A Gold Nugget Within Our Midst

"Education is the most powerful weapon which you can use to change the world."

Nelson Mandela

I attended an early morning breakfast yesterday at the Salt Palace Convention Center to share Guadalupe School's vision and hope for its students through education. As I listened to the keynote speaker, Salt Lake Mayor, Ralph Becker, the stories of former Guadalupe School students, and the story of a young Hispanic couple participating in Guadalupe's ESL (English As A Second Language) Program, I was reminded how foolish we are to try and reinvent the wheel when we have a success story within our midst to teach us what works---Guadalupe School students continually score in the 90th percentile on state mandated tests.


Guadalupe's Mission is: To teach economically disadvantaged children and non-English speaking adults the vision and skills needed to live productive, rewarding lives-- through learning, literacy, and living.


This mission isn't just a written statement tucked away in a drawer, but it plays a vital role in directing what Guadalupe does to make it a reality through the following:

• Providing door-to door bussing for preschoolers through third grade.


• Providing a continuum of services from birth through third grade some of which are bilingual because the value of first language is recognized.


• Maximizing the support of its volunteers who log over 2,000 hours each school year.


• Providing free breakfast, lunch and healthy snacks to students.


• Offering a community learning center model so that an entire family can find educational services.

This "gold nugget" in our midst began when Our Lady of Guadalupe parish, with leadership from Father Jerald Merrill and Suzanne Weiss, founded The Guadalupe Center on Salt Lake City’s west side in 1966. Four over four decades, disadvantaged children and families, about 95% of whom are Hispanic, have been served by this gold nugget.

In spite of Guadalupe's great success, it doesn't rest on its laurels. It continues to be a vibrant and growing organization by continually learning and adopting new approaches that will help them to be even more effective for the families they serve.

Guadalupe must not only be a shining light for Utah, it must also be an example that is replicated so that even more Utah families can benefit. This will require a willingness on the part of policy makers to step out of comfort zones and be committed to a vision like Guadalupe's and a willingness to do whatever it takes to make that vision a reality.

Thank you, Guadalupe, for charting unknown paths to provide an ideal for others to follow.

Another Sad Commentary On Becoming Americanized

Dr. June Gordon found that as a general rule, the longer Hispanics are in the U.S. the less respect they have for education.

It seems that even though Hispanics, especially new immigrants, hold teachers and education in high esteem, but the longer they are in the U. S. and start to be infiltrated with American values, the less respect both Hispanic parents and students have.

It's important to understand that the lack of respect for education and teaching as a profession is an American phenomenon. Therefore, in an immigrant's desire to adapt to the American life they adopt the attitudes and values of the mainstream which translates into the fact that the more they become like the dominant culture the less respect they have for education and teachers. In other words, they are reflecting back the American mainstream's attitude.

Again as Pogo would say, "We have met the enemy...and he is us."

Dispelling Hispanic Myth

The Miami Herald quotes Roy Romer, former Colorado governor, "A poll presented at a National Council of La Raza meeting [2007] showed education ranks as the most important issue for Hispanic voters."



The article notes that a poll of 1000 interviewed Hispanic voters in the United States sponsored by Strong American Schools and the National Council of La Raza found that Hispanic voters consider education a more important issue than the other top four issues--war in Iraq, healthcare, jobs, and immigration. Their top education concerns were high drop out rates for Hispanic students and students not receiving enough support at school.

This information obviously dispels the myth that Hispanics don't care about education.

Do What Makes Sense

Article #2:
Denying education to undocumented immigrants doesn't make sense
By George E. Brooks
Article Last Updated: 02/04/2008 12:12:59 AM MST
Salt Lake Tribune

For the past four years I have been working very closely with Utah students for whom House Bill 241 would virtually eliminate the chances of pursuing postsecondary education.

I understand that the bill's sponsor, Rep. Glenn Donnelson, R-North Ogden, believes that HB241 would help solve the very real problem of illegal immigration; that removing the benefit of in-state tuition will somehow motivate the parents of would-be students to relocate or not come here intending to take advantage of this system.

This rationale is fundamentally flawed, as is understood by anyone with firsthand experience with these immigrants. To imagine that the prospect of resident tuition for their children crosses the minds of persons immigrating to work in this state is to either misunderstand or just ignore the more immediate and material factors that actually drive immigration.

