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Volume 23, No. 4

TheNewjournal February 1, 1991

page 9

page 11

ABOUT THIS ISSUE 5 NEWSJOURNALS 6 A Literary Oasis... Dressed for Su ccess page 14

page 20

MINI fEATURES Urban Elites ... By Erik Meers 9 A Question of Difference .. . By Emily Bazelon 11 Scoring off the Court ... By David Kovel 14 Tomorrow's Teachers Today ... By Sally Horchow 23 Too Much, Too Soon ... By Mia Bay 25 The Rules of Attraction ... By Suneeta Hazra 35

fEATURES

Busing or Bust 16

By Jennifer Pitts Hartford parents file suit to rewrite Connecticut's archaic racial integration laws.

With a special report by Kath erine McCarron

Food for Thought

20

By Caitlin Macy A free meal starts a school day where institutions take on parental roles.

PROFILES

On Top for Now 28

By Motoko Rich Some swear by him and some swear at him, but John Dow gets his job done.

To Teach the Children Well 32

By Kathy Reich A Hillhouse High School teacher makes urban education more than an academic issue.

AFTERTHOUGHT 37 Education En Vogue ... By Edith MacMullen.

(Volume 23, Number 4) ~New journal is published six times during the school year by The New journal at Yale, Inc., Post Office Box 3432 Yale Station, New Haven, CT 06520. Copyright 1991

by The New Journal at Yale, Inc. All rights reserved. Reproduction either in whole or in part without written permission ol the publisher and editoJ'oin-chief is prohibited. This magazine is published by Yale CoUege students, and Yale University is not responsible for its contents. Eleven thousand copies of each issue ane distributed free to members of the Yale University community. The Nno Jourrwl is printed by Turley Publications of Palmer, MA. Bookkeeping and billing sevices ane provided by Colman Bookkeeping of New Haven, CT. Office address: 305 Crown Street, Office 312. Phone: (2()3) 432¡1957. Subscriptions are available to those outside the Yale community. Rates: One year, SIS. Two years, $26. The New founun encourages letters to the editor and comment on Yale and New Haven issues. Write to Motoko Rich, Editorials, 3432 Yale Station. New Haven, CT 06520. All letters for publication must include address and signatune.

Th~ Nnu foumlll reserves the right to edit aU letters for publication.

February 1, 1991

The New Journal 3

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February 1,1991

About This Issue

A TNJ reporter wanted to write about "tracking" in the New Haven public schools.

He hoped to talk to teachers and students at one of the city's high schools, but a high-level administrator squelched the project. The administrator feared that the reporter might give the school a bad rap. In his estimation, educators had invested too much time and energy cleaning up the schools to risk getting bad press. In the past, a few words from New Haven journalists had undermined the image that educators had worked so hard to create.

"We've been burned before," said the administrator.

While the reporter decided to highlight tracking by writing about a specific honors program, he knew he would not get the whole story. If we've learned anything from putting together this¡ special issue on education, it's that the whole story is an elusive thing. Even if administrators had given us free rein to talk to whomever we wanted, we knew our own biases could still skew our reporting. Though we live and study in New Haven, we all have a lot to learn about education in the city that surrounds us. Many of us get a glimpse of February 1, 1991

local schools by volunteering, but it is still difficult for us to gain an informed view of Elm City educational issues.

On the national level, it seems equally difficult to get an informed view of education, the cause celebre on the domestic agenda of the '90s. The rhetoric often sounds hollow and abstract, and the catch phrases distant from reality. With this issue, TNJ hopes to contribute concrete information that will ground old arguments and generate new ones.

Through interviews, research and a vigilant sense of our limitations, we have tried to report on the actual conditions and programs that operate in New Haven's public schools.

Here we profile several people and programs that attempt to improve education in New Haven: a social studies teacher at Hillhouse High School, free breakfasts in the schools, Yale tutoring groups, the Macy Prep program, Superintendent John Dow and others.

Through these articles we hope to look beyond ourselves and begin to understand the issues that confront the community around us.

-MR The New Journal 5

NewsJournals

City librarians hope that $17 million in renovations will aUract chlldren.to the public library.

A Literary Oasis After they finish classes at New Haven's Sheridan Middle School, Jason Jackson and Jerome Harper take the bus downtown to the newly-renovated main branch of the public library. It's not that their homework requires endless research; Jackson and Harper go to the library every day because they like it. "It's better than home," explained Jackson as he looked up from a math problem. "It's good for doing homework. There are no distractions or temptations here." Harper added, "It's really nice here. It's a place to learn more."

Jackson and Harper are taking advantage of the downtown library's recent expansion. Despite the city's fiscal crisis, the New Haven library system raised enough money to expand its central facility. The New Haven Free Public Library, on the corner of Elm and Temple Streets, re-opened last November after undergoing renovations costing nearly $17 million.

While New Haven still lags far behind nearby cities in library services, officials hope this expansion will make up some of the difference.

The renovations took more than 6 The New Journal

two years to complete and tripled the library's size to 100,000 square feet. The new space provides room for 80 percent of the library's collection in open stacks; before, readers had to wait for librarians to fetch most books. T he library also boasts a new public computer facility, an audio-visual station with compact disc players and video cassette recorders, an employment information section, and rooms for literacy tutoring.

Despite the recent expansion, the library system has not escaped the fiscal restraints that have hurt all of New Haven's city services. In 1976, there were eight libraries throughout the city; today only four remain. Forty-eight people staff the main library, down from 83 two years ago, and the library opens its doors only 33 hours a week. A government study found that New Haven has the smallest library b u dget per capita in all of Connecticu t. But librarians are still optimistic. "When we're open, everything is accessible and there is plenty of staff to help," said Joanne Connelly, director of t he reference department. "We'd rather stay open fewer hours and p r ovide good service than open for more h ours than we cou ld handle."

Some say that 33 hours, even with good service, isn't nearly enough . "It's

ridiculous," argued Harry O'Connor, librarian at Wilbur Cross High School.

"You're talking six days a week. And out of the whole six days you can only find thirty-some hours to go there."

Although library hours have shortened, librarians have made the main branch more accessible to students. Teachers can request library tours for their classes, and a Children's Services Department handles the needs of elementary sch,qol readers. To attract teenagers, the library created a new young-adult reading section and boosted its research facilities. "We're a pretty central location, and the other branches have limited resources," Connelly said. "High school students are going to have to come here to do their research papers." Nevertheless, many local students have not yet discovered their new library.

"I just found out about it three days ago," said Odette Morrison, a junior at Cooperative High SchooL "It's a great place just to relax and read. But nobody knows about it. I wouldn't have heard about it if my friend hadn't brought me." H illhouse High School English teacher Fran Perricotti asked her students whether they use the public libraries. "The feedback I get is that they really don't," said Perricotti.

Ernest Roth, assistant principal at Hillhouse, agrees with this assessment.

"My guess is that they probably don't use it very much. As they get to the high school, I don't think there are many opportunities for kids to be made aware of the public library and the resources they have."

The only library many New Haven students use is the one in their school.

Both major city high schools, Wilbur Cross and Hillhouse, have small school libraries which provide reference materials, periodicals, and a modest book collection of 11,000 volumes. "We get students here from A to Z, from third grade reading level to future Yale students," O'Connor noted. "I've got to February 1, 1991

provide for all of them." Botlr school libraries are open during classes and for an hour after school.

These libraries, however, often lack adequate materials for the resear ch papers that juniors and seniors face each spring. "Just like every library, the H illhou se library cou ld use more resour ces," said Hillhouse teacher Robert Moore. To help students in their research, he encourages his students to use the public library system. "The library is limited," said Moore. "But you have to direct your students. If they want to do serious research, they are going to have to go to the public library ." With the renovated main branch now open, more students like Jackson and Harper may take Moore's advice.

-Julian Ku

Dressed for Success Jeffie Frazier worries about her students.

"Even at elementary schools," said the principal of the Helene Grant School, "children are being killed over expensive items." But Frazier and a growing number of local educators think they have a solution: public school uniforms.

In 1988, Helene Grant became the first of five New Haven elementary schools to put students in uniform. Four other schools-Truman, Vincent Mauro, Lincoln Basset, and Columbus-soon followed suit, while students at Isadore Wexler and Jackie Robinson Middle School will begin wearing uniforms next September. "The idea came from the parents," Frazier said.

"They understand what children are going through if other children make fun of

Uniform advocates want students to devote less attention to fashion trends.

February 1, 1991

them." Debra Kelly, who has three children at Grant, is a big fan of the policy. "I think it's a fantastic idea," she said. "In today's economy, you just don't have the money to spend on clothes."

Charles Flynn, principal of the Truman School, has parents like Kelly in mind. "The uniforms are economical and easy to maintain," he said. "The students need about two sets to last the year." Both Helene Grant and Truman help parents who cannot afford the uniforms, which range between $30 and $50. Robinson, however, provides no such assistance. ''We don't help parents when they buy their children clothing at the beginning of the school year," said principal Charles Warner. "After all, we have a lot of kids around here wearing $100 sneakers."

Administrators feel that putting students in identical clothing gets rid of a primary source of competition. They want students to devote more attention to homework and less to fashion. "We needed to eliminate an obstacle to learning," Frazier said. "We instill in the students the idea that clothes can be thrown away, but what you have inside your brain, no one can take from you."

Flynn adds that uniforms will help maintain security. "If you come into the school and you're not in uniform, you get a second look," said Flynn. "The kid who's just drifting in, scouting out the place--1 want to know what he's doing here." Both principals say their students feel part of a special group when in uniform; they are members of a distinctive and respected school. ''We're conveying the concept of family," said Flynn. "We're one big Truman family.

When you're out on the street with that uniform on, you're representing Truman."

The policies seem to work. At Gran t , Frazier reports that since students began wearing uniforms, test scores have risen, while the number of disciplinary cases has dropped. All her The New Journal 7

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students come to school in uniform.

Flynn estimates the success rate of Truman's newer program to be around 90 percent. In an attempt to boost participation, Truman's principal offers his students incentives. Pizza parties and movies go to the classes that boast the highest monthly number of students in uniform.

Not everyone has been happy with the change to uniforms. During the policy's first year at Grant, the parents o.f one child complained to the Connecticut Civil Liberties Union, claiming violation of their civil rights._ "The parents I spoke with seemed primarily concerned with their right to decide," said CCLU director William Olds. "The principal obviously disagreed with us, but nevertheless, we felt that parents should ultimately be able to decide what their children wear." The incident was resolved when the student agreed to dress neatly for school each day. The CCLU has heard no o ther complaints.

Efforts to institute a uniform policy in the city's seven middle schools have been slow in coming. So far, only Robinson has made the move. While other middle schools are eager to join Robinson, administrators are waiting for parents to speak up. "We need parents to push for uniforms," said Carl Babb, assistant principal at Roberto Clemente. "But if middle schools are going that way, we're not going to be the last one."

