[Reader-list] Non-racist maths?

Ujwala Samarth ujwalasam at gmail.com
Sat Feb 26 12:12:27 IST 2011


Here's how 'connected' learning takes place -- while we continue to
compartmentalise the way and what our young people learn -- or rather, don't
learn.


"Anti-Racist" Geometry Lessons Explained
 Photo: Mark Murrmann

*Editors' Note: This education dispatch is part of a new ongoing series
reported from Mission High School <http://www.missionhs.org/>, where
education writer Kristina
Rizga<http://motherjones.com/authors/kristina-rizga>is known to
students as "Miss K." Click
here to see all of MoJo's recent education
coverage<http://motherjones.com/category/primary-tags/education>,
or follow <http://twitter.com/KristinaRizga>*The Miss K
Files<http://twitter.com/KristinaRizga>
* on Twitter <http://twitter.com/KristinaRizga> or with this RSS
Feed<http://feeds.feedburner.com/KristinaRizga>
.
*

For Mission High
School<http://motherjones.com/media/2010/12/mission-high-school-open-house>principal
Eric Guthertz, just walking from the school's parking lot to his
office can be a test of conflict mediation skills: last month one such trip
took him two hours and involved "an angry student, an upset teacher, and a
maintenance person." He's short of breath when he sits down to meet with me
in the principal's office on one typically hectic day. "Please keep the door
closed!" he yells to his staff. But within five minutes a young woman is
already knocking on his door. He takes it all in stride.

An educator for 22 years, Guthertz has been at Mission
High<http://motherjones.com/mojo/2010/12/welcome-mission-high-school-san-francisco>for
the past 10—first as an English teacher, then vice principal, and more
recently as the school's principal. Test scores in Math and English among
African-American and Latino students have shot up significantly since he
took over as head of school three years ago, though he attributes these
improvements largely to the work of Stanford's Linda
Darling-Hammond<http://www.stanford.edu/%7Eldh/resume.html>and the
"anti-racist" foundation laid by Mission High's previous principal,
Kevin Truitt. This year Mission High showed the largest
gains<http://missionlocal.org/2010/09/mission-high-makes-highest-api-gain-of-sf-high-schools/>in
test scores among all San Francisco high schools, passing 600 points
for
the first time (out of a total 1,000). Student college acceptance rates are
growing <http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/blogs/sfmoms/detail?entry_id=40827>;
student drop out rates declined from 32 percent to 8 in one year. These
changes are especially impressive in California, which ranks 47th when it
comes to school funding per student.

How did this happen? Guthertz took 30 minutes out of a typically hectic day
to explain:

*Mother Jones: *Which major changes, in your opinion, contributed to
significant increases in your students' test scores?

*Eric Guthertz:* About seven years ago, we redesigned the entire school into
smaller learning communities based on the work of Linda Darling-Hammond out
of Stanford <http://ed.stanford.edu/faculty/ldh>. The first notion was
"personalization"—that if students are known and cared for, they will be
more successful.

The second was collaboration. We redesigned the school around teams, so that
a group of teachers would work with each other all year long, and have time
in their daily schedule to talk about how to support students and to reflect
on their pedagogy.

The third change is that we also have student advisors. So I may be your
English teacher, but I also could be your advisor. And as your advisor I'll
see you two days a week, so that kids are really well known.

Finally, I think the center of all that we are doing is our work around
anti-racist teaching. Darling-Hammond has a list of goals, and one of them
is this idea of multicultural and equity education. "Multicultural" and
"equity" are fine terms, but we felt that "anti-racist" was more honest,
named the issue directly, and signaled something quite powerful to the
community at large.

*MJ: *So what does "anti-racist" mean in terms of pedagogy?

*EG:* [It means] how do you teach? Are you using engagement strategies? Are
you valuing oral language as well as the written word? In terms of
curriculum, is what you are teaching relevant to kids' lives?

This work can be really controversial sometimes. If you are going to be an
anti-racist school, there is a flip side of that, which is, 'Well, what does
it mean to be racist?'

**We have amazing teachers here—really dedicated, thoughtful faculty. But
certainly, we had our own internal controversies that we had to deal with.
We had to learn how to be reflective and have brave, open conversations with
each other. We are now at a level where all teachers desegregate their
grades by ethnicity and have conversations about what it means when we have
failures of one ethnic group over other. And then actually develop action
plans around that.

*MJ: *Could you give an example of something specific a teacher changed in
the class as a result of this approach?

*EG:* Let's say a teacher is looking at the standards of American history
and comes across a section around the Monroe doctrine or the Westward
expansion. While they will be covering the standards, they will also make
sure that the issue is covered from a Latino perspective. So, they make an
effort to find readings and writing that are connected culturally to the
students.
In a geometry class, students are learning to map out their communities and
look at how freeways are designed and how certain neighborhoods like Bay
View or Western Addition—where many students live—have been reconfigured.

In a geometry class, students are learning to map out their communities and
look at how freeways are designed and how certain neighborhoods like Bay
View or Western Addition—where many students live—have been reconfigured.

In a math class, they will look at percentages of demographics and how
certain communities are shifting around the city. The idea is it's math, but
it's the real world that kids can connect to.

*MJ: *How difficult was it to implement these changes?

*EG:* Some things were hard. In terms of anti-racist teaching, just the
culture of self-reflection wasn't there yet, but it's very strongly here
now.

I was in the classroom when we started the collaborative model and I think
in general, it was welcomed. But people weren't used to working together
that closely, and with students.

*MJ: *Have you had to fire any teachers?

*EG:* We don't fire teachers. I've certainly done a few evaluations where
the teacher needed improvement and in some cases, there is a process called,
"non-reelection." It means that if you are tenured, the district chooses not
to re-hire you. I think you have to be very careful, and thoughtful, and
make sure that all of the supports exist before you do that.

*MJ: *Some people argue that some teachers are just not born to be teachers.
Do you agree with that?

*EG:* I think that's ridiculous. And I also think the "Waiting for
Superman"<http://motherjones.com/riff/2010/11/waiting-for-superman-teachers>thing
is kind of ridiculous. Laying the blame on teachers or the unions is
ridiculous. It's a smoke screen.

*MJ: *If the teachers' unions aren't the main obstacle to quality education,
then what is?

*EG:* Number one is really adequately funding education...

http://motherjones.com/media/2010/12/mission-high-school-principal
-- 
Ujwala Samarth
(Programme Coordinator, Open Space)

www.openspaceindia.org
www.infochangeindia.org
http://www.facebook.com/pages/Open-Space/116557125037041

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Kanchan Lane, Off Law College Rd,,
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