Steve Bush points to a post by Jamie Smith (a.k.a JKA) responding to an article by Jonathan Kozol in Harper’s
Fors Clavigera: Orwell, Foucault, and the State of Urban Public Schools
Documenting years of visits and conversations with children, teachers, principals, and education bureaucrats at state and federal levels, Kozol paints the picture of a nation that is clearly going backwards. Fifty years after the supposed ‘victory’ of Brown v. Board of Education, Kozol shows that civil rights legislation hasn’t erased racism, and that legislation for equality needs to be backed up by tax laws that could actually fund equality–but we all know that in that respect, America is headed down the wrong road. Not even Democrats have the courage to talk about raising taxes anymore! I confess to feeling overwhelmed by the direction this nation is headed. How does this happen?
The more I read and hear from Jamie Smith , the less I disagree with and the more I find that those matters where I do disagree are far less weighty than the things which he and other “RO writers” have emphasized about just how “alien” our promised land is to the parody of wholeness and salvation offered by “the mainstream” and by “the empire”; and our value to the existence of God’s people as a living and redemptive society. But we also have to be there and work at this in order to understand just how true this is.
It also does my heart good to see the disgust seething through in
Kozol provides a stark picture by considering the “head start” that suburban white children get, and shows up the ridiculous language of “accountability” that we get from the “No Child Left Behind” Act
, especially as the “stuff” starts hitting the fan with heavier and more rpeated “splats” with the inditements handed down today, and the clear indicators of on ominous trail upward. Such things as these are the typical discoveries of a group such as this administration that can BS their way through their “work” in education, while their real attenyi on and energies are in ropin off for themselves what they perceive to be the roads to wealth and power, and the education, health, and the very lives of those not “of them” are of no consequence, especially when they are perceived to be “roadblocks” to absolute dominion. There’s certainly a lacking in accountability toward what their “words” pay lip service. It is showing up in nearly every arena of “responsibility” which has unfortunately been largely left to the very ones who increasingly show their unworthiness to the task.
In the early church, it was certainly taken to be very personal that noone was placed or perceived themselves to be, in a place of higher esteem than others, and this state of education in our country is one of the most glaring examples of forces pulling us in the wrong direction (which was part of , if not most of Jamie’s point, as well as Jonathan Kozol )
