Jonathan Kozol’s The Shame of the Nation throws readers into the inner-city schools of America to highlight our disgraceful education system; haunted by segregation. Kozol’s main thesis is that we’ve strayed far from the ruling of Brown V. Board of Education, as schools have reverted to some of the highest levels of segregation since the 60s. Although we have made progress in the past one hundred years, we have clearly dismissed one of the most crucial aspects of society: a quality and just education.
I'm just over one hundred pages into the novel and my blood is boiling. It’s shameful to read on about the discrepancies and injustices that inner-city kids have faced for years in silence. The Shame of the Nation makes readers frustrated and bothered by the lack of equal education minority children receive.
Kozol develops his argument over the course of the first five chapters by highlighting the key faults to the system. In the first chapter, he introduces the topic of school segregation and backs it up with statistics. Kozol proves the gravity of school segregation when he says "If you want to see a really segregated school in the United States today, start by looking for a school that's named for Martin Luther King or Rosa Parks.... In Los Angeles, there’s a school that bears the name Dr. King, 99 percent black and Hispanic, and another in Milwaukee where black children also make up 99 percent of the enrollment” (24). As the chapter progresses, Kozol continues to provide sufficient evidence to solidify the validity of his argument. The establishment of his argument makes for a good segway into the next chapter which talks more about what exactly separates the black and white schools.
In chapter two, Kozol goes in-depth on the issue surrounding class that has ultimately led to the profound segregation in the inner-city school systems. Once blacks and whites were separated by class, they started to live in separate areas with different schools. It is in this chapter that Kozol stresses the abundance of wealth in America and how many people are able to donate and fund middle-class schools, but never give back to poor schools. Prior to reading this chapter, I thought that it was completely normal for wealthy towns to have adequate funding and for poor towns to have minimal funding. After thinking about the text, I’ve started to question what’s really holding us back from funding other schools, and what’s holding the government back from funding the schools. We have so much money rushing through our economy and we still haven’t come around to helping crippling schools that need attention.
Kozol seems to imply that the economic divide between predominantly black and white schools is prompted by our inclination to ignore; because it's easier. He writes “Keeping them at a distance makes it easier” (62). I think that this is certainly true in the past, as we as Americans deemed segregated schools as unconstitutional but then resumed life like all was equal. In the modern era, however, I think a lot of our divide in social class has to do with our selfishness as Americans. In our capitalist society, we seem to prioritize ourselves so much that we forget about the principles that bring us together as individuals. Through our constant pursuit of wealth and happiness, I think we tend to abandon others.
In my latest reading, much of the content has been about the strict teaching practices within the schools, and the bureaucratic enforcement that has institutionalized schooling. In chapters 3, 4, and 5, Kozol talks about how poor schools felt that in order to “improve” the education of their children, they must have more regulation and strict labels on how the school operates. Kozol makes the argument that these practices take away from creativity and shortcuts the journey that kids undergo when learning. I wholeheartedly agree with him, as I'm a strong believer in the idea that school should be fun, and that learning should be predicated upon discovery and curiosity. So far, Kozol has shaped his argument by highlighting the faultiness of the segregated schools, and showing how far we've drifted from equal education.
Works Cited
Kozol, Jonathan. The Shame of the Nation: The Restoration of Apartheid Schooling in America. New York, Three Rivers Press, 2005.
I definitely agree that the rigid programs described by Kozol are counterproductive to the effect that they are trying to have. A prescribed curriculum rarely gets students interested in learning and most likely exacerbates the issue of minority students being interested in their educations. There is a podcast called "Nice White Parents" that explores the issue of trying to integrate students in urban schools. It would pair nicely with your book.
ReplyDeleteHi Ms. LaClair,
DeleteThanks for the comment! I think I'll look into that podcast for my upcoming blog post regarding the relevance of school segregation today.
I, like you, was equally outraged at that part of the book. These schools that are 99% minority that are so underfunded versus the white schools that seem to get quite adequate funding just doesn't seem fair. Additionally when he talks about the way these white schools get funding there just seems to be a profound unfairness there. Do you have any solutions, on any scale, that you think could be enacted to stop this problem?
ReplyDeleteI think that after last class (when we read about equalizing the class/privilege issue), I'd say that a good possible solution is to look into minimizing funding of some of the more affluent school communities and diversifying that wealth towards poorer communities. I don't know how that'd exactly play out in terms of taxes but I think that there definitely needs to be some way of raising funds for these struggling communities.
DeleteWow Bryce this sounds like a powerful book. It's crazy that an economic deficit or the stereotype of a deficit can create such a divide even between kids at the same school. I wonder how schools could try to fight this problem as it doesn't have a clear solution. As you were suggesting, we seem to forget about our principles for the pursuit of wealth and maybe principals could be taught better in schools or be a more prominent schedule. Now that I'm thinking about it, I believe the world would be a significantly better place if a principals and morals class was part of the core curriculum in schools. What do you think? Great Post!
ReplyDeleteI think that your idea of adding morals to the core curriculum of schools is a great idea. I think that an astonishingly absent part of the school system is teaching "real-world" lessons and morals. Schools should push and encourage kids to be ambitious and pursue big roles in society, while also promoting a sense of courtesy in students to help others whenever possible.
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