Education across the bay: an Oakland visit
Oakland parent activist Sharon Higgins took me on a drive-by tour of some Oakland schools the other day, the better to expand both of our horizons. I'm sharing a few impressions, for those interested in what's going on across the bay. Sharon was a paid staffer, parent coordinator, at an Oakland middle school for several years, until last month.
Sharon took me past the wildly (widely AND wildly) hailed American Indian Public Charter School, a middle/high school located in a nondescript church, and gave me what would have been a hot piece of breaking news if it were verifiable.
Every year just before standardized testing time, she says, a flock of AIPCS students landed in her middle school, bounced by AIPCS just in time to get rid of low scorers. AIPCS is a favorite of the Bush and Schwarzenegger administrations and the press, and charter schools high priestess Jeanne Allen gave a commencement speech there. I'm shocked — shocked — to hear that they'd cheat. Can't prove it, though.
We looked at a couple of those embarrassingly named schools that are so popular these days in Oakland's flatlands — Think College Now and United for Success Academy. Sharon has written about seeing a gang of school-uniformed kids at United for Success shaking down a schoolmate in a "backpack check." Perhaps it should be renamed Don't Mug Your Classmates Academy.
Oakland is much more sharply divided than SFUSD between middle-class schools and flatland schools attended by black and brown kids. Montera Middle School is the quintessential school for the higher end — higher literally, in a bucolic, wooded hillside setting.
But then check out Skyline High School. It looks like a college, spread across a hilltop with east and west views and big student parking lots. Its playing fields look gorgeous, and boy, would our SFUSD schools like to have one of those expensive electronic events announcement signs like Skyline's. Sharon's daughter, an avid horsewoman, strolls down the road after school to the riding stable where she hopes to "sponsor" a horse (a kind of lease arrangement) soon.
Sharon says Skyline was built to serve the white middle class in Oakland's hills, but they mostly drifted off to high-end privates like Bishop O'Dowd. Its makeup is now 10.8% white, as well as 40.4% African-American, 21.9% Latino, 21.5% Asian — most of those students coming up Redwood Road from the flatlands.
Oakland was setting up its high schools as specialty academies at the time it collapsed financially and was taken over by the state, and Skyline was the music/performing arts academy. Alumnus Tom Hanks funded an auditorium.
Today, Skyline's neighbors (in its sparsely populated, wooded, expensive mountaintop setting) aren't exactly fans. Their complaints have led to a ban on the use of lights for the Skyline playing fields and a requirement that the electronic events announcement sign be turned off at night.
We cruised by the Oakland School for the Arts, currently a dense cluster of portables and a tent amid construction equipment, crammed into the parking lot of the landmark Fox Theater, a 1928 gem being renovated for occupancy by the struggling charter school, supposedly this fall.
If that happens so soon, it'll be a tribute to the determination of state Attorney General Jerry Brown, who conceived that school and has been dogged in trying to make it work. (Disclosure: The principal of my son's high school, Donn Harris, was wooed away by Brown to take over OSA — Harris is splitting his time between both schools this semester.)
Naturally we also drove by the KIPP Bridge Academy, made a bit notorious by this blog for its startling attrition, especially of African-American boys. There was a class in the yard, though in school uniform rather then P.E. clothes, being led by an African-American teacher and observed by a white guy with a clipboard.
One more note about Sharon Higgins and her employment: She held her job at Oakland's Bret Harte Middle School for several years, and was suddenly let go this February. She's quite certain she was fired in retaliation for her writings speaking out about the current state of Oakland Unified, which has basically been turned over to billionaires whose hobby is school reform, to experiment with those oddly named "boutique schools" and whatever other whims strike their fancy. Sharon writes that when outsiders swoop in to renovate a school district, they throw out babies like community and history with the bathwater.
Sharon took me past the wildly (widely AND wildly) hailed American Indian Public Charter School, a middle/high school located in a nondescript church, and gave me what would have been a hot piece of breaking news if it were verifiable.