Even if New Haven's middle schools don't adopt uniforms, Frazier and Flynn are confident their programs will have a lasting impact on t heir students. 'We've said to boys and girls that they are special," said Frazier. "If you want children to learn, one of the first things they must do is to feel good about themselves. That w as our goal in adopting uniforms, and that is still our aim."

-lAura Heymann

8 The New Journal

February 1, 1991

Urban Elites Erik Meers

An annual grant of $98,000 to Hillhouse High School is creating unusual opportunities for Its top students.

The sign in front of New Haven's oldest high school reads: "Hillhouse High School: Champions in Athletics and Academics." While Hillhouse students have always excelled in athletics, the arrival of the Macy Prep program in 1986 boosted confidence in the classroom. A grant provides a select group of students with special science instruction and enriched courses in English and math. For the past five years, the Josiah Macy Foundation has given this inner-city high school a $98,000 annual grant to fund an ambitious curriculum for the top 40 students in each class. Still, Hillhouse administrators realize that the Macy program must contend with the overwhelming problems that their students face. "We have kids that are coming from family situations that are really disastrous," said Marc Blosveren, February 1, 1991

the Macy program director at Hillhouse.

'We are fighting against those disasters to get the kids to realize that they can do the work. We can get them into

"Public schools, instead of projecting into the future, have reacted to crisis. We have a real crisis going on." college."

The Macy Foundation, dedicated to " minority science education," chose Hillhouse because of its almost entirely

African-American population. The grant pays for extra class time, training for teachers, and lab materials for science cours es. Hillhouse science teachers have used some of the money to attend workshops at the famous Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory on Long Island.

To qualify for the program, students must demonstrate that they read at their grade level. This group constitutes about ten percent of the s tudents at Hillhouse. Even if the students qualify, the administration only takes students who demonstrate an active interest in the Macy curriculum.

Once accepted, students cannot cut more than two classes per semester to stay in the program.

The English component of the Hillhouse Macy program includes Ethnoliterature, in which students study The New Journal 9

the social histories of the various ethnic groups represented in New Haven. In the ambitious science program, the curriculum includes microbiology and physiology. Students use medicalschool case histories, and dissect specimens ranging from sharks to cats.

The foundation pays for high-tech laboratory equipment often absent in even the most exclusive private schools.

In addition to providing this sparkling equipment, the Macy curriculum responds to the particular

"Most kids don 't have parents with a college or even a high school diploma. " social problems that many of these students face: drugs, domestic violence, and street crime. "Public schools, instead of projecting into the future, have reacted to crisis," Blosveren said.

"We have a real crisis going on."

Last year, tutors from The Princeton Review helped Macy juniors prepare for the Scholastic Aptitude Test.

The program's teachers also helped with college applications. For many of the students, the program makes college seem attainable. "Most kids here don't have parents with a college or even a high school diploma," said Blosveren. In the two classes that have graduated, all but three students went on to college.

Despite the outpouring of money and effort, returning Macy alumni report having difficulty keeping up with reading in college. Moreover, the students have shown little improvement on standardized tests. Macy programs in New York, Alabama, and Arizona report similarly disappointing scores.

The sponsor is demanding better results, especially on reading comprehension tests. "The foundation is coming down really hard. They want to see them doing so much reading that it 10 The New Journal

is coming out of their ears," said Blosveren. To meet the foundation's demands, Hillhouse is now implementing an extensive reading program with regular testing for all Macy students.

Such extra attention and money spent on Macy students causes resentment among some of their nonMacy classmates, those in the lower "honors," "college-level," or "special-ed" tracks. A high proportion of Macy students lead the school's student government, athletic teams, and extracurricular organizations. A single group of students sticks together in all of its Macy classes. This system helps the teachers monitor students' development and detect problems early.

It also fosters many close friendships.

Some people outside the program, however, view Macy students as cliqueish. "The honors and Macy students just socialize with each other," said tenthgrader Chris Santos, who wants to get into the Macy program.

Many Hillhouse teachers, however, believe the creation of an academic elite

"People feel that either you are a Macy student or you aren 't.

The others feel that they are have-nots. " is beneficial to the school, making achievement socially acceptable. Macy recalls the spirit that once christened Hillhouse sports teams "the Academics." Administrators note that many of the best students join the program after their freshman year, when they see friends who are in the program sticking with it. "I've heard a lot of students say that they would like to be in the Macy program, so I think it serves as an incentive," said Macy

chemistry teacher Lise Orville. "Kids are willing to work a little harder to be in Macy." Still, Orville fears that lessmotivated students get the wrong message and view their lower academic status as inevitable. "I think that we haven't been careful enough to say to students that they can get into Macy if they work very hard. People feel that either they are a Macy student or they aren't. The others feel that they are the have-nots."

Although sotne Macy students come from very poor families, most do not. By contrast, the majority of Hillhouse parents have incomes near_ the poverty line. "A large number of Macy students are middle class. A lot of professionals-teachers, doctors., or nurses-send their kids to Hillhouse," said Orville. Although Blosveren claims that the Macy program has brought more affluent students to Hillhouse, he rejects the idea that Macy fosters elitism.

"They're just a group of students, with the same ability as everyone else, who are taking advantage of what they have."

Despite the program's uncertain results, most of the students believe that the Macy name will help them get into more prestigious colleges. "A lot of them want to be somebody and get out of this school," said Terry Bailly, a nonMacy student. For many Macy students, "being somebody" often means escaping from New Haven. "A number of our Macy graduates visit and say 'I'll never come back to New Haven. I'm going to get my degree and move on,"' Blosveren said. "In the past, with white communities, we called it upward mobility." li1J

Erik Meers, a sophomore in Berkeley College, is on the staff ofTNJ.

February 1, 1991

A Question of Difference Emily Bazelon

Tutoring groups are puUing Yale students In touch with kids from New Haven middle schools.

Other Yale groups that work with Hillhouse High School junior Alisa Reed wanted to boost her grades in New H aven children wonder how racial differences between tutor and student chemistry and English. For extra help, affect the educational process. At the she turned to Branch, a tutoring program founded in 1989 by Yale Ulysses S. Grant Foundation, where Yale students teach classes in English students. One of the tutors assigned to and math on campus for talented sixth Reed is white, the other Africanthrough ninth graders, charges that American, like Reed. "Both of them are white teachers lacked racial sensitivity really helpful, and I'm comfortable with provoked a major upheaval last spring. them," she said. "But we talk about The organization's board of directors different stuff together." Reed's Africanalmost suspended classes when its American tutor attended a high school counseling department and assistant similar to Hillhouse and talks to Reed director walked out in protest. about what it's like to go to a The indignant counseling staff, predominantly white college. Still, Reed made up entirely of students of color, doesn't think that race plays a big role believed that they were the only staff in her relationships with her tutors. "I members who paid sufficient attention don't think about whether they're white to racial and class issues. "We felt that or black when I'm with either of them," the teachers were not adequately she said "I just think about how they're responding to the needs of the students h elping me."

February 1, 1991

they were trying to teach," said Billy Ray Gonzalez (PC '91), the assistant director who led the walk-out. "They refused to see that dealing with issues of race and class is central."

Gonzalez thinks that Yale students need intensive sensitivity training before they can teach effectively. Grant seems to have taken his words to heart.

Last summer, then-program director Jeff Dolven (CC '90) asked teaching candidates questions about how they would handle racial tensions in class.

For the first t ime, Grant leaders ran workshops about racial, ethnic and class differences, and its present staff is more racially diverse than before. "This was the 'consciousness year,"' said new teacher Crystal Marie Smith (DC '93).

"The workshops were a good start because they admitted that you might The New Journal 11

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encounter problems just because you are white."

Still, Dolven refuses to accept the possibility that white teachers do more harm than good. "At its best, Grant provides an environment where the dignity of the individual is part of dayto-day life," he said. "Differences are honored but not perceived as divisive."

Dolven recognizes that Yale students may fall short of meeting these ideals.

"Few undergraduates can really work through issues of racial consciousness with a group of junior high kids," he said. ,, While other Yale tutoring groupsBranch, Youth Together, and Urban -Improvement Corps-have not faced the upheaval that disrupted U. S. Grant, each group has .shaped its own philosophy on the role of race in education. Youth Together, structured around independent projects for. students at the Roberto Clemente Middle School, tries to select a group of tutors that reflects Yale's racial and class composition. "The kids are used to the mainstream white culture," said current director Margaret Etienne (MC '91). "But it's important for them to see people who look different from each other working together as equals."

Eighth-graders Jose Candelario and Kimberly Smart say that their images of white people have changed since they joined Youth Together.

"There are only five white kids in this school, and none in my neighborhood," said Smart. "Until I started working with my tutor, most of what I thought about them came from negative images on TV." Candelario thinks that the program makes cooperation seem more attractive. "It shows us that you can work with white people, and that segregation is not the right thing," he said.

Candelario's tutor, David Pepper (BK '93), says his work in the program has made talking about race easie¡r .

"Last year I shied away from even saying the word 'black' to someone of color," Pepper said. "But I talk about race all the time with my student and February 1, 1991

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with the minority tutors."

Other programs also hope to break down stereotypes. Hillhouse chemistry teacher Lise Orville believes Branch proves eye-opening for tutors. "It's important for Yalies to know what the community they live in is really like rather than just being scared by it," she said. David Coleman (BR '91), Branch's founder, hopes that tutors will leave prejudices beh ind when they enter H illhouse doors. "There is a danger of tutors bringing in preconceived notions about how Hillhouse students behave," he said. "It is u~terly important to respond to them as individuals."

While Branch may encourage tutors to go beyond cultural stereotypes, the program also helps dispel Hillhouse kids' misconceptions about Yale students. Art tutor Dan Clarke (CC '93) remembers that kids first assumed he owned a car. Youth Together's Etienne believes that as an African-American woman, she can change student assumptions about who goes to Yale. "At first the kids don't believe I go to Yale, because for them it's a place where African-Americans work in the dining halls," she said.

Monica Simmons (MC '91), director of the Urban Improvement Corps (UIC), a tutoring program that operates out of the Afro-American Cultural Center, believes that African-American tutors give students a sense of their potential.

'Tm happy that we have a lot of African-American tutors because the tutees are people of color in need of positive role models," said Simmons.

She also believes that the bond of race gives tutors of color a head start.

"Students may not take as long to warm up to us because race is something very visible they can identify with," she said.

Indeed, Youth Together participant Smart recalls that the first time she met her white tutor, she felt put off. "I left the room," said Smart. "I thought I w o u ldn't like working with a white tutor." Smart changed her mind by the end of the first session. "Now I really like her," said Smart.

UIC's Simmons maintains that as February 1, 1991

an African-American tutor, she is more in tune with her students. " I can relate to the student's fa m ily or school situation," she said. Still, former Grant Assistant Director Gonzalez feels that the common bond of r ace does n ot guarantee sensitivity. "To be successful, Yale students of color require the same training as white students do in respecting differences," he said.

Although Branch does not yet have an official training session, Coleman is wary of providing too much training before students begin t utoring. "We don't want to saddle them with huge generalizations about what it means to be an inner-city kid," he said. Still, Coleman realizes that tutors need some preparation. "We don't want our tutors to go in with any illusions about how difficult some of the skill problems and family problems are," he said.

