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Journal Entry 2 by JesseBC at postal release in San Antonio, Texas -- Controlled Releases on Thursday, December 18, 2003
 Released on Thursday, December 18, 2003 at postal release in San Antonio, Texas Controlled Releases.
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Journal Entry 4 by synergy from San Antonio, Texas USA on Friday, April 23, 2004
Even though this book lists data from 1989 to 1991 I feel that what Kozol has to say is still relevant today. I grew up in poor public schools of the south and east sides of San Antonio, TX and I know of what he writes firsthand. From the get-go the book choked me up because of some comments made by a boy talking about how wealthy districts don't want them and he never goes to the nicer sides of town because of the stares and feeling intimidated. I knew where he was coming from because I used to be like him. Black adults placed in leading roles to try and handle the mess that's the american school system have to deal with the very people who are causing the mess in the first place: "At length they are even willing to adjust their schools and their curricula to serve the corporate will: as the woman in Chicago said, to train the ghetto children to be good employees. This is an accomplished fact today. A new generation of black urban school officials has been groomed to settle for a better version of unequal segregated education." As another official says, "...The United States now has, in many black administrators of the public schools, precisely the defeated overseers it needs to justify this terrible immiseration. It is a tradition that goes back at least 300 years. A few of us are favored..."
There have been numerous lawsuits brought against wealthy school districts and often it's the same story over and over, that poor districts are poor because they choose to be and have poor education systems because they choose to be. I don't get this! How could ever enter a logical person's mind that ANYONE would CHOOSE to be any of these things?? But the people that live there who hear these types of things know the truth and one of the author's friends says this: "...they know this other world exists, and, when you tell them that the government can't find the money to provide them with a decent place to go to school, they don't believe it and they know that it's a choice that has been made- a choice about how much they matter to society. They see it as a message: 'This is to tell you that you don't much matter. You are ugly to us so we crowd you into ugly places. My son says this: 'By doing this to you, we teach you how much you are hated.' I like to listen to the things my children say. They're not sophisticated so they speak out of their hearts." That's what pisses me off, is that those that deny these children something better don't even consider them as even sentient, like they're not aware of what so many others ELSEWHERE are getting and they are not! "They see the poorer children as a tide of mediocrity that threatens to engulf them. They are prepared to see those children get their schooling in a metal prefab junkyard rather than admit them to the beautiful new school erected for their own kids." What's worse is that while wealthy districts have assured budgets, poor districts are usually highly dependent on politicians and changes are made with the political winds, what little they get in the first place.
I know a lot of people who have yet to leave the neighborhood where I grew up. Those that do often joined the military for the promise of getting their education paid for or having an assured "job" for several years out of h.s. But as one child in this book says, "Most of the students in this school won't go to college. Many of them join the military. If there's a war, we have to fight. Why should I go to war and fight for opportunities I can't enjoy- for things rich people value, for their freedom, but I do not have freedom and I can't go to their schools?" This is why I always say that no one in my family is in the military and we don't understand really why anyone we lived near or did know would do so. All those people who graduated from h.s. with me, many of them may even be in Iraq as I type and we know what's happening over there. This is of course if they even graduate from h.s. What with all the standardized testing these kids can't even pass rudimentary rote memorization much less go to college where it's essential to know analytical and creative thinking!
And finally, I come to the final chapter of the book which covers my very own San Antonio, TX. Back in 1968 a man, Demetrio Rodriguez, sued the state and I believe some 48 wealthy school districts for the unequal education system that allowed his children in the poor southside Edgewood school district get nowhere near the education of the sued districts. In 1968 dollars Edgewood was raising $37 per pupil plus state aid resulting in $231 per pupil while the wealthiest school district in San Antonio, Alamo Heights, was raising $412 per pupil and ending up with $543 with state and federal aid. The lower courts ruled in favor of Rodriguez, but later the higher courts repealed their decision and students were left in the same hole as always. It wasn't until the late eighties soon before this book was written that ruling was repealed and funding schemes were changed into what is now derisively (in some circles) known as the "Robin Hood" program. What I found most interesting near the end of this program was a comment made by one O.Z. White about the passage of this approach: "Predictions were heard that, after legislative red tape and political delays, a revised state formula would be developed. The court would look it over, voice some doubts, but finally accept it as a reasonable effort. A few years later, we'll discover that they didn't do the formula 'exactly' right. Edgewood probably be okay. It's been in the news so it will have a showpiece improvement. What of the children in those other districts where the poor Hispanic families have no leaders, where there isn't a Rodriguez? Those are the ones where children will continue to be cheated." I find this most interesting because as I type this the Texas legislature is in a 'special session' called by the governor and his primary mission appears to get rid of the "Robin Hood" program. And, yes, I remember growing up, now and then, seeing news pieces about Edgewood and how it was improving. It seems that Mr. White's predictions just might be right on the money.
Obviously I've written my own novel about this book, but it really hit close to home and education and literacy are among my major interests outside of my career. I highly recommend this book, especially if you never grew up in a school system where there were holes in the ceiling, no toilet paper in the bathrooms or stall doors for that matter, and if you just might learn a thing or two about growing up poor in america.
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Savage Inequalities: Children in America's Schools
