  |
A School of Our Own:
Parents, Power, and Community at the East Harlem Block Schools
Tom Roderick
Teaching for Social Justice
Pub Date: November 2001, 192 pages
Paperback: $21.95, ISBN: 0807741566
Cloth: $48, ISBN: 0807741574
 
|
:
"This is an inspiring, informative, and sometimes infuriating story of the determination of low-income parents to create good child care in their neighborhood, and the multiple ways in which bureaucracy can cast aspersions and obstruct. In this age of 'welfare reform,' the lessons are as fresh as they were thirty years ago. "
—Peter Edelman, Professor of Law, Georgetown University Law Center,former Assistant Secretary, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services "This powerful story of the generation of hope and of the power of a community to educate its young must be read by all people concerned with the future of our children. "
—Herb Kohl, Director, Center for Teaching Excellence and Social Justice, University of San Francisco "Contemporary policymakers, parents, educators, reformers, and activists have much to learn from this book. "
—Augusta Souza Kappner, President, Bank Street College of Education "An exciting, dramatic account of a pathbreaking, parent-controlled educational experiment. Essential reading for teachers, community organizers, and of course, parents. "
—Ruth Sidel, Professor of Sociology, Hunter College, New York A School of Our Own shows how in 1965 a group of Puerto Rican "homemakers" created better schools for their children and built a community that enabled many adults to transform their lives. Including both educational and political struggles, this engaging story addresses timely topics like:
- How to provide good early childhood education in a way that simultaneously strengthens families.
- How to create an organization strongly committed to countering race, class, and gender prejudice and discrimination.
- How to strengthen civil society and engage people in public life.
- How to eliminate poverty-specifically, how to address the unfinished business left by the 1996 "reform" of welfare.
|
