Baseline

Some facts I dug up from various web sites about Latinos and education:

*A lack of English-language ability is a prime characteristic of Latino dropouts. Almost 40 percent do not speak English well. The 14 percent of Hispanic 16- to 19-year- olds who have poor English skills have a dropout rate of 59 percent.

* Among Latino high school graduates, less than one in four complete high school with the UC/CSU required courses needed to gain admission into a state university.

* The most recent studies underline the problem of getting enough Latinos into school and college. Latinos have the highest dropout rates, the lowest college participation rate and the lowest percentage of adults with a college degree among racial groups. Only 22 percent of young Latinos enroll in college (compared to 32 percent for blacks, 60 percent for Asians and 43 percent for whites), and only 8 percent of adult Latinos have a college degree (compared to 18 percent for blacks, 45 percent for Asians and 37 percent for whites).

* The rate of Latino high school graduates in California going directly to college is 43 percent, while 47 percent of white, 49 percent of black and more than 70 percent of Asian students enroll in college directly after graduating high school.

* A University of Southern California study in 2004 found that half of Latino parents and 43 percent of Latino young adults surveyed could not name a single source of college financial aid. But 75 percent of young Latino adults who had never attended college or dropped out said they would have been more likely to see it through if they had better information on scholarships, need-based grants and loans.

* More than half of all Latino survey respondents incorrectly believed that a student must be a U.S. citizen in order to apply for college financial aid. 1 in 4 respondents believed parents need to be U.S. citizens in order for students to apply for college financial aid. Most respondents over-estimated the costs of attending California State University and University of California campuses.

* California population (2000): Whites 44%, Asians 12%, Latinos 35%, Blacks 7%

* UC enrollment: Whites 43%, Asians 37%, Latinos 14%, Blacks 3%
- Less than nine percent of graduate students in the UC system
are Latinos

* CSU enrollment: Whites 43%, Asians 23%, Latinos 25%, Blacks 6%

* Average yearly earnings by education level:
High School Dropout: $19,169
High School Graduate: $28,645
College Graduate: $51,554
Advanced College Degree: $78,093

* About 85 percent of California's attorneys are white, 3.8 percent are Latino and 1.7 percent are black.

* Latino physicians comprise 4% of all physicians in California.

* 15 percent of California teachers are Latino.

* 3 percent of the nation's scientists and engineers are Hispanic.

I've still got it

I'm awake, and have been, all night, working on the latest issue of the school newspaper, listening to the rain tap-tap-tapping on my roof while my fingers tap-tap-tap on the keyboard.

It reminds me of college, when I'd wait till the last 24 hours to write a 15 page paper and somehow, some way, I'd get it done. With a decent grade, no less. To stay awake, I'd down cans of Mountain Dew and eat ground coffee by the spoonful.

And here I am now, similar situation, though with a self-imposed deadline to get the paper done, sans soda or coffee.

This is why, some nights, I fall asleep early, on the couch or the floor, and sleep through everything all the way till morning. It's because I have to save up on sleep for nights like this.

So here it is. As before, if it doesn't just automatically load, try right clicking and downloading the linked file or go to http://www.prez2012.com/garfieldspace and download it from there. I saved it in a different PDF format than the previous times, so if you have problems with it, let me know!

Recommendation Letters

Is it common practice for people to write their own recommendation letters and simply have the "writer" sign it?

About 5 years ago, one of my students was applying to a private, all girls school in Mountain View that required both a teacher and principal recommendation. The principal, because he didn't know my student at all, asked me to write the letter for him. I didn't like the idea, didn't feel quite right about it, but did it anyway, trying to alter the voice of the letter so it didn't sound too much like my own recommendation. He signed it, she got in, done deal.

Now I'm in the process of finding a job and I need recommendation letters. A couple weeks ago I asked my directors to each write one for me. Tuesday I get an email from one of them saying that she's worried she won't be able to get to writing my letter right away, and since there's just so many good things to say about me, would I mind writing a draft that she could just embellish?

I was insulted. I've given nearly 9 years of my life to Garfield and she can't take an hour or so out of her schedule to write a recommendation letter?

So I thought about it and wrote her back, saying I'd really prefer that she write the letter, that I wouldn't feel right doing it myself, and that I hoped she could find the time to do it even though I know she's very busy.

Geez.

Too Much Credit

I think I've mentioned in a previous blog, in the context of coaching and having disagreements with referees, that I feel I often have too much respect for rules and people in positions of authority.

This is, I think, a bad habit, something I've done for as long as I can remember. Whereas up until probably my early 20's I would have said that authority ought to be respected absolutely, I now think that, though authority should still be respected, when that authority has proven itself to be incompetent or malicious, then it deserves to be questioned and challenged.

This is tricky, of course, because people in authority, by definition, have authority, and they can use it against you if you choose to rock the boat. There are consequences for questioning authority, sometimes serious ones.

