From a woman in the field, Abigail Thernstrom, co-author of No Excuses: Closing the Racial Gap in Learning, writing in the Philadelphia Inquirer (registration req.):
In the last five years, in searching for superb inner-city education, I made a discovery: Almost all excellent schools teaching highly disadvantaged kids look very much alike — and quite different from most regular public schools.
These schools combat what Harvard sociologist Orlando Patterson has called “the greatest problem now facing African Americans.” And that is “their isolation from the tacit norms of the dominant culture.” His statement is really the academic version of Bill Cosby’s recent remarks in which he talked about black parents who are not parenting and about kids who can’t speak standard English and who will be shut out of the world of economic success.
This is how the best inner-city schools I know address that “isolation from the tacit norms of the dominant culture.” In addition to an academically superb program, they demand that their students learn how to speak standard English. They also insist that kids show up on time, properly dressed; that they sit up straight at their desks, chairs pulled in, workbooks organized; that they never waste a minute in which they could be learning and always finish their homework; that they look at people to whom they are talking, listen to teachers with respect, treat classmates with equal civility, and shake hands with visitors to the school.
Resources and Book Reviews:
- No Excuses web site
- More on Abigail Thernstrom
- Walter Williams
- Thomas Sowell
- National Review
- New Republic
In an attempt to be fair and balanced I tried to find bad reviews, but in the allotted time I had to do this post, I couldn’t find any.
