Not that I am going to change who I am, and not that I will tell it like it is, but rather, or perhaps, tone it down, to be less sarcastic, less snarky.
I started this blog in August 2008 as a way to keep a journal about my day to day dealings with everything in my school, PS 154, District 7, in The Bronx. I went on TV, FOX 5 with Ti Hua Chang when our assistant principal Derrick Townsend (known in this blog as Numb Nuts) was physically abusing students, and the principal at the time, Linda-Amil Irizzary (known in this blog as John Deacon) was covering it up. Here is a link to the video from FOX 5. I have looked much better than this. I have also lost weight since.
After several months it morphed, as well as did I, into something bigger, more astute to the world of the so called "reform movement," and the ability to read between the lines and the double speak and give my 2 cents and be who I am.
Right now we live in the most perilous period ever in our education system in this country. There is a full throng attack by powers unseen, seen, and worse, those that have the money and the power and the wherewithal to foist their will -- not the parents, or students, but their will -- on what they it is they want. Sadly, the ones being damaged are the students and the families, particularly those that live in poverty and the inner city.
I have said it before and I will say it again. One person, not me, not you, not anyone can affect change, to stop these people from destroying education. It must be a group effort, a team effort. Students, parents, teachers must all band together, must all fight the fight until we are victorious against the deformers.
It can and will happen in time. I am, just as anyone that is reading this, just a cog. I wish to be nothing more. But many cogs together, thousands upon millions, turn the wheels of what is right and what can and will be accomplished.
Thank you for your time reading the writings of me, just one person in this fight. I don't plan to stop or ever back down from what is right.
4 comments:
SBS, I too am a working cog in a broken machine that is starved of oil. You along with other brave bloggers are in a small but relevant way what keeps me going because what you provide is what is so absent during these times. You along with them provide THE TRUTH. I have always been the introvert, but when you asked Alexander N. my question when interviewing him and saw how he ran from it, it felt empowering and has led me to be much more outspoken in my school. The truth that is revealed through your blog and the others is spread by me to my peers at work. Thank you. We both have families, but I wish we could one day grab a beer and BS about all this BS. Be well!
Good for you, man! Thank you for being so brave, for our kids.
I hope that even if you do decide to "tone it down, to be less sarcastic, less snarky" that we will still see posts with awesome images that capture the essence of the the corporate education reform types, along with their rank opportunism and insatiable greed.
If the best these vultures can do is criticize my wife and I for taking care of rescue cats, then that speaks volumes to their lack of principles.
You have been doing a great job, so keep it up. I'm lucky enough to have found a good school but I know what a mess most schools are. I found your site a few weeks ago when someone told me that you wrote about my former school. It is a mess, I left because it was a mess, the DOE report said that they know it is a mess, yet they are not only allowing an incompetent Leadership Academy Principal to continue but putting in more administration who fit the Bloomberg profile. The school will fail, teachers will be blamed and half will lose their jobs. We need people like you who aren't afraid to speak out to stop the destruction of public schools.
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