School Board Members

On Monday night we had two school board members come to speak to us about their role in the school. I guess there were just a few things that popped out at me, one being that it seems that the Decorah School District as a whole really sees NCLB as a positive thing. We heard that from the Principle at the Elementary School and the Associate Principle the week before, and now we heard the same thing from the School Board Members. They all keep saying it's the attitude you have about it, and I agree. You can not like it and complain about it all the time, or you can accept it for what it is, and look at the positives. It's a matter of seeing the glass half full or half empty- you decide.
I also like the part of the discussion when we started getting into foreign languages. I am a firm believer that we, being the U.S., should have to learn some other languages of the world. I think it is ridiculous that some people just expect everyone else to learn English so we can communicate effectively. There are different parts of the brain that are at work when you learn another foreign language too. I also think that we should start teaching our students in Elementary School Spanish or Mandarin-Chinese, because it is a lot easier to learn another language or two when you are younger. I know this for a fact, because I started learning Spanish in Middle School (I wish I could have started sooner), and now in college as a Spanish major I took French for "fun". It is a lot harder to learn French, and I think that part of that is because my brain already depends on English and Spanish for everything, so throwing French in the mix is just really hard for my brain to grasp. So we need to encourage students early to learn foreign languages if we want to survive globally, and keep up with other countries like China and India.

Hometown to the World: The Postville Raid and Casualties of Globalization

I went to the lecture about the Postville Immigration Raid by Dr. Erik Camayd-Freixas tonight. It started off with an Introduction by Pastor David Vasquez. Then Dr. Camayd-Freixas first gave an introduction, directed towards the Spanish speakers in the audience. He said "Gracias por sevirme en su pueblo". Dr. Camayd-Freixas was one of the 16 interpreters involved with the two week trial in Waterloo, IA. He said that 3/4 people in the raid were Guatemalan. Then he started talking about the build up to the raid, and everything that has had some part in it. It started with the United Fruit Company or "Banana Fruit Republic" and how they, with the help of the CIA overthrew the pres in 1951. Then there was a Civil War which turned into a genocide against Mayans from 1960-1996. The worst of this took place in the 1980s during the Iran-Contra affairs where some 250,000 people were killed and another 1.5 peasants displaced. So, most of the people that are working here as undocumented hands, were actually orphans objected to a life of poverty. Then in the 1990s, we issued the Free Trade Acts which pressed families to immigrate North because they couldn't make a living off of what they were growing. With the NAFTA (North American Free Trade Act) and CAFTA (Central American Free Trade Act) the market was supposed to become more open. However, the United States has no need for tariffs- Dr. Camayd-Freixas called this "built in protectionism", where products from other countries undergo 9 different inspections and drive the price up and the producers loose money in freight costs and their perishable items. Then he talked about how 9/11 sent an urgency to do anything through the nation and caused a demand for retribution. We ended up going to war abroad, in Iraq, and at home, with immigrants labeled as potential terrorists. He talked about End-Game which is the 10yr plan to rid immigrants out of the U.S. Dr. Camayd-Freixas called this a recipe for ethnic cleansing. He said that this would attribute to the downfall of our economy since virtually everything we eat from produce, dairy, and meat has been touched by undocumented hands. Then he talked about some of the problems facing the system which handles immigration. There is a severe shortage of immigration judges and ICE is arresting people faster than they can try them. There is a shortage of prison space, and they are asking millions of our dollars to build more jails. Typically, they accuse them of identity theft, put them in jail for 5 mo, and then deport them. The problem that has been occurring though, is that the civil society has been revolting against this. In the Postville trials though, the defendants were not allowed to give their personal circumstances, and were bullied into signing a grand jury waiver. In some circumstances, their children's survival was on the line for signing the piece of paper saying they were guilty of something they were not guilty of. It gets worse though, because they are taking it so far that they are trying to deport children who were born in the country and are U.S. citizens.

I just think it is horrible that we can tear apart people's countries, basically forcing them to have to choice but to try and live here, and then when they get here, we give them worst jobs that no one else wants to have. Then, we go and try them, and deport them, with their children's survival on the line? I don't know about the way our country is handling this immigration thing.

I feel that this is going to greatly affect us all, especially the way this is continuing. As a Spanish teacher, I feel that I need to really be on top of what is going on in our country as far as immigration goes. I mean, this is one of the reasons why the need to teach Spanish has really come into play in the last few years. We have a lot of Spanish speaking people in our country and there aren't that many people who can effectively communicate with them. This is the obstacle we have to overcome.

