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 WHAT DOESN'T WORK February 05, 2007 2:06 PM

One year when my kids were young and in elementary school, the welfare office delivered a few presents to each family, including much needed stocking caps for each one. However, they had gotten them from the same place, so each one was exactly alike -- making the caps a visable sign of one's poverty. Therefore, of course, most kids refused to wear them. Who wouldn't?!?
PEACE~
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WHAT DOESN'T WORK February 05, 2007 2:13 PM

Just checking on recent post....  [ send green star]
 
 February 06, 2007 2:41 PM

Definitely a good observation.  In fact, John Lennon started wearing his granny glasses because they were the standard issue glasses for welfare kids in England.  He knew that the kids were stigmatized for it, so he used his fame and popularity to their advantage by wearing them himself, knowing that it would then become a "hip" fashion item once he wore them.  Then everyone with money was going out to buy the "granny" glasses, and the welfare kids glasses with from being a negative to a positive item.

Why can't more people with power think so creatively?

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Lennon'd Glasses February 06, 2007 10:45 PM

Hi Charlie!
Thank you for sharing!!! If I knew that about his glasses, I'd forgotten. I can't wait to tell my kids, too!
Peace~
KathleenR/AngelFaith
The Angel Power Emporium  [ send green star]
 
What Doesn't Work February 06, 2007 10:56 PM

Kind of reminds me of the Jews in Germany having to wear those stars on their clothing.  Nobody wants to be labled! Especially children who want so badly to "fit in."

My cousins who wre very poor had to work in the school bookstore to "earn" their books back in the fifties and sixties. Thus everyone knew who the poor kids were and made fun of them. I certainly hope we have learned something by now about how to treat humans with dignity. But have we?

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In the past.... February 06, 2007 11:06 PM

When my kids first began school, kids getting free lunches were very obvious. I did a lot of volunteer groups which eventually got this changed, at least in the schools I'm aware of so far.
PEACE,
AngelFaith
The Angel Power Emporium  [ send green star]
 
 February 15, 2007 6:44 PM

Something else that aggravates me is the schools in the poorer sections of town are not as good. While mine were in grade and middle school I paid the extra money so they would get a better education. It was a stuggle but WELL WORTH IT ! By the time they were in high school they were in advanced classes. A good education should  not be given by addresses. I see too many  children made fun of because of the clothes they  wear etc. Society is wrong. Here in the US there is getting to be no middle class.  [ send green star]  [ accepted]
 
 February 16, 2007 11:38 AM

Absolutely!  Unfortunately, the system is designed to prevent equitable education.  Schools are funded in large part through property taxes, which enables wealthier communities to spend substantially more per child than poor communities.  Also, in allocating that revenue, poorer communities are less able to spend as much on education as wealthier communities because they have to spend far more on police, fire and other costs.  Ironically, many of the people who live in wealthier communities work in poorer cities and take advantage of the police, fire and infrastructure benefits that the poorer city dwellers must pay for and thereby have less to spend for educating their own kids. 

The only way to change that is to eliminate education funding by property taxes and treat quality of education as a RIGHT and not a privilege and fund the education system by state and federal government revenue and allocate it to communities based on a per child cost. Of course, if you tried to do that it would be amazing to see how many "progressive" people from wealthier communities would be willing to change a system that ensure justice for poorer children if it means shifting money from their own kids to do it.

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Changing School Funding Methods February 17, 2007 8:53 PM

Hello!
I had to add to this because it was our local school district that initiated the big DeRolphe vs State school funding legal case! Over 55% of the district's population is low-income, and, the funding is always fluctuating -- rarelyfor the good. We even increased our academic rates, yet lost some funding! Somehow, funding is also based on how many students are IN school on the 1 day a year a "state" attendance is taken. That is silly because there are so many variables involved!! Things are improving, thanks to some dedicated people working from the outside. My kids & grandkids were/are all honor students. And, our district has much proof that good grades are NOT related to income!!! According to several instructors in regional colleges & universities, some of our (region's) high school graduate who were always on the Honor Roll end up discovering at college that their literacy is quite below what is expected!! Such a situation is related to the fact that inadequate funding plus proficiency test requirements is a huge detriment toproviding a good education!!!
In case you've not read of my goals before...  I am currently completing my M.Ed. and, then, I hope to find some funding to establish an online academy. The academy is intended especially for teens and adults who wish to advance to post-secondary education and/or gainful employment. The main mission is to provide a program of what I refer to pre-life communication skills. I want low-income folks, persons having to change jobs, returning veterans, etc., to gain the necessary such skills to be successful in further education, or in seeking good employment, and, in order to be well-informed and active citizens -- who also care to then "give-back" to the region in order to help improve the quality-of-life for all families.
Of course, I greatly welcome all suggestions and leads. Being in poverty myself & with disabilities, I especially need solid leads for seeking private funding!!!
Thank you!
Peace,
KathleenR ~ The Angel Power Emporium
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 February 21, 2007 9:52 PM

