/4/91 - tape broadcast nationally
|
|
3/7/91 - King released from county jail
|
|
3/11/91- a poll by UPI:
|
|
52% favored king,
|
|
15% believed cops,
|
|
rest of the people questioned were undecided.
|
|
92% of people polled felt that the police used excessive force.
|
|
3/15/91 - Grand jury indicties officers-suspended by department without pay
|
|
4/2/92 The trial takes place in Simi Valley. A "cultural galaxy" away from
|
|
south Central Los Angeles. A white suburban bedroom community, of 100,000
|
|
people. A police force of 102 officers. A stable industrial base, clean
|
|
streets, good schools and a large percentage of home ownership. Simi Valley
|
|
happens to be 79% white and 2% black, according to the 1990 census.
|
|
4/30/92 - superior court acquits four officers of using excessive force when
|
|
they beat Rodney King.
|
|
-the jury included no blacks and only took 6 hours to deliberate on this
|
|
decision.
|
|
-the 81 second video tape did not convince them -the defence lawyer convinced
|
|
the jury that the beating amounted to responsible police work.
|
|
-the jury's decision, coming from a suburban middle class setting, favored
|
|
police and fears crime
|
|
-the defence portrayed King as a hard to handle suspect who made officers
|
|
fear for their lives
|
|
-"We feel we have done the best job we possibility could have done"
|
|
statement by the jury at closing of trial
|
|
*result: Police are acquitted
|
|
|
|
Stacy Koon - 16 year veteran , sergeant in charge of officers. stunned King.
|
|
Called beating " managed and controlled use of force" that followed the
|
|
policies and training of the LAPD.
|
|
Lawrence Powell -29 years old- "I acted as if I was being attacked by a man
|
|
on drugs. I was completely in fear of my life, scared to death".
|
|
Theodore Brissaro -39 years old- "I thought the whole thing was out of
|
|
control".
|
|
Daryl Gates, LAPD Chief of Police: "I think we have a system of justice, we
|
|
just witnessed that system work. . . we may not like it . . but we must not
|
|
prejudge the system. We must not prejudge the administrative systems of
|
|
justice.
|
|
King's Defense Lawyer: "The verdict says it is OK to beat somebody on the
|
|
ground, beat the crap out of them." The jury chose to ignore and disregard
|
|
the fundamental issues: the issues of brutal, vicious, felonious assault.
|
|
There is nothing Rodney King did to deserve this fate, and the defendants are
|
|
walking out as heroes. The fact is twelve middle class suburban jurors are
|
|
not going to convict 4 white cops. The King video shows police brutality in
|
|
its rawest form, it is only unusual because it was filmed. It is symbolic of
|
|
the chasm between police officers and the communities they are supposed to
|
|
protect.
|
|
|
|
4/30/92- The rebellion starts in Los Angeles, the city is soon on fire. In
|
|
San Francisco peaceful demonstrations become riots which invite looting. Why
|
|
were people looting? Because we associate commodities with what is
|
|
inaccessible in our society, prestige and being part of the power elite.
|
|
|
|
*It is interesting to note that the Beating of Rodney King never made it
|
|
to the front page of the SF chronicle until the riot/reaction/rebellion, and
|
|
then, coverage only focused on the lawlessness of the inner city inhabitants,
|
|
not the issue of the verdict.
|
|
|
|
*The ACLU surveyed the residential zip codes of the 7,568 personnel of the
|
|
LAPD and found that 83.1% of the personnel live in the suburbs. (SF Examiner
|
|
3/30/94)
|
|
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
|
|
|
|
The larger injustice of and subsequent reaction to the Rodney King
|
|
Verdict were reflections of the daily inequality that people, especially
|
|
people of color, suffer within this system. The way the administration of
|
|
Balboa High School reacted to the students was similar to the police reaction
|
|
to the citizens of Los Angeles, they are both connected to the same power
|
|
structure, only functioning on different levels.
|
|
|
|
----------------------------------------------------------------------
|
|
(This section is comprised of the dialogues spawned in Room 112 during
|
|
the day of and after the Simi Valley Acquittal.)
|
|
----------------------------------------------------------------------
|
|
|
|
Kevin Conway- Student teacher
|
|
I don't believe it. After I saw the video tape I thought why even bother
|
|
with the trial. Why waste the money? I come from a family of police
|
|
officers. They said this is cut and dry, these guys are gone. Big time
|
|
trouble. Obviously it was a very smart defense lawyer. It shows what happens
|
|
if you have some money behind you. There was a large bankroll behind this
|
|
case. When they moved the trial to a middle class area, they passed this off
|
|
as the war on drugs. In a war people get hurt. This is what we have to do
|
|
because if we don't contain it here it will be coming to your neighborhood.
|
|
Rodney King is the personification of this. You can frighten the
|
|
suburbanites. When they moved it to Ventura they found a jury that would be
|
|
sympathetic to that line of reasoning.
|
|
PC: I used to live in Ventura and Simi Valley has the highest proportion
|
|
retired LAPD in Southern California. It is where they live.
|
|
KC: That is similar to New York. Most of the police live in the city,
|
|
they live in Long Island and other suburban periphery. They drive into the
|
|
"jungle".
|
|
JG: That is a fundamental respect issue, if you don't live there you can
|
|
never share the same commonalties and build up a rapport with the people you
|
|
work with. It is like being ruled by an invader.
|
|
KC: When the police bring home stories of the animals in the city to the
|
|
suburbs the people become scared. The mayor of New York tried to pass a law
|
|
that made the police live in the city. If it was enforced most of the force
|
|
would be gone.
|
|
|
|
(Conversation With 10 Students 4/29/92- morning after the Acquittal:)
|
|
|
|
Is there Justice?
|
|
-money rules this country.
|
|
-we are out of Justice.
|
|
-If it was white man and black cops there would be an automatic death penalty
|
|
for the officers.
|
|
-The anger should be directed downtown, at the cops.
|
|
-A lot of places they was down in their own neighborhoods.
|
|
-In their own neighborhood how out of all them stores how many do you think
|
|
is owned by blacks? None. The are owned by A-rabs, white people.
|
|
-It ain't going to be changed.
|
|
-We gotta buy in black shops, that's all.
|
|
-There is going to be a big change coming.
|
|
-There has always been racism in this country.
|
|
-That means if they can get away with that they can get away with a lot a
|
|
more stuff.
|
|
-The police are going to beatin people up if they know it is going to be
|
|
allowed, and they don't care about how bad that person get beat up. I seen it
|
|
already.
|
|
-They will just say Not Guilty.
|
|
-That is uncalled for.
|
|
-It is the same thing how they did like Mike Tyson.
|
|
-I don't understand how they put all white people on his jury. It supposed
|
|
to be a jury of your peers. White people from high jobs, they don't
|
|
understand what he do. And why (King) kept driving.
|
|
-I am not racist or nothin, but why did they pick an all white jury? That
|
|
makes no sense to me.
|
|
-They will say say he provoked them he spit on them or something.
|
|
-They have it on tape, it is all there
|
|
-They said he got up and said something and tried to charge one of them.
|
|
-He got a fuckin electric chain on him, in a choke hold.
|
|
-They pullin him while they beatin him.
|
|
-How he going to do somethin with all those force people up? They got guns
|
|
and sticks and stuff. I don't think so. Ain't nobody going to take on that.
|
|
-That is like saying he caused it all (this reminds me of the televised cop
|
|
chases that end in a shootout- live on tape- nobody questions wether the
|
|
officers have a right to shoot and kill)
|
|
-They blame the victim
|
|
. -I don't care is he was driving fast, When he did stop is if fair for all of
|
|
them to beat on him like that?
|
|
-They beat him like a dog.
|
|
-I know how Rodney King feels.
|
|
-If you get out of line they are supposed to retain you.
|
|
-or try to hold your wrists.
|
|
-not beat you.
|
|
-cuff you or whatever. They didn't do that at all. All they did was beat
|
|
him until he couldn't move and then they cuffed him and took him where he had
|
|
to go.
|
|
-Why didn't he pull out his gun?
|
|
-Who the hell is goin' to be billy bad-ass in front of hella guns?
|
|
-Not me!
|
|
-No one that's who.
|
|
-I want to know something. Now, say, they said they was in a little small
|
|
town where there was ninety eight percent is all white, where he got beat up
|
|
at. What I'm just sayin, Lets say he was in Compton, a cop got caught in
|
|
Compton,and four black brothers beat up on him the same way, they would have
|
|
Death penalty automatic.
|
|
-gas chamber.
|
|
-they did this so they goin'.
|
|
-That's wrong.
|
|
-They would have been made examples.
|
|
-Do you know how the Watts Riots of 1965 started? It was two white police
|
|
officers were arresting a black person in the middle of Watts. An altercation
|
|
broke out, a crowd gathered and it exploded.
|
|
|
|
-What can we do about this situation?
|
|
-We can't do nothing about it.
|
|
-But violence will give us some answers.
|
|
-We can go down there and kill somebody, but people have already been killed.
|
|
It ain't doing nothing. They want us to kill each other. We are too stupid,
|
|
half of us are too stupid to see. And we are still killing everybody -I can
|
|
hear Public Enemy right now in the studio.
|
|
-I agree with her. Killing people ain't going to help. It is just going to
|
|
be another person dead. To me, what they did last night. You can get
|
|
something out of it, that was positive. People got T.V.s, that was positive.
|
|
You can turn any negative into a positive.
