Part One: The Reading
Find and discuss quotes and places in the text that relate to colloquium themes:
What motivates Canada? What are the social justice issues that he seeks to address and what is his "vehicle" and/or philosophy?
What are some of his personal challenges/inner debates/dilemmas that he faces in his work?
The second chapter, "Unequal Childhoods," chronicles some of the history of the debate surrounding the causes of generational poverty: "Canada had come up against one of the most nettlesome questions in all of social science: Why are poor people poor?" (23). It is interesting to note how non-objective science can actually be, depending on who is designing the tool of measurement, deciding what should be measured, and how this data should be interpreted--on top of all of this, politics also enters the picture. Paul Tough does a good job of laying out some of the different approaches and attitudes to the issue.
What most surprises you? What appears finally to be fair and less biased accounts of some of the root causes of poverty?
Part Two: Starting the Visual Research for "Act Up"
For those of you who took photos of the murals on Balmy Alley, analyze your favorite. Discuss how it visually speaks to an audience about the issue it is addressing (composition, symbolism, style, color, context). For those of you who didn't take photos, use the image collection in the Research Guide that Annie created for this colloquium, find a mural/street art and do the same. Do the images reflect any of the issues we are discussing, reading about?
Watch Canada on 60 Minutes and check out Harlem Children's Zone
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ReplyDeleteThe overall idea that Canada has relates so perfectly with our class. Even the name of our class “Imagination for a change” relates to Canada’s way of thinking. He saw an issue in the education system and figured out a way to help. What motivates Canada is when he sees the huge difference between the public school systems. He wants for children everywhere to be offered the same educational opportunities. He did not look to put a band-aid on the problem he goes to the root. Tough says “It wasn’t enough to help out in just one part of a child’s life: the project would need to combine educational, social, and medical services”. This goes much further than simply helping their education, it looks at all the aspects that can affect how a student learns. This is what colloquium is all about, it goes deeper than helping people for a little bit, it helps them have skills for the rest of their life. Some personal challenges were how he was going to actually get his idea to work. He had to start somewhere by picking a specific location rather than making multiple schools at a time. Also all the decisions he made as to what type of school it would be was also a dilemma. He had many decisions to make that would affect his overall vision in many ways.
ReplyDeleteIn the second chapter what surprises me the most is the deep look at poverty. I didn’t even think about all the different aspects that are involved to make someone poor. I can admit that I so quickly jump to the stereotypes of alcoholic homeless people. When I think of people suffering from poverty I immediately get the image of a substance-addicted person that basically chose to be that way. I know this is wrong but it was still surprising to hear all the other reasons why people can end up poor. Some less biased root causes of poverty that stood out to me are that he community simply losses hope. Everyone gives up on each other. The teachers give up on their students, families give up on their child and this cycle of not expecting things continues. It is sad but seems to make sense to me. When there is no real inspiration or when a goal seems so unrealistic people may not even try for it.
The mural that really spoke to me is very realistic. It sends a message of standing of for your rights, and standing up for what you believe in. Although it takes hard work and sometimes some hard times it is important to come together and speak up. It is visually very rich colors and has people of a Hispanic background. My favorite part of it is the woman’s face to the left. There is her face crying, and then being strong fighting. To me the message is rather than crying it is important to stand up and do something. The main issue that I see that relates to what we are learning is standing up for what you believe in.
Jessica McKean
ReplyDeletePromises, giving, and reflection
Canada wants to help children in Harlem get to college. He is battling poverty by creating his charter school Promise Academy. When the school opened, the speech he made to the parents included his promise; “If your child is in our school, we will guarantee that child succeeds. There will be no excuses” (Whatever it Takes, 12). He wanted to give the children the best education around. Canada wants to level the playing field between the poor kids and the middle-class kids. He was successful; he took students and increased their education to the level of the white middle-class children. He didn’t want to only help a few children, but he wanted to help all children. Because of this he struggles with the fact that he is unable to help all children. There isn’t enough space in his school and he wishes that he didn’t have to pick a few and let the others fail. He said, “This is very hard for me to see. It’s very, very sad. People are desperate to get their kids into a decent school. And they just can’t believe that it’s not going to happen” (Whatever it Takes, 18). If he were able to take them all, then he would in a heartbeat, but unfortunately money keeps this from being possible.