I grew up overseas (American born, American ancestry but grew up on and island in the Pacific) but when I was in the US at ages 12 and 13 I had the odd fate of being sent first to a very rich school and then to a very poor school.  The contrast was mind boggling. 

At the rich school, everyone bought pizza or hamburgers for lunch at the cafeteria ($1 per day, way beyond my parents' ability to pay).  I and two of my friends brought sack lunches to school.  So strong was the feeling against sack lunches that the pizza kids actually moved 6 seats away when we sat down at the same table with them. 

This was so unbearable that we ended up eating outside in the winter cold, sitting on a tiny curb and staring at the asphalt rather than face being ostracized for our sack lunches. 

The poor school was in Los Angeles, near Long Beach.  It was 75% black, and the rest mostly Latino and Armenian.  I was bussed there during the 70's bussing experiment.  I was told that the purpose of my being bussed for one hour each way was so that when some white kids started "integrating the school" more money would follow them and the school would end up better off. 

At that school, we had no text books, no books of any kind, no lab, no visuals, no bulletin board, no anything, not even any instruction of any kind.  We just got yelled at by trapped teachers.  Everyone there felt trapped.  It was like a jail.  No one knew why they had to be there.  Nothing was relevant to the student's lives or futures.  The soccer field was full of dirt patches and thorn weeds.  The basketball court was asphalt with huge cracks going across it.  It was a nightmare.  It was not a real school. 

Recently, I have taken to looking back at places of long ago by looking them up on Google maps with sattelite photos of the terrain.  One of the places I looked up was that old school near Long Beach.  Boy, I found it alright!  Same cracked pavement, same huge patches of bare dirt, same everything. 

I read the parents' comments online and it definitely is still the same school.  Most parents said the only department worth anything at all was the English department.  Everything else, they said was a sham of an education. 

It's been over 30 years.  THey couldn't change that school in over 30 years???? 
They bussed me there so people would get interested in improving that school.  Where are the improvements?  From all I can tell, that school is still a prison to both body and mind.  It's horrendous.  No longer separate- but not one bit equal!
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RE: Marie M February 21, 2007 10:19 PM

Hi Marie,

I really appreciate you sharing your experiences! I too had lived overseas a while & experienced many shocks due to the US education system over the years. Being a life-long avid advocate for issues concerning poverty and education both, I've had my mind blown by poor school districts and citizens who are so apathetic to the plight of others! Thirty years of no improvement is shameful, to say the least!! It is especially hard to take when the government resists helping schools yet so carelessly spend billions on the wrong things (WAR!)!! It amazes me that wealthier folks do not realize that investing in schools is investing in our nation's future!! End the senseless murder through war and "fix" our education and healthcare systems. IF this is not taken care of immediately, we cannot remain the top country of the world!!!

Peace,
KathleenR
~The Angel Power Emporium~  [ send green star]
 
 February 23, 2007 5:06 AM

Kathleen, glad we are in so much agreement.  Unfortunately, more and more programs that help the poor are being but back severely by the Republicans, sometimes with Democrat backing, to fund this war.  We keep people homeless over here so we can bomb them into homelessness over in Iraq and Afghanistan. 

My biggest concern is that I believe that money from many of these programs that help the poor just to survive is already being siphoned off and channeled into the war through secret backdoor channels.  I also worry that these kinds of programs may be robbed dry before we know anything about it. 

Bush has already made it clear more than once that he thinks he can spend money from ANY program on the war, and that Congressional approval is irrelevant to the commander in chief.  What's to stop him from using these funds on the war in ways that don't let us, the public, find out until it's too late? 

At the rate they're spending on the war, it would not take long for our government and all its programs to run completely dry and become extinct without warning.  Do we really know where all the money spent on this war is coming from?  This is not an administration that keeps an account of its spending with any kind of diligence.
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