|
|
-They did this on purpose because they knew how black peoples was going to
|
|
react.
|
|
-I would run into a store and get something.
|
|
-When those cops got acquitted, it wasn't nothing new. It just showed me
|
|
that if the government and the police department wants to get off on something
|
|
they can. It shows you the bottom line. They had Rodney King recorded
|
|
getting his ass whupped, and they said that they was just goin along with
|
|
procedure. Because he was resisting arrest.
|
|
-I can see having riots
|
|
-People at abortion clinics were going more crazy than Rodney King while
|
|
they were resisting arrest. The only thing they do is put them on their
|
|
stomach and cuff them.
|
|
-There was eight officers, there was no way they couldn't hold him down once
|
|
they put cuffs on him.
|
|
-Once they found out he wasn't armed there was no use for force. They are
|
|
using force for their best interest, so they don't hurt themselves.
|
|
|
|
-What is Justice?
|
|
-Justice in America, not just for white people, is for rich people. Let me
|
|
tell you what justice is. When you get a judge and you get a lawyer. And you
|
|
hire them. To me it is not about color it is about money. When you are rich,
|
|
color don't mean shit.
|
|
-Money talks.
|
|
-When you are rich, you can buy justice, and that means "just-us" protect me.
|
|
-Everybody is out for themselves trying to get their hands on money.
|
|
-Is that right?
|
|
-No!
|
|
-When they say we have freedom, everybody should be treated equal.
|
|
-We are not treated equal.
|
|
-It is lopsided.
|
|
-Things are different than way back when, but we are still treated lesser
|
|
than them.
|
|
-To me when people took to the streets last night, white and blacks, the
|
|
focus was on the blacks. Even with all the gang stuff in South Central,
|
|
nobody took the time to say " there go this dude, he from Sunset, I can kill
|
|
his ass right now" people were together.
|
|
-Is it going to take something like this to bring everybody together?
|
|
-It just might.
|
|
-It is going to start a revolution.
|
|
-It will end the fighting without reason.
|
|
-We are being lazy, not just black people, but all poor people in America.
|
|
We got a Constitution and we ain't pushing it to the limit, we are not doing
|
|
shit, we are letting all these rich people kick our ass. The Constitution is
|
|
not set up for us but for them. What we need, I am serious, people in America
|
|
need to revolt.
|
|
-All right, what kind? Is it going to be the people taking on the police
|
|
force?
|
|
-Once they get a badge they thing they are better than everybody, you try to
|
|
talk to the police, reason with them, they don't listen.
|
|
-They have too much power.
|
|
-They have all the guns. And they will win in court.
|
|
-Guns ain't shit, anybody can get a gun.
|
|
-There is way more artillery on the street than on a police force. What they
|
|
got is money.
|
|
-They got political backing. They can get away with anything.
|
|
|
|
(4/29/92 Conversation With: Camile Brousard and Thomas)
|
|
C-I have got a bad attitude about the decision. You see, they going to get
|
|
them not guilty. If it was a white person, no offence, who get beat up they
|
|
would have sent him up with a life sentence. They let them go free, I don't
|
|
go for that.
|
|
T-Paid in full and freed from jail.
|
|
-Do you thing the trial was totally unfair?
|
|
C-Ah-hua, there were no black people in the jury. All white people, that
|
|
made it easier for them.
|
|
T-thank you.
|
|
-How are you feeling right now?
|
|
C-I ain't got no words for that. I am so angry I could kill somebody.
|
|
(laughs) The verdict was unfair, I think people have the right to riot. They
|
|
need to serve justice.
|
|
-What is justice to you?
|
|
C-The fair penalty, the cops need to be taught for beating up Rodney King.
|
|
They have evidence against them and then they go free
|
|
PC-That is the message they are telling us, that cops can bang us over the
|
|
head any time they want.
|
|
C-A lot of people are going to protest Downtown, me and my mom are goin'.
|
|
The protest might do a little good.
|
|
|
|
(4/29/92 Conversation with Marcus Freeman)
|
|
-Do You think it is right what has happened to Rodney King?
|
|
MF: Do you think it is right? They got him on video tape and the cops got
|
|
off. It makes me feel like going to LA to raise hell with them. That is the
|
|
only thin you could do, whether it is right or not.
|
|
-What do you think Justice is?
|
|
MF: It ain't what they did.
|
|
-Do you think there is Justice?
|
|
MF: Nope, It probably is around but they ain't using it.
|
|
|
|
Reconciling Looting within a Capitalist Framework
|
|
5/1/92, May Day- Conversation with students: Marcus, Rob, Andre, Harvey
|
|
|
|
-Do you think getting stuff makes things equal?
|
|
-It is proving a point.
|
|
-I don't know what it is.
|
|
-It really isn't proving a point it it just giving people like us a chance to
|
|
take shit that's all. Everybody, people that have been honest their whole
|
|
life were taking stuff. If you get a chance to take free stuff, you are going
|
|
to take it.
|
|
-I will tell you right now, the President is a crook, the CIA is a crooked,
|
|
FBI, IRS and the police is all crooked. If we are going to get something free
|
|
we might as well be crooked to.
|
|
-I had an opportunity to take something last night. Somebody handed me a
|
|
footstool that was looted from Macy's window display. I thought whether I
|
|
should take it or not take it
|
|
-You should take it because it is free.
|
|
-To be honest with you I didn't take it. Do you know why?
|
|
-Because you had some leather jackets?
|
|
-Is window smashing, and taking going to solve these problems? Is it going
|
|
to make people react and the cops more mad?
|
|
-I will tell you right now it is madness. You can't stop it no more. You
|
|
just can't stop it. The verdict is the straw that broke the camels back.
|
|
People were just waiting. There is no way you are going to stop the gangs,
|
|
there is no way that they will stop the violence. You didn't see no bloods or
|
|
Crips fighting each other, you didn't see no body fighting over San Francisco
|
|
turf. They all grouped up and went against the police. Because one way or
|
|
another everybody has something against the police.
|
|
-When we started marching at 24th street (and Mission) there was people from
|
|
HP (Hunter's Point), Sunnydale, Lakeview, Double Rock, Mission, Portero (Hill)
|
|
we all marched together to the Fillmo'. When we got down there we started
|
|
tearing shit up.
|
|
-That is exactly what they are afraid of.
|
|
-They don't want us to be together.
|
|
-I fucked up I should have taken that chair. Because that is corporate
|
|
America. That's the enemy, the system. The Justice system, the corporations
|
|
that make money off us. A part of me says "fuck ya I am glad you went to
|
|
Radio Shack and pulled the place apart and took everything in sight. They
|
|
have been taking stuff from you for years.
|
|
-But the other part is that we took innocent stuff.
|
|
-We robbed from small businesses, that's not right.
|
|
|
|
-Is there a difference between a small business and a large corporation like
|
|
Macy's?
|
|
-It doesn't matter. When someplace is busted open and you are tired of
|
|
paying $77.00 for a pair of shoes that is not going to your peoples, you are
|
|
going to go take something. Forget it, it ain't my peoples store, we don't
|
|
own it. So lets go get it, it ain't hurtin' my people.
|
|
-The little stores in our community, that are for us, run by us. We fucked
|
|
up when we got them. Those big ass places, fuck them I am glad we hit all
|
|
those places.
|
|
-When Bush says "we should repeal the verdict" ,it is too late, you can't
|
|
change nothing. If you put them in jail it still won't change nothing. It is
|
|
too late.
|
|
|
|
-Here's a larger question. After the stores are looted, what next?
|
|
-Motherfuckers are going to start shooting each other.
|
|
-The world will come to an end, motherfuckers will start blowing shit up.
|
|
-As soon as the National Guard starts shooting people in LA that's it. The
|
|
gang bangers have way more artillery than the average cop. Cops got a 9mm
|
|
automatic but these brothers have AK-47's, a 12 gage can't hang with a street
|
|
sweeper. The whole thing is going to toe up. It will spread from each city
|
|
to each city.
|
|
-Do you think it is just going to come down to guns and violence?
|
|
-Violence, that's all.
|
|
-There is no way you can stop it now. The National Guard is going to get fed
|
|
up because one of them will get killed. Once they start that they will have
|
|
to bring the Army in.
|
|
-OK let's say mayor Frank Jordan declares San Francisco an Emergency zone and
|
|
declares a 24 hour curfew. How do you thing people are going to react?
|
|
-A 24 hour curfew?
|
|
-You can't do that because people have to work.
|
|
-People are dying, everything is shut down.
|
|
-Ain't nobody going to stay in their house.
|
|
-It is going to be a war.
|
|
-But then again 'Frisco ain't hard as LA. Those boys in LA ain't stoppin for
|
|
nobody. They don't care who you bring. 'Frisco ain't like that yet. If
|
|
'Frisco and Oakland get like that there ain't no way the cops, national guard
|
|
or the Army are going to be able to stop them. Unless they start blowing up
|
|
houses and everything. Shooting ain't going to solve it. Because is you get
|
|
shot somebody else is going to get shot.
|
|
-Two people are going to get shot.
|
|
-We don't want to see people die, but we can't do nothin about it.
|
|
-There are too many people. They got black, white, mex, Fillipino, everybody
|
|
hooked up against the police.
|
|
-I don't think there is no black person in the National Guard who will shoot
|
|
another black person.
|
|
-During that whole rally there wasn't one black police out there.
|
|
-They know better,they know to stay the fuck back. Just because they is
|
|
black, they still wearin blue.
