Auyana Orr, Rosanne Lynch, Tomas Vail, Pat
McGrath, Katie LaZelle
Marcus is a 39 year old, black single father. He works as a cab driver and takes night classes at the technical institute in Computer Programming. His son Gabe is 14 and a freshman in a high school on the other side of town. Because his father often comes home so late, Gabe spends a lot of time at his cousin's house.
Recently Marcus has been getting notices in the mail from the school that Gabe has been doing badly in Math and English. These notices ask him to "Please take an interest
in your child's education" and " come and meet with your child's teachers." In past years Marcus has been able to visit with Gabe's teachers, but with the new night classes, it's just not possible. He talks to Gabe- he wasn't doing the homework and promises he'll start. "But I still don't like the way the class is run, dad."
Marcus gets no more noticesof his
son's poor performance, but is asked again to "take an interest"
by attending meetings regarding the hiring of new teachers and budgest allocations.
He realizes the importance of this and wishes he had time, but " with
the school so far away
and all...” Now Marcus is getting mail from the
local middle and high schools as well, asking him to "take an active
role in the education of your community" and " support Lowell Middle
School at Thursday's Book Drive and Back Sale." "Sounds great,"
thinks Marcus, "but what's my connection? I don't even know what these
schools have to do with me."
He
doesn’t have the time to visit his son's school,
and he doesn't have the interest to visit a school his son does not attend.
Marcus doesn't really know what good he would do- "What do they want
from me? Why would the administration listen to me? There's so much red tape...
I just don't have the time, and I wouldn't know who to talk to."
While plans for the reform of America’s schools abound in the states and in Washington, one of the most effective-and inexpensive-ways to improve childrens’education is to actively build a relationship between school and community. While some forums for this interaction currently exist, major obstacles prevent people from taking part. This default exclusion has grave implications for the schools, the success of students, and ultimately our participatory democracy which shall require heightened levels of shared knowledge, communication, and involvement in order to survive. To address some of these difficulties, we propose a new kind of forum for urban and suburban school districts, the Public Action Team (PAT).
The problems with the relationship between school and
community are manifold. First and
foremost, there is no clear working definition for the relationship and
subsequently no concrete model of this relationship. More often than not a relationship between
school and community takes the form of mandatory community involvement for
students and for the community, some type of showcase (i.e. art show, talent
show) where parents fraternize with each other over the students’
work. Needless to say, this normative
view of the relationship between school and community does not include any
meaningful dialogue relating to school reform and what steps should be taken to
ensure democratic progression of public schools.
As it stands, the closest thing that resembles a relationship between school and community is what we call the “tyranny of the soccer moms.” This term denotes the hyper-involved parents who form relationships with teachers and administrators, usually at their children’s schools, and subsequently become the spokespeople for all parents. While it is commendable that people are taking such an active role in education, the suggestions that come out of this relationship are inevitably stilted. When the relationship between the school and the entire community becomes a relationship between school and “soccer mom,” substantial change is not permitted due to the lack of perspectives and input. The tyranny of the soccer moms ignores some important factors that should be taken into account when thinking about the larger community, like race, class, and socioeconomic status. These and other important factors need to be considered if a productive relationship between school and community is to be formed. If not for the myriad of more complex reasons, the fact that not everyone is privileged enough to have the time and means to dedicate to school/community involvement should be noted.
The “soccer mom” issue speaks volumes to the overarching problem of the lack of
an open forum for civic dialogue.
Currently, venues for discussing issues that affect the relationship
between school and community are very few.
In effect, valuable perspectives are not being heard. Also, accessing the school system is impeded. Open forums would allow important issues
about the school system, such as the nature of its bureaucracy and ways to
possibly circumvent that bureaucracy can be discussed. The power dynamics inherent to the system
would be demystified and thus a relationship could be formed given the new information.
Open dialogues would also create a space for schools in the same district to
communicate and support each other.
The political and social restructuring of the economy in
recent decades has resulted in a decline in democratic participation. Economic instability leads to a lack of faith
in the institutions traditionally associated with freedom through responsible,
democratic behavior. Many argue that
public life has changed because individuals spend an increasing amount of time either
at home or at work, and less time interacting with their families and neighbors
in meaningful ways. Americans are
working longer days and for less pay, particularly poor people and people of
color; these people are the least likely to be politically involved in national
as well as local political issues.
