Separate And Unequal Didn't Work 100 Years

Well, Teachers Have Been Profoundly Demoralized In Recent Years And Are Often Treated With Contempt By Politicians. There's A Great Deal Of Reckless Rhetoric In Washington About The Mediocrity Of The Teaching Profession - And I Don't Find That To Be True At All.

Let's Concede That We Have Decided To Let Our Children Grow Up In Two Separate Nations, And Lead Two Separate Kinds Of Lives. If, On The Other Hand, We Have The Courage To Rise To This Challenge To Name What's Happening Within Our Inner-city Schools, Then We Also Need The Courage To Be Activist And Go Out And Fight Like Hell To Change It.

Many Of Us Regard Ourselves As Mildly Liberal Or Centrist Politically, Voice Fairly Pleasant Sentiments About Our Poor Children, Contribute Money To Send Poor Kids To Summer Camp, Feel Benevolent. We're Not Nazis; We're Nice People. We Read Sophisticated Books. We Go To Church. We Go To Synagogue. Meanwhile, We Put Other People's Children Into An Economic And Environmental Death Zone. We Make It Hard For Them To Get Out. We Strip The Place Bare Of Amenities. And We Sit Back And Say To Ourselves, "well, I Hope That They Don't Kill Each Other Off. But If They Do, It's Not My Fault.

You Need Massive Recruitment To Tell The Poorest Of The Poor What Is Possible.

I Think A Moment Of Critical Energy Has Suddenly Emerged. But Moments Like This Come And Go Unless We Seize Them At Their Height.