Festival of Writers: surviving the American dream

Festival of writers was a great experience that brought three authors together to read from their short story compilations or books that reference the American dream in different ways. It was put together by Columbia College. The event was held at the Metro a concert venue in Wrigleyville.
The even started with quotes that were repeated in several languages followed by a reading of part of the constitution.
Randy Albers the head of Columbia College's fiction writing department gave an introduction that emphasized the power of story and action. Now in our day and age American's need a vision because we are in crisis. He said "regardless of background the american dream is about achieving happiness, and now that is hard to find so we need writer's imaginations"

First to read was Patricia McNair who read from her story collection Temple of Air. The story is about the teenage experience during the Vietnam war.

Next up to read was Heidi Durro. Her writing was said to touch on complex racial issues
She said her book is about social responsibility, and it began with a story of a real girl, it is called The Girl Who Fell From the Sky. She used her own experiences of being asked if she was black or white on the girls story to meld the issues. The girl in the story deals with a confused identity of being half black and half white, and not knowing how to identify. she writes this in the voice of an 11 year old girl, which I found really interesting as it dealed with what she went thorugh at that age.

John Sales read last from his book. It was on the Filipino American war.

All in all I found this experience an interesting way to experience education. The event was free to the public, which allowed everyone to be able to come in and experience literature and different takes on what the American life is. It allowed me to see education in different ways that take place outside of the classroom. This was very accessible. Some of the things I wish were involved was a more indepth discussion with the crowd and audience participation. I did like to see that it was all kinds of perspectives on what the american dream was, not just a white middle class american dream, but a varied response to the topic.

Chicago Public Schools board meeting

This was such an interesting experience for me as I have never been to a school board meeting before. This was definitely a crazy experience. I was surprised and excited to see how many people were there to "fight the system" for their children's and students' educations. We all want our nation's youth to have the best education possible, but this is defined in very different ways by whoever you might ask so I was interested to hear what was going to be discussed and debated on. Education is such a pressing issue that needs to be discussed especially in Chicago. Schools in Chicago are struggling greatly, there is not enough money or resources and the resources are not distributed equitably. Students are not learning under ideal circumstances, and that is obviously frustrating to not only the teachers and parents, but also the students. I was surprised to see how many students were in attendance to support their teachers who were speaking out on their behalf. Tensions were high as we walked in amongst protestors and waited in a long line just to register to get in line again only to be seated in a back up room watching the meeting from a tv screen. The sheer amount of people taking part was incredible to see. What struck me was the response we got as students at the board meeting. Many people asked what school we were affiliated with, and when we told them we were art education graduate students I feel like we got some strange reactions. Most people decided to stop talking to us at that point and turned back around. I thought this was strange, and I would assume this is because they didn't think we had much stake in what was taking place.
We were finally seated in the room to watch the meeting which started with the pledge and speaking of the success of the JROTC's campaign to end youth homelessness. The student noted that 15,000 students in CPS are homeless, which is a devastating number. I recalled a news story I read about a woman being arrested recently as she sent her son to public school and was homeless. She was said to have stolen money and education. Such a terrible story, I wonder how this is handled in Chicago.
After this the viva project was addressed, and the speaker stated that policy was failing at the classroom level and it was directly hurting the youth. We need to move beyond politics and integrate student, teacher and community voices in education. teacher's voices must be heard.
The president of the board then spoke and said this was all in the best interest of the students. Interesting to hear as many of the participants and speakers felt that the best interests were of the board.
Following that many spoke about the acheivement gap, the educational apartheid, unfair conditions, and the failing systems. These speakers were met with much praise and applause. Interestingly all of them went over time and ignored the director of the meeting who told them their time was up. They didn't follow the rules of the "democratic" meeting. They also spoke out of turn and allowed others to speak when they had not signed up.
Following that speakers were addressing the extended school day. They want an increase in instruction time by 30% for what they say will be for art, music, and individual help. They were met with booing and not given any respect.
To me this was surprising. I don't understand how people expect respect from all parties when they don't respect anyone else whether it is the board or other speakers. There are ways to deal with problems that don't involve pushing people out of their speaking turns and booing others. I know they are all passionate and have their hearts in the right place, but I would have liked to see more respect on all levels for this "democratic" board meeting.

Introduction

This blog will serve as the documentation of my observation hours for the graduate course in art education - Doing Democracy at The School of the Art Institute of Chicago. I will be documenting my experiences of observing democracy at work (or not at work) in educational sites around the city of Chicago. My first observation hour was the Chicago Public Schools board meeting, and my documentation will be posted soon.