Suggested Discussion Outline - Nov. 8th

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johnkarls
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Suggested Discussion Outline - Nov. 8th

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Suggested Discussion Outline – 11/8/2007
The Supreme Court’s 6/28/2007 Reversal of School Integration
The NAACP’s 9/20/2007 March on Jena LA

A. What Happened

A-1. The Supreme Court’s Decisions

A-1-A. Plessy v. Feguson – “separate but equal”
A-1-B. Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka – “separate is inherently unequal”
A-1-C. Parents v. Seattle School District – “race may NOT be used as a criterion to achieve diversity via voluntary busing”

A-2. What Happened to “The Jena Six”

A-2-A. African-American HS student dares to sit under a “white only” tree on their HS campus, from which were strung nooses in the “dead of night” before the following dawn
A-2-B. Six African-American HS students retaliate by beating up the white students who hung the nooses
A-2-C. Five of “The Jena Six” are charged with Attempted Murder despite being minors and all six are convicted of Aggravated Assault
A-2-D. The Jena District Attorney tries to justify his “free pass” for the white students in an Op Ed article in the NY Times
A-2-D. John Karls’ Letter to the Editor (which the NY Times refused to publish) exposes the Jena DA’s “justification” as a lie, and his follow-up Letter to the Editor (also unpublished) castigates the NY Times for its de facto exalting the Jena DA’s lie as being true (please see our bulletin board (www.drinkingliberallyslc.org/reading) for copies of the letters under “Participant Comments”)

B. The linkage of the NAACP 9/20/2007 national march on Jena LA by the President of the NAACP Legal Defense Fund (which had been defending “The Jena Six”) to the Supreme Court’s 6/28/2007 reversal of school integration - Please see www.drinkingliberallyslc.org/reading > Background Materials for Nov. 8th > Item 2

C. Conditions Prevailing in America’s Inner Cities

C-1. As described by Jonathan Kozol in his books on public schools in America’s inner cities –

C-1-A. The Shame of the Nation: The Restoration of Apartheid Schooling in America (2005)
C-1-B. Ordinary Resurrections: Children in the Years of Hope (2001)
C-1-C. Amazing Grace: The Lives of Children and the Conscience of a Nation (1995)
C-1-D. Savage Inequalities: Children in America’s Schools (1991)
C-1-E. Rachel and Her Children (1988)
C-1-F. Illiterate America (1985)
C-1-G. The Night is Dark and I Am Far From Home: Political Indictment of US Public Schools (1975)
C-1-H. Death at an Early Age (1967)

C-2. As described in John Karls’ essays (they are posted on www.drinkingliberallyslc.org/reading under the topic “The Controversy That Is Bill Cosby for Nov. 8th”)

C-2-A. Perceptions of Inner-City 5-Year Olds!!!
C-2-B. Pushers Recruiting Third Graders as Runners
C-2-C. Inner-City Measured IQ’s
C-2-D. Typical Inner-City Conditions and IHAD Results
C-2-E. Inner-City Kids and Public Education

D. America’s Attitudes Today as Compared to the 1920’s in Indiana and Illinois as documented in “Women of the Ku Klux Klan” (© 1991 by the University of California Regents – U. of California Press) = “All the Best People in Society Belonged” (please see www.drinkingliberallyslc.org/reading for further details)

E. Different Models for Trying to Solve America’s Apartheid Education System

E-1. Tutoring/Mentoring (a la “I Have A Dream” or Big Brothers/Big Sisters, etc.)

E-2. Bill Cosby’s Challenge to the African-American Community to “heal itself”

E-2-A. Please see Tim Russert’s 10/14/2007 “Meet the Press” interview of Bill Cosby re his new book “Come on People: On the Path from Victims to Victors” published 10/9/2007 –

E-2-B. Russert’s interview of Cosby is posted on www.drinkingliberallyslc.org/reading > The Controversy that is Bill Cosby for Nov 8th > “Meet the Press” Interview of Bill Cosby

E-3. Jonathan Kozol’s Ideal of School Integration via Voluntary Busing

E-3-A. Please see Jonathan Kozol’s 7/11/2007 NY Times Op Ed Article on the Supreme Court’s Reversal of School Integration picking up on Justice Anthony Kennedy’s concurring opinion – and Kozol’s Six-Point Program building on Justice Kennedy’s comments (posted on www.drinkingliberallyslc.org/reading > Background Materials > Item 1)

E-3-B. Please also see Jonathan Kozol’s books, especially “The Shame of the Nation: The Restoration of Apartheid Schooling in America” (2005)

E-4. Tailored Training Programs Installed in Inner-City Public Schools by Specific Corporations

E-4-A. Please see Chapter 4 of Jonathan Kozol’s “The Shame of the Nation: The Restoration of Apartheid Schooling in America”

E-4-B. Although Jonathan Kozol doesn’t admit it in his derogation of what these corporations have done, their programs (and the strict classroom discipline to which Kozol refers throughout his book) are really nothing more than our inner-city kids will face if they haven’t become enmeshed in the drug culture and/or landed in jail before the end of their teen-age years – when they opt for the US military which, for most inner-city kids, is the only realistic escape from America’s apartheid inner-city ghettos

E-4-C. Question to Ponder (often posed by African-American politicians such as Rep. Charles Rangel (D-NY)) – What kind of country condemns a racial underclass to live in ghettos from which the only practical escape is to enlist in a so-called “voluntary” military that is used as a de facto mercenary army to fight foreign wars???

E-5. What about supplementary federal-financing (and perhaps federal administration as well) of all inner-city schools that are judged to be "failing" under "No Child Left Behind" -- to pay for (1) a new first-class physical plant designed to house 200% of the student population of the school that is being replaced, and (2) raising the per-student operating budget to a sufficient multiple of the per-student operating budget for the commuting suburbs of that particular city ("sufficient" to turn the school into such an attractive "magnet school" that the new capacity is easily filled by applications from students living in the suburbs). Perhaps a feature of the admission (AND RETENTION FROM YEAR-TO-YEAR) decision FOR APPLICANTS FROM THE SUBURBS would be a "suburban brother/sister" program complete with an evaulation by the inner-city student of how well s/he was treated by her suburban "sibling" and the "sibling"'s family the previous school year. -- "A Think Piece" per John K.

E-6. Other.

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