[the urban politician]

Originally Posted by Steely Dan

^ teachers and principals can't do it all by themselves. the biggest indicator for the academic success of a student is the level to which that student's parents are involved in their education. unfortunately, in many of chicago's predominately african american neighborhoods, there is a culture present that doesn't place a high value on education. and parents who do not value education have children who do not value education and so forth and so on. it's a vicious cycle. the teachers and principals who dedicate themselves to educating the children who come from this culture where education is not valued have a herculean, some might even say impossible, task ahead of them.

changing that culture is not easy. in fact it's one of the toughest challenges our city, indeed even our entire nation, faces. but just because something is difficult, that doesn't mean we should just throw in the towel and give up. there are few people that i respect more than the courageous heroes, like liz dozier, who commit themselves to making every attempt available to get children from these struggling communities educated so that some of them might beat the odds and avoid becoming another statistic. not every single student can and will be saved from the culture of social dysfunction that surrounds them (poverty, violence, gangs, drugs, crime, etc.) but graduation rates in CPS are better than they were 2 decades ago, and they continue creeping upwards. that's at least a start. that's at least a reason to not give up. improvement is possible, even if the progress is slow.

The biggest cop out in American urban education history is to attribute high dropout rates to "bad schools". Keep on pointing the finger at everybody else, that sure is a formula for success. If we kept the buildings, curricula, and teachers the same but replaced the entire student population with Asian kids, CPS would be the best school system in the country overnight. I'm sure the PC police will be hounding me any moment now for saying that in 5..4..3..