Jaime Escalante school proposal

Ron Unz announced that he was planning on opening an elementary school in the MacArthur park area to be named after his good friend and fellow Republican Jaime Escalante.

An Unz spokesman Will Garglio, stated that this will be called Jaime Escalante Westside Elementary School (JEWES). Unz plans to open a similar school on the Eastside.

JEWES curriculum will be total English immersion with a focus on media manipulation. Plans include having a student run television station just like professional Latino TV stations. They plan to staff the station with the lightest and blondest of the community, even if they have to import them all the way from Miami to do so. Will Garglio said, “We want these youth to feel like they are in the real world and that world doesn’t look or speak like them, so they need to get used to it now.”

Textbook orders have already been filed and include texts that exclude Sal Castro, Che Guevarra, Rudy Acu~a and other Chicano/Latino heroes that might instill pride in the students, something that must be avoided, according to textbook publisher: Bendover for Texas Press.

CSUN Chicana/o Studies Furlough day and teach in

This past Wednesday at the big N, we took a department wide furlough day/walkout/teach-in. We are multi disciplinary so are our actions.

I didn’t call for a furlough day because then none of my students would have gone to campus, unless they had other classes, and they would have missed the march and teach in.

The weird thing about it all was that very few of the students knew what to do at a rally or march. Most had never been to a march. They grew up in an era of grotesque lies, conservativism, fear mongering and resistance to dehumanization but had never participated or seen what people did in the streets.

I met with my later class and asked “what will it take to get you angry and into the streets?” none could answer. I hope they come back with something on Wednesday.

Keeping kids in check

The L.A. Times published a story today about how some teachers can’t control their classrooms and how it makes for a horrible learning environment. The story focuses on how teacher school doesn’t teach teachers how to  handle discipline problems because it’s all circumstantial and what may work for one class won’t work for another. The story didn’t shed any light on anything we already didn’t know really. So, since I am a product of the LAUSD system and have seen a lot of shit, even in my day, I’m going to chime in with my own two cents and offer my suggestions to would be LAUSD teachers on how to deal with the discipline issue of teens.  Also, if teachers, former and current, can chime in with their war stories and what worked for them, anonymously of course, it will be greatly appreciated.

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LA Hungry 4 Education

flyer

The flyer pretty much sums it up ; Lincoln High School Teachers/Faculty and more are protesting @ Lincoln High School through the evening…and into the morning. This is late notice but  be sure to spread the word that such an ACTION is happening. These sort of ACTIONS lose any power if no one knows about them! This also late news but bestselling writer, Luis J. Rodriguez, author of “Always Running” will be there at 8pm tonight!

Follow this link for more info.

One hour Walk-Out

Working as a Teacher’s Aide at Lincoln High School I’ve been hearing a lot of talk of budget cutbacks as well as very probable layoffs for teachers. When I hear how many teachers may be layed off I wonder how the LAUSD supposes Lincoln High School will manage to function with less teachers in a student body of 3000+ kids! In response the United Teachers of Los Angeles (UTLA) organized a one hour walk-out for teachers, dubbed: One Hour’s Pay for Our Kids. Even though I am not in the UTLA I also participated out there on the sidewalk of Broadway. I am pretty sure that almost every teacher was out there, plus the support of some students!

After the jump, some photos:

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