I think that many of us Americans have too healthy a respect for authority. We assume that the people in positions of power have our best interests at heart. We assume that they will do the right thing, and so we don't monitor them very closely. Or, maybe we assume that if they do something *really* egregious then the press will let us know. But I don't think that many of the people in power are worried about what's in our best interest. They can't possibly really know what is in our best interest because they do not share a lot in common with us - they are generally extremely rich and privileged people, a truly elite group that is nothing like a representative slice of who we are as Americans, even though they are our "representatives." And we give them too much credit. We believe that if we put them in office they'll do what's right.

And by "we" I mean the half or so of us who actually vote. The other folks, the nonvoters, don't even participate, which is worse than giving our "leaders" too much credit - it's giving them a blank check. So the end result is that we end up with a government composed of elitists who are elected by a little more than half of less than half of the people - that is to say, at best, 1/4 of us.

And as for counting on the press, well, maybe they'll let us know as long as no blondes are missing or have been kidnapped or have committed suicide or have shaved their heads.

To sleep, perchance to dream

Over the last few years, I've had a recurring dream maybe four, five times. In these dreams, I have killed someone and, though I have gotten away with it and I know that there's no way anybody will ever find out it was me, I'm unable to cope with the everyday feeling of guilt for what I've done. The guilt is maddening - walking around knowing what I've done is a tremendous burden, and I feel compelled to confess, even though I know it will ruin everything that I have worked towards.

The tension builds and builds, I reach a breaking point, and I wake up, having to tell myself over and over again, "It was just a dream... it was just a dream!" until I'm convinced that yes, indeed, it was just a dream. I never killed anybody. I can let go of the guilt. And so it goes until the next time.

I had this dream again on Saturday night. Unlike all the other times, this time my dream included part of the murder's planning. Though my memory of it is vague, I recall it involved poisoning. I had contrived an ingenious plan that I knew, based on my standing within the community, would achieve the desired result without giving anyone a reason to point the finger at me. The victim would be poisoned, but no residue would be left over either in the poison's container or within the victim - it would be the perfect murder.

I never know who I've killed. I only know that I've taken someone's life. And this awareness, try as I do to go on with my everyday life and be content knowing that I got away with it, is omnipresent.

Have you read Crime and Punishment? I began reading it around 10 years ago and never finished it. I seem to recall that the narrator goes through a similar experience. I became so engrossed in the book's plot and so entrenched in the main character's guilt and paranoia that I couldn't shake those feelings during the day. Kind of like how when I was tearing through the Lord of the Rings books I had dreams of being pursued by the Dark Riders.

What does it mean? They say that dreams contain meaning - and recurring dreams even more so, that they can contain a truth or a message so important that they refuse to go away. That they are triggered by a life problem or situation that keeps coming back again.

What does it mean? I'll have to sleep on it (though preferably not on my couch with the lights on and in the clothes I wore all day yesterday and with the taste of sausage and pepperoni pizza in my mouth because I fell asleep before brushing my teeth, which is how I woke up 15 minutes ago).

Isolation

It's past 2 am and I'm sick. I took a 6 hour nap this afternoon/evening, and I've sneezed and/or blown about half of my body weight out my nose since then, and so the natural thing to do is blog!

We're going to Outdoor Ed the first week of March. Outdoor Ed is a week long science camp that kids in California go through (for me, I did it in 6th grade, but in San Mateo County, the program is generally for 5th graders). The kids stay in cabins, go hiking in the woods, explore the beaches and tide pools, etc. -- all that good stuff that makes being a kid fun and that we look back on, nostalgically, for the rest of our lives. I remember, for example, that I danced with a girl for the first time at Outdoor Ed. It was a square dance, and she was Danielle Knoop. I also remember that Josh Rubel, on his way back from the bathrooms one night, got lost, went into the wrong cabin, and "accidentally" got into bed with some other kid. Good times, good times.

Ok, back to the present.

When we go to Outdoor Ed, we go with one or two other schools from San Mateo County. Usually, the schools we go with are vastly different from ours. We are certainly on one extreme side of the spectrum. Our school is 94% Latino, over 90% qualify for free or reduced lunch (an indicator of poverty), about 85% are classified as English Language Learners, etc. There are, of course, schools in San Mateo County on the other side of that spectrum - vastly white, very low percentages of students in poverty, very few English Language Learners. Outdoor Ed gives our students an opportunity to have interactions with kids of very different backgrounds and experiences.

What happens when you put these two very different groups of kids together? Well, generally, it's a very positive thing. The kids get to know each other, become friends, and, for a week at least, Dr. King's dream of kids of all colors going to school together is a reality.

But there are challenges. Inevitably, when our kids speak to each other in Spanish, kids from the other schools assume the Garfield kids are saying bad things about them (granted, sometimes they are! our kids figure out pretty quickly that knowing a language other people don't know can have some mischievous benefits, but usually it's completely innocent). Also, some of our kids lack the more subtle language adults employ when we navigate multiracial waters, like the time last year when D. got mad at another boy and called him a "stupid little China boy." Often, the worst problems are caused by the adults. Last year, for example, a teacher from another school punished one of our kids for speaking Spanish at the dinner table. Yikes!