UIC tutor Adria Imada (DC '93) often wishes that her tra ining had included more information about the environment in which her students live.

"Kids come in talking about violent situations at home or in their neighborhood," she sa id. " I'm frustrated because I don't have the knowledge or resources to help."

When tutors meet with students, what goes unsaid may be the most telling of all. Last fall, while helping out in an art class, Branch tutor Clarke noticed one student creating a graphic design that incorporated the words: "Blacks and Whites Unite." " I was really impressed with the design, and I told him so," said Clarke. "But I felt it was inappropriate for me to ask him about the social implications of that slogan."

While Clarke and other Yale students struggle to define their role as tutors within New Haven schools, chemistry teacher Orville believes their academic function is paramount.

"Helping the kids with their work is the meat of what tutors do, and anything else is pure gravy," she said.

1&1) Emily Bazelon, a sophomore in Pierson College, is on the staff ofTNJ.

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Expires March15, 1991 The New Journal 13

Scoring off the Court .David Kovel

¡I

Five hundred fans packed Southern Connecticut State University's basketball stadium this January for the semiannual men's game between Wilbur Cross and Hillhouse High Schools. Both teams rank consistently among the top basketball powers in the state; last year the Hillhouse Academics beat the Cross Governors in the finals of the state championship. Although neither team is likely to make the finals this year, their match two weeks ago was a thriller.

In the opening minutes Hillhouse kept the edge, but Cross managed to stay close, never falling behind more than three points. Midway through the first quarter, the Governors took the upper hand, widening their lead w 13 points. In the final minutes of the half_ Hillhouse surged to within eight ¡ points, but never managed to take the lead. The Governors blew the Academics away in the final quarter, winning by 12 _ points. The New Haven school system's version of the Lakers-Celtics game was over. ¡ Sal Savo, assistant supervisor of athletics for the N~w Haven public schools, believes the city's basketball teams are successful because the game itself is inexpensive and easily

As New Haven kids get older, basketball becomes more important to their futures. In the.past 25 years, Cross has sent 110 basketball players on to college.

The basketball rivalry between Wilbur Cross and Hillhouse is as intense as the familiar one between the lakers and the Celtics.

14 The New Journal

accessible. Children can learn the sport even without lessons or equipment, although Boys and Girls Clubs throughout the city offer organized basketball programs. New H aven children learn to play ball not from coaches, but from pick-up games on neighborhood courts or in the clubs. For many of the players on the Hillhouse women's team, high school marks the first time they have played organized ball.

As New Haven kids get older, basketball becomes more important to their futures. In the past 25 years, Cross has sent 110 basketball players on to college. Cross and Hillhouse graduates now attend such powerful basketball schools as Lasalle and Louisiana State University. Some of these players, however, may not have been academically prepared for college. Maurice Williamson, a Cross graduate attending LS'I,.J, was ineligible to p lay this year because of academic problems.

In response to cases like this one, the New Haven Ath letic Department has established supplementary academic programs for its athletes.

Five years ago, Bob Laemet Supervisor of Athletics for February 1, 1991

r' r'

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New Haven's public schools, institUted a tutorial program to believes they cannot sufficiently address academic problems give athletes extra help. Teachers tutor athletes so they can which begin before the players reach high school. He suggests keep up their grades and remain eligible to play. Failing that schools use basketball as an educational tool not only for students are not allowed to participate in sports. secondary school students but for young children as well.

Still, athletes often find the tutorials inadequate. One new program, Biddy-Basketball, combines education "Teachers don't always make you do what you're supposed to with basketball for 162 public school children aged four do," said Terry Brookshire, a junior basketball player at Cross. through 12. Directed by high school coaches, the program "But you can get help if you ask for it yourself." Hillhouse brings children to Hillhouse on Saturday mornings. Hillhouse basketball player Dorheen Towles said the tutorial often students provide both academic and athletic training for the seems more like a social hour than a study session. "The children. An Assistant Basketball Coach at Cross and Biddytutorial program gives us time to do work and to get help Basketball coordinator, Tom Fleming, believes that having from teachers if we need ;;; high school students it, but it is sometimes ~ teach the children distracting because there ~ makes this kind of are so many people there." ~ instruction more But Paul Goglia, exciting than classroom history teacher at Cross learning. "Any child and former director of the psychologist will tell tutorial program, thinks ~ you that children are the study sessions are less bored by and learn productive. "Any athlete faster from older kids," that shows a need for he said. "Basketball is interactive help gets it," he something that almost said. He believes the every kid likes, and to program has value even get an educational for students who don't component with it is need extra academic help. rare."

"A study period may be Biddy-Basketball exactly what some athletes administrators hope need. The period between that the program will school and practice is help improve the kids' usually wasted time academic futures. For anyway. With the tutorial Basketball players ~ho earn low~r than a B minus in any class must attend athletes at Hillhouse period, the students are an after school tutonal program If they want to stay on the team. and Cross, basketball able to use this time more efficiently." already works as an educational tool; at the very least it keeps Although the tutorial program is available to all athletes, them in school. Laemel claims that while the drop-out rate in the basketball teams have created their own programs. Jim New Haven is approximately 20 percent, only two percent of Wolf, head coach of the Hillhouse men's team, invited Yale student athletes quit school. Moreover, the discipline that athletes who tutor in the Branch program to teach a weekly coaches like Salisbury demand on the court spills over into Scholastic Aptitude Test review for his players. The review classroom behavior. "The basketball players have always been improves athletes' chances of college acceptance and also some of the best-behaved students in my class, and their addresses Proposition 48, the National Collegiate Athletic grades are often as good or better than the class average," Association regulation which requires a minimum combined Goglia said. Teenagers love basketball and are willing to SAT score of 700 to play varsity sports in the fi rst year of abide by the academic and disciplinary rules required to play. college. Terell Myers, a Hillhouse junior, thinks his SAT scores "Rules don't bother me," said Cross senior Emanuel will rise because of the review. Branch d irector D avid Williamson. "I'm playing something I like."

18) Coleman (BR '91) hopes that improvements in the basketball players' test scores will encourage o ther coaches to try similar programs.

While Bob Salisbury, the Cross men's basketball coach, thinks these programs are steps in the right direction, he David Kovel is a sophomore in Calhoun College.

February 1, 1991

The New Journal 15

. '

Busing or Bust Jennifer Pitts Separate may not be e q ual, but it seems to be the rule in hopelessly outdated. Under the act, ethnic populations within Connecticut. The student body at New Haven's Hillhouse a school must mirror the composition of the district as a whole.

High School, for example, is now 98 percent African- The intention of the law was to prevent cities from having American. While students of color account for only a quarter separate schools for white and non-white students. Twenty of Connecticut's public school population, they are years ago, a law based on individual school districts might concentrated in a handful of cities-New Haven, Hartford, have been enough to maintain integrated schools. But after Bridgeport and Waterbury. In contrast, 115 of the state's 169 .two decades of white flight-the exodus of middle-class districts have non-white enrollments of less than five percent. whites from cities to suburbs-whole towns and cities are "Under current law, there is no way to achieve racially unbalanced. meaningful integration in Connecticut," said John Brittain, a The old law may actually thwart efforts at integration. law professor at the University of Connecticut. Hoping to While a school in Hartford or New Haven with an entirely reverse a 30-year trend toward segregation, Brittain is African-American and Latino student body is in compliance representing 19 Hartford-area residents in Sheff v. O'Neill, a with the Racial Imbalance Act, any public !j<;hool population in class-action suit against the state. The plaintiffs claim that these cities over 35 percent white is illegal. At the same time, racial and economic imbalances between Hartford and its .most suburban or rural public schools cannot have student suburbs violate the Connecticut state constitution, which populations less than 70 percent white. Because of assures every citizen's right to an education. The case will be Connecticut's residential segregation, schools are almost heard by a state court this spring. Regardless of the initial required not to integrate. outcome, appeals will cer tai nly follow. But if the Sheff The legislators who drafted the act, Brittain says, were not plaintiffs ultimately prevail, the court will force Connecticut simply shortsighted. As early as 1955, the United States Civil to legislate state-wide desgregation.

Rights Commission warn¡e d Connecticut of the growing racial Though Connecticut has a desegregation law on the disparity between its cities and suburbs. Brittain claims that books-the Racial Imbalance Act of 1969-this legislation is the state assembly, dominated by representatives from rural =""'"'"_,..........,.,towns and suburbs, drafted a law that would not force ~suburban children to attend city schools. For these legislators, ~ Brittain argues, concern for local autonomy and the integrity of ~individual districts outweighed any desire for racial balance in ~the schools. "They hammered out a law that could not violate £sacrosanct boundaries between urban communities and their ~suburban counterparts," he said. "They knew the law would ~not have any impact on the state's three largest cities." ..., Brittain and the Sheff plaintiffs demand desegregation that will cross the lines between cities and suburbs. ''There simply are not enough white children in the cities to sprinkle around the urban school districts," Brittain said. He claims Connecticut classrooms must include both city and suburban schoolchildren. Although courts have refused to mandate interdistrict desegregation since the early '70s, Brittain is confident of victory. He emphasizes that Connecticut's current racial imbalance violates citizens' fundamental right to education as ensured by the state constitution.

The state's attorneys argue that Connecticut cannot accept legal responsibility for the problem. ''The state did not create these demographic conditions and is not violating the constitution," said John Whelan, the main defense attorney in Sheff. Whelan believes that the state's racial imbalance should be addressed with policy initiatives, not court orders. "If the case is decided in favor of the plaintiffs, a single judge will be taking over the entire Hartford school system," he said.

"Segregation," wrote Gerald Tirozzi, the state's Education Attorney and professor John Brittain said, "Under current law, Commissioner, in a 1988 report, "is educationally, morally and legally wrong." But he insists that court involvement won't there's no way to achieve meaningful Integration."

16 The New Journal

February 1, 1991

Spc(1king the¡ San1L' Language 1! ~

When the final bell rings at Hillhouse High School, most students beat a hasty retreat ~ from their daily studies. But a number of ~ sophomores and juniors stay put. This ~ group is joined by students from all over -e the New Haven area who are bused to g ~ Hillhouse four times a week to participate g. in Hi llhouse's International Studies .:3 Program. Picking up where most high school language curricula leave off, the program offers courses in Chinese, Japanese, and Russian. Participants devote eight hours a week to conjugating verbs, translating passages and memorizing dialogues. But hard work has its rewards.

During the summer, program members travel to China, Japan or the Soviet Union to practice their newly-acquired language skills. They live with families, tour museums, and journey through the countryside. To top it off, the students don't have to pay for anything but souvenirs. The federal government picks up the tab.

The US Department of Education funds International Studies at Hillhouse because the program doubles as an experiment in voluntary integration. Of the 1,()20 students who attend Hillhouse during school hours, 95.3 are African-American, 51 are Latino, and 12 are white. In contrast, the after-school program is more ethnically balanced. Eighteen African-American and Latino, 35 white, and 6 Asian students participate. Program administrator Edith MacMullen says that this balance 1s the result of a concerted effort to recruit students from schools throughout the New Haven area.

