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morrigirlYesterday there was an article about my junior high school in the Metro section of the New York Times.
I'm having a severe problem with this article because the Crossroads School Joseph Berger is trying to write about is not the one I remember. Berger paints a very specific picture of Crossroads as this successful progressive middle school, a beacon in the dreary New York City educational landscape. But hints of the Crossroads I attended manage to come through in places, and when they do Berger diverts the reader's attention, or plays down the dirtier aspects of the Crossroads experience.
For instance, he spends the first paragraph describing Crossroads' unconventional pedagogy; how sixth, seventh, and eighth graders were all mixed together in classes, (an aspect of the Crossroads experience that I actually liked. It enabled me to make friends with people I wouldn't have had the grades been separate.) and textbook learning is the exception rather than the rule.
But in the next paragraph he writes, "Reading and math scores were below the citywide average, but many of the school's students were from poor homes and a larger than average number had learning disabilities." He admits that these unconventional teaching methods aren't improving the reading and mathematics abilities of the students as measured by standardized tests. (Not that I think standardized tests are a good measure of a child's ability to do anything but take a test but, unfortunately that's the way NY state evaluates ability.) But, since this is supposed to be an article about how a change of leadership turned a good school into a mediocre one, Berger must justify the low test scores that came in under Ms. Weiner, the "good" principal, by pointing out the students are poor and some have learning disabilities. Oh yes, because poor kids, just by virtue of their class status can't be expected to perform well on standardized tests, and neither can children with learning disabilities. It has nothing to do with maybe, oh I don't know, the teaching methods and curriculum just not working very well! Naw, couldn't be that.
He does it again on the second page when he quotes a former Crossroads teacher as saying that Ms. Weiner "ran too loose a ship, with students escaping penalties if they talked disrespectfully or roamed the halls." This is the ONLY negative comment about the school or Ms. Weiner that Berger chooses to include in the article, and again he must breeze over rather than explore it if the story is to keep the spin he wants to put on it. He follows that sentence with, "Still, it is a telling measure that in a neighborhood where many middle-class white parents send children to private schools, Crossroads, where most students are black and hispanic, annually drew white students as well." Because EVERYONE knows that if WHITE parents allow their WHITE kids to attend an NYC public school then it MUST be good. Couldn't be because not every white family in the neighborhood can afford private school. Of course not. There's no such thing as lower and working class caucasians in Manhattan anymore. And even if there are that doesn't change Berger's clear message that white = good and black/latino = bad.
I was one of the 60 students who made up Crossroads first incoming class in 1990. What I remember from my three years there were tons of throw-away periods. "Classes" like Advisory, Silent Sustained Reading (SSR), and Writer's Workshop that quickly deteriorated into free periods of socializing because the teachers didn't know how to control a class. I remember being relentlessly bullied and picked on in clear view of teachers and authority figures, and never seeing a single student get punished or reprimanded for their behavior, nor a single teacher come to my rescue. I remember them testing out new progressive classes like "Humanities" on us. In theory, Humanities was supposed to fuse History and English into one class. The problem with it was that we always wound up with a teacher skilled in one subject or the other. So, while we SHOULD have received some form of structured English education, what we ended getting was year after year of straight up History class with only a scant amount of formal English.
Crossroads wasn't all bad. I met...one or two genuinely nice human beings there. I came into contact with one of the most influential teachers I have ever had there. One who had such a profound effect on me as a writer that to this day, when I read over any piece of my own creative writing, I can literally point to places in the text and say "Mr. Cibula taught me to do that." And the small size DID make it feel like a close knit community even if the majority of its members were cruel, rowdy, hair-pulling, arm-punching, book-vandalizing 11-13 year olds. In Berger's article he writes that Crossroads graduates "went on to strong high schools like Beacon, Mott Hall, and the Museum School." But those are all alternative high schools that deal in pedagogy similar to that found at Crossroads. I went on to graduate from a good alternative high school as well. What I didn't realize until I got to college was that by championing unconventional teaching methods and curricula "alternative" schools fail to instill their students with the skills required to succeed in traditional schools that teach traditional material.
I found myself woefully unprepared for my first year of college. Whereas many of my fellow first years had taken AP classes in high school (a term I'd never even HEARD before entering college) had read many of the assigned first year and introductory level texts while still in high school, and knew how to critically analyze a text and formulate a thesis, I didn't. I felt stupid, and I wound up wasting a large portion of my first year of college learning how to do the basic shit everyone else already knew how to. I suspect I would have had a similarly rude awakening had I gone from Crossroads to a traditional high school rather than an alternative high school. And when I say "normal" I mean a school that sticks to conventional grading, curricula, and organizational practices.
Not that I have anything but great things to say about my high school. I LOVED high school. I'm probably the only person on the face of the planet who did. I loved the people, I loved (most of) the teachers, I loved (most of) the work I had to do. Every morning I woke up happy at the thought of going to school. Doesn't change the fact that MVA did not properly prepare me or any of my classmates for college level work.
I am now bitter that I did not get a conventional education. Maybe if I had, I wouldn't have floundered so badly during my first couple years of college. Maybe I'd have a better understanding of certain subjects. Then again, maybe I wouldn't. Maybe it wouldn't have made a lick of difference. I'll never know. However, I do think it is irresponsible not to teach students basic things that colleges and society in general will expect them to know. Basic grade appropriate English, American History, Science, Mathematics, and Geography classes should all be required. For alternative schools to shrug off the importance of these subjects, not to mention basic discipline (and, I gotta admit, MVA knew how to shell out discipline and weed out bad eggs,) only harms the student body and instigates the sort of academic deterioration highlighted in the NYT article when leaders with more traditional ideas about education take over these schools and have no idea how to operate within the "alternative" social and educational structure that is already in place.
