Happy Friday friends. Don't read this, go out and play.
In order to show that New York has not swallowed me whole (yet), I signed up for a visitors library card at the main Public Library just so that I could make a quick post to you, my loyal blog readers. Contrary to my last statement, I imagine that I am swallowing more of New York, I can feel it in my hips.
Jumpin Jehozafats my library ID is long. My ID card looks like they tried to fit a majority of pi on the back.
Today I took the subway deeper into Brooklyn to visit Erasmus Hall public schools. This is where my friend Justin teaches and he asked the principal for the permission to have a visitor. It was, without a doubt, a very sobering experience. Not that it was a scene that I feel I was ill-prepared for, because it does not take a brainiac to know what the public education condition is going to be like in inner city Brooklyn. However, there are subtleties that they can't show you in the picture shows: kids passing through security scans every single day before class, large portions of the student body walking around the halls instead of being in class, and in my humble opinion very strange organizational decisions made by administration (the way teachers are assigned to classrooms, roaming students on lunch breaks, etc.). Thank the good spirits that there are teachers doing what they can. I believe it takes thicker skin than most to be an educator as is, but man oh man do they have there work cut out for them in these kinds of environments. I will give Justin a hug when I see him later. All the rest of you, go hug your teachers.
I did get to go to a pep rally at the school while I visited. One more thing I can check off the "Things To Do Before Your Biological Self Stops Working" list.
Like I said, I am in Manhattan now, going to some museums tonight, but more on that later.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
1 comment:
it's all a dream which you know. And your mom would like your props for teachers in general, and for her, and your friend in particular. Great teachers are few and far between, but they are the glue of the whole damn dream.
I am in Albuquerque, quite an interesting trip, and tonight was hilarious. Met some guys who rode their bikes from the upper heights to sports bar near downtown. Some of the biggest RE developers in NM, and they are going to come build some in peanut country. Wait. this is your blog. gnight.
Post a Comment