Class Warfare
"Do you defend niggers, Atticus?" I asked him that evening.
"Of course I do. Don't say nigger, Scout. That's common."
"'s what everybody at school says."
"From now on it'll be everybody less one--"
"Well if you don't want me to grow up talkin' that way, why do you send me to school?"
(from chapter 9)
That exchange made me think of the conversations we've been having in our comments about home schooling vs. public. I think we all agreed that public is necessary not because the education is better but because the socialization is even more important than the education. Unfortunately, as this conversation shows, there are always negative sides to the socialization. Fortunately, Atticus seems to handle it perfectly (doesn't he always?).
I've also been thinking about the conversation we've had about the quality of different public schools since neither Erica nor I were required to read it in school. She talked about how her brother got a much superior education than she did since the family had moved the JoCo. Schools vary from location to location, but I think most people would agree that the JoCo ones are generally among the best. While the quality of teachers, general affluence of the community, and other things factor into the equation, I think the biggest influence is the expectations of the parents and students. By and large--and to a much larger extent than most other places--the general student population goes to school expecting to work hard and achieve something. Parents drive their kids to be the best and not getting a quality education is not an option. And I think that, more than anything else, is what allows the schools to teach more and produce better quality graduates.
It makes me think of a book I read a while back, Fear of Falling: The Inner Life of the Middle Class, by Barbara Ehrenreich. It's a bit long, I know, but I'm including some of a review that summarizes her argument quite nicely and describes the achievement culture I see in the JoCo schools:
The target of Fear of Falling: The Inner Life of the Middle Class (Pantheon, $18.95) is one small but potent segment of the great middle: professionals and managers who owe their economic and social status to the educational hurdles they have surmounted. These are credentialed workers--professors, engineers, corporate managers, doctors, lawyers and therapists among them--whose work provides intrinsic satisfaction and considerable autonomy. While some are quite wealthy by ordinary standards, none are able to depend upon inherited money and therefore must work to pay for their needs and pleasures.
This is precisely the root of their contradictory lives. Access to the kind of work they do is restricted by educational barriers--college entrance tests, bar exams, tenure reviews and the like--restrictions that guarantee that those who succeed will be well rewarded with a life of comfort and esteem. But how, Ehrenreich asks, do these benefits affect their sons and daughters? Will the goodies they enjoy undermine the discipline they need to climb the same ladder?
Doctors can't pass on their medical licenses to their children. All they can hope to transmit is the same orientation toward achievement that boosted them over the top. And yet, the security and affluence their status affords may dampen the very desires that are critical to their children's educational and professional success. Fear of Falling argues that this paradox defines the inner life of the middle class, characterized by insecurity and anxiety caused by profound fear of "inner weakness, of growing soft, of failing to strive, of losing discipline and will."
. . . parents are all too aware that there is little they can do to guarantee their children a comfortable life beyond encouraging a fierce drive for success. Hence we find baby-boom parents preoccupied with flash cards for 1-year-olds and agonizing over their toddlers' prospects for admission to selective preschool programs.
"Of course I do. Don't say nigger, Scout. That's common."
"'s what everybody at school says."
"From now on it'll be everybody less one--"
"Well if you don't want me to grow up talkin' that way, why do you send me to school?"
(from chapter 9)
That exchange made me think of the conversations we've been having in our comments about home schooling vs. public. I think we all agreed that public is necessary not because the education is better but because the socialization is even more important than the education. Unfortunately, as this conversation shows, there are always negative sides to the socialization. Fortunately, Atticus seems to handle it perfectly (doesn't he always?).
I've also been thinking about the conversation we've had about the quality of different public schools since neither Erica nor I were required to read it in school. She talked about how her brother got a much superior education than she did since the family had moved the JoCo. Schools vary from location to location, but I think most people would agree that the JoCo ones are generally among the best. While the quality of teachers, general affluence of the community, and other things factor into the equation, I think the biggest influence is the expectations of the parents and students. By and large--and to a much larger extent than most other places--the general student population goes to school expecting to work hard and achieve something. Parents drive their kids to be the best and not getting a quality education is not an option. And I think that, more than anything else, is what allows the schools to teach more and produce better quality graduates.
It makes me think of a book I read a while back, Fear of Falling: The Inner Life of the Middle Class, by Barbara Ehrenreich. It's a bit long, I know, but I'm including some of a review that summarizes her argument quite nicely and describes the achievement culture I see in the JoCo schools:
The target of Fear of Falling: The Inner Life of the Middle Class (Pantheon, $18.95) is one small but potent segment of the great middle: professionals and managers who owe their economic and social status to the educational hurdles they have surmounted. These are credentialed workers--professors, engineers, corporate managers, doctors, lawyers and therapists among them--whose work provides intrinsic satisfaction and considerable autonomy. While some are quite wealthy by ordinary standards, none are able to depend upon inherited money and therefore must work to pay for their needs and pleasures.
This is precisely the root of their contradictory lives. Access to the kind of work they do is restricted by educational barriers--college entrance tests, bar exams, tenure reviews and the like--restrictions that guarantee that those who succeed will be well rewarded with a life of comfort and esteem. But how, Ehrenreich asks, do these benefits affect their sons and daughters? Will the goodies they enjoy undermine the discipline they need to climb the same ladder?
Doctors can't pass on their medical licenses to their children. All they can hope to transmit is the same orientation toward achievement that boosted them over the top. And yet, the security and affluence their status affords may dampen the very desires that are critical to their children's educational and professional success. Fear of Falling argues that this paradox defines the inner life of the middle class, characterized by insecurity and anxiety caused by profound fear of "inner weakness, of growing soft, of failing to strive, of losing discipline and will."
. . . parents are all too aware that there is little they can do to guarantee their children a comfortable life beyond encouraging a fierce drive for success. Hence we find baby-boom parents preoccupied with flash cards for 1-year-olds and agonizing over their toddlers' prospects for admission to selective preschool programs.
posted by Degolar at 9:15 AM
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