Charts and figures are great, but what's missing are the voices of the people...

Brought to you by Teacher Certification Map and MAT@USC | Masters of Education
The chart says but half the story...but kudos to the MAT@USC for soliciting personal stories...They will make the difference...
I was in the classroom today and noticed that my music teacher who is still teaching by the way received a care package with a lannard, a black whiteboard marker, a bag of Cheetos, and a tiny bottled water...and I was thinking to myself, "It must be Teacher Appreciation Week..." Yet much like these days of remembrance or whatever appreciation week, it seems to me that this is just a way to show that even though we crap on teachers, blaming them for society's ills, call them freeloaders when they rise up to protect their benefits, we actually really do care...It's still shit even if it's sugarcoated with chocolate...
What are we actually doing to show that we appreciate teachers and what are we doing to show that we appreciate the students who are also maligned in the media and by those who desperately want to cut public education?
When we talk about cuts, (I know it's state funding in the chart above) we never hear about the bloated Pentagon budget...we never hear about oil subsidies or corporate welfare...we never hear about states subsidizing highly profitable industries such as the oil industry, when we talk about taxes, we do not hear about raising the tax rate on the highest income brackets...we hear about how hard it would be for those making $250,000 to pay an extra 3.6% on the income that is over $250,000 as if they would become destitute and penniless...we never hear about how the failure to extend the Making Work Pay credit will affect taxpayers who received that credit ($400 is a lot of money these days...)...We never hear when it comes to sob stories about the richest Americans, teachers paying out of pocket to ensure that their students have the best school supplies available for their classrooms...we never hear about the turnover rate in this job, which is the favored scapegoat of those who engage in class warfare...
How do we frame funding education? The Santa Clara Unified School District relies on property taxes, but the majority of it comes from the commercial properties in our city, such as Intel. Could we not frame this as a way to fund the future employees at Intel or the other high-tech companies we have in this area? Could we not frame this as fighting for our country's future so we remain competitive? With elementary school education on the chopping block, with the district proposing that it be cut completely, how do we frame the benefits of music education? The district had proposed turning it into an after-school activity, but that carries the stigma of it being voluntary and students may see that as something that they can come whenever they feel like it. Music gives children the chance to express themselves emotionally and artistically...some students may not shine in the standardized tests that we force down their throats, but when it comes to music, their genius may finally be revealed. 
Which brings me to my point that standardized tests are not enough to measure what our children gain through school. Unfortunately, our focus on the number games the standardized tests make available to us has ensured a mentality that since we don't test on music, music programs become expendible...This is a tragic mistake as it denies students what brings them joy in actually going to school...along with drama programs and art programs. These are a vital part of the schooling experience, not extras...I see students every day at the high school I work at, and their faces light up whenever they're in Drama or even Choir...I see students who WANT to take this choir program and build upon it...I hear things about show choirs, choir and drama students working together to produce musicals just like we did in the old days when I was going to high school, I see students who bemoan the fact that Cantanova at Wilcox had been cut...These are the voices that need to be heard instead of those emotionless, soulless voices talking about budgetary figures and statistics. Unfortunately, these voices full of passion and anger are drowned out by news of "budgetary shortfalls," "cuts," "increased class sizes, the voices that those who promote a culture of austerity except when it comes to perks that benefit themselves and their system...This has to end.
Update: I just remembered that the survey that I saw at the middle school was based on a scale from 1 (DO NOT WANT as in cuts) to 10 (WANT cuts) to use LOLCAT...I do not remember if there was a space provided for comments, but I realize that I made a huge mistake in not writing personal comments. In this budget battle, the voices of the people are the ones that need to be heard, not the numbers that the system wants to reduce this debate down to...I shall return and fix this oversight...

Interesting question raised about today's walkout...

The question for today's National School Walkout I am hearing quite often is, "Are students being politicized?" as in the passive sense. That is a question that we must all answer, but a better question might be, "Are they politicizing THEMSELVES?" in the active sense...as agents of change themselves. Now what I see is that they are more active than we give them credit for and that they if given the opportunity will be a voice that cannot be silenced. There are too many instances on Facebook where students as young as 11 years old are organizing protests, vigils, and rallies in support of their favored causes. This is something that we should celebrate, not demean or try to diminish by suggesting that students do not have an independent voice.

A common theme that seems to be brought up is that they are being manipulated or being dragged into the political battles of adults and that this is shameful. That may or may not be a legitimate point. However, I am a firm believer that this can evolve into a dangerous talking point that threatens the legitimacy of student-led movements whether they are political or not. This is more rhetoric from the establishment that seeks to discredit any movements against it. By portraying the students as pawns or brainwashed by teachers, unions, or acting on their feelings, they hope to perpetuate the stereotype that students cannot think on their own, or that they are easily manipulated in contrast to the coldly, logical adults who always "know better." Their hope is that we see a bunch of young people in the streets and brush them off as they're just being kids and don't know any better.