This disassociation of the self with society has severe
consequences for community involvement in public schools. Schools that exist within communities that no
longer feel a sense of commitment to them end up with the lowest levels of
parent volunteers, after-school programs, and additional financial
resources. It is no coincidence that
these schools are the very same that are under-staffed, lacking in funding,
contained in deteriorating structures, and unappealing to the best and brightest
teachers. Within urban communities,
outside involvement in a school cannot solve the complexities of a racially
polarized, spiritually unhealthy society.
Bringing more ideas and contributions to the life of a school creates
greater demands on everyone involved, but it can lead to greater benefits.
Solutions & PAT
In an effort to allow communities to define for themselves
what involvement is, as well as to create for themselves the model working
relationship between communities and local schools, we propose a program for
community meetings every three weeks to discuss such plans. Similar to Local School Council (LSC), an
association that acts as a site-based community management team for individual
schools, Public Action Team (PAT) will more effectively create a working
two-way relationship between non-school connected community members and their
local schools. However PAT is not simply
a new PTA or LSC, it is a newly created forum for discussion and shared knowledge. PAT meetings are equally accessible to
everyone. PAT meetings are to be
mediated by two teachers, two community members, and two students--each of the
representatives is to be democratically elected by its respective constituency.
The first task of PAT is to select an administrative liaison
that shall attend all school board meetings as well as all PAT functions--this
position is best if held by someone familiar with the workings of public school
bureaucracies, most likely a former administrator. For the first the first six months of
meetings, participants must work on creating a district wide mission statement
for the goals of their ideal community-school relationship. The remainder of the year will be spent
discussing strategic directions for implementation of the self-determined
mission statement, as well as continue as a forum in which the current status
of the school-community relationship can be shared with all. The meetings change their location (always,
however, at a public school), day of the week, and time of day (in order to
accommodate those parents who work unconventional hours) every three
weeks. At each meeting food will be
provided for those who attend.
Non-English speaking parents are strongly encouraged to attend,
translators for these parents shall always be provided, and onsite childcare
will be an option for all.
After the first year of meetings has been completed and each
district has created, through a deliberative process, its community-school
relationship mission statement, the PAT meetings will continue. The years that follow the initial mission
statement creation year will be assigned self-determined topics based on
community needs. These meeting foci will
continue to involve the mission statement, as well as a commitment to group
deliberation and a higher level of shared knowledge. Incentive to continue meeting attendance
shall be that at the end of the second year a sum of $20,000 will be allocated
to each district wide PAT to use as it sees fit, in accordance with PAT
consensus and district rules.
Gabe's been doing better in school, and Marcus sometimes
sees his son doing homework as late as 11 when coming back from the technical
institute. Gabe's even participating as a student representative in a new group
in his high school district. He calls it a Public Action Team, and he seems
pretty excited about it. Gabe says the meetings have people from the community,
parents, teachers, and students, all sharing ideas and expressing their
opinions. He encourages his dad to attend the next meeting, held on Sunday
evening at the local high school. Although they're still developing a mission
statement, there is a lot of potential to change how the school is run,
especially since a former adminsitrator is there to help out. The main goal is
to encourage more school-community interaction within the district.
Marcus figures this is a good way to spend some time with
his son, and learn something more about the school system. He finds a lot of
similarly interested parents and community people there, and the PAT meeting is
fairly productive. He plans on going to the next meeting if he can, and once he
finishes his night classes, Marcus is definitely going to be more involved in
both his son's school and others in the district.
The first step towards an increased community role in public
schooling is as simple as creating a forum for people to exhange ideas. While this may seem like common sense, too many
efforts to involve parents and other community members do not take into account
the realities that a parent like Marcus faces every day. As a consequence, the lofty goals that are set
for these interactions fall flat due to practical reasons (inconvenient time;
locaton) or an agenda that is perceived by non-teachers and non-administrators
to be exculsionary. With a forum like
PAT, we can eliminate some of these barriers and enable a meaningful dialogue.
Like all such experiements, PAT is not perfect, and no doubt will face
other obstacles and challenges before success.
However, we are not making predictions for what changes will be made,
instead we are creating a forum in which all inclusive planning for change
can be a reality. PAT is adaptable
to participants’ needs by providing a solid yet flexible framework that may change
the way that our society views public education.