The Rose That Grew from Concrete

by Wishart, Diane

• ISBN13: 9780888645166
• ISBN10: 0888645163
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2009-08-15
• Publisher: Univ of Alberta Pr

Summary

Quality of education is a topic as important to Canadians as national health care, but what happens when students start to fall between the cracks in the system? Diane Wishart interviewed many at-risk students in an urban high school, including a number of aboriginal students. What Wishart discovered weren’t statistics, but teens and their experiences, needs, and personalities. The qualitative analysis that comes from these interviews doesn’t supply a blueprint to fix the educational system. What it does do is give a fresh, objective viewpoint for policy makers, scholars, teachers, and the general public to consider.

Author Biography

Diane Wishart has worked intensively with disenfranchised students. She has a doctorate in Educational Policy Studies from the University of Alberta and resides in Edmonton.

Table of Contents

Preface	p. ix
Introduction	p. xii
Framing The Story	p. 1
Teachers and Students Finding Balance	p. 3
Values and "Victims"	p. 10
Engaging Students	p. 19
Conforming, Confronting, Co-creating	p. 39
Comfort that Eludes: Programs For Disenfranchised Urban Aboriginal Youth	p. 43
The Limitations of Experience	p. 43
The Tensions of Togetherness	p. 44
Deconstructing "Regular"	p. 47
Consciousness-raising Education	p. 50
Feeling Uncomfortable in Schools	p. 56
Becoming Comfortable in Schools	p. 60
Constructing the "Self": Opposition and Acceptance in Public Schools	p. 65
Race and Class Disadvantage	p. 65
White and Disenfranchised	p. 71
White and Privileged	p. 80
Gender and Disenfranchised Urban Youth	p. 82
Female and Middle Class	p. 89
Learning from Listening	p. 90
Other Tensions: Schools, Teachers, and Students	p. 93
The Dangers of Labelling	p. 94
Origins of the Term "At Risk"	p. 96
The Institution and the Economy: How and Why Alberta Produces and Supports Labelling and "Treatment"	p. 99
WRS as an Alberta Institution	p. 102
Struggles to De-code	p. 106
Understanding School Practices and Critical Literacy	p. 109
Creating the Conditions to Break the Status Quo	p. 110
Popular Theatre and Media at WRS	p. 119
Critical Literacy in Higher-level Classes and the Example Issue of Police Brutality	p. 125
Conclusions: The Story Speaks	p. 131
The Process of Discovery	p. 132
What the WRS Model has to Offer	p. 135
Disrupting the Status Quo through Uncomfortable Conversations	p. 138
Tensions of Pedagogy Revealed	p. 140
The WRS Model and Its Potential Contributions to the Sociology of Education	p. 141
Notes	p. 147
Bibliography	p. 153
Index	p. 157
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