The Debate on "High Stakes Community"

So I realize that I am talking about the debate, and it was a week and a half ago, but I feel the need to blog about it- it is still really fresh in my mind. It stated off pretty nice. Everyone was just taking it all in, but then I felt that it really started to get ugly once the "parents" presented their point of view. I (being a parent of an underachieving student) felt almost offended when the parents of the high achieving students got up there and were saying that my child was of no importance and that their children were the only ones of value to the education system because their children were more likely to go to college. What about my child's self esteem? I really had issues with the proposal when it came to the 3rd graders having to be at grade level as measured by the IBTS on reading or math or they would be required to attend summer school for 4weeks until they achieve grade level. (Which if I am a parent struggling to put food on the table, I don't think I can drive my child back and forth for 4weeks of summer school.) I feel that if a 3rd grader is not at grade level, it is not necessarily that kid's fault. There is more of a fault within the teaching system-- and why would someone punish a child for that? Everyone learns at a different rate too. We discussed this in our group prior to the debate and I said that that is where I think Multiage can have a positive effect on students. If you have students who are relatively the same age together in the classroom for instance, 4th and 5th graders, you can split them up for example in Math. If you have some 4th graders who excel in Math, put them at a higher level. If you have some 5th graders who need a little more time to understand some of the concepts you can put them at a lower level, but yet keep them with their classmates, so they don't feel as if they are out of place, since this is the time that most kids really start to worry about their peers. This way you aren't leaving someone in the dust, but also giving the students who are good in Math the opportunity to excel. You can get that happy medium. Anyways... I also did not like the "bell-shaped curve" distribution in the proposal. My child could really improve from lets say "D work" to "B+ work" but because of the bell-shaped curve they could still receive a "D". I don't think that's right. Also, when the Reps of the Fine Arts were talking, and they made a really good point of defending their program. I loved it when someone said "What makes Math and Reading so much more important than Music?" If a student loves band or choir and you just take that away because of the Standardized Testing-- it could be detrimental. That's the only part of the day that many students go to school for. If you take away what they have passion for, they may not have a reason to go to school. Obviously I think that the proposal has many flaws that need to be addressed therefore I do not support it.

The Newsweek Article

This past week we were given an article titled "Young, Gay and Murdered" to read. I tells the story of a 15 yr old boy, Larry King, who had come out that he was gay. He would deck out in women's accessories, paint his nails, put on glitter, and wear stilettos to school. As time passed on, Larry would egg on some of his fellow classmates, which turned more or less into harassment. Then one day, a fellow classmate that Larry had been harassing, Brandon, shows up to school and shoots Larry in the head, killing him.

There are many questions concerning this story, and some of them I will say I do not know the answers to. I don't know if anyone does. How could Larry's death have been prevented? Why did Brandon have the gun in the first place? Why was there no counseling services for either of these boys? Also, I think that when one reads the article, they know that Larry was pushing his buttons yes, but was it because he was gay that he did all this, or was it in fact a cry for attention?

I think that yes, if there had been counseling services for both of these boys who came from rough homes (which I believe that has a lot to do with the situation as well) this might have been prevented. We will never know. Why did Brandon have the gun- this goes back to the rough home life, which is really heartbreaking when a child is raised with abusive parents. Maybe the fact that his dad had shot his mom when he was younger instilled some subconcious thought that it was ok to shoot people? Again, who knows? I believe that Larry dressed up in women's clothes, and pushed people's buttons as a cry for attention. I think that that comes into more play than the fact that he was gay.

I think that there are certain things that the administration could have done that wouldn't have let the situation escalade into the tragedy it became either. If the assistant principle, Epstein, wouldn't have necessarily egged him on so much, yes I believe she was a driving force in what turned into Larry harrasing the other students, but rather would have been more of just a supportive figure- it may not have happened. Also I think that the teacher who gave him her daughter's green dress played into it too much as well.

These are all just assumptions though, we will never know the "what ifs" of the world. That is what makes it so hard to discuss, because we don't have all the answers. It's like being left in a pitch black room with no flashlight to guide your way- it's scary. I believe that with the next generation, schools need to be more informed on how to deal with cases like this so it doesn't turn into a tragedy.