Voices from the Inside

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  011 ** Executive Summary
  • 011.1 * understanding children's perceptions of what is wrong with schools; agreement of children and adults
    • 011.1 * "The participants--students, teachers, custodians, secretaries, security guards, administrators, parents, day-care workers, cafeteria workers, school nurses and others inside schools, along with graduate school educators--together acted simultaneously as both researcher and subjects of their research. Over 24,000 pages of written data alone were collected and analyzed. As the process evolved, adult participants increasingly understood and came to agree with their students' perceptions of what was wrong with schools."
  • 011.2 ** view from inside very different from "experts'" view
    • 011.2 * "Our data strongly suggest that the heretofore identified problems of schooling^1 (lowered achievement, high dropout rates and problems in the teaching profession) are rather consequences of much deeper and more fundamental problems. Seen through multiethnic students' eyes and the eyes of other participants inside schools, the problems of public education in the U.S. look vastly different than those issues debated by experts, policy makers, academicians and the media."
  • 011.3 "This place hurts my spirit."
    • 011.3 "Using multiethnic student voices as a centerpiece, participants have identified seven major issues from inside the classroom. Collectively, these seven issues are best summed up in the words of the high school student who when asked "What is the problem of schooling? replied, "This place hurts my spirit.""
  • 014.2.2 * schooling seen as irrelevant
    • 014.2.2 * "Students, especially those past fifth grade, frequently report that they are bored in school and see little relevance of what is taught to their lives and their futures. Teachers feel pressure to teach what is mandated and sometimes doubt its appropriateness for their students. Teachers are also often bored by the curriculum they {015.1.1} must teach."
  • 015.1.1 ** "Students want more participation in important choices made inside classrooms."
    • 015.1.1 ** "Students from all groups, remedial and advanced, high school to elementary, desire both rigor and fun in their schoolwork. They express enthusiasm about learning experiences that are complex but understandable, full of rich meanings and discussions of values, require their own action, and those about which they feel they have some choice. According to student descriptions of the most boring and least relevant schoolwork, they include activities which stick closely to standardized materials and traditional transmission teaching methods. Students want more participation in important choices inside classrooms."
  • 015.1.1 "non-validation" of students of color
    • 015.1.1 "Many students of color bring knowledge from their communities that they do not see represented inside school curriculum. This makes them doubt the curriculum and not feel validated."
  • 016.1.1 ** students want an attractive physical environment
    • 016.1.1 ** "Students want schools that reflect order, beauty, space and contain rich materials and media. The desire for clean, aesthetically pleasing and physically comfortable spaces is expressed by all. The food served to students is a persistent complaint. Many would like foods more typical of their homes and home cultures. The lack of any significant personal space such as lockers is problematic to students and also leads to feelings of being devalued. The depressed physical environment of many schools, especialy those in lower socioeconomic areas, is believed by participants to reflect society's lack of priority for these children and their education."