|
|
(Mr. Walker, vice principal sticks his head in and says "take your cap off")
|
|
-close the door.
|
|
-They nervous.
|
|
-Have you noticed any tension this week?
|
|
-Since it started.
|
|
-Nobody will stand on the back of the bus. People are terrified. They know
|
|
what time it is now.
|
|
-They had us weak for all these years, until now.
|
|
-Everythang is toe' up. Everybody dis each other. It don't matter now.
|
|
-We are at a point right now, the stores are being looted. It will end. And
|
|
we will sit here and say,"now what?".
|
|
-There will be hella people dying. You watch.
|
|
-There will be a lot of stores burning.
|
|
-Do you want to see people die?
|
|
-No. . . but we can't do nothing about it.
|
|
-It is everybody against everybody.
|
|
-It turns into a race thing. It's not against the police anymore. I seen
|
|
some white people they was with us from the march at 24th street, they was
|
|
gettin their ass whupped. They didn't do shit. Like on the news that one guy
|
|
in his truck. They pulled him out of his truck and started whuppin his ass,
|
|
knocked him unconscious and shit. They killed his shit.
|
|
-Was that fair?
|
|
-No that ain't fair but you got to think again they shouldn't be out there.
|
|
If I knew that there was hella crazy white people running around mad at black
|
|
people I would not go out the house. Fuck that. I wouldn't go no where near
|
|
where they was at. They brought that shit on themselves, you just don't do
|
|
shit like that.
|
|
-The things you are talking about what you saw on the news, right?
|
|
-No, shit I seen yesterday when I was down there.
|
|
-So, people were getting hurt?
|
|
-Ya.
|
|
-And the police ain't going to do nothing.
|
|
-They was scared. the was running from us.
|
|
-Like the national Guard in LA, they was just looking white people was
|
|
tearing things up. they ain't going to do nothing.
|
|
-Cause they know if one of them get hurt it is going to be hella shit.
|
|
-So, have you guys have accepted the inevitability of violence? People are
|
|
going to get hurt?
|
|
-We don't like it, but that is just the way it is going to be.
|
|
-If I was the mayor, I would say that we were in a state of emergency.
|
|
Everybody outside their house after nine is getting shot.
|
|
-There ain't no way in the world that you are going to come down to Sunnydale
|
|
and tell them to be in at nine. Because they going to look at you and say
|
|
"what? we live here".
|
|
-They will shoot the cops.
|
|
-That is what I meant by enforcing a curfew. Enforcing it in your
|
|
neighborhood.
|
|
-They will start getting killed.
|
|
-You are going to have to send a couple of patty wagons out there to the
|
|
community. If they send two cop cars . . .
|
|
-They going to flip those bitches over
|
|
-They will blow those cars up and everything.
|
|
-Shit will go down.
|
|
-Things will get worse before they get any better.
|
|
-Will we have to go through this violence to have things get better.
|
|
-Hell yes, it is going to have to be like that
|
|
-Because it is too late.
|
|
-Is there a way to work together so people won't have to die?
|
|
-If I was the mayor, I would call a big ass meeting. With people from the
|
|
community, community leaders.
|
|
-Who are your community leaders? Do you even know who they are?
|
|
-Cecil Williams, and shit . . .
|
|
-What I am saying. . . It ain't going to stop! It ain't the old people doing
|
|
it. It's the young people doing it. People my age that are doing it. You
|
|
cannot tell them nothing nowadays. If they momma can't tell them to stop.
|
|
How is someone else going to? They will be looking at you like "who the hell
|
|
is you, and what the fuck are you doing?".
|
|
And they are going to keep doing it. I am telling you you aren't going to
|
|
stop them unless a bunch of them get shot. There was a three year old on the
|
|
TV, his cousin got shot and he was sayin, "we going to get him, we going to
|
|
get him". That the only thing he say.
|
|
-It is going to come down to revenge, one big gang war. Except this time
|
|
instead of against each other it will be against the police.
|
|
-If one of us die, at least two policemen will die.
|
|
|
|
Are the Police your Enemies?
|
|
-YES.
|
|
-Or are they just guys doing a job?
|
|
-NO. -See that ain't the first time this has happened in LA. This is the
|
|
first time the police got busted. This happens every day. It happens up
|
|
here. Everywhere.
|
|
-Why do the police have the power, where are they coming from?
|
|
-They are not supposed to have power like that.
|
|
-The only thing I need to say is politics. They got it because they are the
|
|
government, and that's the power.
|
|
-They got it because we are scared.
|
|
-We showed them we weren't scared yesterday when we were whuppin their ass.
|
|
-When every body gets together and shows that they aren't scared. They see
|
|
they can't stop us. They know, look how quick they brought in the National
|
|
Guards.
|
|
-Look what they are showing on the TV. It will influence everybody, it will
|
|
be nationwide.
|
|
-As it gets bigger and bigger who has got more of the power? Who has got the
|
|
big guns? Who has the big ships? How many people did they kill in Iraq?
|
|
-200,000 people.
|
|
-We shouldn't have been over there.
|
|
-We were fighting for land and oil.
|
|
-When did people start protesting? After the war was already started. After
|
|
the soldiers were already fighting. When Exxon spills oil in Alaska, when do
|
|
people get up? After the shit has already spilled. When do the riots start?
|
|
After the cops kicked his ass. What's up?
|
|
-If the cops went to jail that wouldn't have happened.
|
|
-Why did the trial get taken out of Los Angeles?
|
|
-Why aren't people taking steps right now to take control of their own
|
|
neighborhoods, their own lives. And not letting things like this happen to
|
|
them, so they have to react.
|
|
-You are saying the day he got beat we should have been out there protesting.
|
|
-No, like Harvey said, Rodney King is not the first person to be beaten, this
|
|
happens every day. Why aren't we at the police station saying "don't beat us,
|
|
don't use these tactics".
|
|
-People say "it don't happen to me so I don't care".
|
|
-It is the same way people look at homeless people. They think they are a
|
|
bum. But that might be you one day. The world is messed up. They don't
|
|
care.
|
|
-To me everybody in the world is crooked you know, if the world is full of
|
|
crooked people it ain't ever going to be cool.
|
|
-Why are people crooked?
|
|
-We got no choice.
|
|
-Because it is our society is like that. The only way you are going to come
|
|
along, you gotta be a crook. The only way to get up to a higher place you
|
|
gotta be a crook. You can't never be nice. I don't understand that. Why you
|
|
can't be honest? You gotta make some changes or you gonna stay down on a low
|
|
level.
|
|
-How are we going to change it within our own little world that we live in?
|
|
With our families and our friends. How are we going to start being honest?
|
|
And how are we going to live so we don't fuck each other over to survive?
|
|
-Man! It's just like you said . . . who is the enemy?
|
|
-I don't know who.
|
|
-Who are my enemies?
|
|
-Are ourselves our enemies?
|
|
-I don't have an enemies, really.
|
|
-I can't trust him, he might backstab me, I can't trust you, you might
|
|
backstab me. You can't go to them they might do something. You can't trust
|
|
nobody. The only thing is that you can trust is yourself. That's it. See
|
|
you can worry about people, then again you can't worry about nobody. If you
|
|
worry about people then you at their level. And when they get you pulled
|
|
down, they goes up. They get ahead of you.
|
|
|
|
-Do you want to hear a statistic?
|
|
" In 1984, Forbes Magazine, a leading periodical of finance and Big Business
|
|
drew up a list of the wealthiest individuals in the United States. The top
|
|
400 people had assets totaling 60 billion dollars. At the bottom of the
|
|
population there are 60 million people who had no assets at all. Around the
|
|
same time the economist, Lester Thurow estimated that 482 very wealthy
|
|
individuals controlled without necessarily owning over two trillion dollars."
|
|
I don't know if you guys can fathom that, I can't fathom one thousand dollars
|
|
myself. But one million dollars, or one hundred million dollars, and one
|
|
thousand million. Consider the influence of such a very rich class, with it's
|
|
inevitable control of press, radio, television, and education on the thinking
|
|
of the nation.
|
|
-These are the people that can push a button and say, "the worlds over".
|
|
-Things are getting worser and worser every day.
|
|
-It is going to have to.
|
|
-I don't have to. We can try to stop it. If we stop it one day, than the
|
|
next day something is wrong. There is always a right and always a wrong.
|
|
-The only reason people was lootin last night because, we was marchin, we was
|
|
all pumped up. When we got there it was the only shit left to do. What are
|
|
we going to do? Walk away?
|
|
-That's what happened, that's what they said on the news too.
|
|
-That's true if you are going to march, march and march. There are going to
|
|
be stores right there. The police ain't going to do nothin unless it just
|
|
turns into violence. They can arrest people, but they will let them out
|
|
sooner or later. In LA the jails are already overcrowded.
|
|
|
|
-Do you think more jails are the answer?
|
|
-NO.
|
|
-Look at all the mother fuckers on death row.
|
|
|
|
PART 3 REACTION AND AFTERMATH AT BALBOA
|
|
|
|
The week before the Simi Valley acquittal was tumultuous at Balboa.
|
|
Monday, a black student shot an asian student in the neck at Lincoln High
|
|
School. Although the incident was not gang related, it put the student body
|
|
of Balboa on edge. CTBS tests were given on Tuesday and Wednesday. On
|
|
Wednesday, April 29, the acquittal of the officers was announced after the
|
|
students had gone home for the day. By Thursday, April 30 1992, the
|
|
insurrection in Los Angeles had erupted. In San Francisco marches turned
|
|
into riots and looting in the downtown area. The mayor of San Francisco,
|
|
Frank Jordan, declared a state of emergency and imposed a city wide 9:00
|
|
curfew and halted bus operation from the poorer parts of the city.
