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When I click a link and see David Brooks's face, I have the same exact feeling as when I fall for a rick roll.

by loumf 18y ago

deleted 18y ago
[deleted]
Alex3917 18y ago
I've actually read the book the article is based on. This school is essentially a giant test prep factory. All the kids do for 10+ hours a day is learn how to guess correctly on multiple choice tests. Then the entire measure of school performance is how well the kids have done on these tests. The whole program is designed to separate black kids from their parents and communities; the NYT admits as much actually. In Paul Tough's original NYT Magazine article, which the book is based on, the central question posed is: "Can the culture of child-rearing be changed in poor neighborhoods, and if so, is that a project that government or community organizations have the ability, or the right, to take on?" (Changing the culture is defined as extending the school day to keep kids away from their parents, and also changing the qualitative school experience. The idea being that poor black kids are qualitatively different than poor white kids, and they need a qualitatively different school system based on rote memorization and frequent testing.)
- chancho 18y ago
  "Promise Academy students who are performing below grade level spent twice as much time in school as other students in New York City. Students who are performing at grade level spend 50 percent more time in school." Yeah I don't really see whats magical about this program, its just really intensive. If you took all the underachievers from other schools and tutored them for 6 hours a day then those school's scores would rise too. It's sort of like the "epiphany" of clear-build-hold in Iraq. No shit - the secret to progress is focusing on fundamentals and working your ass off? But then again, maybe common sense in bureaucracy is magical.
- ellyagg 18y ago
  You sound critical. Is black culture in America a success? The basic approach to reverse a bad culture is to take its saplings and replant them. Academics don't like this for one reason or another, maybe it seems too easy, but hey, crazy thing, reacculturation works.
- nihilocrat 18y ago
  I also got the feeling from the article that the methods of the school seem to be contrived to please the metrics used to evaluate them. The high amount of rigor seems very Prussian of them, a paradigm is particularly uninterested in teaching kids but instead in disciplining them and making them do well on tests, and more generally in making them comfortable with the future that has been predetermined for them. However, I honestly don't see anything bad about transplanting people from a seemingly negative cultural surrounding to one which is more likely to make them have a more successful and fulfilling life, even if it seems hostile to parents and condescending to poor neighborhoods.

When I click a link and see David Brooks's face, I have the same exact feeling as when I fall for a rick roll.

by loumf 18y ago

When I click a link and see David Brooks's face, I have the same exact feeling as when I fall for a rick roll.

deleted 18y ago

[deleted]

Alex3917 18y ago

I've actually read the book the article is based on. This school is essentially a giant test prep factory. All the kids do for 10+ hours a day is learn how to guess correctly on multiple choice tests. Then the entire measure of school performance is how well the kids have done on these tests. The whole program is designed to separate black kids from their parents and communities; the NYT admits as much actually. In Paul Tough's original NYT Magazine article, which the book is based on, the central question posed is: "Can the culture of child-rearing be changed in poor neighborhoods, and if so, is that a project that government or community organizations have the ability, or the right, to take on?" (Changing the culture is defined as extending the school day to keep kids away from their parents, and also changing the qualitative school experience. The idea being that poor black kids are qualitatively different than poor white kids, and they need a qualitatively different school system based on rote memorization and frequent testing.)

chancho 18y ago
"Promise Academy students who are performing below grade level spent twice as much time in school as other students in New York City. Students who are performing at grade level spend 50 percent more time in school." Yeah I don't really see whats magical about this program, its just really intensive. If you took all the underachievers from other schools and tutored them for 6 hours a day then those school's scores would rise too. It's sort of like the "epiphany" of clear-build-hold in Iraq. No shit - the secret to progress is focusing on fundamentals and working your ass off? But then again, maybe common sense in bureaucracy is magical.
ellyagg 18y ago
You sound critical. Is black culture in America a success? The basic approach to reverse a bad culture is to take its saplings and replant them. Academics don't like this for one reason or another, maybe it seems too easy, but hey, crazy thing, reacculturation works.
nihilocrat 18y ago
I also got the feeling from the article that the methods of the school seem to be contrived to please the metrics used to evaluate them. The high amount of rigor seems very Prussian of them, a paradigm is particularly uninterested in teaching kids but instead in disciplining them and making them do well on tests, and more generally in making them comfortable with the future that has been predetermined for them. However, I honestly don't see anything bad about transplanting people from a seemingly negative cultural surrounding to one which is more likely to make them have a more successful and fulfilling life, even if it seems hostile to parents and condescending to poor neighborhoods.