Educators attribute the success of this integration experiment to the strength of the language instruction. The language classes are team-taught by a certified teacher and a native speaker. While one explains the basics, the other coaches students' accents and helps them master idioms. NWith the two-teacher system, there is far more instruction and flexibility," MacMullen said.

New Haven Supelintendent of Schools John Dow believes the rigor of the program explains its success as a tool for mtegration. uwe have white students coming into

)

February 1, 1991

TheNewJoumal 17

1

'

solve anything. Integration, he says, will only work if it is voluntary. To stave off court involvement in the issue, Tirozzi founded the Commission on Quality and Integrated Education. "We have to show the courts that Connecticut is serious about voluntary remedies," he said.

Tirozzi wants to see the s t ate earmark funds for magnet schools and desegregation specialists. He says that the state legislature must also encourage joint educational ventures betw~en the cities and suburbs. "Connecticut gives New Haven 80 cents on the dollar to build schools, and only about 40 cents to suburban districts," Tirozzi said.

"Suburban taxpayers will soon see the value of joint construction."

Brittain warns that T i rozzi's

"If the court forces desegregation, all hell will break loose." remedies are not enough. "We have a blunt admission of racial and economic segregation by the state's top educator," he said. "But the commissioner's voluntary efforts are marginal in their impact." Right now, the state's integration efforts are con1ined mostly to after-school and summer programs.

Only a court manda.te, according to Brittain, will achieve adequate interdistrict desegregatiOil;.

But to many Connecticut residents, interdistrict desegregation just means

forced busing. The ultimate hurdle that the Sheff plaintiffs face in ensuring court desegregation may be public opinion. "If the court forces desegregation," said Tirozzi, "all hell will break loose." A recent survey of Connecticut residents indicates that although most people believe integration is essential to quality education, only 32 percent are willing to accept busing. Given Connecticut's

To many Conneclicut â&#x20AC;˘ residents, interdistrict desegregation just means forced busing.

Hillhouse's after-school language program Is better integrated than classes during regular school hours.

18 The New Journal

February 1, 1991

8

Hillhouse every day for ::'le program," Dow

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them," Tirozzi said. "New Haven officials began to wonder why they were taking our best s tudents and returning the ones they didn't want."

Discouraged by the experience and facing a fiscal crisis, the city pulled out from the program altogether.

Whether Connecticut manages to make voluntary integration work this time or the court hands the state a mandate, c ity officials ca nnot desegregate urban centers on their own.

"The state must e nd orse collective responsibility to desegregate the schools of Connecticut," said Tirozzi.

Connecticut Civil Liberties Union lawyer Philip Tegeler believes state involvement is forthcoming.

"Connecticut cannot administer a system that deprives children of equal education opportunities," he said. ''This case is as much about quality education as it is about desegregation."

Ia)

Although white students come to Hillhouse for this program, they stay for only two hours. "We might not get the same response if it was for the whole day," Program Director Burt Saxon said. Even on a small sca le, integration is a tricky business. Since students decide what language they want to take, administrators cannot socially engineer particular classrooms. "Realistically, we'd like to have each class fall within a ratio of two to one, minority to non-minority, or vice versa," Saxon said. "But that is an awkward thing to try to impose." While the Japanese class i<> racially mixed, most students in the Chinese class are either African-American or Latino. ln the Russian class, most of the students are white. Saxon admits that the program has struggled with drawing nonwhite students into Russian classes.

"Attracting minority students historically has been a problem for Soviet studies," Saxon said. Students said that AfricanAmericans in particular feel uncomfortable m the Russian class. "1 knew a black girl who dropped Russian," said Tina Couverthier, a junior in the Japanese class.

"It was like being a mouse in a room full of elephants."

The after-school language program cannot remedy Connecticut's integration woes on its own. But the program does bradge gaps between kids from different parts of the New Haven area. "In my class, we are all friends," Couverthier said. A few romances have even sprung up among the after-school students. The program also brings students to Hillhouse who might never have come otherwise. Nl'd never really seen the inside of an urban high school before," ..aid Hopkins senior Richard Coluris, a student in the Japanese class. "It's good for kids from the suburbs to see." The International Studies program strives to open the minds of New Haven students to the world around them, not just across the globe, but in their own hometown.

Jennifer Pitts, a junior in Calhoun College, is photography editor of TNJ.

Katherine MfCarron, a JUnior in Calhoun College, is on the staff of TN/.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ <!I

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demography, integration cannot proceed without busing.

Even if state officials could convince residents that busing is in their best interest, there's no saying the program would work. Busing has a lready failed once in New Haven. In the '60s and '70s, the city sent elementary school children to North Haven and other s uburbs through a state-funded voluntary integration arrangement called Project Concern. The program still buses about 700 Hartford students to the suburbs, though no suburban kids make the opposite commute. Project Concern reached its heyday in New Haven in the early '70s but could not, according to Tirozzi, weather suburban hostility.

"The suburban distric t s were behaving like private schools," Tirozzi said. Students were hand-selected for the project, and the suburban schools often sent back children with academic or behavioral problems. " In a public system, if kids act up, you don't return February 1, 1991

The New Joumal 19

Food for Thought Caitlin Macy

~ expanded health education and in-school health clinics, the ~ breakfast program represents the city's effort to provide not ~

only for students' intellectual development, but also for their physical well-being. <;~ In February 1988 the Hunger Task Force under the ~ direction of then-mayor Biagio DiLietcfs office implemented the breakfast program in response to a state-sponsored study on hunger in New Haven. The 1986 study reported that more than one-quarter of the families in the city's Hill neighborhood (near the Yale Medical School) did not have enough food. In reponse to questionnaires, families said that children sometimes missed meals and went to bed hUl)gry.

City teachers observed that these children had difficulty concentrating. "Children told me they felt hungry," said Margaret Thomas, a teacher at Martin Luther King elementary school. ''I'd have to send them down to the cafeteria and buy them a snack so they could participate in class."

Reagan-era budget cuts exacerbated hunger among city children. In 1981, revised federal guidelines reduced the number of New Haven students eligible for free or reducedprice lunches. To compensate, the Mayor's Hunger Task Force recommended that New Haven open a free breakfast program to all students in kindergarden through eighth grade--even those ineligible for a free lunch.

Despite the 1981 cuts, federal funding remained available to support breakfast programs in "needy'' districts--defined by the U.S. Department of Agriculture as those communities in which 40 percent of the children eat free or reduced-price lunches. New Haven, where only a quarter of the students pay full price for lunch, easily qualified for funding. "One of Working parents who have no time to fix breakfast can count on the the reasons the free breakfast is so important is that since the schools to feed their children a morning meal.

Reagan budget cuts, fewer families can have their children eat lunch for free," said Mary Ragno, Coordinator of the State Sometimes the juice is frozen or the fruit is not ripe. But the 25 students in Allison Gouterman's kindergarden class say Department of Child Nutrition. that usually the food tastes good. Each morning before they City officials, educators and community activists believe the meal program is working. "School breakfasts specifically practice reading and math skills, the students at the Isadore Wexler Elementary School eat a breakfast provided by the improve the performance and attendance of the students," said Laura Cohen, Director of the Connecticut Anti-Hunger New Haven public schools. Only after the students pile their Coalition. Anne Antonucci, the school nurse a t Wexler cardboard trays in the recycling bin does Gouterman instruct them to open their books and begin the lesson of the day.

Elementary, has noticed a reduction in the number of students who require her services. '1 no longer see children who don't This year the New Haven public school system will feel well because they haven't eaten breakfast," s he said. provide breakfast for 76 percent of its elementary and middle school students, nearly 10,000 children citywide. Two years Gouterman believes that the program allows her to make more demands of her students. "I know they're eating, and I ago, administrators launched the free breakfast program to alleviate hunger among the city's children. Along with can push them during the day," she said. ~

20 The New Journal

February 1, 1991

Breakfasts meet federal nutrition standards. "The government allows donuts as long as they're whole grain."

As the' schools assume responsibility for more than phonics and math, students eat during time previously spent studying. Schools serve breakfasts in the classrooms rather than in the cafeterias, and teachers must allot class time to supervise meals. "I appreciate that it gets the kids to school on time because their parents want them to eat for free, but it takes time away from lessons," said Gouterman, who allows half an hour for breakfast in her classroom.

Some question the nutritional value of the meals.

"Parents sometimes complain that the schools are serving 'junk food' when they see their children are eating donuts for breakfast," said Ragno, who stressed that all breakfasts meet federal nutrition standards. "The government allows donuts as long as they're whole grain," she said. Others feel the program promotes unhealthy eating habits. Linda Thorpe, a teacher at Martin Luther King elementary school said that some of her students habitually eat two breakfasts, one at home and one at school. "I can't stop them, even if they're overweight," she said.

Despite these pitfalls, breakfast at school continues to grow in popularity. Since September, an additional 500 students have joined the program. Ragno attributes this rise to increased economic hardship in New H aven, and social

Schools teach students mealtime manners, a lesson once left to parents.

February 1, 1991

The New Journal 21

acceptance of the program. New.Haven currently operates the largest breakfast program in Connecticut, followed by similar programs administered i n Hartford and Bridgeport.

Open to all students regardless of financial need, the breakfast program not only feeds hungry children, but assists parents as well. "If a working parent does not have time to make bacon and eggs every morning, she doesn't have to worry about whether her child will eat,'' said Head Public Health Nurse Muriel Oberg. Parents appreciate that schools provide this service. "If we're running late in the morning, my kids usually eat at school," said Susan Sapp, president of the Fair Haven Parent Teacher Organization.

Gouterman notes that the program forces schools to assume responsibilities previously considered parental. "We're teaching children how to behave a t mealtime and clean up after themselves -skills they used to learn at home," she said.

Breakfast is not the only parental responsibility the school has taken over.

A social skills curriculum implemented throughout the New Haven schools emphasizes topics ranging from AIDS, drugs and alcohol to self-esteem, relationships, decision-making and peer pressure. The program grew out of the work of nationally-recognized Ya le psychiatrist James Comer, who began developing social-skills education at Helene Grant Elementary School in 1968. "We have learned to teach the whole child," said Diane Garber, coordinator of the Social Development Program for kindergarten students 22 The New Journal

through fourth graders. "We know that you can't just tell a child to say 'no' to drugs without teaching him about the uniqueness of self and consideration for others."

While assuming tradi tiona! parental roles through the Social Development Program, school officials also want to involve parents in the educational process. "Dr. Comer's _c hild development program taught us that in

"Feeding children at school should be like busing, something we should take tor granted in public education." impoverished communities we must bring the schools and the parents together to provide a positive message for the children," said Mickey Kavanagh, facilitator for Curriculum and Social Development.