|
|
On Friday, May 1st, the atmosphere at Balboa was charged. Marcus
|
|
Lewis retells the events of the morning, "The first thing we came to school
|
|
early. Some students from State came with some pamphlets. They told us about
|
|
a big rally, that we should go to. That was the plan from right there, as
|
|
soon as they came. That made me want to fight. That was the only thing on
|
|
our mind that day, we were going to rally. We were going to have our voices
|
|
be heard. We didn't want to sit. That just got us pumped up. Nobody went to
|
|
class."
|
|
Around 10:30 a group of students from Jefferson High School, were
|
|
marching around Balboa trying to get students to join them. The procession
|
|
was followed by a small phalanx of police on foot and several squad card.
|
|
Principal Montevirgin addressed the school over the P.A., announcing "If you
|
|
walk out, you are out of here. It is a closed campus, nobody is leaving."
|
|
The administrators did not attempt to de-escalate the situation. They shut
|
|
the doors and said "you are going to stay here".
|
|
Marcus and Kevin Keany walked outside to join the demonstration.
|
|
Marcus recalls, "I walked out the front door, they can't keep me in there.
|
|
Mr. Walker told the police not to let me back in. I went around the back."
|
|
When they returned, the power structure reacted accordingly. The vice
|
|
principals, Mr. Walker and Mr. Smith were in Room 112, yelling at both of them
|
|
for violating the rule. The veins on Mr. Walker's neck looked as though they
|
|
were about to explode.
|
|
Throughout the office a feeling of hyper-kinetic energy, driven by
|
|
panic careened into the hallway. Something was out of control, and the
|
|
administration was beginning to show it. The synthesis of the early morning
|
|
discussion was encapsulated by Eugene Lesser, the acting supervisor of Room
|
|
112, by saying "this school is a house of cards, it can be brought down in a
|
|
second, if you (the students) decide to get together and walk out".
|
|
Sparked by the concept of having a student strike, the students
|
|
decided if they couldn't join an external protest they would create one
|
|
inside. They were started to make signs, with slogans like "Fight The Power"
|
|
and "Fuck da Police". While others made plans to have a mass meeting on the
|
|
front steps of the school at lunch.
|
|
Just as the students were making signs, Principal Montevirgin came
|
|
into Room 112 and asked "what were the students doing there?" We replied
|
|
"the students were talking about the acquittal". She asserted "if the
|
|
students were talking about there feelings, they were being counseled".
|
|
Principal Montevirgin proceded to move the whole class to the teen counseling
|
|
center, where trained school psychologists could deal with the students
|
|
emotions.
|
|
Once the room was cleared out, Montevirgin came back into the room and
|
|
accused Eugene and I with getting the students riled up. We said we were
|
|
"constructively talking about the anxiety caused by this event". Her action
|
|
was too late, because the student's fuse was already lit.
|
|
Lunch time came around, and nothing much was happening. Having closed
|
|
the campus with a promise of treating the student body to a free lunch was
|
|
problematic for the administration because food services are non existent at
|
|
Balboa. A majority of the students ignored the imposed martial law and left
|
|
to get lunch.
|
|
When it was time to go back to 5th period students started clumping in
|
|
the center of the quad and a spontaneous sit in developed and metamorphosized
|
|
to include over one hundred students. The discussion was mediated by
|
|
students. The teachers and administrators were delegated to the outside.
|
|
Lasting over two hours, the sit in produced a long list of grievances and
|
|
solutions geared towards improving the students school environment.
|
|
After the final bell rung most of the students who were assembled
|
|
dispursed. Except for a group of twenty students who went into Room 112 and
|
|
started writing the ideas from the sit-in onto paper. One of the student's
|
|
first solutions to materialize was a student review committee for the
|
|
teachers, and a formal a grievance process where students could complain about
|
|
a teacher without fear of suffering repercussions. The meeting had very high
|
|
energy, yet many incomplete ideas were forced to wait through the weekend.
|
|
On the following Monday is when the student movement began to
|
|
crystalize. Between 12 and 15 students were assembled in room 112 throughout
|
|
the day and formulated a Student Bill of Rights. It consisted of four main
|
|
points focusing on an individual students right to have choice and expression
|
|
within an institutional setting. Each broad ideological point had proposals,
|
|
ranging from mild to radical, to implement them (see appendix).
|
|
The Student movement that developed was spontaneous. It was
|
|
individual and group energy feeding off itself. There was no leader, everyone
|
|
was leading each other. Throughout the formulation stages the students opted
|
|
for having no leader, with the sentiment being that people would just waste
|
|
time fighting over a title and not get anything done. It proved to be an
|
|
egalitarian movement with the female students, like Dina, having equal say in
|
|
all matters. The gender balance leaned towards males, but the women that were
|
|
there made their voices heard and were equally acknowledged. Since there was
|
|
no single leader, the administration initially had trouble identifying the
|
|
students who were organizing and instigating.
|
|
By Tuesday copies of the "Student Bill of Rights" were distributed to
|
|
the students. They also developed a letter, signed by over 200 students and
|
|
delivered to the Superintendent of the SFUSD.
|
|
|
|
By Wednesday the students who were showing up to room 112 just messed
|
|
around. Realizing for this movement to be pure the direction had to come from
|
|
the students, not me. I threw up my hands and resumed tutoring. On
|
|
Wednesday, I felt the movement was dead, the sparks had snuffed out.
|
|
When I arrived to school on Thursday May 6th, twenty students were in
|
|
room 112, writing down the Bill of rights on poster paper. The room was
|
|
buzzing with energy and activity. The students had determined they were going
|
|
to have a strike, and rally for the whole student body on the next day.
|
|
A student named Whitey, prepared a statement and started calling the
|
|
media to inform them a peaceful gathering was happening at Balboa and
|
|
requested them to bring their cameras. A reporter who was a friend of
|
|
Mrs. Montevirgin's called to ask what was going on. She had no idea anything
|
|
was happening. A lesson for all those who trust the media to be impartial, DO
|
|
NOT because they are firmly rooted on the side of power! This does not
|
|
diminish the skill the students displayed at keeping secrets and avoiding the
|
|
administration. Because the students were so complexly covert, Montevirgin
|
|
didn't know until the last moment.
|
|
When Montevirgin found out about the strike she became enraged. She
|
|
called Dr. Collins at 9:30 on Thursday night and said "what have you been
|
|
teaching your black students, they are starting a revolution at my school".
|
|
She then proceeded to call Blonsky and blame the whole incident on the
|
|
"skinhead" who worked for him.
|
|
On the morning of Friday May 7th, a meeting had assembled with about
|
|
10 students, the Senators, Blonsky ,Dr. Augustine, Dr.Goody and
|
|
Mrs.Montevirgin. It was apparent form the start that Montevirgin was not
|
|
going to allow any dialogue and discussion. From the onset she dictated the
|
|
meeting by cutting people off in mid sentence, shouting down any oppositional
|
|
points and veering off into moot points when anything remotely resembling the
|
|
truth was mentioned. This meeting, coupled with Montevirgin's blocking of
|
|
media coverage and locking down the school effectively derailed the Friday
|
|
strike.
|
|
Q: Do you think the list of grievances and the meeting what was being
|
|
said, was there valid things being said?
|
|
WS: Very valid things. But I knew nothing would get accomplished. I knew
|
|
how they would handle it. They would basically jump on your side to slow it
|
|
down. When it is over with you are grinded down. You know how the meetings
|
|
were It was a grinding process. Meeting after meeting, then we will have
|
|
another meeting. And you talk about the same old issues.
|
|
Q: It degenerated into non-issues, Mrs Montevirgin started defending
|
|
herself about the hat rule.
|
|
WS: It was just . . . why bother?
|
|
ML: To me it was like I was five, and my mother comes to school when I am
|
|
in trouble. And your mother believes the teacher, and that is all they are
|
|
doing. Now they say "you are still students and you have no say, what we say
|
|
goes, don't be messin' with it, bottom line."
|
|
WS: I don't know it really wasn't nothing surprising. It is just like
|
|
another struggle with a different reason. If we sneak out of class, they know
|
|
how to react to us. It is no different the way we was protesting, the way
|
|
they acted towards us. I see the same connection. How they revolve around
|
|
(and use) power.
|
|
|
|
One positive thing about the meeting was the SFSUD policy on student
|
|
rights, outlined in the hand book, magically appeared. They found that under
|
|
state law students are allowed to hand out information, use the schools PA to
|
|
announce events, pass out flyers as long as it is not printed on school
|
|
equipment, wear buttons or other things that are political statements. This
|
|
knowledge in itself was a small victory because students could wear their
|
|
Malcom X hats as a political statement. Yet, all these "rights" were subject
|
|
to interpretation by administrators.A reporter from the Chronicle showed up
|
|
and was escorted around the campus by a group of students. What was printed
|
|
in the paper was a picture of students standing in front of a graffiti covered
|
|
wall in a boys bathroom.
|
|
Q: How did you feel about the way the reporter handled the story?
|
|
WS: Nothing. It was like she just came and felt like she had to do
|
|
something because she was there.
|
|
ML: I thought the media was going to talk about the teachers. But when
|
|
you see the picture in the paper. You see them standing in the bathroom
|
|
looking at the graffiti. The graffiti has been going on so long, you see it
|
|
everywhere, ride a bus. You don't need to see it in the newspaper. You need
|
|
to talk about the real reason they came up here.