Every year just before standardized testing time, she says, a flock of AIPCS students landed in her middle school, bounced by AIPCS just in time to get rid of low scorers. AIPCS is a favorite of the Bush and Schwarzenegger administrations and the press, and charter schools high priestess Jeanne Allen gave a commencement speech there. I'm shocked — shocked — to hear that they'd cheat. Can't prove it, though.
We looked at a couple of those embarrassingly named schools that are so popular these days in Oakland's flatlands — Think College Now and United for Success Academy. Sharon has written about seeing a gang of school-uniformed kids at United for Success shaking down a schoolmate in a "backpack check." Perhaps it should be renamed Don't Mug Your Classmates Academy.
Oakland is much more sharply divided than SFUSD between middle-class schools and flatland schools attended by black and brown kids. Montera Middle School is the quintessential school for the higher end — higher literally, in a bucolic, wooded hillside setting.
But then check out Skyline High School. It looks like a college, spread across a hilltop with east and west views and big student parking lots. Its playing fields look gorgeous, and boy, would our SFUSD schools like to have one of those expensive electronic events announcement signs like Skyline's. Sharon's daughter, an avid horsewoman, strolls down the road after school to the riding stable where she hopes to "sponsor" a horse (a kind of lease arrangement) soon.
Sharon says Skyline was built to serve the white middle class in Oakland's hills, but they mostly drifted off to high-end privates like Bishop O'Dowd. Its makeup is now 10.8% white, as well as 40.4% African-American, 21.9% Latino, 21.5% Asian — most of those students coming up Redwood Road from the flatlands.
Oakland was setting up its high schools as specialty academies at the time it collapsed financially and was taken over by the state, and Skyline was the music/performing arts academy. Alumnus Tom Hanks funded an auditorium.
Today, Skyline's neighbors (in its sparsely populated, wooded, expensive mountaintop setting) aren't exactly fans. Their complaints have led to a ban on the use of lights for the Skyline playing fields and a requirement that the electronic events announcement sign be turned off at night.
We cruised by the Oakland School for the Arts, currently a dense cluster of portables and a tent amid construction equipment, crammed into the parking lot of the landmark Fox Theater, a 1928 gem being renovated for occupancy by the struggling charter school, supposedly this fall.
If that happens so soon, it'll be a tribute to the determination of state Attorney General Jerry Brown, who conceived that school and has been dogged in trying to make it work. (Disclosure: The principal of my son's high school, Donn Harris, was wooed away by Brown to take over OSA — Harris is splitting his time between both schools this semester.)
Naturally we also drove by the KIPP Bridge Academy, made a bit notorious by this blog for its startling attrition, especially of African-American boys. There was a class in the yard, though in school uniform rather then P.E. clothes, being led by an African-American teacher and observed by a white guy with a clipboard.
One more note about Sharon Higgins and her employment: She held her job at Oakland's Bret Harte Middle School for several years, and was suddenly let go this February. She's quite certain she was fired in retaliation for her writings speaking out about the current state of Oakland Unified, which has basically been turned over to billionaires whose hobby is school reform, to experiment with those oddly named "boutique schools" and whatever other whims strike their fancy. Sharon writes that when outsiders swoop in to renovate a school district, they throw out babies like community and history with the bathwater.
2 Comments:
here you go again....
"parent activist" translates to you one of your buddy "charter basher".
whatever... i have now come to expect these comments in between the salad bar riffs and pink slip info!
This article is reprinted with permission from The National Black Agenda, February, 2008, edition:
Believing the best way to uplift youth is better education, UniTee Design, Inc. (UDI) is on a mission: to rebuild African-American unity in our communities primarily through the development, support and funding of more effective educational opportunities for today’s young generation.
A youth education and ethnic empowerment enterprise with offices near Detroit, Atlanta, and in New York City, UDI’s primary product and service offerings are youth enrichment (i.e., educational programming and motivational speaking), and ethnic apparel design, production, distribution and sales.