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  019 ** The Voices: Seven Issues from Inside the Classroom
  • 019 Relationships
    • 019.2.4 being cared about vs. ignored
      • 019.2.4 "Students, over and over again, raised the issue of care. What they liked best about school was when people, particularly teachers, cared about them or did special things for them. Dominating their complaints were being ignored, not being cared for and receiving negative treatment."
    • 022.2.3 teachers do not understand other cultures
      • 022.2.3 "While there is no consensus on what to do, many readily admit they do not understand students from cultures other than their own and feel fearful of them. They report they do not know how to address issues of racism or poverty inside the schools. Virtually all teachers have taken classes on issues of culture but have found them to be woefully lacking."
    • 023.1.2 administrators' problems
      • 023.1.2 "one principal said, "Yes, my spirit is hurt, too, when I have to do things I don't believe in." School administrators frequently have to deny their natural instincts to ask, is this right or good for the students and staff in this school and are forced to substitute questions such as is this legal or is this policy or what can I risk."
    • 024.2.4 parent's concern for childrens' self-confidence
      • 024.2.4 "The issue of how schools contribute children's self-confidence to act in the world is the primary concern of parents. This is far more frequently mentioned than issues of achievement."
  • 027 Race, Culture and Class
    • 028.3 weaknesses of multicultural workshops
      • 028.3 "Workshops tend to focus on cultural characteristics rather than histories and literatures of people of color or ways of encouraging critical discussions about racism."
  • 030 * Values
    • 030.1 * different cultures and races share basic values
      • 030.1 * "There is no evidence in our work that people hold different fundamental human values across groups of persons or across racial, cultural, class, or gender lines. Different groups and people may express particular values in different ways. However, in our data, participants across race and class express values of honesty, hard work, beauty, justice, democracy, freedom, decency and the need and desire for a good education."
  • 032 ** Teaching and Learning
    • 032 ** school not seen as relevant; standardization = boredom
      • 032.1.3 ** "Most students, particularly after fifth grade feel that many of their classes require them to learn or memorize irrelevant things they perceive are not connected to their lives. Even students who do well in school do so with little effort. They learn what they are told because it is easy for them to memorize and they are obedient. Other students actively resist attempts to get them to learn what they see as boring or irrelevant facts. Students who do not do well in school or for whom schools hold low expectations often experience even more routine and boring activities in remedial or basic classes."
        • 93/05/18 This suggests that schools must validate their curriculum in the eyes of the students. Then learning will happen as students see the importance and relevance of what they are learning to their lives.
      • 032.2.1 ** "Some students of color distrust the very content they are being taught and see school as only tangentially related to who they are or will become. Most students desire more interesting and relevant choices in the content and process of instruction. They enjoy classes where assignments require them to think about issue for themselves, involve critical issues embedded with values and controversy, and allow them to talk with peers. They particulary enjoy and learn from experiential activities and frequently request more field trips. Descriptions of the most boring, least relevant school activities suggest that the more standardized the curriculum, text and assignments, the more disengaged the students."
    • 033.1.1 using external rewards
      • 033.1 "Parents of high-achieving youngsters sometimes use extensive external rewards to get their chldren to do well in school. Some sense this is necessary because of the boredom their children experience inside the classroom."
  • 035 Physical Environment
  • 037 Despair, Hope and Change

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  039 ** From Voices to Action: Moving from Problems to Solutions
  • 039.2.2 avoiding resistance
    • 039.2.2 "How can we create schools to avoid the unproductive resistance of students and staff evident everyday inside classrooms and schools?"
  • 039.2.3 ** democracy taught but not practiced
    • 039.2.3 ** "It is a national paradox that a nation whose ideological roots are so profoundly democratic would structure an education system that valued the teaching about democracy but not its practice."
  • 039.2.3 ** participation in the development of new methods is crucial
    • 039.2.3 "The failure of even the most [040.1.1] progressive methods, we believe, can be directly linked to the lack of participation in the development and selection of these methods by the people who are supposed to use them."
  • 040.1.2 ** students cry out for control and responsibility
    • 040.1.2 ** "Extending this to students, we see them cry out for a say in what they are doing inside schools and classrooms. They resist the lack of control and responsibility. They are taught democracy as a subject to be memorized and somehow expected to become productive, responsible citizens in a free, democratic environment. By developing processes whereby all members of a school community can actively engage one another and participate in the constant transformations of their schools, many of the seven issues identified here can be addressed from the inside."
      • {This is where students' language skills can be used and given a context for improvement. Students need to be shown the power of the written (and spoken) word and learn to use this power.}
  • 040.2.3 problem of paying schools by attendance

• 030 learning
  • 030 "We are born with a desire and will to learn. How do schools, teachers, students, administrators, the system and the staff destroy learning?"--High school teacher
• 031 safe environment and taking risks; failing is not failure
  • 031 "A safe environment is a place where risk taking can occur for success more readily, and failing is not failure." -High school teacher
• 045 *** empowering students to find solutions
  • 045 *** "Wouldn't it be nice when there was a problem on campus if we had students form teams with their teachers and go through this process, looking at gangs, safety, lunch problems, whatever. Then we would be empowering students to find solutions." --Middle school teacher

• ** "I think what they said in these pages was right because they said the truth about the relationship, race, culture, and class, values, teaching and learning, safety, physical environment, despair, hope and the process of change. They put some of my stuff in there, like honesty and stuff about gangs. . . I think they should put this in the newspaper."
• ** "I think this is pretty good. They realized that we want our schools to be more fun. To look at school as fun and learning instead of daily boredom and hard work. They also realized we want to go to a school that looks nice. Grass, trees, flowers, clean bathrooms and classromms. That's what we want too."

• Questions for Group Discussion
  1. Why was this report included as the final reading for this course? (What links does it have with the content and ideas of this course?)
  2. What did you find most striking or interesting in the report?
  3. What implications does the report have for your understanding of the problems of education today and what can be done about them?