|
|
Q: Wasn't the reason you called the press was to show your student bill
|
|
of rights too?
|
|
WS: Yea, at first they kept asking if it was going to be a riot. And we
|
|
kept telling them no, we were having a sit-in. We came up with a Student bill
|
|
of rights.
|
|
Q: Do you think if you said yes they would have all came?
|
|
WS: Hell yes. They would have come if we told them we had a teacher with
|
|
a gun to his head they would have come running. That's what it is.
|
|
ML: The only thing we get media for is trouble. Because every year
|
|
everybody is having money problems and it don't mean nothing. But when there
|
|
is a fight or somebody got stabbed, there are cameras, we talk about it for
|
|
the whole week.
|
|
WS: Or if it is something they don't like, like communism. Something so
|
|
beneficial, they raise hell about it. They only come when that idiot comes
|
|
down from Wells Fargo.
|
|
|
|
The media's treatment of the students devalued any credibility that
|
|
the students had because it depicted the students of being incapable of
|
|
respecting their own environment.
|
|
That night a "Fuck the Police" demonstration and march was held at
|
|
Dolores Park. There were about 500 people sitting in the middle of the park
|
|
with banners and 10 foot puppets. The perimeter of the park was surrounded
|
|
with police cars, helicopters buzzed overhead, and motorcycle cops tried to
|
|
coral onlookers like stray cattle. There was a small PA system through which
|
|
various speakers talked about police brutality, organization and revenge. The
|
|
speakers were frequently interruped by a police van, which announced through
|
|
loud speakers, "the gathering was in violation of the law and when the group
|
|
set foot onto the street we were going to get arrested".
|
|
When I arrived at the demonstration I noticed that several of the
|
|
students from Balboa were sitting in the front row. Their excitement was
|
|
reflected by an unmistakable light that glowed in their eyes, it was unbridled
|
|
newly discovered feeling of empowerment. When the march actually started, the
|
|
students were in the front, leading the charge.
|
|
It was evident from the start that the power structure of San
|
|
Francisco was not going to allow a repeat performance of the events of the
|
|
previous week. When the demonstration crossed Market Street there was a line
|
|
of riot police blocking both sides. They were not going to let the
|
|
demonstration go up Market street to team up with the more militant elements
|
|
of the gay community and potentially loot or destroy the property of the
|
|
Castro Street merchants, or head down market street to the stores and office
|
|
buildings of downtown. The only way for the group to head was North.
|
|
On DuBoce and Church the Muni Street cars were halted, a line of cops
|
|
blocked the passage to the North. They were not going to let the
|
|
demonstration go over the hill to the housing projects in the Western Addition
|
|
then potentially towards Pacific Heights. The Police effectively cordoned off
|
|
all possibilities. There was no way out. After a brief conflict the police
|
|
started isolating groups and arresting protestors.
|
|
|
|
PART 4
|
|
AFTERMATH AT BALBOA
|
|
On the following Monday, I was fired from my tutoring position at
|
|
Balboa High.
|
|
Q: What was your reaction to that? What was the current running
|
|
through the students?
|
|
WS: First of all we tried to find out who fired you. That was one of the
|
|
main things. they wouldn't tell us who. And they wouldn't tell us the
|
|
reason. First they said it was because of differences. Also in the
|
|
confrontation, I heard it was more than Mrs.Montevirgin behind you getting
|
|
fired. Mr.Smith, he flat out said it, "he got rid of his bald headed ass".
|
|
MF: He wanted you out, man.
|
|
WS: That was the same day when he told Blonsky to get the fuck out of the
|
|
office. When we call you, then you come down. Then he said he don't take
|
|
that shit from whitey.
|
|
CC: Mr. Smith, he is the vice-principal?
|
|
WS: He is another bully.
|
|
CC: Was he trying to get you guys to turn on Justin. Do you think he was
|
|
feeling like this is the only chance you guys are going to get.
|
|
WS: On the side? Yes. It was a boast. He kept saying how he has got
|
|
to look after you. And afterwards they kept on saying to me. "You make sure
|
|
to stay out of trouble, you be sure to go straight home." They kept telling
|
|
me I wasn't going to graduate after that.
|
|
CC: He probably thought he was working in your best interests, but he kind
|
|
of had some racism going on in there because he didn't see Justin's method as
|
|
something that wasn't going to work towards you benefit. And so he wanted to
|
|
get that out of there.
|
|
WS: He tried to show us, reverse it, that he is not the bad guy because of
|
|
his skin color.
|
|
ML: The way I see it, he got mad at Justin because we went to Justin
|
|
instead of coming to him.
|
|
WS: All of them.
|
|
ML: Because we black and we came to Justin.
|
|
WS: Another fellow teacher, Mrs Miner, she got really pissed off about
|
|
that. We was having a meeting about
|
|
that after you was fired. 5th and 6th period in room 112. There was
|
|
no teachers. She decided to come in and listen to what we was sayin.
|
|
JG: Was she really verbose at the sit in?
|
|
WS: Exactly. She got up and cut somebody off, and said. She brought up
|
|
the race issue also. It wasn't just black people in the room. She tried to
|
|
treat us like brothers and sisters, and then she said others, because there
|
|
was other races in the class. And she said if you were really serious about
|
|
the whole thing why didn't she come to her. I said look what she just said,
|
|
that is why we didn't come to her. She just tired to take over the meeting.
|
|
She tried to do that with us. All of them do.
|
|
|
|
The day after I got fired, 40 students staged a walkout/demonstration
|
|
in front of the school in protest over my termination. The protest was moved
|
|
to the large auditorium where 80 to 100 students had an open mike discussion
|
|
with the superintendent of the SFSUD. While this meeting was going on I met
|
|
with Mrs. Montevirgin and Tim Gabutero, manager of the Senators. I didn't get
|
|
my job back, but some of the issues were put on the table in our conference
|
|
|
|
5/12/92 around 11:00 AM with Principal Juliette Montevirgin, Tim Gabutero
|
|
manager of the Senators, and Justin Gorman
|
|
|
|
JM-A student and an unnamed teacher have brought to my attention that you
|
|
are in fact the ringleader of the whole student movement
|
|
JG-Who were they?
|
|
JM-I am not going to share the name of the student who shared with me the
|
|
information
|
|
JG-Unnamed sources?
|
|
JM-They said that you were telling the students what to do, go on strike,
|
|
walk out
|
|
JG-Yes, some kids came up to me yesterday with some pretty drastic stuff- my
|
|
position was, "look you have to have a clear idea of what how and when- you
|
|
have to have an idea what you want before you jump into this abyss, because
|
|
that is not necessarily your first step, that is a last resort to doing what
|
|
you are talking about."
|
|
JM-Yes, that really frustrates me about the whole thing is all of a sudden I
|
|
hear a student say "but we have been to you many many times, honest to god,
|
|
honest to god". Nobody has come to me many many times. Or even one time.
|
|
JG-They are afraid of you Mrs. Montevirgin
|
|
JM-See but why would they say publicly they have come to me many many times
|
|
when in fact they have not come to me. If they are afraid of me, why don't
|
|
they have an adult they trust be the mediator and come to me?
|
|
JG-And that is what we were doing until you fired me yesterday Mrs.
|
|
Montevirgin
|
|
JM-No see that again was wrong. Because then after lunch the whole room of
|
|
112 was full of students. I walked in them to tell them to get to class.
|
|
Lets clarify my role here, at this school, my role is to get those kids to
|
|
those class rooms for education. OK? That is my main role. OK? I cannot
|
|
allow students to stay in one room two periods, and this is since the Friday
|
|
after Rodney King. Almost on a daily basis to be there and cutting their
|
|
classes. I am responsible for them to be in classroom. And then I walk in
|
|
there, all of them jumped on me. And said "why did you fire Justin?" I think
|
|
the word fired Justin is inaccurate.
|
|
JG-Well what was I than yesterday?
|
|
JM-I did not employ Justin at Balboa.
|
|
JG-OK Tim fired me. But your influence got Tim to fire me.
|
|
JM-NOW,What I wanted from this meeting is to clarify the role of a San
|
|
Francisco Senators in the school. I need to know exactly what is their job
|
|
description?
|
|
TG-Let me tell you what it is, basically the job description
|
|
JM-Now, uh. . .are we supposed to be taping this meeting
|
|
JG-This is for me because. . .
|
|
JM-I, I do not like a meeting with a tape recorder
|
|
JG-I am sorry I don't like being fired without due process. This is my
|
|
version of making some for myself.
|
|
JM-I requested this meeting it is not due process
|
|
JG-No I requested this meeting yesterday Mrs. Montevirgin, I came up and
|
|
asked you for this meeting initially.
|
|
JM-Now I want some specific questions answered. What is the role of the San
|
|
Francisco Senators in the school site? Very specific.
|
|
TG-To assist students who are struggling with their academics.
|
|
JM-OK, assist. OK, the students with their academics. OK, now what did we
|
|
employ Justin to do at Balboa?
|
|
TG-To assist students
|
|
JM-In what particular subject area?
|
|
TG-There wasn't just one, he comes very well educated. Justin can work with
|
|
Math, English and Reading. He is very highly educated. But that was specific
|
|
subjects.
|
|
JM-OK, how can we explain the fact that Justin is involved with the students
|
|
who are trying to uh . . .have open meetings and explore their complaints and
|
|
frustrations. What would be the role of a San Francisco Senator? Is that
|
|
academic?