As educators seek to cultivate children's social skills, they also bring health care into the schools. At their free clinic on State Street, the schools have long provided free immunizations and physicals to students w ithout private health care providers. School nurses r outinely screen vision, hearing, and posture. But since 1983 New Haven has expanded its subsidized health services through in-school health clinics. These clinics, now operating in Wilbur Cross High School, Jackie Robinson Middle

School, and-as of January 24Katherine Brennan Elementary School, provide more comprehensive health care than is avai!able in the offices of school nurses. The funds that subsidize the clinics come from several sources, including the state and federai governments and private organizations.

By providing comprehensive health care, the clinics benefit both students and parents. These clinics oper~te in conjunction with nearby health facilities so that physicians can advise the nurse practitioners on duty at the schools. The nurses can make diagnoses and if necessary prescribe medication.

Students can also go to the clinics for psychological counseling.

Educators have long known that hungry and unhealthy children make poor students. In-school health clinics, the social development curriculum and the free breakfast program demonstrate that schools are providing services once considered solely the responsibility of the parent. While many educators are pleased with the success of these programs, they believe they need to do more. Ragno points out that free breakfasts alone cannot fully alleviate hunger among city children. Despite the present lack of funding, Ragno hopes eventually to implement a universal free lunch program. "Feeding children at school should be like busing," she said. "It's something we should take for granted as part of public education."

II1J Caitlin Macy, a junior in Saybrook College, is on the staff ofTNJ. February 1, 1991

Tomorrow's Teachers Today Sally Horchow

Edith MacMullen, director of Yale's Teacher Preparation program, is not interested in armchair philosophers.

"We want to link the ideal with the real," she said. "We don't sit and discuss education in the ivory tower." As a resu lt, Teacher Preparation is the only undergraduate pre-professional program at Yale. To complete the program, students must not only take theoretical courses like "Schools, Communities, and the Teacher" and "The Methods of Teaching" but they must also student-teach in local public high schools. The result: state teacher certification for publ ic secondary schools.

Upon completion of the Teacher Preparation program, students are qualified to teach junior and senior high school in the Connecticut public school system. Approximately 50 people per year complete the program. The University is also experimenting with a pilot Child Development program that p r epares students interested in preschool certification.

Teacher Prep has been part of the undergraduate curriculum for 20 years.

Still, the program remains small because the University hires few p rofessors with e xp e rtise in the educational process.

MacMullen is one of only two full-time ins tr uctor s in the program; all other professor s w ho teach Teacher Preparation classes have substantial February 1, 1991

"There are people who say that Yale shouldn 't have a teacher preparation program at all.

They think that anyone can teach."

commitments t o other departments.

While MacMullen teaches an education course in the history department, neither the political science nor the economics department offers any courses on educational policy. The philosophy department once sponsored a course in educational philosophy, but the professor retired, and no one has taken over the course. This paucity of classes, MacMullen says, is indicative of the University's ambivalence towards teacher training. "There are people who

Edith MacMullen, director of the Teacher Preparation program, claims that the University Is ambivalent toward teacher training.

The New Journal 23

say that Yale shouldn't have a teacher preparation program at all," she said.

"They think that anyone can teach."

Struggling for credibility is nothing new for Teacher Prep. Even in the 1950s, when Yale offered a graduate degree in education-the Master of Arts in Teaching (MAT)-University officia~s turned up their noses at teacher preparation. The University did not commit many resources to support the program, and MAT administrators had to seek outside grants. The MAT, instituted to meet a national need for teachers after the post war baby boom, was phased out in the late 60s. "Yale is a research institution devoted to developing scholars," MacMullen said.

"The MAT was there to develop

"/learned so much in ten weeks of student teaching. It's a lot more difficult than it looks." practitioners. People thought that MAT students weren't as good." Teacher Prep re-emerged in 1970 as an undergraduate program. MacMullen argues that by moving the program to the undergraduate level, the University did future teachers a favor.

Today's Teacher Prep is stronger because its undergraduate program balances practice with theory. The "Methods" course, for example, introduces theoretical approaches to classroom situations. Students in the program apply what they have learned when they teach for ten weeks in a Connecticut public school. "When someone brought a neat idea to the methods class, I could immediately go and try it, " said Jeff Carroll (TO '90), a graduate of the program. By the same toleen, students inject hard facts into

24 The New Journal

methodological discussions. "I could say, 'Well, this is the way it really happened today. This is real life,"' Carroll said.

Experienced "master teachers'~ advise Carroll and other Teacher Prep students. But ins.ide the classroom, Yalies are on their own. "My master teacher was in class with me only if I asked her to be there," Carroll said.

"But most of the time I faced the class alone."

Marilyn Szwed, the coordinator of practice teaching, is in charge of finding master teachers to participate in the program, often a formidable task. Last year, the Connecticut Assembly passed legislation that required special training for all master teachers. ¡Because teachers must sacrifice time outside of school for this training, few have volunteered.

"There are some marvelous teachers out there who are not certified to be master teachers," MacMullen said.

What's more, two other area schools-the University of Southern Connecticut and Albertus Magnus-also have students who want to practiceteach. There simply are not enough master teachers in New Haven to go around. Most of the certified master teachers are located in suburban schools, another problem for Yale students without transportation. Carroll, for example, had difficulty locating a nearby certified master teacher in social studies nearby. Szwed eventually found one at North Haven High School, but Carroll had to borrow a car to get there each day.

Graduates of Teacher Prep have even more difficulty finding permanent jobs. Although people may think that the United States can always use more teachers, hiring in public schools today is actually very limited. Job openings attract masses of applicants. It was not easy for Lucija Begonja, a Special Student who graduated from the program last year, to find work. Begonja sought public school employment for months but ended up at St. Mary's, a

Catholic girl's school in New Haven.

"Teaching is my top priority," said Begonja. "But there is so much bureaucracy and politics that you have to deal with in the public schools." The public schools do not hire until August, while private schools begin recruiting in

Although people may think that the United States can ¡always use more teachers, hiring in public schools today is actually very limited.

February.

After finally finding a job, Begonja faced conflicts with colleagues who were not prepared in the same way that she was. "They've been trained, but they haven't been challenged," she said.

Begonja finds it interesting that most of the teachers stick to uninspiring multiple choice tests, a method that she has never considered. "Edie and Marilyn pushed us to be creative and made the program special. Even today, when I have my crises in the classroom, I caU up Marilyn and ask 'What should I do?"'

The graduates of Teacher Prep feel ready for these crises. In the classrooms of MacMullen and Szwed and in the classrooms of Connecticut public schools during their practice teaching, they have learned to challenge and be challenged. "I am always trying new methods to see what works best with what group of kids," said Begonja. "I am growing as a teacher."

Ill)

Sally Horchow, a junior in Calhoun College, is on the staff of TN].

February 1, 1991

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"

February 1, 1991

Last September ushered in a new era at the Yale Graduate School. On the basis of proposals made by Deans Donald Kagan and Jerome Pollitt, the Graduate School introduced dramatic policy changes that will transform the face of graduate education at Yale. Above all, these changes reflect the two deans' sense that across the country, there is a crisis in graduate education. Simply put, graduate school takes too long.

Graduate students¡ at Yale currently take an average of eight years to complete a Ph.D.-less than the national average, but over a year longer than in the 1970s. "A red light went on when the figure went up to eight years," said Pollitt. " I just don't see the need to keep anyone captive for more than six."

Kagan noted that educators nationwide believe graduate school wastes both time and money. "There is a concern that money is being thrown down a rathole," Kagan said. "Why should the Ph.D. be limitless?"

The Kagan-Pollitt plan is shaped by the 1989 findings of the Ad Hoc Committee on Teaching at Yale College, headed by Jules Prown, professor of art history.

Following the Prown Committee' s conclusion that excessive teaching responsibilities interfere with graduate work, the deans cut 200 of Yale' s 1000 teaching assistant positions. ''The focus of education ought to be tilted back toward the faculty," said Robert Bunselmeyer, associate dean of the graduate school. "We hope that faculty will become more involved in teaching sections themselves."

To compensate for lost TA salaries, the Kagan-Pollitt plan called for a Dissertation Fellowship Program to award $8000 stipends to fifth- and sixthyear graduate students. But the plan also ensures that the sixth year will be the students' last. Overstepping the Prown Committee's suggestions to speed up graduate education, the Kagan-Pollitt plan demands that students complete their programs on The New Journal 25

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26 The New Journal

schedule or risk losing course credit.

Previously, students could negotiate due dates for late course work, but now they have one month to finish incomplete credits. "The deans have put more emphasis on stick as well as carrot measures," said Rogers Smith, Prown Committee membe-r and professor of political science.

While many professors applauded the Prown report, they think Kagan and Pollitt went too far. "The plan's decisions were imposed entirely without reference to faculty concerns," said Nancy Cott, Director of Graduate Studies for American Studies. Contrary to the two deans' expectations, professors say T A cuts won't make the faculty teach more.

"There' s nothing structural in the plan that requires them to do so,"said William Cronon, DGS for the history department. "The faculty have no room to be doing more teaching."

If graduate students teach less and faculty cannot teach more, undergraduate education will deteriorate. This semester, undergrads face capped lecture classes, larger sections, and less individual attention from TA's. "I'm just appalled about how this is affecting section sizes," said History TA Heidi Tinsman (GRD '95).

Equally worrisome are the plan's effects on graduate education. Students say they receive insufficient faculty guidance to finish within six years. "You have to have someone work with you very closely to finish that quickly," said Jeanne Lawrence (GRD '92). Because the Kagan-Pollitt plan does not increase faculty involvement in the graduate school, students fear their research will suffer.

"People' s research may not be rigorous enough to compete in the job market," said Renee White (GRD '93). "Everyone is really nervous about the six-year cutoff," said Tinsman.

While graduate students insist the six-year cap is unrealistic, Kagan and Pollitt seem to think that all the graduate students need is a new attitude. "My primary concern is helping graduate

students finish rather than lead a kind of gypsy life in New Haven," said Pollitt.

Grads respond that the deans don' t understand their pos ition. "The deans seem to think that we have a welfare

"The deans seem to think that we have a welfare mentality.

They think we are having a good time." mentality," said Gordon Lafer (GRD '94). "They think we are having a good time."

Some graduate students s ay that the deans have been blinded by their desire to save money. Organizations like the Mellon Foundation support initiatives to speed graduate education, and grad students say Kagan and Pollit shaped their plan to tap into such funds.

Pollitt acknowledges that funding concerns played a role. "I wish that there was a lot more money that the graduate school could hand out," he said. " But every penny in our budget has bee n allocated."

Kagan and Pollitt may have intended the fellowship program to free grad students from financial concerns, but money remains an issue. " A freebie at the end of five long years doesn't seem to be adequate," said Lisa Rabin (GRD '92), the only graduate student to serve on the Prown committee. "Whe n making a living becomes a worry, it interferes with the completion of a degree."

Students say the absence of teaching opportunities coupled with inadequate grants has made graduate school inaccessible. "People are dropping out because they can' t afford to be here," said Mary Renda (GRD ' 94).

"Increasingly you have to be from an upper-middle class background to survive in graduate school."

