Blog #5 1980-Present - The Bottom Line Reflection

     

Ronald Regan presenting 'A Nation At Risk'.

    In this section, we went over the increasing involvement of business-minded attitudes in public education. During the 1980s, America was undergoing an educational crisis. To combat this, free-market ideals of the time we're introduced to the system. This is a really massive change in the direction of the public education system. The participation of private businesses and alternate schools is a more recent phenom than I initially thought. I'll go over some of the main ideas which resonated with me.

Students using Samsung-powered Chromebooks.

    Private businesses are heavily involving themselves in the education of children. This involvement ranges from simple funding aids to having complete control over the management of public schools. A particular form of involvement I found very interesting is how businesses view schools as an avenue for advertising. The section mentioned how children were forced to watch Channel One in exchange for free media equipment. Nowadays, large tech corporations are showing their presence in schools. When I was in elementary and high school, Apple, Google, and Samsung proudly gave high-tech equipment featuring their logos everywhere. When I first received a laptop from Google, it wasn't just a laptop; it was an exclusive "Chromebook™." This feeling was reflected by the fact that everyone in the school always referred to them as Chromebooks; It was blatant advertising. The young impressionability of children in schools was initially used to instill nationalism; now, corporate brands have found a new use of it.

    

Success Acadamy, Charter School

    

    Charter schools, in particular, are a very major and interesting topic mentioned in both the section and the documentary. From everything we learned on public schooling, Charter schools have changed the fundamental way of how parents interact with publically funded schools since their inception. The local bureaucracies that have been developed for decades will be cast aside in favor of the efficiency of entrepreneurs. In the charter school system, parents will lose the influence and control they have over the schools. It will be interesting to see what happens to public schools if the charter school movement gets better. 

    I never expected that the favoritism of traditional education came from the crisis of the '80s. I've personally seen this occur at my high school. Initially, there was a whole portion of the school dedicated to vocational training. Carpentry and Plumbing were prominent jobs there. But as the years went by, it was replaced with more advanced academic classes. These courses were moved off to a separate school. I only know this from older relatives who went to my high school. More focus has been put on traditional classes that can bring higher standardized test scores.

PARCC standardized test, which was supposed to replace NJ ASK. 

    I have seen the rise of standardized testing and the increased pressure on schools mentioned in the section. Teachers would always mention having to worry about keeping scores high for standardized state tests. If we did terrible on these exams, they warned that the school would receive less funding. This was especially prevalent when PARCC was introduced suddenly with a way higher standard than previous exams. Both teachers and students became overwhelming stressed over the exam. Failing the exam meant being immediately left-back despite class scores. Often the teachers' plans were derailed to focus on the PARCC. It caused a lot of controversies, but now it is slated to be replaced with another exam. Another example of this increasing priority on scores was in AP classes. When I took AP Calculus, we were suddenly threatened that the exams would no longer be free if not enough students passed with high scores. This was quite unfair for poorer students. All of this competitive testing now makes whole communities have to worry about the funding of public schools.

    The group work for this week was pretty simple. We've all grown accustomed to the workflow of doing a project together. This section, in particular, didn't really have as many controversial topics, so we all agreed on the same issues very rapidly. The tricky part was trying to represent the varying topics of the section through a visual presentation. In the end, I believe we came up with an excellent theme to unite all the subjects. 

Blog #4 1950-1980- Separate and Unequal Reflection

    This section went into the gritty aspects of desegregation during and after the civil rights era. I've learned of this era in elementary school like many other students, but various deeper details were never mentioned before. My knowledge of desegregation for education only really extended to Brown v. Board of Education. In this section, I really noted the number of groups desegregation actually encompassed, the extent of federal intervention, and segregation's lingering effects.

    Desegregation was a combined effort of multiple oppressed groups fighting for their fair share of high-quality education. Before desegregation, top-tier education was limited to white students. Everyone else was given lower-quality lessons and facilities, which significantly restricted these children into their preconceived roles in society. As education got better, but mainly only for whites males, this gap grew further and further until it was too much to ignore. African Americans, Native Americans, Hispanics, women, and the disabled all par-took in this era but differently. From Brown v. Board of Education to Crystal city to Title IX, these groups fought for more funding and resources. 

101st Airborne Division escorting Black students into Little Rock school.

    Government intervention had a very prominent force that isn't really mentioned outside the elementary teachings of Brown's case. Besides the court ruling, the government had to do a lot more to actually make states abide. Little Rock Nine is one of the few historical instances where the government called upon the federal army to enforce a law. I found it very interesting how national funding school was used as an indirect measure of making states comply. For the States, it meant complying and getting more funding or disobeying and going broke. This intervention made me realize the political importance of bussing. I always thought of bussing as a simple transportation method rather than a tool for desegregation. Government intervention was a significant component in making these reforms actually go through. Despite all of these actions, it can be argued that the government hasn't done enough to really enforce desegregation. 

The proposed City of St.George, as seen in the documentary

    The most major takeaway I had with this section was the lingering effects of segregation. It was mentioned in the book, the documentary, and the TED Talk. The gerrymandering of school districts led to minority communities being resegregated and losing much-needed funds. Not enough was done to stop the unofficial segregation that's formed out of tricky policy decisions. The issue itself is tragic due to how much more complex the problem is. The documentary showed how there were motivations outside of race that promoted these policy decisions. Some people simply were just selfish and wanted all their funds to make their child the best. Sadly, this issue is still seen today. 

    As a group, we came to the same conclusions quite quickly. We wanted to highlight the struggle for desegregation. Creating the poster was a fun but challenging way of trying to represent this era of reform.