|
|
TG-Let me say this?
|
|
JG-But they are talking about their academics, they are talking about school,
|
|
about what they like about school, what they don't like about school. Their
|
|
whole goal is they want to make this place the best place they can make it.
|
|
JM,TG-Now Justin (in unison)
|
|
JG-OK, I have overstepped my bounds obviously and clearly by your narrow
|
|
definitions.
|
|
TG-Exactly, and that's what they are, they are clear, it's in black and white
|
|
JG-I agree they are clear, but we are talking about academics though
|
|
TG-And that is what we are all here for Justin. I am not going to take sides
|
|
with Mrs. Montevirgin, I am not going to take sides with you. I am only
|
|
trying to tell you what the roles of the San Francisco Senators program is.
|
|
We don't commit, we are not counselors. If you look at your scope of
|
|
responsibilities, we are there to help . . . Again I have to reiterate to help
|
|
students who are having problems academically. This situation with Rodney
|
|
King is not something the Senators should not be involved in.
|
|
JG-Rodney King was the catalyst, it was a mirror that made the questions
|
|
arise it was a reflection of this campus-
|
|
JM-Regardless of what King was you can't . . .
|
|
JG-You can't ignore an event of this magnitude because it effected everybody
|
|
here.
|
|
TG,JM-Justin (in condescending unison)
|
|
JM-It is our role
|
|
TG-Justin, it is our role not the Senators. And I am telling you, not on
|
|
behalf of anybody but the Senators, the people who I am employed by, who I
|
|
work for, who I will always work for. I employed you not to come in and do
|
|
anything that was going to ah . . .to start any type of rebellion against them
|
|
JG-Wait . . . w-wait rebellion? Wait a sec, we were having dialogue and
|
|
discussion about how we can make our academics better.
|
|
TG-Yes you see but that's not our job.
|
|
JG-Isn't our job to educate? Is our job to make this school better?
|
|
TG-No, your job is to help assist students with academic problems.
|
|
JM-We know that and you know that.
|
|
JG-Finding our what is wrong with academics is assisting them in a larger
|
|
goal.
|
|
JM-But that is not what your role is. That's not your role. This makes it
|
|
very clear.
|
|
TG-If a student is having problems with Algebra one concepts . . .
|
|
JM-Exactly!
|
|
TG-A student is having problems with understanding reading . . .
|
|
JG-And that ties into the fact there are real problems here, 10th graders
|
|
can't do their times tables . . .
|
|
TG-That is why you are coming in to help them
|
|
JM-That is why you are tutors. Now if you have problems with that, Justin, I
|
|
would have appreciated if you came to me. I said , "you now, all those
|
|
students are really having problems - but they are talking about the problems
|
|
with teachers, but you have not" . . .
|
|
JG-To be honest with you Mrs. Montevirgin I have got nothing but negative
|
|
feelings from you. I have tried to say Hi to you in the hallways but you are
|
|
too busy being the police hat monitor. You haven't come into our program. I
|
|
have said "good morning", and you just go (gesture of a scowl), and it makes
|
|
me have bad feelings and not want to communicate with you. And the only
|
|
contact we have from administrators, Dr. Smith and Mr. Walker, is when they
|
|
come in and look around and say "is this a tutoring room or a hangout room?"
|
|
JM-I am not going to justify what I am doing in this school Justin.
|
|
JG-If you want me to come to you, you have to establish communication
|
|
JM-No. Common sense, if you work with a system, unfortunately it seems
|
|
though you are not working with the system, it will be very hard to have
|
|
anybody in a system and people who will not work with you. Now we are not
|
|
perfect people here.
|
|
JG-Nor am I.
|
|
JM-Do you know why I am policing the halls. Because their safety is number
|
|
one.
|
|
JG-The hats.
|
|
JM-Wrong, their safety is number one, Justin. If I am not out there, if I am
|
|
not controlling the crowd those kids without any reason only by mistake hit
|
|
the shoulder of another student and then they will punch each other. Not hats
|
|
Justin. Hats is a district policy and I am just implementing what the
|
|
district tells me to implement. OK? It really frustrates me when an adult
|
|
who is being looked up, at by a very vulnerable, you know, age group like high
|
|
school, cannot really see that. If you think I am in the halls because of
|
|
hats you are wrong.
|
|
JG-I am just saying what I hear every morning.
|
|
JM-Now, anything that you cannot correct it's your approving it. You as the
|
|
adult have the responsibility to make a statement that will try those kids.
|
|
JG-There are real problems here and hats aren't one of them.
|
|
JM-Unfortunately you wear your hat in that room, you put your walkman on in
|
|
that room.
|
|
JG-I do not own a walkman
|
|
JM-yesterday you were wearing an earphone walkman in that room,
|
|
JG-I was listening to this tape recorder, I have been interviewing the
|
|
students and was listening to a conversation I just recorded.
|
|
JM-And you put your feet on the table.
|
|
JG-It was passing time there was nobody in the room. I was relaxing.
|
|
JM-It does not matter if it was passing time or not.
|
|
JG-I think this is a non issue.
|
|
JM-It is an issue to me because I would like to model proper demeanor, proper
|
|
behavior, decent appearance, and that's why I wanted these kids when they go
|
|
to the classroom and when they go to school they take off their hats. Because
|
|
when you go to you business or employment out there you don't wear a baseball
|
|
hat. And that's my job.
|
|
JG-If that is your job that means you are focusing on dress, appearance and
|
|
external actions but academics is the mind, academics is exploring . . .
|
|
JM-Justin that is my main focus
|
|
JG-You just said that's what your job on campus is, obviously your priorities
|
|
are unfocused.
|
|
JM-My job is to educate the students, my job is to be an instructional
|
|
leader, my job is to visit those classrooms and find out wether the teachers
|
|
are doing their job or not, unfortunately some of those teachers that get
|
|
complaints from the students receive outstanding evaluations last year from
|
|
other administrators. This is my first year as a principle of this school and
|
|
the board knows and the superintendent knows and the names of these students,
|
|
teachers that are not being mentioned by students and I have told them that I
|
|
don't mind putting my job on the line and I am going to someday consolidate
|
|
teachers, and I don't care what seniority means. Because I am here for the
|
|
students, I care for the students.
|
|
JG-We all care for the students
|
|
JM-My job is to make sure we really do our job, because if you let them
|
|
hanging on these things explode in their heads and they get really excited and
|
|
misdirected sometimes.
|
|
JG-And what we were trying to do was direct and communicate and then take
|
|
action.
|
|
JM-No you see what all these groups, you see I had so many students, about
|
|
thirty or forty hanging out there (in front of the school) they did not want
|
|
to come to school, you know the very first thing they told me? It is because
|
|
I fired Justin. OK. They refused to come in.
|
|
JG-You made your own martyr
|
|
TG-My question is how did they find out?
|
|
JG-I told two kids.
|
|
JM-You see.
|
|
JG-I was pissed off as I walked out of school.
|
|
JM-So how can I work with a person like that, you know who is almost working
|
|
against me.
|
|
JG-And I also told my other employer, and I told my family. . .
|
|
JM-I am trying to make this place. A peaceful environment for education. I
|
|
do not need any disruption. I do not need any protest where there no issue,
|
|
but one. It is not right, it is not accurate.
|
|
JG-There are plenty of issues here.
|
|
JM-I know there are a lot of issues Justin, I heard them. And we are doing
|
|
something about them. I cannot just snap my fingers and make miracles, I told
|
|
the group, and make them disappear.
|
|
JG-They are not expecting you to do it by yourself.
|
|
JM-Yes they are.
|
|
JG-They want to take responsibility and they want to do it together.
|
|
JM-Justin, I think you are not hearing them. But you are not doing anything.
|
|
And I told them that.
|
|
|
|
After my termination the movement was effectively halted. I didn't
|
|
want to press to get my job back for several reasons. The first being that
|
|
the Senators were trying to work to change the schools, if I continued to
|
|
press the organization would be in jeopardy of losing its contract with the
|
|
school district. Also if my job was turned into the focal point it would be a
|
|
distraction from the true issues at hand and give Montevirgin fuel to further
|
|
discredit the students because it would look like the needed their leader to
|
|
continue.
|
|
|
|
Q: So, did the movement continue. Or did it fall apart? Why did it
|
|
stop?
|
|
WS: Actually it never stopped. On the last day we still got together and
|
|
kept on talking. Because a couple of people were at the orientation, this
|
|
guy who was also in BBCT, who came to a couple of our meetings. We gave him
|
|
this booklet. We gave the teachers the student program, that file they gave
|
|
us with the constitution, the handbook with all the rules and all that.
|
|
We were saying they didn't give us that. Many of students were saying they
|
|
didn't give us that.
|
|
ML: Things simmered down, but they never stopped. Everybody hung out in
|
|
the same group. We would start
|
|
playing basketball and start talking.
|
|
JG: No more walkouts, but you kept talking. What are you going to do now?
|
|
How can you continue this?
|
|
KS: Right it was transferred into a place, I don't know what it was.
|
|
Because Montevirgin and Smith and some other people, what was it, Goody, they
|
|
came in there and had a meeting with the students at that point.
|
|
|
|
Kevin Singleton relates how the event wrapped itself up. "Room 112
|
|
was no longer sacred ground for the revolution. I don't know if people were
|
|
let down. Everyone was like, 'ya, Right-Said-Fred ain't here', even the
|
|
people who didn't know you were like, 'I can't believe they did that to him'.
