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Bridging the class divide

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Classism in K-12 Education

Inciting critical thinking in 8th graders: An inspiring ‘Created Equal’ story

September 27, 2012 by Veronica Quiles 1 Comment

 “The learning process is something you can incite, literally incite, like a riot. And then, just possibly, hopefully, it goes on.” — Audre Lorde A deep conversation about equal opportunity was incited recently in a group of Latino 8th graders participating in a summer program in a Boston public school. I and another Class Action intern, Anna Rodriguez, […]

Filed Under: Classism in K-12 Education, Teaching about class Tagged With: American Dream, Class Action workshops, Created Equal, kids, low-wage jobs, working class

Shame, School Lunch, and Passing

August 20, 2012 by Lita Kurth 9 Comments

When I was in sixth grade, my family was eligible for free school lunches. I attended a small country school, without much class diversity, mostly farmers, some without indoor toilets in their homes. Even so, when I gave my lunch ticket to the student appointed to collect them, I noticed and she noticed that there […]

Filed Under: Class and Disability, Class cultures, Classism among Kids, Classism in Everyday Life, Classism in K-12 Education, Classism in social services, Money, Poverty Tagged With: California Schools, charity, education, entitlement programs, Helping the Poor, kids, money, poverty, public school, public services, School Lunch Program, stigma

New classism book holds the keys to movement-building

June 15, 2012 by Betsy Leondar-Wright 2 Comments

Barb Jensen was a rebellious teenager. When she tells her own stories in her new book Reading Classes, readers can vicariously enjoy her mouthing off to teachers, flouting school rules and delighting at turning a classroom into a circus. And unlike most writers about kids disengaged from school, who focus on their deficits and fret […]

Filed Under: A World Without Classism, Class cultures, Classism, Classism in K-12 Education Tagged With: class cultures, classism, social movements, working class

The Dreams of Poor and Working-Class Students

May 14, 2012 by Jane Van Galen 2 Comments

I was half-listening to the radio last week when I heard an interviewer ask a question that made me pause in my work to listen.   “So”, the interviewer warmly asked, “You knew even as a small child that you wanted to be a concert cellist?”  “Oh yes”, the woman answered. “Since I was eight.” I’ve […]

Filed Under: Class in Higher Education, Classism among Kids, Classism in K-12 Education, First Generation College Students Tagged With: academia, classism, education, first generation college students, social capital, working class

Class Reproduction by Four Year Olds

April 20, 2012 by Jessi Streib 10 Comments

I watched how class played out in a preschool classroom, creating disadvantages for the already disadvantaged and privileges for those born into privilege. I spent eight months observing in a preschool classroom full of four years old. About half of the preschoolers in this classroom were from working-class families and were receiving scholarships to attend […]

Filed Under: Classism among Kids, Classism in K-12 Education Tagged With: class reproduction, class speech differences, classism, kids, public school, speaking up

Hiding the lunch ticket

January 16, 2012 by S.M. Miller 3 Comments

I was an outsider at my junior high school. Why was I ashamed of my family’s poverty? When my family lost its small business and home in Philadelphia and was forced to move to Brooklyn to live with one of my mother’s sister, I was in the middle of the last term of the sixth […]

Filed Under: Classism among Kids, Classism in Everyday Life, Classism in K-12 Education Tagged With: classism, kids, public school

Remember When It Was Poster Board?: Computer Technologies and School Disadvantage

August 11, 2011 by Paul C. Gorski 8 Comments

Remember when it was the poster board? I do. I remember my elementary school classmates—Russell, Missy, Jake—who could never afford it, who would raise their hands meekly, eyes downcast, when the teacher asked, “Who needs help getting poster board?” I pitied them and wondered what else they couldn’t afford: a pack of National Football League […]

Filed Under: Classism in K-12 Education, Online Classism, Poverty Tagged With: class, computers, digital divide, education, poverty, technology

A 4th of July Declaration of Dependence

July 11, 2011 by Maynard Seider Leave a Comment

It’s no small irony that on the 4th of July weekend our nation’s largest union surrendered a chunk of its independence. At their annual meeting in Chicago, the National Education Association’s Representative Assembly voted to support the use of student standardized test results in the evaluation of teachers. That vote alters the union’s previous opposition […]

Filed Under: Classism in K-12 Education, Classism in Politics Tagged With: kids, public school, selling out, standardized testing, teachers unions

Moving the Bar

June 27, 2011 by Jane Van Galen Leave a Comment

At first glance, I thought that  it was just  another article about disappointing test scores. I almost didn’t click through to read it, in part because I spend so much time in my teacher education courses trying to contextualize the rhetoric about “the achievement gap” and testing and my students’ role as teachers in closing […]

Filed Under: Classism in K-12 Education, Classism in the Economy, Politics and Class Tagged With: kids, poverty, public school, teachers unions

From a Teenage Class Action Fan

June 21, 2011 by Liora Field 3 Comments

My name is Liora and I’m fourteen years old.  I’ve attended public schools my whole life except for the last year and half when I went to a private school.  At this school, the classes were small and there was support and help anywhere and anyhow we needed. Not the case in public school. This […]

Filed Under: Classism, Classism among Kids, Classism in K-12 Education Tagged With: classism, middle class, private school, public school, working class

Learning about Class in Private School?

