Childhood and Education #22: Voice Without Exit

Nikole Hannah-Jones wrote a brave self-critical piece in The New York Times , centrally about how she intentionally sent her daughter to a well-funded but failing school, PS 307, in the hopes of using voice to improve it, and how that utterly failed her daughter and failed to impact the school. Ultimately her daughter recovers, but we see a completely broken system that is unresponsive to internal voice, and until now she made no attempt to blow the whistle and utilize her professional position to do so. The whole incident illustrates not only how messed up so many of our schools are despite abundant funding, it also raises the question of what the schools are even for. If her daughter can fully recover from severe deficits and be getting As and Bs at a challenging school within a year, what are the first eight years of school for? How much of the schools, grades and tests are fake? Can we somehow do better? Table of Contents New York City PS 307. Nikole Knew And Had Exit Ramps. PS 307 Is Fraudulent And Indifferent. Moving In Unison. A Good School. What Were Elementary and Middle School Even For? The Project Was Ideological. Null Hypothesis Watch. School Spending. Costs Are Not Ben