Comments

I appreciate Pastor Jackson's work. But the church needs to also be at the forefront of preventing the dropout. This means getting in the schools and working for structural change. I saw some research this week about the proficiently of teachers in Chicago and the suburbs. It showed that using a method of evaluating teacher proficiency, CPS had about 50% low proficient teachers and only about 8% of the highest proficient teachers, which on average the Chicago suburbs had only 8% low proficient teacher and about 40% highly proficient teachers (there were four categories of proficiency.) Another study cited in the presentation followed students in Dallas. Students that started in very similar positions (according to test scores- about 55%) were very different three years later. Those that had had three years of highly qualified teachers (same definition) were now at 76%. Those with three years of low performing teachers were at 27%. We as the church need to work to end this as a structural problem.

Yes, and we also need to look at the continuing social pressures on the black family. Two-thirds or more of black households have no father present.

My point is that we often want to blame the victims. Certainly more black fathers that were involved would be helpful. But there is a lot of evidence that the schools are not working. It is not simply money, although money is involved, it is not just bad teachers, although there are many bad teachers, it is not just poverty and preparation for school, although there is a ton of research about how much more prepared students from middle and up class homes are for school than low income students. In the end, there needs to be a willingness to put the needed effort into educating students, not matter what their background. It is not helping students to say, well they come from a bad background, so give them a break. Instead we need to be sure that we say, they come from a bad background, but we are going to make sure that we still expect a lot from them, and then provide the resources that are necessary to get them there. This is an issue of imageo dei. These children are created in God's image just as we are.

If that doesn't move you then maybe the fact that every dropout costs the government about $160,000 more than their contemporary that graduated, but lives in the same community. Or that dropouts that get involved in drugs or prison system will cost about $1.3 to 2.3 million over their life.

So, Adam, what do you propose?

I'm a teacher (not sure at which level I'd fall under according to those definitions, or if there's any sense of consistency in those studies [unfortunately, the way education is generally being measured, probably not]) in the CPS system. And I'm eagerly trying to find out how to come at and attack the problems, to literally help the kids and teens of my beloved city, b/c, as you say, they are made in God's image and God cares deeply for them.

And I know Pastor Phil. He's a good, Godly man who's been working amongst some of the hardest-to-reach youth in one of our poorest communities. And he's been doing this for decades. And they do more than just door-to-door evangelism and street praying (though I'm sure that's a part of it). Lawndale Community Church is well-known to be an active part of the community, much more so than just about anything else in that area (including bringing in businesses, tutoring, homeless work, etc.). I'll let Phil or anybody from LCC talk about that.

I'm frustrated too, at the problems of urban, blighted schooling system. But, please, don't blame the teachers (there are some bad ones, for sure. But, really, not as many as the news would have us believe, from my experience.). Or the churches that are actually trying to do something. Or even the schools.

But I agree with you here:
Instead we need to be sure that we say, they come from a bad background, but we are going to make sure that we still expect a lot from them, and then provide the resources that are necessary to get them there.

Now, how do we propose to do that? (and i'm not just being sarcastic. i seriously want your input.)

Without clarifying my entire rant above (don't mean to upset so much. Certainly don't have it figured out in the least), I should mention that Phil Jackson is pastor of the House Covenant Church (which is the hip-hop themed church featured in the news story) and youth pastor of Lawndale Community Church. And that Lawndale has been around for a long time and long-term activists in the neighborhood. (The House meets at Lawndale still, I believe, and they are both intricately linked somehow.)