In “Unequal Childhoods,” there are many thoughts about poverty. Some thoughts were that poor people bring it on themselves and others thought that it wasn’t their fault. It’s something that is still being discussed today. From some of the things that were presented, it seems like people don’t need handouts. What seems to be a cause is the lack of good education and learning skills necessary for life. We need to give education instead of handouts. What poor people really need are the tools and skills to get out of poverty themselves; it helps you become a better person to rely on yourself a bit. If you depend on someone else it’s hard to get things done, what happens when that person is gone? Eventually everyone needs to be able to stand on his or her own two feet.
There were many murals that I admired and inspired me. I think that the mural I liked the most was the one with the big eyes. There were two with large eyes one with blue and the other with brown. All I can remember is the eyes starring at me. I liked them because I’m obsessed with eyes; all of them are different, like a fingerprint. Also the colors were vibrant and grabbed my attention instantly. One set had smaller pictures in them as if reflecting what the eyes were seeing and the other pair had lines like a real pupil would. I don’t know if there was a message in them, but both gave me a sense of the artist’s passion. I loved seeing all of the murals and I’m really excited to do our mural.
From Phillip:
ReplyDeleteCanada roots his motivation primarily from his childhood environment. Growing up in Harlem, he was surrounded by poverty, and in poverty he found a need to create change. He knew, that escaping the projects and poverty was not an option many youth could undertake or even considered a possibility. This is where Canada points out that just simply giving these children opportunity was not the answer. The solution was to start when they were young, he wanted to provide them the resources and support needed to motivate them to get out. Canada stated that it required “educational, social and medical services”. Canada was smart in realizing the requirements for these youth to escape poverty and the problems plaguing the projects, he knew that education was the key, and he was determined to provide it. He knew there was a flaw in the educational system when it was obvious that only a select few out of dozens would succeed, the others in turn would likely become demoralized and refuse to try. The thing to tackle was improving the educational system so they succeed. When touching the issue of poverty, many people would blame 1 of 2 things, either the government or people. I believe both are to blame, the government should not just hand out “charity” to underserved people, but instead provide them a means to succeed and escape poverty. If these people were provided guidance and counseling, along with the proper support and resources, poverty wouldn’t be so much an issue. But seeing as most of the general population segregates the projects and poverty stricken people, providing help and support is difficult. Many people wouldn’t want to go near the underserved areas because of negative mental connotations associated with those areas.
The perspectives of root causes of poverty was a huge reminder of our first activity in class for perspective, many people bring up the race card today blaming the long history of slavery into play, however, I believe that you can either blame it on the past or do something about it and change your future. America has become so divided between social class and income that moving from one class to another is extremely difficult.
When we went to Valencia, I didn’t know what to expect, but when Emily began to speak about their goals, I asked myself how did this one young lady and a few others put such a huge change on the future of thousands of young children? The environment was completely different though, it wasn’t your typical run of the mill tutoring center. I could tell the environment promoted a different attitude, youth would be excited in that environment to learn, and I think that’s the type of structure that Canada sought to have. The background of the support tutoring group was made of people who were WILLING to help, not just doing it for salary, they were doctors, nurses, teachers, professors, etc. and I believe this drew out respect from those they tutored.
When we walked through the mission, I felt surrounded by stories and the personal lives and motivations of other people willing to stand up and express their thoughts, which correlates perfectly with the objectives in the class. The murals each represented a story, a passion, a reason for them being there. One specific mural depicted the miracle of life as a baby was delivered from a mother, I found this quite moving as I feel today there is a huge disregard for the value of a human life and lack of celebration for the birth of a human being. The environment of the mission was a close knit environment where people just seemed to know each other and talk, the small restaurants offering different foods spoke of the cultural diversity offered. This type of environment, I feel, is important to fostering the educational development that the youth Canada was targeting, instead of being surrounded by poverty and crime in the projects.