|
|
They didn't know who the hell you were. That really kind of blew away the
|
|
hope that the students had. Because they saw that you were behind it, and
|
|
instrument of it and you were chopped off. Decapitated. I think that really
|
|
got them thinking. It is actions like that by the power structure keeps
|
|
minorities and the poor down. They begin to see if anyone takes the lead,
|
|
they are chopped off. And they start thinking, 'I don't want to be chopped
|
|
off'. They are young kids, this is an impressionable age for them".
|
|
While the students saw how the power structure reacts, in its naked
|
|
exacting force when individuals act out against the system, another side was
|
|
also uncovered. The students got a taste of organization, a taste of getting
|
|
together and actually doing something, the feelings of empowerment. What
|
|
frightened the administration most was the fact that the students were acting
|
|
on their own. The administration knew that I wasn't telling them what to do.
|
|
To be successful, a group needs an idea of their demands before they
|
|
engage in a strike. The students never clearly articulated their position,
|
|
this was a shortcoming of the movement. In fact the students never even
|
|
collectively decided if they wanted to work within the system or tear the
|
|
whole thing down. When a loose conscensus of means had been achieved the
|
|
students could have made flyers articulating their demands, and distributed
|
|
their message to fellow students. From there a student strike could have been
|
|
implemented, or at least more widely discussed as an option amongst the
|
|
students. If the students distributed the information to all the schools, a
|
|
district wide strike, or a boycott of homeroom, or a fire party could have
|
|
been implemented and shut down the school systemfor at least a day, a week, a
|
|
month?
|
|
The students in this inner city setting are militant and pissed off
|
|
because school and the society which it represents isn't offering them
|
|
anything and it is high time that they reappropriate what is rightfully
|
|
theirs.
|
|
After the movement was over the students involved started getting
|
|
hassled. Will Smith relates the degree of harassment he and other BBCT
|
|
members received, "Hassle? I also got, well almost got used by a lot of
|
|
teacher.
|
|
They would come up to me, like Mr. Smith, the vice principal, and tried to
|
|
play a mind game. He said, "I don't get it, why are you doing this with this
|
|
white boy? What you doing having these protests? He just wants to keep you
|
|
out of class." He thought you was a skinhead. I got a lot of that from
|
|
different staff. They had tried to transfer to different students, and
|
|
interrupt that. They seen a lot of people looking on. They were trying to
|
|
push that the only thing we was doing was causin' trouble.
|
|
Marcus Lewis adds,"I couldn't believe I wasn't down there. I was
|
|
short two credits. That crackdown knocked me out. I will get my diploma.
|
|
They can have there's, but they took the easy way out."
|
|
Q: Would you call it a crackdown? Besides suspensions, do you think they
|
|
were singling out your group?
|
|
|
|
ML: If there was a fight they would say "you shouldn't of let them have
|
|
that class".
|
|
CC: Just be proud of yourselves for getting out of that and seeing there
|
|
really is a value to education. High school can be a good place if you are
|
|
treated like a human being. Imagine if you had a shop class that actually
|
|
prepared you for a job, or had a history class that inspired you to know
|
|
yourself, where you came from, your culture, your community, your own history
|
|
(ourstory). It seems so absurd to me that people are so afraid of that. They
|
|
want to just beat that down.
|
|
ML: That is why they got so mad during the sit out. They chained the
|
|
doors, they told us don't leave. The treat us like animals, they wanted us to
|
|
act like we did. We calmed down, they laughed it off, we sat down and wrote a
|
|
constitution. And then they talked. There was no fights, no breaking
|
|
windows. That is why she got so mad, she wasn't used to us acting like that
|
|
(or giving you the credit to be capable of!). She was the one running around
|
|
the school yelling for no reason.
|
|
JG: I feel the students were far more civilized than she, and the
|
|
administration was.
|
|
|
|
The reason the Student of Balboa got in trouble is because they
|
|
started asking why. Overall the movement was stopped before it could realize
|
|
its goals. Yet even in the face of failure there are many victories, ranging
|
|
from personal to group empowerment. The same conditions of inequality will
|
|
still exist until the system we live under is destroyed.
|
|
Schools function as a vital, well funded enforcer in our society. Their main
|
|
job is to keep the power of youth from ever being realized or organized. It
|
|
is up to the younger brothers, sisters and cousins of the students involved in
|
|
this uprising, and the youth who read this account to take heed and find
|
|
inspiration in the acts captured in this book. It will be up to you, with a
|
|
full school year to organize yourselves. To band together and fight the power
|
|
of the system. Build strength from your community of peers so you won't have
|
|
to react to the injustice of our society, but are the catalyst in finding a
|
|
remedy.
|
|
|
|
PART 5
|
|
APPENDIX: Student Bill of Rights
|
|
student suggestions- sit in 5-1-92
|
|
Remodeling
|
|
Choose your own electives
|
|
Donations
|
|
Fund Raisers
|
|
Food Festivals
|
|
Money should be spent more on schools
|
|
Better security guards
|
|
Better sanitation
|
|
Study Halls
|
|
Acknowledgement-Respect!!!
|
|
Better tardy procedures-so it does not effect your grade- after school
|
|
detention?
|
|
Suspensions-in house suspension-sending home is wrong
|
|
Better environment-- Administrators/teachers should listen
|
|
Student Union
|
|
Out reach program
|
|
Money for school
|
|
Student amendment
|
|
Teacher review board
|
|
Better teachers
|
|
Better administration-take a cut in pay!
|
|
Keep tradition
|
|
Student communication with teachers
|
|
Productive teachers- qualifications
|
|
choose our own program- major
|
|
bring in programs that can give us something we can take out with us
|
|
auto shop-wood- steel- beauty shop-
|
|
APPRENTICE PROGRAMS
|
|
Food service on campus
|
|
PRIORITIES: It is every person for themselves
|
|
Nobody cooperates-Nobody communicates
|
|
The school turns to shit
|
|
Remodeling students be involved in rebuilding and maintaining the school so
|
|
they can take respect in it.
|
|
1. Fund Raisers-to make money
|
|
2. Donations- business proposals-Wells Fargo sponsor
|
|
3. Student Coalition What are we going to do with the money? Fix up the
|
|
school
|
|
|
|
SOLUTIONS:
|
|
Student Bill Of Rights:
|
|
1. The Right to Choose- choose our own classes.
|
|
*There should be basic requirements, like taking Math for 2 years.
|
|
English:-basic skills required, grammar, spelling, reading. A student should
|
|
not be required to take English for 4 years. If the student wishes to explore
|
|
it they pursue it.
|
|
*Teachers should bring life concepts into teaching, tie in economics
|
|
and other life skills.
|
|
*Teachers should be more flexible in teaching.
|
|
*College bound students could take a schedule that meets the entrance
|
|
requirements. Those students who do not choose that path can create their own
|
|
agenda/schedule by choosing different electives that offer a trade or skill.
|
|
All students should have the opportunity to explore, by changing skills every
|
|
6 weeks. Students will have the opportunity to learn through life experience.
|
|
Students will form a committee to write letters to companies to get them to
|
|
donate the materials and bring in people to train the students.
|
|
*Have work experience credit/classes where the students get paid with
|
|
a grade.
|
|
*Give the student the right to pay their teachers every month.
|
|
Through a voucher system, if the students
|
|
approve of the teacher they will give them their voucher at the end of
|
|
the month. It will push the teacher if they don't perform they don't get
|
|
paid,it will make them care.
|
|
*Create an Ethnic Studies program at Balboa. Black, La Raza, Asian,
|
|
Filipino, have literature and history. Have students learn their own heritage
|
|
perhaps a genealogy project or an oral history of their family and language.
|
|
Have a list of all the possibilities for electives- have the student body vote
|
|
for what they want to take to determine what the students want. -call Wells
|
|
Fargo and have them fund it.
|
|
2. THE RIGHT TO BE HEARD- Have a say in how we are taught things
|
|
3. THE FREEDOM OF EXPRESSION- through our dress and language.
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4. THE RIGHT TO LEARN/GET AN EDUCATION IN A POSITIVE LEARNING ENVIRONMENT.
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TEACHER REVIEW BOARD
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The board will consist of three students and three teachers with a
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para or other neutral party in the middle who can act as mediator and tie
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breaker. The purpose of the board is to hear both sides of an argument,
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facilitate conversation and have participants come up with an agreement. The
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board is to hear grievances in writing both from the students side and
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teachers side. The purpose is to reach a compromise that both sides can live
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with. The board makes a decision only when the participants cannot come up
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with an agreement by themselves. The people who sit on the board are on a
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rotating basis. The board has the power to write decisions down and issue
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demerit points that will be brought to the district if the problem persists-
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i.e. a teacher keeps on receiving many complaints that can lead to their
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transfer or dismissal.
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STUDENT REVIEW BOARD
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Is the students defense in cases where a student expulsion or
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suspension is about to happen. The board will act as intermediaries. The
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teacher and administrators will have to let the students into the meetings.
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The review board also critiques teachers/administrators performance- how they
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are teaching what they are teaching. Teachers should be people who want to be
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here and those who don't shouldn't be here. The review can be positive or
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negative and also act as a reward to the teachers and administrators that do
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well!
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PROBLEMS *Teachers don't get paid enough!
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*The priorities of the nation are screwed up. The government needs to
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change, constructively change.
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*Petition to Frank Jordan- to take a cut in pay!
