Our Schools Suck: Students Talk Back to a Segregated Nation on the Failures of Urban Education

Jeanne Theoharis; Gaston Alonso; Noel S. Anderson; Celina Su

Published by New York University Press 2009

Our Schools Suck

Students Talk Back to a Segregated Nation on the Failures of Urban Education

Jeanne Theoharis , Gaston Alonso , Noel S. Anderson and Celina Su

https://doi.org/10.18574/nyu/9780814707760.001.0001

Overview
Contents

About this book

Shares the voices of students speaking out against the failures of urban education

"Our schools suck." This is how many young people of color call attention to the kind of public education they are receiving. In cities across the nation, many students are trapped in under-funded, mismanaged and unsafe schools. Yet, a number of scholars and of public figures have shifted attention away from the persistence of school segregation to lambaste the values of young people themselves. Our Schools Suck forcefully challenges this assertion by giving voice to the compelling stories of African American and Latino students who attend under-resourced inner-city schools, where guidance counselors and AP classes are limited and security guards and metal detectors are plentiful—and grow disheartened by a public conversation that continually casts them as the problem with urban schools.

By showing that young people are deeply committed to education but often critical of the kind of education they are receiving, this book highlights the dishonesty of public claims that they do not value education. Ultimately, these powerful student voices remind us of the ways we have shirked our public responsibility to create excellent schools. True school reform requires no less than a new civil rights movement, where adults join with young people to ensure an equal education for each and every student.

Author / Editor information

Theoharis Jeanne :

Jeanne Theoharis is distinguished Professor of Political Science at Brooklyn College of CUNY. She is the co-editor of The Strange Careers of the Jim Crow North: Segregation and Struggle outside of the South (NYU Press, 2019), A More Beautiful and Terrible History (Beacon Press, 2018), The Rebellious Life of Mrs. Rosa Parks (Beacon Press, 2013), Want to Start A Revolution?: Radical Women in the Black Freedom Struggle (NYU Press 2009), Our Schools Suck: Students Talk Back to a Segregated Nation on the Failures of Urban Education (NYU Press 2009), and Not Working: Latina Immigrants, Low-Wage Jobs, and the Failure of Welfare Reform (NYU Press 2006).Alonso Gaston :

Gaston Alonso is Professor of Political Science at Brooklyn College of the City University of New York.Anderson Noel S. :

Noel S. Anderson is Professor of Political Science at Brooklyn College of the City University of New York.Su Celina :

Celina Su is Professor of Political Science at Brooklyn College of the City University of New York. She is the author of Streetwise for Book Smarts: Grassroots Organizing and Education Reform in the Bronx and co-author of Our Schools Suck: Students Talk Back to a Segregated Nation on the Failures of Urban Education.Jeanne Theoharis (Author)
Jeanne Theoharis is distinguished Professor of Political Science at Brooklyn College of CUNY. She is the co-editor of The Strange Careers of the Jim Crow North: Segregation and Struggle outside of the South (NYU Press, 2019), A More Beautiful and Terrible History (Beacon Press, 2018), The Rebellious Life of Mrs. Rosa Parks (Beacon Press, 2013), Want to Start A Revolution?: Radical Women in the Black Freedom Struggle (NYU Press 2009), Our Schools Suck: Students Talk Back to a Segregated Nation on the Failures of Urban Education (NYU Press 2009), and Not Working: Latina Immigrants, Low-Wage Jobs, and the Failure of Welfare Reform (NYU Press 2006).

Gaston Alonso (Author)
Gaston Alonso is Professor of Political Science at Brooklyn College of the City University of New York.

Noel S. Anderson (Author)
Noel S. Anderson is Professor of Political Science at Brooklyn College of the City University of New York.

Celina Su (Author)
Celina Su is Professor of Political Science at Brooklyn College of the City University of New York. She is the author of Streetwise for Book Smarts: Grassroots Organizing and Education Reform in the Bronx and co-author of Our Schools Suck: Students Talk Back to a Segregated Nation on the Failures of Urban Education.

Reviews

For anyone desperate for a fresh look into the apartheid education system, in which Black and Latino students are currently trapped.

Our Schools Suck aims to give voice to some of the youth caught up in the maelstrom of 21st century urban education, within a critical framework of the cultural values and larger socioeconomic forces that shape the decade.

Nadine Dolby,author of Constructing Race: Youth, Identity, and Popular Culture in South Africa:
This book reminds us that there are lives and futures at stake and that young people are passionate and tenacious, despite the obstacles they face every day in our urban schools.

Pedro A. Noguera,co-editor of Unfinished Business: Closing the Racial Achievement Gap in Our Schools:
Our Schools Suck offers a clear and unmitigated analysis of the perspectives and voices of students who are trapped in schools that fail at meeting their intellectual and social needs.

Angela Valenzuela,author of Subtractive Schooling and Leaving Children Behind:
Our Schools Suck is a passionate, hard-hitting critique of a re-emerging hurtful and offensive discourse on the alleged & culture of failure among youth of color. Rather than demonizing children, we need to take aim at the role that schools play in the creation and maintenance of social hierarchies. This multi-voiced account is a soulful, if poignant, re-framing of what really is an urgent, national crisis to which we must all attend.

Topics

Frontmatter Publicly Available Download PDF	i
Contents Publicly Available Download PDF	v
Acknowledgments Publicly Available Download PDF	vii
Introduction Celina Su Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	1
1. Culture Trap Talking about Young People of Color and Their Education Gaston Alonso Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	31
2. “I Hate It When People Treat Me Like a Fxxx-up” Phony Theories, Segregated Schools, and the Culture of Aspiration among African American and Latino Teenagers Jeanne Theoharis Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	69
3. “They Ain’t Hiring Kids from My Neighborhood” Young Men of Color Negotiating Poor Public Schools and Poor Work Options in New York City Noel S. Anderson Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	113
4. “Where Youth Have an Actual Voice” Teenagers as Empowered Stakeholders in School Reform Celina Su Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	143
Conclusion Jeanne Theoharis Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	177
Methodological Appendix Listening to Young People Gaston Alonso Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	215
Notes Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	233
Index Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	275
About the Authors Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	287

Language: English
Publisher: New York University Press
Audience: Professional and scholarly;
Keywords: African; American; attend; compelling; gives; inner-city; Latino; Our; schools; stories; students; Suck; under-resourced; voice

eBook

Published: May 1, 2009
ISBN: 9780814707760