I'm having a severe problem with this article because the Crossroads School Joseph Berger is trying to write about is not the one I remember. Berger paints a very specific picture of Crossroads as this successful progressive middle school, a beacon in the dreary New York City educational landscape. But hints of the Crossroads I attended manage to come through in places, and when they do Berger diverts the reader's attention, or plays down the dirtier aspects of the Crossroads experience.
For instance, he spends the first paragraph describing Crossroads' unconventional pedagogy; how sixth, seventh, and eighth graders were all mixed together in classes, (an aspect of the Crossroads experience that I actually liked. It enabled me to make friends with people I wouldn't have had the grades been separate.) and textbook learning is the exception rather than the rule.
But in the next paragraph he writes, "Reading and math scores were below the citywide average, but many of the school's students were from poor homes and a larger than average number had learning disabilities." He admits that these unconventional teaching methods aren't improving the reading and mathematics abilities of the students as measured by standardized tests. (Not that I think standardized tests are a good measure of a child's ability to do anything but take a test but, unfortunately that's the way NY state evaluates ability.) But, since this is supposed to be an article about how a change of leadership turned a good school into a mediocre one, Berger must justify the low test scores that came in under Ms. Weiner, the "good" principal, by pointing out the students are poor and some have learning disabilities. Oh yes, because poor kids, just by virtue of their class status can't be expected to perform well on standardized tests, and neither can children with learning disabilities. It has nothing to do with maybe, oh I don't know, the teaching methods and curriculum just not working very well! Naw, couldn't be that.
He does it again on the second page when he quotes a former Crossroads teacher as saying that Ms. Weiner "ran too loose a ship, with students escaping penalties if they talked disrespectfully or roamed the halls." This is the ONLY negative comment about the school or Ms. Weiner that Berger chooses to include in the article, and again he must breeze over rather than explore it if the story is to keep the spin he wants to put on it. He follows that sentence with, "Still, it is a telling measure that in a neighborhood where many middle-class white parents send children to private schools, Crossroads, where most students are black and hispanic, annually drew white students as well." Because EVERYONE knows that if WHITE parents allow their WHITE kids to attend an NYC public school then it MUST be good. Couldn't be because not every white family in the neighborhood can afford private school. Of course not. There's no such thing as lower and working class caucasians in Manhattan anymore. And even if there are that doesn't change Berger's clear message that white = good and black/latino = bad.
I was one of the 60 students who made up Crossroads first incoming class in 1990. What I remember from my three years there were tons of throw-away periods. "Classes" like Advisory, Silent Sustained Reading (SSR), and Writer's Workshop that quickly deteriorated into free periods of socializing because the teachers didn't know how to control a class. I remember being relentlessly bullied and picked on in clear view of teachers and authority figures, and never seeing a single student get punished or reprimanded for their behavior, nor a single teacher come to my rescue. I remember them testing out new progressive classes like "Humanities" on us. In theory, Humanities was supposed to fuse History and English into one class. The problem with it was that we always wound up with a teacher skilled in one subject or the other. So, while we SHOULD have received some form of structured English education, what we ended getting was year after year of straight up History class with only a scant amount of formal English.
Crossroads wasn't all bad. I met...one or two genuinely nice human beings there. I came into contact with one of the most influential teachers I have ever had there. One who had such a profound effect on me as a writer that to this day, when I read over any piece of my own creative writing, I can literally point to places in the text and say "Mr. Cibula taught me to do that." And the small size DID make it feel like a close knit community even if the majority of its members were cruel, rowdy, hair-pulling, arm-punching, book-vandalizing 11-13 year olds. In Berger's article he writes that Crossroads graduates "went on to strong high schools like Beacon, Mott Hall, and the Museum School." But those are all alternative high schools that deal in pedagogy similar to that found at Crossroads. I went on to graduate from a good alternative high school as well. What I didn't realize until I got to college was that by championing unconventional teaching methods and curricula "alternative" schools fail to instill their students with the skills required to succeed in traditional schools that teach traditional material.
I found myself woefully unprepared for my first year of college. Whereas many of my fellow first years had taken AP classes in high school (a term I'd never even HEARD before entering college) had read many of the assigned first year and introductory level texts while still in high school, and knew how to critically analyze a text and formulate a thesis, I didn't. I felt stupid, and I wound up wasting a large portion of my first year of college learning how to do the basic shit everyone else already knew how to. I suspect I would have had a similarly rude awakening had I gone from Crossroads to a traditional high school rather than an alternative high school. And when I say "normal" I mean a school that sticks to conventional grading, curricula, and organizational practices.
Not that I have anything but great things to say about my high school. I LOVED high school. I'm probably the only person on the face of the planet who did. I loved the people, I loved (most of) the teachers, I loved (most of) the work I had to do. Every morning I woke up happy at the thought of going to school. Doesn't change the fact that MVA did not properly prepare me or any of my classmates for college level work.
I am now bitter that I did not get a conventional education. Maybe if I had, I wouldn't have floundered so badly during my first couple years of college. Maybe I'd have a better understanding of certain subjects. Then again, maybe I wouldn't. Maybe it wouldn't have made a lick of difference. I'll never know. However, I do think it is irresponsible not to teach students basic things that colleges and society in general will expect them to know. Basic grade appropriate English, American History, Science, Mathematics, and Geography classes should all be required. For alternative schools to shrug off the importance of these subjects, not to mention basic discipline (and, I gotta admit, MVA knew how to shell out discipline and weed out bad eggs,) only harms the student body and instigates the sort of academic deterioration highlighted in the NYT article when leaders with more traditional ideas about education take over these schools and have no idea how to operate within the "alternative" social and educational structure that is already in place.