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*Write letters to corporations to tell their executives to take a cut
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in pay
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*Teachers have to be behind this, because that is why they are here!
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*Lack of respect, people want without giving!
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IDEAS *have the power to suspend the teachers without pay
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*Issue a proclamation to other schools to get cohesion and unity in
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the district.
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*The students have the power and right to have a general strike,
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walk-out or sit in.
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*These measures are only as good as the unity behind it.
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Student interviews
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I started this book when I was reading Studs Terkel's "The Great Divide". I
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realized that I could do something very similar, ask the students questions
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|
around a central theme. I asked what they thought about school, how they
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could make it better and what they thought of living in the city. Two weeks
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into this project the King verdict exploded, that is how I caught the
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reactions of the students, I was armed with blank tapes, batteries, and a tape
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recorder at the right time. Here are some of the interviews that really
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didn't fit into the scope of the book yet I feel are an important glimpse of
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|
the attitudes and environment of the schools.
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Frank Knighten - Student 4-15-92
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Is school working for you?
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Ya, I guess. I wouldn't know how to do other things, right? I like what I
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|
am learning here. I have learned to contain my temper, hold it back. When I
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|
go into the real world when my boss get on my nerves I won't have hit him.
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|
That's the truth, huh?
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|
What would you like to do for a job?
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I want to be a cop. Undercover. Narcotics. I feel there aren't enough
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|
brothers on the force. I want to contribute back to my community. It is a
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|
contribution to get all the drugs out of my neighborhood. Everybody deal dope
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|
to the younger people coming up. I used to live in Lakeview, now I live in
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Bernal Heights it's a little quieter. There are a lot of drugs in Lakeview.
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|
I have seen a lot of my friends get killed too. Mostly by drive by shootings.
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|
I makes me feel sad. That is the big reason I am not on the street right now
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|
selling drugs or shooting dope. Besides my mom would hit me and kick me if
|
|
she knew I was selling drugs. That is the only thing that saved me, my momma
|
|
hit me, everything bad that I do. I got arrested once and got hit, I won't do
|
|
that again. Every time I think of doing something bad, I think of my momma
|
|
and how she will execute me. And that's what keeps my head going the other
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direction. I want to go to college for four years to get a degree and shit so
|
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I can get a job. I want to get a degree in criminology, criminal law since I
|
|
was eleven years old.
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Do you think police officers are powerful?
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|
I don't think they are powerful. I think some of them get overprotective
|
|
with their badge. I don't think they are god and stuff. Not that they are
|
|
bad or weak. I mean there ain't nothing behind there position. Anybody can
|
|
be cop if they put their mind to it. Some things are wrong and some things
|
|
are fair. I think there is justice if you catch it on tape now a days.
|
|
Otherwise there ain't no justice. Somebody's word doesn't cut it no more.
|
|
People used to have a little bit of honesty if they were in court with their
|
|
hand on the Bible. But now they probably have their feet crossed or
|
|
something.
|
|
Do you think people believe in the truth anymore?
|
|
No.
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|
Or are honest?
|
|
No. The people that are honest end up getting hurt because they are too
|
|
honest. They are vulnerable. The truth hurts you.
|
|
Do you want to have a family one day?
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|
Yes, I want to have a wife that works too. Have a couple of kids. I am not
|
|
old fashioned. If we both work, we both can cook the bacon.
|
|
Do you want to vote?
|
|
Ya, I want to vote a lot. Politics is all right. My vote might make a
|
|
difference. My mom not really into it. She says if Brown goes out she ain't
|
|
even gonna vote. I would rather have Clinton in there than Bush. He ain't
|
|
doing nothing. If he ain't doing his job you should give someone else a
|
|
chance. Maybe Clinton will do a little bit better.
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|
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|
How do you feel about school?
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|
I think things is messed up. They are more worried about the hats than the
|
|
drugs. There are a lot of drugs in this school. There is a lot of booze here
|
|
too. There are a lot of guns here, lot of guns. We got kids coming from
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|
Bayview/Hunter's Point, Valencia Gardens, Fillmo'. They are going to have to.
|
|
They are going to get hyped one day and they might have to jump somebody.
|
|
They will come down here and shoot up the whole place. Especially in Summer
|
|
school, everybody has one.
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|
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Jose M. - student
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|
What's wrong with the school?
|
|
Students, nobody cares. Because they prefer hanging around with friends-
|
|
you get to talk, do stuff. In class all you do is listen to the teacher, sit
|
|
there and be told. I don't like people telling me what to do. I don't like
|
|
bullies in classes, the kids who sit in the back and pick on you. I like US
|
|
History, I don't like math, too many numbers, who is going to use all those
|
|
stupid numbers? All that you are going to use is adding, dividing ,
|
|
subtracting and multiplying. I want to be an undercover cop. So I can get
|
|
back to all those bullies in class! (Laughs) What would you do to make
|
|
school better? Get rid of the security guards. They should be more strict,
|
|
they don't know what they are doing. I think they should put a metal detector
|
|
in the door I see guns, knives, all kinds of weapons on campus the teachers
|
|
don't know about it. A lot of people get hurt, and the kids show you what
|
|
they are carrying and say "after school". There are a lot of problems after
|
|
school. There are too many gangs, Filipinos, Samoans, Latins, blacks and a
|
|
few Chinese. The same guys that are in the gangs are the ones who make the
|
|
trouble in the classes, you can tell who they are by the way they dress, the
|
|
colors they wear, red or blue.
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|
|
|
Leonardo Iglesias- student
|
|
Do you like school?
|
|
Not really. its boring.
|
|
The work?
|
|
I like some work like Spanish because I can relate to it, I speak it at home.
|
|
I like math, but it gets me frustrated when I don't know how to do the
|
|
problems. That makes me mad. I don't like history, it is too complicated, too
|
|
many dates and things that occurred, very complicated. I like English, it's,
|
|
you know, in homeroom at Denman (Jr. High School), I used to memorize the
|
|
definitions. Other kids think school is boring.
|
|
What would you do to change it?
|
|
I would have half days once a week, on Friday. People aren't thinking much
|
|
about school anyway, they want to party. I would make school start at nine I
|
|
still want to get out at 2:50. I think we should extend our lunch, but the
|
|
time you get your food the bell rings. There should be a snack bar at school,
|
|
with everything. They have one at the Jr. High, they call it the beanary.
|
|
The students can work it, run it and get paid for it. We should have a food
|
|
fair, carnival, games. I like Mr. Jessup, he is calm, he doesn't pressure
|
|
people. When people get in my face, pressure me, I say 'fuck you' to get them
|
|
mad . I do it at my own pace. Mrs. Kehoe, she pressures people ,she wants work
|
|
done at the end of the period, she is too strict. It is OK to be strict, like
|
|
on being tardy, excusing absences with notes. I went from a 3.68 to straight
|
|
"F's". I was cutting, I didn't like school. I would change the teachers, to
|
|
be more flexible to give the students more room, more time. I would have
|
|
assignments that we make up. I would base part of the grade on participation
|
|
and improvement, judging me for the effort I do. It is rare for teachers to
|
|
care about students, there are so many they cant care for everybody they can
|
|
help some not all. I don't blame them it's not there job not to care.
|
|
Teaching are to help the student learn, learn what they teach. Math applies, I
|
|
don't know how US history applies to your life.
|
|
|
|
Ammer Nasrawi
|
|
Actually, I do Like school. I like the friends I have, learning new things.
|
|
I like the social aspect. Wwhat do you think about the subjects you are
|
|
taught?
|
|
There is no problem, the classes they give me are no problem. Some teachers
|
|
push and some don't. Do you like being pushed?
|
|
Not really. Some will just keep throwing work at you. And push you as hard
|
|
as they can. They will give you three assignments every day, so you get the
|
|
most out of it. Do you think you get the most out of it?
|
|
Sometimes, not all the time. I like math, algebra and biology, I love
|
|
biology. I don't like history or English I am not in to that.
|
|
What do you think about the school?
|
|
It is not bad concerning the violence here. I don't think there is any here,
|
|
very little if any. There have only been two fights this year. Everybody
|
|
likes each other a lot. I don't have a problem with nobody here. The only
|
|
time when a student gets mad at another person is like when don't belong. In
|
|
the wrong business, messing with that person if they aren't supposed to.
|
|
Basically every student likes each other. There are only fights if someone
|
|
from another school comes.
|
|
Is there gang problems here?
|
|
I have never seen a gang in this school. You will never see a group walk
|
|
around. I know almost everybody in the school. There are no problems here.
|
|
|
|
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
|
|
I would like to thank: Carrie Crawford,Will Smith, Marcus Lewis,
|
|
Kevin Keany, Kevin Singleton, Eugene Lesser, Julie Schweit, Mike Fonseca,
|
|
Chris Danielson, Will Smith, Marcus Lewis, Marcus Freeman, Frank Knighten,
|
|
Dina, Whitey, Mike Jackson, Black Brothers Coming Together, Cammille, Thomas,
|
|
all Balboa Students who had the courage to stand up communicate and act, Kim
|
|
Quality mother of the .98 revolution, Shay MacKenzie, Gatsby Contreras, Larry
|
|
Gillmore, John Lyons for the photos of the campus, and everybody else whose
|
|
ear I have talked off about this *%$#*&^ project during the last year. for
|
|
making this project possible
|
|
|
|
-----------------------------------------
|
|
This electronic edition transcribed and edited by Chuck Munson
|
|
[cm150@umail.umd.edu]
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