I sense that the movement to deny students the right to vote in the communities they go into college is connected to the youth activism in the streets of state capitols around the country. Everywhere, the voices of the establishment, and by that, I mean politicians, those in the media, and corporate-tycoons such as the Koch brothers, basically the dominant group that holds the power in this nation, are trying to restrict their right to vote, because “a dearth of experience and a plethora of the easy self-confidence that only ignorance and inexperience can produce.” in the words of state Representative Gregory Sorg and House Speaker William O’Brien who proclaimed that students only vote with their feelings.

Another talking point seems to be a general distrust on whether they would behave in a "civil" manner. Well, what defines civil? Are we to believe that students are so lacking in self-control that they'll discredit whatever movement that they have decided THEMSELVES to stand up for? Anyone can be a boor, anyone can become uncivil. Yet we are to believe that students are prone more so than others?

Above all, why do we not give students the credit they deserve for being their own voices? Too often, we assume that they are accounts to deposit information and knowledge. That is the very notion that critical pedagogy fights. Instead of downplaying their passion and their activism, we should do well to listen to their voices and learn from their own experiences, because not only are they learning from their own experiences, they are creating their own experiences whenever they protest. Perhaps the lesson to be learned also on this day of student activism is to TRUST STUDENTS and their ideas. Students KNOW BETTER and we should all keep that in mind.

Resistance and Revolution

Mobilizing Teaching Not only for knowledge but for Resistance and Revolution

Inspired by Michael Morgan, who created the Teachers for Revolution group at the MAT @ USC, I too want to brainstorm ways how we, not just teachers but more importantly students can make the change in our lives that we deserve, instead of waiting for the establishment to move at its snail-like pace.

Critical Pedagogy not only involves identifying ways in which the oppressors divide and conquer the people and ways to fight back, to get the consciousness of freedom moving in forms of direct action but...

1. A focus on personalizing education for all students regardless of background, socioeconomic class, ethnicity, sexual orientation, etc. Is the material relevant for us students? Do the standards connect to the lives of students or do they favor a certain group? Do the material and curriculum we present leave behind groups who do not identify with them? Why should students care about the material they learn in school? Why should they care about a bunch of dead guys supposedly making history while the voices of the forgotten linger in the dustbin of history to be silenced into oblivion.
2. Student activism, not led by teachers or such, but student led. A prime example is the National Student Walkout promoted by Wisconsin High school students themselves, belying the myth of the apathetic high schooler unconcerned about anything besides video games. Change comes from the people, and who better than students who are the future leaders of the nation.
3. Students creating history themselves in an active manner, instead of learning passively about people whom they may not relate to. The protest above is history in the making, and it might be studied by future generations of students and inspire them to even greater heights. Passivity in the standards should be replaced with standards that highlight the struggle of the people to gain legitimacy, to fight for their rights, and to push back against any and all attempts to oppress them.
4. Focus on students creating knowledge instead of relying on the banking model of education, where teachers "deposit" information into the minds of students, a model that Paolo Friere criticized in Pedagogy of the Oppressed. Students are not blank slates that come without knowledge and an awareness. You ask them about the issues in their own lives, and they will show you a side different from the establishment's stereotype of the apathetic student, yet another example of a stereotype used by those in power to demean and to diminish those who could potentially rise up against them.
5. Big Ideas, not in the form of statements as if what the teacher says goes but rather in the form of questions where students find and research the answers for themselves. Yes, how we present the questions and material may in itself be biased as well, but it is a step above presenting a big idea to guide students' research instead of having the research lead students to THEIR answers.
6. Student-based texts, not only relating to the standards themselves, not only having them create blogs, but creating their own voices. Their voices should not be just solely used to learn the material and to present it in their own way. They have their own concerns, their own fears, their own goals in life, their own opinions on the events around them. Yet we ignore their voices at our own peril. You look on Facebook and you see protests being led by students such as the protest at Gunderson High against the Westboro Baptist Church people. Likewise, we have many examples of primary sources that we read. The example that comes to mind is the Diary of Anne Frank, who was 15 when she died in the death camps. Numerous others include letters, journals, diaries, blogposts, etc. Students will find a way to have their voices heard, and the school leaves those voices behind in favor of a hidden curriculum that silences dissent and silences innovation, risk-taking, and change.
7. Standards which are student-orientated, with a focus on critical multiculturalism, not liberal multiculturalism which trivializes diversity to the "let's celebrate all cultures, especially their foods!" but a critical multiculturalism that challenges the status quo and the institutionalized isms that back the status quo and the establishment's power.
8. Students above all...