Pedagogy, Policy, and the Privatized City

by Buras, Kristen L.

• ISBN13: 9780807750902
• ISBN10: 0807750905
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2010-06-01
• Publisher: Teachers College Pr

Summary

In cities across the nation, communities of color find themselves resisting state disinvestment and the politics of dispossession. Students at the Center-a writing initiative based in several New Orleans high schools-takes on this struggle through a close examination of race and schools. The book builds on the powerful stories of marginalized youth and their teachers who contest the policies that are destructive to their communities: decentralization, charter schools, market-based educational choice, teachers union-busting, mixed-income housing, and urban redevelopment. Striking commentaries from the foremost scholars of the day explore the wider implications of these stories for pedagogy and educational policy in schools across the United States and the globe. Most importantly, this book reveals what must be done to challenge oppressive conditions and democratize our schools by troubling the vision of city elites who seek to elide students’ histories, privatize their schools, and reinvent their neighborhoods.

Author Biography

Kristen L. Buras is assistant professor of urban education and reform at Emory University. Jim Randels is a veteran public school teacher, founder of Students at the Center, and executive vice president of United Teachers of New Orleans. Kalamu ya Salaam is a writer and producer who co-directs Students at the Center, including its digital media work through Neo-Griot Productions.

Table of Contents

Forward! On the Freedom Dreams of Young Race Rebels	p. xi
Introduction	p. 1
Counterstories on Pedagogy and Policy Making: Coming of Age in the Privatized City	p. 1
Scorching the Earth Isn't the Way: New Orleans Before and After	p. 15
"We have to Tell our Story": Neo-Griots, Schooling, and the Legacy of Racial Resistance in the other south	p. 17
Students at the Center: The Word, The River, and Education for Liberation	p. 46
Opening Reflection
Forming a Mighty River	p. 46
Beginnings
It's the Working Conditions, Not the Teachers	p. 50
The Power to Tell Our Stories
Speaking Out
Rain	p. 53
"Just Fill Me Up"	p. 56
The Stories in Me	p. 57
Commentary
Making Sense of Race Through Counter-Storytelling as Pedagogy	p. 59
Education for Liberation Rather Than Exploitation
Speaking Out
We Stand by Our Students	p. 65
Commentary
Soldiering On: Black Literate Lives Past and Present	p. 72
Closing Reflection
Toward a Critical Reading of the Privatized City	p. 76
Race and Reform in the Privatized City	p. 78
Opening Reflection
Capitalist Dreams	p. 78
State Abandonment and the Privatization of Education
Speaking Out
Forgotten by Our Government	p. 83
Worse Than Those Six Days	p. 85
Does Anybody Know?	p. 87
Commentary
Making Schools "Right" Again: Whose Choice Is the Education Market?	p. 88
Forceful Expulsion and the Exclusive Right to Home
Speaking Out
Missing Project	p. 93
Who's Holding the Gun?	p. 94
Commentary
Racial Reform on Chicago's Home Front	p. 95
Suppression of Veteran Teachers' Labor
Speaking Out
Passing on a Torch	p. 101
I Don't Want to Go to That School	p. 103
Commentary
African American Teachers in the Old South and the New	p. 104
Poetic Declaration of Rights to the City
Wake Up	p. 109
Closing Reflection
"I've Been Scarred and Battered": Warnings from Harlem, Washington, DC, and Beyond	p. 111
Putting all Students at the Center: Charting an Agenda for Urban Educational Transformation	p. 114
Opening Reflection
From Capitalist Dreams to Freedom Dreams	p. 114
Challenging the Suppression of Identity and Knowledge
Speaking Out
No Black History in School	p. 119
Breaking Free of Our Muted Existence	p. 122
Commentary
Mis-Education or the Development of Critical Race Consciousness: Curriculum as Heritage Knowledge	p. 126
Demanding Rights to the Educational Commons
Speaking Out
Honoring Community	p. 131
Rebuilding New Orleans, Redoing Education	p. 133
The Story of Z: Lessons for Teachers and Educational Policy Makers	p. 136
Commentary
Redesigning Urban Schools as Communities: A Grassroots Movement for Change	p. 138
Closing Reflection
What's at Stake If We Don't Wake Up	p. 142
Conclusion	p. 145
Schools, Cities, and Accumulation by Dispossession: A Word on the Indisposable Instruments of Liberation	p. 145
Contesting the Politics of Disposability Through Culture and Pedagogy
Speaking Out
Salvaging Our Culture and Our Schools	p. 153
I Would Not Throw It Out for Anything	p. 157
Afterword
Whiteness and New Orleans: Racio-Economic Analysis and the Politics of Urban Space	p. 159
References	p. 163
About the Contributors	p. 177
Index	p. 183
Table of Contents provided by Ingram. All Rights Reserved.