February 1, 1991

While some students say the deans only want to cut corners, others suspect that the Yale administration's distrust of T A unionization sparked the KaganPollitt plan. "The plan would never have come into existence if the graduate students had not organized," said Robert Hinton (GRD '91). TAs are unionized at several major universities, and in recent years graduate students at Yale have sought better conditions under the auspice of TA Solidarity, a nascent union. Las~ April, the group changed its name to the Graduate Employees and Students Organization (GESO) and joined the Federation of University Employees-a union that

nothing is ever gooci," he said. " It's always some trap to defraud them."

Still, Pollitt says the faculty may be responsible for this paranoia. "The nature of the disciplines does have something to do with it. Some of them have faculty members who teach them that rebellion is a way of life."

Accusations of insidious plots aside, there is no guarantee that as graduate students teach less, they will complete their studies more quickly. With the exception of language degrees, the Prown Committee was unable to establish any correlation between teaching and the length of time to complete a degree. "We tried hard to find evidence

for a correlation," said Prown Committee member Smith. As a result, graduate students claim that because of its faulty premise, the Kagan-Pollitt plan is illogical and destined to fail. While Tinsman says that a shorter time for a degree is certainly appealing, she believes that it's only wishful thinking.

"I think that we would all like to finish in six years," she said. "I'd like to do it in five." ..:)

Mia Bay is a fifth-year graduate student in American history.

"The nature of the disciplines does have something to do with it. Some of them have faculty members who teach them that rebellion is a way of life. " already represents Yale's Clerical and Technical workers, and Service and Maintainence workers. With the support of the other organized workers, GESO began a membership drive last spring.

Hinton says that Kagan and Pollitt wanted to stymie this effort, and so imposed the six year ceiling on graduate education. "Many of the people who were organizing were beyond their sixth year," said Hinton. "The plan was mostly intended to be a threat."

Pollitt says such accusations are unfounded. "There has always been an unhappy group-in history, American Studies, political science-for whom February 1, 1991

The New Journal 27

Profile

On Top for Now: John Dow Sounds Off ·Motoko Rich ~ ~

confidence in the schools had reached a low point," says Carrano. ~ When Dow took over in 1984, he wasted "' no time overhauling some of New Haven's ~ ~ most feared schools. Calling New Haven the ~ "cesspool of educational impersonation," he ~ fired a number of administrators, enforced ~ strict disciplinary rules-evell prohibiting students from wearing hats in school-and demanded that parents c.Qme to orientations before their children could enroll in classes.

He ordered copy machines and other basic · materials the schools lacked. "We wanted kids to improve in their subjects and we · didn't have books, didn't have paper," he recalls with disgust. "We didn't have furniture and didn't have copy machines."'

Since then, Dow has boosted parental involvement in the schools, beefed up special education programs, instituted social development curricula, and enlisted " I try to operate in this school district as if every decision I make is for my own corporate sponsorship for school programs. child," said Superintendent of Schools John Dow. He has brought computers into all "Sometimes people may think that I shoot from the hip," says classrooms through the fifth grade, introduced advanced placement classes, funded college visits for high school John Dow, Jr., Superintendent of the New Haven Public Schools. seniors, and schmoozed for grant money to send students He's got that much right. "He tends to shoot from the abroad. "If you name it, he has done it," says ]effie Frazier, hip and when you do that you tend to create some level of principal of Helene Grant elementary school. controversy," says Frank Carrano, president of the New Dow began his career 28 years ago as a science and math Haven Teachers Union. Now that controversy may be teacher in Grand Rapids, Michigan. After only four years in spinning out of control. In December, Education Department clerk Joanne Bivona resigned and then accused Dow of telling her to stay quiet about bills allegedly doctored by school officials. She says Dow promised her a promotion in exchange for her silence. When Mayor Daniels called a meeting with the school board to discuss the issue, no one showed up. Daniels accused the board of deliberately snubbing him and Dow publicly called the mayor "a damn liar."

"Dr. Dow does things to get people's attention," says Edward Ferruci, principal of Martin Luther King elementary the classroom, he advanced to the administrative level, serving a year as a middle school assistant principal. From school. "He reminds me of George Patton. He's a fighter."

Dow's aggressive approach has gotten results. Educators there, his career rocketed and within eight years of his first and parents recall the dismal conditions of the New Haven teaching job, Dow had become an assistant superintende~t.

By the time he was 38 years old, Dow had landed in the school system before he arrived. "Before Dow came here, the schools were out of control, " says Susan Sapp, a parent with Grand Rapids superintendent's office.

The superintendent came to New Haven after the school three children in district schools. "Kids were running around and the doors of classrooms used to be locked with students board in Grand Rapids asked him to step down amid inside." Parents were desperate for improvement. "People's allegations of financial indiscretion. The board accused Dow

"Someone once said of Dr. Dow that you either love him or hate him. /love him. He reminds me of George Patton. He 's a fighter. "

28 The New Journal

February 1, 1991

of mishandling expense accounts and using school funds for personal use. Although the board brought no criminal charges against Dow, the distrustful community essentially gave him the boot. "Things started escalating," says Maryanne Challa, teacher in Grand Rapids and former Board of Education member. "People thought that Dow wasn't doing his job and there were allegations that he misused funds. It served the best interests of the community and John that he stepped down." New Haven Board of Education members traveled to Michigan before hiring Dow and decided that he was treated unfairly as a victim of media sensationalism and school board mistrust in Grand Rapids.

When he came to New Haven, Dow moved from a school district of more than 54,000 students to a district of 18,000 students here. "Right off the top his tactics were offensive," says John Einhorn, Alderman from the 25th Ward. Within the first few months of his tenure, Dow demoted an assistant superintendent and fired several other high-level administrators. "I told the board that we're going to hire people that are going to be effective, and we're going to fire people who are not," says Dow. Although one of the fired administrators took Dow to court on charges of discrimination, local residents viewed the firings as a good move. "He shocked a very staid, sluggish system," says Barbara Pynn, co-president of the Edgewood elementary school Parent-Teacher Association. "He got rid of a lot of dead wood."

In 1985, Dow caused an uproar within the medical community and among AIDS activists when he barred a fiveyear-old child with AIDS from coming to school. Rumors spread that Dow wanted to banish children with the disease to basement schools. Dow claims he acted out of caution and the ignorance of the times. "There were all kinds of wild stories about how AIDS could be contracted," Dow says. 'We were trying to be more safe than sorry." A lthough most board members backed him up on his decision, a 1988 federal court order prohibited school districts from denying HN carriers their right to an education.

More recently, Dow proposed that officials withhold welfare checks from parents who did not send their children to school. Dow attributes many of the district's educational difficulties to low attendance rates in the schools. This year, for example, 28 percent of the fourth graders who failed the state mastery test had missed 20 or more days of school. "You can't blame teachers when children don't come to school," says Dow. "That's negligent parenting." While Dow hoped the welfare proposal would force increased attendance, the community expressed some misgivings. Dow thinks these objections were off the mark. "Hell, I get arguments from the February 1, 1991

liberal do-gooders who suggest that having your kid miss 40 days of school is all right," he says.

Although Dow hopes to make parents more accountable for the education of their children, he believes the schools must assume a role he calls "institutional parenting." Under his guidance the schools have started serving free breakfasts and lunches, and students can stay after school for an

"He shocked a very staid, sluggish system. He got rid of a lot of dead wood. " extended day academy. As he continues to add such programs, Dow takes the philosophy of "institutional parenting" very personally. "I try to operate in this school district as if every decision I make is for my own child," he says.

Like any savvy leader, Dow knows when to give a little.

By paying the city's teachers more money, he has cultivated faculty support for his initiatives. 'Without a superintendent leading the movement to improve teacher salaries, we would still be one of the lowest-paid districts in the state," says John Courtmanche, principal of Wilbur Cross High School. Faculty are relieved to have the superintendent on their side. "That's a refreshing change," says Rhoda Spear, supervisor of both the city-wide Talented and Gifted Program and the English curriculum for grades nine through 12. ''You usually meet a superintendent as an adversary across the bargaining table."

Dow has also given the city's teachers at least a little more power. He supports teachers in their efforts to institute School Planning and Management Teams, which decentralize authority in the schools. At each school, a team made up of teachers, parents and the prinicipal would decide how to run the school. "Dow has supported it, which has been important because this kind of change can only happen if there's support from top to bottom," says Carrano.

While supporting faculty concerns, Dow nevertheless makes high demands on his staff and comes down hard on anyone who tries to slack off. "If we don't do our jobs he can be a mean SOB," says Martin Luther King principal Ferruci.

Dow doesn't let himself off the hook either. School board members report that the superintendent often works late into the night, though he frequently forgets that not everyone works on the same schedule. Former school board member and current City Comptroller Peter Halsey reports that Dow made regular calls to board members as late as 3:00 in the The New Journal 29

"You can 't blame teachers when children don 't come to school. That's negligent parenting."

morning. "He would just assume you were sitting there waiting for his call," says Halsey. "That's just part of his style. He's intense."

Yet Dow's intensity has disgruntled city officials, particularly during annual budget battles with the city. Dow has locked horns with former Mayor Biagio DiLieto and present Mayor John Daniels in a series of much-publicized disputes,

John Dow has brought computers Into all classrooms through the fifth grade.

30 The New Journal

often characterized by name-calling and accusations of financial impr_opriety.

In his most recent clash with the city, Dow has claimed that New Haven failed to meet educational funding requirements manCfated by the s tate.

He has demanded that the city come up with the cash. While the state supports Dow's claim that New Haven should add $2 million to its educational budget, city officials claim Dow could meet state guidelines by transferring funds from non-essential programs to those mandated by the state. "It is absolutely clear that the school system could meet the state requirement under the current budget," says Halsey.

City officials claim that Dow uses suspect accounting practices. "John Dow has never produced an honest or straightforward budget," says Steven Mednick, a New Haven attorney and president pro tempore of the Board of Aldermen. Dow opponents accuse the superintendent of refusing to be fiscally accountable. "He has lost support by playing 'hide the ball' with finances while the city is on the verge of bankruptcy," says Alderman Einhorn.

Dow, however, says that city officia ls are using New Haven's financial crisis to excuse its failure to meet the state funding requirements.

"I'm not asking the city for more money, I'm asking it to meet the law," says Dow. The superintendent sought to dramatize t he situation by eliminating eleven teaching positions one week before school started last September. But the move generat~d more antagonism for Dow than sympathy for the schools' economic woes, and two weeks later the superintendent evidently reallocated February 1, 1991

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funds and rehired the eleven staff members.

"All responsible people agree that the school system is underfunded, but Dow's tactics can't be condoned," says Einhorn. "He's essentially declared war on the city, and everybody loses. The taxpayers lose, the students lose."

Carrano believes the annual tensions have degenerated into pettiness. "It's unfortunate that we are reduced to squabbling," he says. Dow is frustrated as well. "It's probably the greatest waste of my time every year," he says. "I spend nine months messing around with the politicians about the budget."