To be candid and specific, the majority of the students affected by this bill are children of undocumented immigrants, brought here as infants or children with no choice in the matter, and raised here. If college is even academically an option for them it is because they have gone to school here, studied hard and successfully integrated into their communities.

A child of undocumented immigrant parents has no access to the resources that would enable him or her to attend college paying non-resident tuition. So, essentially, denying in-state tuition sends the message that, hard work or not, they will find only closed doors after high school. Rep. Donnelson contends that closing these doors to these undocumented members of our community will somehow serve as an immigration enforcement strategy, and that those who are impacted by the bill will just finish high school and go home to their country of origin.
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The reality is that, by now, these students are more American than anything else. Those students who are here, who have grown up here, are not going to go away, and denying them an education is neither in their nor the state's best interests.

The argument that resident tuition for these students puts any kind of undue strain on the state is false. In the 2003-2004 school year, the 117 students statewide who took advantage of this resident tuition cost the state about $300,000 in lost tuition, according to state System of Higher Education figures.

That same year 10,424 nonresident students paid $34 million in tuition and fees over the in-state rate. And when one considers the long-term benefits of having motivated, well-educated, well-integrated second-generation Americans, the cost becomes even more negligible in comparison.

Again, we are talking about students who did not choose to come here but are now making choices about what kind of Americans they will be. Denying them access to college education is morally wrong and civically irresponsible. ---

* GEORGE E. BROOKS is an adjunct instructor at Snow College's International Center and coordinator and instructor for the Snow/Sanpete adult literacy program.

Hope and Change

It would be hard for anyone (Democrat, Republican, Independent) to listen to Barak Obama's speech mantra of "hope and change" and not be inspired. Yet, Shelby Steele on Bill Moyers Now last Friday evening expressed the following:

"But if you listen to his -- speeches 'change,' 'hope.' I mean, it's a kind of-- it's an empty mantra. I mean a surprising degree of emptiness, of lack of specificity. What change? Change from what to what? What direction do you want to take the country? What do you mean by hope? There's never any specificity there because specificity is dangerous to a bargainer."

Earlier in the interview Shelby defined and explained a bargainer as " a black who enters the American, the white American mainstream by saying to whites in effect, in some code form, I'm going to give you the benefit of the doubt. I'm not going to rub the shame of American history in your face if you will not hold my race against me. Whites then respond with enormous gratitude. And bargainers are usually extremely popular people." Shelby goes onto explain that the bad side of this is that no one ends up telling the truth about what one really feels and thus in a way becomes invisible.

All of this has great application to education issues especially as it relates to the education of our diverse learners. It could very well explain why the achievement gap (s) continues to persist despite all the rhetoric. People have entered into some kind of bargain so no one is offended by speaking the truth---being specific about what needs to be changed and who needs to do the changing. Policy makers enter into the bargain agreement to keep their jobs and/or to be reelected. Result: Nothing changes and the achievement gap (s) continue to exist.

If the achievement gap (s) scenario is ever going to change we need people who because they are more concerned about the next generation than the next "election" will challenge the status quo by telling the truth--with hope.

Democracy and Moral Character

As Rep. LaVar Christensen reminds us, "Education's original aim was not simply to convey knowledge but to forge character." He is not the only one who expressed these sentiments. We can go as far back as Aristotle who told us that the aim of education is "to make men both smart and good." Thomas Jefferson insisted that democracy could not survive without a virtuous citizenry. President Theodore Roosevelt said, "To educate a man in mind and not in morals is to educate a menace to society." The English philosopher John Locke wrote, "Tis virtue...which is the hard and valuable part to be aimed at in education." Samuel Adams described the mission of educators as nurturing the "moral sense" of children. "Great learning and superior abilities, should you ever possess them," Abigail Adams told her son John Quincy, "will be of little value and small estimation unless virtue, honor, truth, and integrity are added to them." John Adams said, "Our constitution was made only for a moral and religious people." Benjamin Franklin stressed that "only a virtuous people are capable of freedom."

William Bennett reminds us "The highest values of education in a democracy are more than the competitive advantage of an increasingly productive labor force....Education is "more than the acquisition of skills; it had [has] to do with the architecture of the soul."