It makes for an interesting sociological experiment. In preparing for Outdoor Ed this year, we've had several class discussions about it. A lot of enlightening information has come out of those conversations. For example, about half of my kids shared negative experiences they've had with white kids, mostly because the kid was just annoying but a few were the result of blatant racism. Nearly all of my kids have had ZERO experience with Asian or black kids. When I asked them what they imagined the kids at the other schools were like, many said things such as "I imagine the other kids are smarter than us" and "Since there's a lot of white kids at that school, they probably behave better than us." Even this one from A.: "I imagine they dress a lot different from us." I told her they're from Belmont, not a foreign country. All these discussions led to other discussions as we've tried to explore these complex issues.

I understand there's at least two schools of thought on this. On the one hand, knowing that the other schools we're going with are very different than Garfield, I could have just said nothing about it and let what happens happen once we get there. On the other hand, which is the hand I chose, I could let the kids know and try to use that information as a way to discuss stereotypes, prejudice, racism, and encourage the kids to really reflect on their attitudes and experiences.

Was I right or was I wrong? By discussing it have I heightened their racial sensitivities, thus exacerbating the problem? Or have I given them a way to think about things so that when issues do arise (and they always do) they'll have a way a constructive way to deal with it?

Regardless, you have to raise your eyebrows at least a little bit knowing that our segregated and isolated neighborhoods and public school systems have created kids like mine that think all Asian people are Chinese, that all black people play basketball and/or are criminals, that American is synonymous with white, and that at least 75% of the United States is Latino.

My Parents

Not *my* parents.

You know, my parents -- as in, the parents of my students. Just like when I talk about "my kids" and people, surprised, say, "You have kids?" and I say, "Yeah - 46 of 'em."

About a week and a half ago the 5th grade team put on a workshop for parents of students who are underperforming (which is about 3/4 of our students).

I've had mixed feelings about parents over the years. Traditionally (I've read this, been told this, and this has been, generally, my experience over the last 9 years), Latino parents leave responsibility for the education of their kids almost completely to the schools. I very rarely have parents check in with me about the progress of their students, for example, even though the great majority of my kids are anywhere from one to four years behind. I've called parents, sent notes home to parents, etc., about kids not getting homework done, and a typical response I get is, "I *told* him to do it! What do you want me to do? Hit him?" or "What do you want me to do? Quit my job?"

It is, in a massive understatement, frustrating. Without parent support, my job is ten times tougher and a student's prospects for success are so much dimmer. It takes a special kind of kid to overcome poverty AND a dangerous neighborhood AND a language barrier AND indifferent parents.

But I have not given up on parents. In fact, my faith has been restored. Though there are some parents that are truly (and sadly) lost causes, most parents just need some tools for working with their kid at home. It's not so much that they don't want to help their kid at home, it's that they don't know how. The last couple rounds of parent/teacher conferences and the workshops that we did recently made that abundantly clear. When armed with important information and strategies to help their kids at home, most parents rise to the occasion.

As part of the parent workshop, we presented a slideshow of important statistics to create a context for the importance of academic success, especially for Latino students. You can view that slideshow here. Just click on the image to advance to the next slide.

Choosing Leaders

Whether it's a game of sports or a competition in the classroom, students often turn to J.C. for inspiration. When decisions are to be made, they look to him. When a leader must be chosen, they defer to him.

Maybe it's because he volunteers. Maybe it's because he's simply more vocal than the rest. Maybe it's because he has a greater sense of his own capacity for the task.

But, unfortunately for him and for the rest of us, at least at this point in his young life, he's just not a good choice. He's actually a loudmouthed, selfish, immature little boy with an inflated sense of self worth, and yet somehow he is a leader in the class and on the playground.

What does this say about people's ability to choose leaders?

The 2008 presidential race has begun and, with the notable exception of Barack Obama, a growing list of candidates has decided to run (I count Obama as an exception because he alone of the candidates, as far as I can tell, is running because he was actually compelled to by a popular groundswell of support; he's not running simply because he can or wants to). They are very much like J.C. - they want to be the leader, they speak first and loudest, and so the general populace is stuck with an uninspiring group of presidential wannabes who really are just not good choices.

I got to thinking about this last week when I was on the verge of jury duty. I've never had to serve on a jury before, but I wondered what it would be like when the time came to select a jury foreperson. Should I volunteer? Should I defer to someone with more life experience? Should I keep quiet and let the group naturally come to a consensus? And it occurred to me that it probably didn't matter what I did. Somebody on that jury would speak up before me, someone like J.C., someone who would say, loudly enough and soon enough, that they wanted to be the foreperson and, like magic, it would happen.

Leadership positions get filled that way, whether it's on the playground or a school administrative position or American politics. A position is announced and people who think they're worthy come forward to fill it. Somewhere along the way these people get the idea that they are capable of leading, but the problem is that many of them (dare I say most?) are wrong. How else to explain the veritable dearth of capable, inspirational leaders, or the general political malaise in our country, or the total failure of so many public schools?

The ultimate question, then, is how to pick real leaders out of the crowd and get them to speak up before the J.C.'s of the world ride us into ruin.