A few years ago, Dow made n~:itters worse by refurbishing school board offices. The furniture reportedly cost around $200,000. "He lost a lot of credibility by putting up an expensive set of office furniture when we couldn't buy books for the system," says Einhorn.

"He has lost support by playing 'hide the ba/1.' with finances while the city is on the verge of bankruptcy. " Investigators are still looking into the matter of the allegedly doctored bills.

But with four of New Haven's 30 a ldermen calling for h is resignation, D ow's stock seems to be plunging.

Although his contract lasts until 1993, the superintendent is not untouchable. The board in Grand Rapids bought out his contract to get him to resign, and city February 1, 1991

officials in New Haven could do the same.

If he is forced to leave, even some of those who question Dow's financial practices would bemoan the loss. "It's a sh ame because I see all the good things he's done. I don't think anybody else would have the same drive," says parent Susan Sapp. "It's like a passion and a vision. I think if he left, the district would slip back into mediocrity."

Dow thinks he can survive the controversy, and plans to stay on for another three to five years. "Wimps don't get very far when times get tough," he says. "But I only want to be superintendent as long as people who have children in the school system and the staff and students want me to be."

Some people are already speculating that Dow will not last long. "I think he might have exhausted his stay here," says Sapp. Other parents echo her opinion. "I think his time is about up," says Edgewood PTA's Barbara Pynn.

Cool under the collar, Dow tries to dispel rumors that the latest scandal will mark his downfall. "All that's hype," he says. The superintendent believes that city officials are just trying to get revenge for the annual budget fracases. "I've been through this sort of thing for a long while-I've been misappropriating funds and getting fired for five years now," he says with a wry smile. "I don't know of any minority who has misappropriated funds and not wound up in jail. Now I'm not in jail yet so I think that say~ something."

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Motoko Rich, a senior in Branford College, is Editor-in-chief of TNJ.

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The New Journal 31

Profile

To Teach the Children Kathy Reich Frances Edwards takes the witness stand to describe how her husband abused her for years before the night she loaded his gun and fired several bullets into his head. The jurors listens intently to Edwards' story. After hearing the evidence, they reason that Edwards, since her husband was asleep when she shot him, could not have acted in self-defense. They convict her of voluntary manslaughter and sentence her to several ¡ years in prison. ¡ This courtroom is on the second floor of Hillhouse High School, where Dr. Burt Saxon teaches a course in Ethnoliterature, a tenth grade elective that combines world literature with social studies. On this day Saxon has chosen to teach his class about the criminal justice system by staging a mock trial. He tells them that he admires their verdict..Then one student raises his hand. "U a man is beating his wife, what should she do?" he asks Saxon. "What would you recommend besides murder?"

Saxon pauses for a moment. "Well, the only thing a battered wife can really do is get out of there, get some help," he says. "There's a battered women's shelter in New Haven, and if you speak to me privately, I can give you the phone number.

But they keep the location a secret so the husbands can't follow their wives there."

"Then how do you know where it is?" one student shouts out.

"Because he chased his wife there," another yells. The classroom explodes in laughter. A bemused Saxon stands in front of the class. "A lot of teachers might have gotten offended by that joke," he explains later. "But I want the kids to feel like they can joke with me. And I suspected that some of the kids in the class knew someone who needed that phone number. I want them to know that I am accessible to them."

Saxon has been teaching the Ethnoliterature class for two years. The 19 students read thinkers from Buddha to Bacon and discuss issues ranging from religious ethics to ethnicity in contemporary America. The eclecticism of the course might prove daunting to some instructors, but Saxon has never limited himself to teaching just one subject. At Hillhouse he also teaches Psychology and two lunchtime seminars. He coordinates the school's Gifted and Talented Program, as well as an after-school International Studies Program and a Saturday enrichment session. He teaches a Yale Residential College Seminar about urban education, and in his free time, cheers his students on at Hillhouse basketball games.

Although not all of his students are members of the Gifted and Talented program, Saxon teaches primarily what school administrators call "high-echelon" students. Roughly 10 percent of Hillhouse's student body falls into this category, including all of the students in the Ethnoliterature class. "The kids in Ethnoliterature are definitely among the better kids in the tenth grade," Saxon says. "Since September, ten of the 19

32 The New Journal

kids have not missed a single day of school."

"It's my favorite class," says sophomore Craig Moore.

Ethnoliterature gives Moore and his classmates the chance to critique their readings and each others' work through discussion. One student faults the defense in the mock trial for hav-

"Most teachers discipline their students to the point where the kids are comatose. I don't do that.

If anything, I tend to overstimulate my students. " ing "a long, extraneous closing statement." And when the discussion moves into a reading from German artist Kathe Kollewitz's musings on love, the students clamor for a chance to read aloud. Afterwards, Saxon asks them to write questions about the reading, and one student writes, "If love is so painful, what is so good about love?"

When the students aren't asking such questions, they are chattering, passing candy to each other, and mocking Saxon' s sense of humor. "Most teachers discipline their students to the point where the kids are comatpse," Saxon says. "I don't do that. If anything, I tend to overstimulate my students." He chats with them about their love lives, their families, and their extracurricular activities-and he tries to relate their experiences to the academic world. Ethnoliterature student Alethea Sealy recalls a recent debate."We had a debate in class on which do you succeed in more--higher education or sports and entertainment?" says Sealy. "Higher education won."

When the bell rings, several Ethnoliterature students stay after class to help Saxon arrange the chairs for his next class, Psychology. Unlike other Hillhouse classes, where students sit in rows, Saxon's students sit in a semicircle. Psychology is a senior elective, and the students are more sedate than the younger Ethnoliterature pupils. They also seem well-versed in the lingo, using phrases like "positive reinforcement" and "Oedipal stage." Today's discussion centers on Erik Erikson' s eight stages of human development; most students prefer Erikson's theory to Freud's more rigid phases of childhood.

Saxon says that discussions can sometimes get unruly. "Last week I asked, 'What happens if a boy never resolves the Oedipus complex?' And one kid said, 'He becomes a homosexual,"' he recalls. "That was basically the end of the class.

Everybody was yelling and screaming."

Though the students sometimes disrupt class, they still respect their teacher. "He's like a father to us," said Sealy.

February 1, 1991

<;;

E

~

~ Saxon focuses a lot of attention on ., the several programs he currently ~ supervises. Administration takes up 3 about 60 percent of Saxon's time-and ~ all of his weekday afternoons. He spends four hours a day running errands for the International Studies teachers, talking to students, and selling potato chips to earn the International Studies program some petty cash. After venturing downstairs to make copies four times in 20 minutes, he collapses in his office in the library. "That's my new world record for trips to the Xerox machine," he says. "Sometimes I feel like a human paper sorter in this job.

There's a part of me that wishes I could teach all day."

Saxon knew by 1967, his sophomore year at Carleton College in To many of his students, Dr. Burt Saxon has become a surrogate father.

Minnesota, that he wanted to teach.

Growing up in Plainfield, Illinois, the son of the town's only attorney, he felt considerable pressure to "There's no one in the class who downs him." Saxon has equal admiration for his students. "They're all really bright kids. Out take over his father's law practice after college. "But I didn't want to do that," he says. "I wan ted to start off on my own, of 13 students in Psychology, I think ten will go on to some and I had a real calling to education. I knew I wasn't going to form of higher learning next year. One just got a basketball make a lot of money, but I d idn't mind." After g raduating scholarship to Quinnipiac College." from Carleton, he received a master's degree at Wesleyan While Saxon doubts that any of his senior students will University, and went directly to the New Haven school district end up at Yale, he holds high hopes for the two juniors in his to teach social studies. 'Wesleyan had a reputation for turning lunchtime seminars. One seminar student has chosen to study out a lot of radicals," Saxon recalls. psychology, the other Western Civilization, but Saxon has In 1970, Saxon took his first job in New H aven, and apart managed to interweave the topics in his discussions. The stufrom a two-year leave of absence in the mid-70s to earn a docdents recently got into a heated argument over the literary and torate in education a t Columbia University, he has spent his philosophical merits of B.F. Skinner's Walden Two-hardly entire professional life in the city's public schools. In 1980, he typical high school fare. "The seminar is definitely not a traditional class," says Assistant Principal Ernest Roth. "I've sat in earned a promotion, moving from Lee High School to on a few of the seminars-he's very good at motivating stu- Hillhouse to coordinate the school's Gifted and Talented program. dents and getting good discussion going."

In 1976, he began teaching urban education in the Yale Saxon used to teach more seminars than he does now, in Residential College Seminar Program. The course is one of his topics ranging from East Asian Studies to Law. He wishes that many ties to Yale; in addition to coordinating the International he could teach 40 students in seminars instead of just a few, Studies program with Yale faculty, he invites Yale students of but he does not have enough time to expand the program.

Even if he did, other academic offerings like Yale's Branch various ethnic backgrounds to address the Ethnoliterature class. "I like to wor k on the cutting edge between the high tutoring and the International Studies program have been drawing potential students away from the seminars. "It seems school and the university," he says. While he believes that Yale faculty and undergraduates help the New Haven public like everyone wants to teach the best kids," he sighs. "It goes against our American concept of fairness. Why should the bet- schools immensely, he complains that Yale does not do its ter kids get all the resources? But they're the kids who give the share a t the institutiona l level to improve relations with the most response. And when you concentrate on a small group of community. Several years ago, when Saxon was teaching in a joint Yale-New Haven college preparatory program, the kids, you get better results."

~

February 1, 1991

The New Journal 33

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34 The New Journal

University paid him only $8 an hour. He had to park nine blocks from campus because no one would give him a parking permit. "Little things like that add up," he says.

Yale is not the only institution that has paid Saxon low wages. Although

"Sometimes you feel like a human paper sorter in this job.

There 's a part of me that wishes I could teach all day." salaries for New Haven teachers have risen dramatically in recent years, for a long time Saxon was forced to scramble for extra cash to support his two chil-

dren by writing textbooks and articles.

"One year I actually earned more money from outside work than I did as a public school teacher-! had earned only $21,000 as a teacher," he says, "What's wrong with this picture?"

Many teachers move into administration because the salaries are higher, but Saxon still prefers the interaction of teaching. Even within his administrative role, he strives to know all of the students at Hillhouse. "Even the kids not in Gifted and Talented like him," said Assistant Principal Ben A. Hunter.

"Normally you get a guy who only deals with kids in the high echelon. He's not like that. He deals with everyone. He's trying to do the right thing by our chil-

dren."

1111

Kathy Reich, a sophomore in Pierson College, is Associate Editor of TNJ. February 1, 1991

The Rules of Attraction /

Suneeta Hazra "You can say it's stupid, but I don't have to worry about getting killed, or getting shot at out of a window," said Joey D'Amico, a senior at The New Haven Sound School. To escape the violence that he thinks pervades the city's traditional high schools, D'Amico chose the Sound School, one of five magnet high

"Magnets are just smaller schools, so they have the same problems on a smaller scale. " schools. Called "schools of choice," these magnets pull 1,500 students from all over the city by offering specialized academics and close teacher-student relations. Their small size and experimental nature provide an alternative to large, comprehensive city schools.