From the summit conference hosted by the Josephson Institute of Ethics in Aspen, Colorado in July 1992 came the following declarations: The well-being of our society requires an involved, caring citizenry with good moral character. The ethical values of respect, responsibility, trustworthiness, justice and fairness, caring, civic virtue and citizenship are core ethical values that are rooted in a democratic society and that transcend cultural, religious, and socioeconomic differences.

We have an inspiring heritage and legacy, a democracy based on moral principles, that all must understand and appreciate if we are to carry the torch forward as we strive to narrow the gap between our country's ideals and realities. "Posterity--you will never know how much it has cost my generation to preserve your freedom. I hope you will make good use of it," quoting John Quincy Adams.

Because a country can only be as good and moral as its citizenry, it is imperative that each of us strives to develop a moral character and help our young people to do the same through our example and teachings.

Civic Education Is An Answer

Representative LaVar Christensen in his 2006 publication for the Annual Journal of Utah's Hinckley Institute of Politics quotes Frederick J. Ryan, Jr.: "Freedom is a fragile thing and never more than a generation away from extinction...It must be fought for and defended constantly by each generation."

Schools are an important part of this process. "Producing better citizens" was the original justification for creating America's public schools. Christensen states in his document that education's original aim was not simply to convey knowledge but rather to forge character. Therefore, when a school's focus is exclusively on reading, math, and other academics to improve one's personal economic prosperity, something very important is lost. This is exactly what is happening in our schools, especially for our diverse learners. Yet, they are the ones who have the most to gain from civic education--the purpose of which is to develop good citizens.

According to David E. Campbell's article Bowling Together, the characteristics of an education that develops good citizens are:

1. Equip the nation's future with the capacity to be engaged in the political process
2. Have citizens not only participating in democratic institutions, but also doing so knowledgeably
3. Impart the "ability to deliberate" in a context of "mutual respect among persons" which stems from political philosopher Amy Gutmann's defining characteristic of democratic education

Of course our diverse learners need to know the academics, but focusing exclusively on academic and leaving civic education to chance is not providing them an equitable education.

Considering the recent published findings of Dr. Robert Putnam's research study that he revealed in the 2006 Johan Skytte Price Lecture called E Pluribus Unum: Diversity and Community in the Twenty-first Century, it is even more critical that all learners have the knowledge and skills to be involved. Putnam's study found that in diverse communities, there is a greater distrust of neighbors, not only between groups, but even among members of the same group. Everyone seems to "hunker down"--pull in like a turtle. They expect the worst from their community, they volunteer less, they vote less, and have less faith that their cries for social reform will make a difference. All of which results in less social capital for everyone.

Rather than responding negatively to these findings, we can look at them as a challenging opportunity. After all, it is inevitable that diversity is only going to increase in America.

So what is the answer to this challenging opportunity? Although diversity can ultimately be valuable and enriching, we also need something that will unite us. I would propose that the characteristics of an excellent civic education as they have been described have the potential to do just that.

William Glasser Quotes

Quotes by Dr. William Glasser, the founder of Quality Schools:

As long as acquiring knowledge is the educational goal of schools, educational opportunities will be limited, as they are now, to affluent families.

Changing that definition to education is using knowledge and backing that up with all classroom work and tests focused on doing this is the way to upgrade the low grade system we have now.

Changing the system means giving up the way things have always been done that are no longer working.

Every single major push in education has made it worse and right now it's really bad because everything we've done is de-humanizing education. It's destroying the possibility of the teacher and the student having a warm, friendly, intellectual relationship.

I think it is totally wrong and terribly harmful if education is defined as acquiring knowledge.
If students get a real education where they are intellectually involved, where they have to show how they use the knowledge or improve the knowledge, they'll do fine on these tests.

Kids from poor families or poor backgrounds like A's as much as anybody else, but early in their career, by second or third grade, they give up on the idea that they'll ever get them and therefore we are killing them off on something that isn't even important, memorizing facts.

Now schooling, to get back to your question, schooling is basically 98 percent factual knowledge and so schooling is that what you're asked to learn in school and punished for not learning, that no one in the real world would ever ask you to know.

Running a school where the students all succeed, even if some students have to help others to make the grade, is good preparation for democracy.

So, we need to start understanding the difference between what I call factual knowledge and educational knowledge, and we don't focus much on educational knowledge.

There are only two places in the world where time takes precedence over the job to be done: School and prison.

We don't focus as much in schools on educational knowledge which requires thinking and application, as we do on acquiring facts.