June 21, 2011 by Debbie Zucker 1 Comment

Like parents everywhere, we wanted to give our teenage daughter advantages we never had. High on our list was to provide her a much clearer class-consciousness than what we got as kids. Class issues are so fundamental to understanding how things work, or don’t, in our personal lives and in our world. So it’s a […]

Filed Under: Classism, Classism among Kids, Classism in Everyday Life, Classism in K-12 Education Tagged With: education, kids, private school, public school

Class in the Classroom

December 28, 2010 by Jane Van Galen 1 Comment

There is a loud silence about social class in U.S. public schools. The silence was deafening on the first day of the course I recently taught — a course in which teachers look closely at how education in the United States is deeply entangled with social class. In this course, students look closely on their […]

Filed Under: Classism among Kids, Classism in K-12 Education Tagged With: classism, kids

Visioning Our Way to Justice

December 13, 2010 by Linda Stout 1 Comment

I grew up in poverty, the daughter of a tenant farmer. I thought people were privileged if they lived in a house, had running water or even an outhouse. My family of five lived in a ten-by-forty foot trailer. I knew that there were farm owners who lived in large houses, but they worked almost […]

Filed Under: A World Without Classism, Classism among Kids, Classism in K-12 Education Tagged With: classism, community organizing, illiteracy intelligence book-learning, kids

Defending my vibrant neighborhood

November 18, 2010 by Julie Joy Leave a Comment

Recently four people were killed about ten houses away from where I grew up in Mattapan, a neighborhood of Boston. The neighborhood was maligned by the media coverage which plastered the headlines “Massacre in Mattapan” in large print across the 6:00 news every night. That image of Mattapan was permanently emblazoned across the minds of […]

Filed Under: Class in the Media, Classism among Kids, Classism in Everyday Life, Classism in K-12 Education, Poverty Tagged With: classism, kids, poverty, racism

Why don’t schools do more to stop bullying?

November 18, 2010 by Julie Withers 57 Comments

I have been reading (I am sure you have too) about the many cases of bullying and the awful consequences of being a target for bullies. Kids and young adults committing suicide, suffering chronic depression, choosing to be home-schooled, or quitting school altogether: there’s no doubt that being bullied negatively shifts how a person experiences […]

Filed Under: Classism among Kids, Classism in Everyday Life, Classism in K-12 Education Tagged With: bullying, kids

The Bus Stops Here

November 18, 2010 by Dan McMullan 3 Comments

I have two little boys; they are very bright, good boys. They have never had a babysitter and maybe I have been a little over protective. But their innocence is refreshing. They do not understand that when a bigot sees that our car is dated, and that our address is in the flats, and they […]

Filed Under: Classism among Kids, Classism in Everyday Life, Classism in K-12 Education Tagged With: kids, snobs

A Wealth of Whammies for Youth in Poverty

November 12, 2010 by Paul C. Gorski 12 Comments

It is unjust enough that scores of young people in the United States are denied basic human rights; that even in a country which paints itself as a global model of human rights, kids go without food, safe and affordable housing, equitable schooling opportunities, and healthcare. Heck, in a country with the level of resources […]

Filed Under: Classism in K-12 Education, Poverty Tagged With: kids, meritocracy, poverty, Ruby Payne

The Politics of “Waiting for Superman”

November 10, 2010 by Maynard Seider 6 Comments

I fidgeted throughout the film Waiting for Superman, through the bells and whistles, the graphs, the close-ups of the five cute kids and their caring single moms, grandmas and parents, having read enough reviews, and having listened to enough critiques to know that I wasn’t going to like the film.  And I didn’t,  but what […]

Filed Under: Class in the Media, Classism in K-12 Education Tagged With: charter schools, kids, teachers unions

Beware of Cabinet Officers Bearing “Gifts”

September 15, 2010 by Maynard Seider 2 Comments

“We already have the privatization of the military…; we’ve seen the privatization of the prison system. Well, the next step is the privatization of public schools.” That prediction by Jonathan Kozol four years ago has come closer to reality with the enactment of President Obama’s Race to the Top educational goals. Besides continuing the previous […]

Filed Under: Classism in K-12 Education, Politics and Class Tagged With: charter schools, privatization, teachers unions

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