New Haven's schools of choice got their start in the late days of the Civil Rights movement. The 1970 New Haven Black Panther trials and the accompanying school riots forced the public to scrutinize the local school system, uncovering severe segregation in New H aven's public schools. George Foote, then a teacher at Hillhouse High School, thought that magnet schools would be an innovative solution to public demands for reform and voluntary desegregation. With several other Hillhouse teachers, he applied for a state grant to start a magnet program in New Haven. The first new school opened in 1971. The program's goal: to give public school students the same privileges as wealthier kids, in particular the opportunity to choose one's high school.

February 1, 1991

Each school of choice features a different "magnet" designed to attract students-from humanities at the High School in the Community to marine life at the Sound School. While recruiters encourage students to consider their interests before applying, some apply just to get out of the comprehensive high schools. Many say they are afraid of Wilbur Cross and Hillhouse. "My mother had heard too many stories of violence at Cr oss. She didn't want to find out if they were true," a Sound School senior said. Another said he got into too many fights at Cross. Lottery determines admission to the schools, ensuring racial and intellectual diversity.

Magnet classes feature more hands-on activity than their counterparts at comprehensive schools. At the High School in the Community, individual classes meet for up to three hours each day, allowing time for field trips and research in New Haven. Students in a law class, for example, attend trials in the New Haven courthouse. Members of a journalism class conduct interviews in their neighborhoods.

Each magnet school has a core curriculum encompassing subjects such as math and English and offers electives within its concentration. The Sound School, for example, offers only marine electives. The optional classes at the Cooperative High School center on business and computers.

To keep their brand of teaching effective, the magnet schools limit enrollment to between 200 and 250 students. This size allows teachers to give students individual attention. Jeff Granoff, a science teacher at the Sound School, values the closeness of his relationship with his students. "I teach them to develop social skills, and to understand what's going on a r ound them."

Teachers can stay close to their students.

They notice if somebody is skipping class. If need be, they can even act as surrogate parents, helping students through emotional crises. When one magnet student began missing classes, her teachers discovered that she was pregnant and offered her counseling.

But the small-school atmosphere has its drawbacks. Some students complain that the schools are too small and too insular. Everybody, they say, knows everybody else's business. Other students miss the school spirit of big high schools. Briceida Trujill, student body president of the Sound School, complains her school is too small for successful school dances or intramural sports teams. She wishes the magnet schools could be bigger.

Robert Cannelli, principal of the High School in the Community, thinks the magnets' small size attracts students who are more motivated and involved in academics. Ninety percent of High School in the Community seniors scored higher on the SAT than their peers at Cross and Hillhouse. Some teachers, however, contest the notion that the city's high-achieving children flock to

Lottery determines admission, ensuring racial and intellectual diversity the magnets. Jon Buell, history teacher at the Sound School, says that students come from a variety of backgrounds.

Because of their small size and limited funding, magnets cannot offer all the services of comprehensive high schools. To cover extra expenses, such as boat equipment at the Sound School and

The New Journal 35

I I

computers at the Cooperat ive High School, administrators have eliminated varsity athletics a nd dramatically increased teacher workloads. The cuts have left student a thletes resentful.

More importantly, the budget constraints and active participation in s tudent life spead teachers thin. "I like the smallness, which a llows us to focus on the kids . But sometimes I feel overw helmed," explained Anne Solomon, a counselor a t th e Cooperative High School. At the Sound School, instructors normally teach four classes although their contracts o nly bind them to two.

And since the electives that magne ts offer change frequently, faculty members must revamp their lesson plans each year. An instructor could be teaching mar itime history and botany one year, world history and marine biology the next.

Cost-cut ting measures have kept

magnet budgets in line with th ose of o ut that their students suffer from probcomprehensive hig h schools, but some lems such as teenage pregnancy and parents in the school system still think drug use. "The magnets a re supposed the magnets get too much money. " I to help the inner-city kid s, but they dis like the fa c t that some schools are don't at all," said Bue ll. " It's easier in chosen to have special programs that are theo ry than in practice." super-enriched," said Barbara Pynn, the Foote, however, believes magnet co-president of the Edgewood stud ents gain much more than they lose Ele mentary School's Parent-Teache r by leaving comprehensive hig h schools Association. ''That's not fair. I'd rather for sm a ll, focused environme nts. He see the money spent across the board ." would like the whole education system Fair or not, the dollars that go to to consist solely of schools of choice. In magnet schools get results. More magmagnet schools, he,~ays, the kids get the net s tudents go on to college than their attention they need and they learn comprehens¡ive school peers.

But things they enjoy. " We~re doing someHillhouse Vice Princ ipal Syd Lillic k . thing they think makes sense," he said. asserts that the mag11et schools are not ¡ "It's rare that we adults ever do that." ¡ necessarily be tter thar comprehensive lBO high schools. "I don't know if they are better able to help the kids. They are just smaller schools so they have the same problems on a smaller scale," she Suneeta Hazra, a junior in Calhoun College, said. Teachers at magnet schools point is on the staff ofTNJ.

Individual attention and marine studies attract students to the Sound School, a New Haven "school of choice."

36 The New Journal

February 1, 1991

Afterthought/Edith MacMullen

Education en Vogue Strike a pose, there's nothing to it Education is clearly in. Both the flood of articles and the rash of TV shows-not to mention registration in Yale classesgive proof of the passionate public concern for our country's schools and tor the quality of education available for our future workers and voters. But the current discussion suffers from certain habitual national weaknesses: our lack of an historical perspective, our propensity for faddism and our yearning for the quick fix, our preference for constant, agonized criticism over sustained commitment and consistent action, and, most crucial of all, our inability to recognize and to accept our ambivalence about goals for education. We s imply do not ask the hard questions often enough; nor do we examine proposed solutions with a vigilant eye.

Historians often describe cycles in American history. In the discourse on education, the pendu lum swings between vacillation and commitment.

Each generation must rediscover the wheel of misfortune in the history of schooling. Johnny could not read in the '60s, and Joanne can neither read nor calculate in the '90s. The antebellum reformers decried the lack of academic preparation among beginning teachers; today's students in education courses are reported to have the lowest Scholastic Aptitude Test scores of any group of pre-professional registrants.

Benjamin Franklin attacked the traditional grammar schools because they prepared young men only for specific and limited roles, and progressives in the '20s had the same criticism of high schools.

Still, parents, principals, and policy makers alike bemoan the passing of the golden age of schools, a time when students trooped eagerly to class in search of truth and willingly followed every suggestion of respected adults. In fact, as fiction and biography amply demonFebruary 1, 1991

~ ~

1

strate, that golden age never existed. In the 19th century, schools were in session for far shorter periods of time. Children attended with appalling irregularity.

Less than half the youngsters between the ages of 14 and 17 were enrolled in high school in 1930, and the majority of the boys who began high school soon withdrew. This caused the much discussed "boy problem" (an aspect of which was that girls did so much better in school than boys) which led to curricular reorganization and "reform." That reform was partially responsible for a tracking and guidance apparatus which systematically slotted children into niches purportedly suitable to their class, origin, and destiny. (This of course persists although with less blatant justification.)

And whether the source was Ichabod Crane or the Lynds' Middletown, teachers were more frequently the object of ridicule than respect.

Even when we admit that the evidence indicates that our schools are not as effective as we would like and refuse to admit that societal conditions may contribute to their weaknesses, we constantly look for quick solutions to

"crises." Performance budgeting, accountability, community control, school-based management, and teacher empowerment are policy slogans that have been successively, but not successfully, adopted over the past ten years alone. Cooperative learning is now the rage, replacing the fad for grouping of a few years past. Som~ ten years ago Connecticut adopted a law that provided for forgiveable loans (with the splendid acronym ELEET) to undergraduates who entered teacher training programs and taught for three years in the state.

The law was repealed two years later because it was deemed ineffectivealthough the students who had received the loans were still in college. No medical advance would be judged on such short term and undocumented research.

Faddism and unexamined assumptions are characteristic of so many of the "expert" reports issued since 1983's Nation at Risk. One reason is overlapping membership among the panels that author them; Albert Shanker has been a busy man this decade. Similar conclusions have led to similar legislative and regulatory activity-teacher qualifications and high school graduation requirements throughout the fifty states have come closer and closer to a national standard without federal action (and that, of course, would violate one of the shibboleths of educational dogma, local control). Yet there is not a smidgeon of conclusive evidence that any one of the reforms will work better than last year's.

Practitioners in the field must share the blame. Educators may be among the most conservative of all professionals.

Most went into the field because they enjoyed their own schooling and were comfortable in a familiar environment; they teach and administer the way they know. Too often, when given an opportunity to participate in decisions and to right the wrongs they attack, teachers The New Journal 37

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It is comfortable and certainly correct to. be aware and to express concern-to read Fred Hechinger in the

"But of course, who would go to. Yale only · to become a teacher?"

Times or listen to John Chancellor deliver bites of insight. Evidence of commitment can be volunteering in a schooluntil reading week or until it gets too discouraging-or teaching at Ulysseus S. Grant for a term. Two years as a Teach for America beginner or in a private school are possibilities before getting on with the real business of life. Last year less than 20 Yale undergraduates prepared themselves for positions in the public schools, those objects of national condemnation. But of course, who would go to Yale only to become a teacher?

All of this must sound suspiciously like an unjust tirade, and it is unfair to the many, many dedicated and unsung students, researchers, and teachers, here at Yale and throughout the country, who struggle day by day, quarter by quarter, board meeting after board meeting, for the cause of schooling. But they also suffer under practices and philosophies that go unexamined, but accepted. Who decided that learning should be presented in 36 or 48 or 52 minute segments?

Who decided that geometry had to come between algebra I and algebra II? Why do you have to be five to go to kindergarten? Or 18 to go to college? Is 18 the

optimum number for a seminar and 25 for a high school history class? These are obvious and easy questions; what about who should go to college and what does a high school diploma mean anyway?

There are enormous and unadmitted disagreements about the direction education should take in the next decade or century. These revolve around precisely the same questions that were debated by Horace Mann and the school masters of Boston, by Charles Eliot and the classics teachers in 1893, by Admiral Rickover and the progressives in their last gasp, and now by Allan Bloom and the curriculum specialists advocating a multicultural curriculum. The ·issues have to do with whether our schools should be inclusive or exclusive, whether our courses of study should be liberal or vocational, theoretical or pragmatic, whether we include moral and social goals or attempt to concentrate on more purely conceptual ones. And how should we evaluate the success or failure (we always want things simple) of our educational endeavor? SAT scores?

Student standing in international math competitions? Or perhaps athletic competions, given the money spent on sports? Yet one British researcher proposed job retention rates rather than 0level scores as a better measure of school effectivenesss. The point remains: what measures do we value?

Searching discussions about educational matters are not comfortable, for they may reveal the true failure of our educational policy and system-the fact that the reality is so removed from the rhetoric. The possibility of lasting renewal in educational institutions is in doubt-unless committed participants stay the course.

18] Edith MacMullen directs Yale's teacher preparation program.

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