UDI uses designs that feature the red, black and green (RBG) colors associated with African-American culture. “UniTee Shirts” and “UniTee Bands” teach our children of a rich cultural history, heritage, and the many, significant achievements of their ancestors, to build and strengthen within them higher levels of self-esteem and self-identity.
Several RBG designs also incorporate the words “pride, power and purpose” (the 3P’s) that serve as positive life principles. The 3P’s provide an opportunity to help youth overcome real-life issues such as broken homes, tough streets, gun and domestic violence, and drugs. They are also used to promote the importance of education to help children become more resilient to the multitude of negative circumstances and influences they often face.
UDI supplies positive reinforcement for our youth by using the RBG colors and 3P’s, and then delivers “alternative” education programs to help them identify a specific purpose in life. These programs are typically developed based on direct feedback from youth as to what their interests are to better engage their motivation, participation and improvement.
R. Lee Gordon, UDI’s founder (and director of Youth Education Programming for The Hip Hop Congress), says there is a growing movement to better the condition of African-American youth through better education. “By proactively seeking out and engaging the multitude of entities and individuals who share our mission and value our vision, we can overcome fragmentation, create consolidation and build a national coalition to propel our ability to deliver more effective educational options to the maximum number of youth. Thus, we are willing to work with anyone who will help us support, develop and fund youth education programming that empowers the lives of our children.”
UDI has alliances with positive groups throughout the country including:
The Single Parent Resource Center
The Hip Hop Congress
Children and Youth Prevention Services
The African American Music Association
The Blackstar Project
Project 2019
The Youth Leadership Program
The International Men of Excellence
Welcome To Harlem
Motor City Blight Busters
The Michigan Department of Human Services
The National Black Graduate Student Association
Youth in Transition
H.U.M.S
UniTee Design is building a national network of “Purpose Providers” consisting of concerned citizens, college students, communities and groups to strengthen youth education advocacy and volunteerism.
UDI also uses a variety of fundraising, cross-branding and cross promotion strategies, as well as live event and online product sales, to fund and develop youth education programs.
Currently teaming with Eastern Michigan University (EMU), UDI is developing a national model that will forge partnerships between colleges and universities, and community agencies. It is also establishing a national peer mentor project initiative that will match college students with high school students, and high school students with grade school students, to empower students to strive for and achieve higher education goals that will result in improved academic and professional outcomes.
Some of the current programs developed or supported by UDI include:
A self-defense and safety awareness program developed in cooperation with The Detroit Threat Management Center helps school-aged children feel more assured and able to protect themselves in their communities by gaining the skills and strategic thinking needed to do so, while fostering self-discipline and respect.
The Model Student Fashion Career Development Program introduces the world of fashion to schools via instructional photography, videography, fashion design, modeling and hair and make-up styling. The program is also structured to reinforce overall academic performance.
Public Art Workz is a summer camp that teaches creative arts and merchandising to inner-city youth. UDI and BlightBusters (a Detroit-based not-for-profit organization) are organizing a major fundraiser in June 2008, featuring Motown recording artists, The Miracles and The Contours, to support this important program.
UniTee Design products are currently available at Spectacles and Naim’s Unique Designs in Detroit, Phat Gear in Atlanta, EMU, Wayne State University, and major national distribution is slated for early spring. Several joint ventures are in the works with The Charles H. Wright Museum of African American History, HBCU Kidz, The Detroit HBCU Network, and others. UDI is introducing new apparel designs and product lines to include sweatshirts, sports jerseys, baseball caps, etc., and will produce “Purpose Provider” (“edutainment”) events throughout the country.
Gordon concludes, "We need to find better ways to educate our youth. Together, we can give them the best and equally better our people and planet."
Prudence Young
UniTee Design, Inc.
www.uniteedesign.com
pyoung@uniteedesign.com
Toll Free: 888.OUR.RBG.TEES
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