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barack obama

At The End of the Day [The Letters Series]

by Jose on November 18, 2009 · 1 comment

in life

This week, I’m writing a few more letters to different people, whose names shall be removed from the post, but who nonetheless are amalgamations of real characters. I won’t be mincing words this week, and in these letters, I hope to address some issues I find in education as a whole through these letters. If need be, I’ll apologize later. Actually, I probably won’t.

Barack Obama at School

Barack Obama at School

Dear Barack Obama,

It’s me again, hoping you’ll soon respond to my letters. As always, I have respect for you and what you’ve done thus far in office (most of the stuff anyways). At the very least, you’ve brought many issues into the national zeitgeist in ways only few have the power to do, particularly education. My letter comes on the heels of a Meet the Press interview with your Secretary of Education Arne Duncan in tow with Al Sharpton and Newt Gingrich. As the video plays, I found myself shaking my head at almost every assertion these men made. While I expect a shallowness over educational issues from afternoon specials and morning wake-up shows, I still don’t expect that from men who have positioned themselves as “educational gurus.”

Very little about their collective histories build confidence in me or many others in their ability to understand the intricacies of the classroom, from the pedagogy and praxis of the everyday K-12 classroom and the management of an actual school because and despite restrictions from underfunded districts to the egregious practices of college loaners and their universities and the ultra-selectivity of the economically and / or racially underprivileged into post-graduate programs. Even if these individuals have tried to make a conscious effort to discuss the numbers behind their message, they sound more like they’ve dined at the corporate line table rather than actually having thorough conversations with people on the ground.

Let’s say we actually took the socialized system of public schools and turned them all over to private corporations and “non-profits.” When the next recession hits, as capitalism is prone to do, will we finally see a bailout then? Will the government have to step in and tell these “CEOs” to take paycuts but turn their backs when they take private trips to islands for professional development? Will our children have to shred all their papers and use the remaining documents for ticker tape, too? Will some of us teachers walk out with only socks and remaining curriculum in our suitcases? Or will we have a situation akin to Major League Baseball where we’ll hire “scabs” like proferred by Teach for America in lieu of qualified teachers with masters and / or years of experience in their profession?

A big part of me gets it, too. The one thing that most people seem to agree upon is that student achievement trumps everything else when it comes to education. However, the ends doesn’t always justify the ends, especially if the ends depend on unsustainable means. When I heard “Teachers have to come into a classroom and believe that they’re going to be ready and disciplined,” it says to me that we have yet to understand the conditions in which our children grow up and how so few actually make it out of the same system we come out of. When I heard “If the schools are failing, we just won’t give them money,” it sounds like it’s a problem that’s already been happening and it’ll continue promulgating the difference between the haves and the have-nots (for that matter, the halved or the halved-not).

To wit, in New York, we had plenty of schools who received the highest rating possible from the NYC Department of Education’s grading system, an A. By plenty, I mean 77.6%. Conversely, we only had 2 schools who received an F. Now, looking at the metrics, one might think NYC has done rather well, and deserves the monies from the Race to the Top fund. At a second glance, we see just how these numbers have manipulated so many of us. Our overcrowded, underfunded, parted, and soulless edifices can’t compare to the gloss Bloomberg’s coated over his office.

But maybe asking those three to visit a very low-performing school, even with Secret Service in tow, would mess up their shine. At the end of the day, as in the beginning, sunshine doesn’t gleam on brick and mortar. Yet the new glass ones aren’t so transparent either …

Mr. Vilson, who wants nothing more than Obama to read …

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Dear President Obama: The Confidence of the People

by Jose on October 13, 2009 · 4 comments

in life

President Barack Obama in front of a UN Flag

President Barack Obama in front of a UN Flag

Dear President Obama,

First, I must congratulate you on becoming the first sitting US President in 90 years to win the Nobel Peace Prize, adding onto an already incredible resume that for any man, much less a Black man in America, should be lauded for. Despite the controversy surrounding the award, the idea that such a highly esteemed foreign committee of men and women would recognize your agenda as the agenda to follow speaks volumes about the power you’ve demonstrated. It’s also important that we’ve had a president who’s helped empower liberals and the like to take on a more active role in their communities and in their government … even if it’s in opposition to your plans.

That’s where people like me come in. While I’ve silently and not-so-silently cheered you on as a great example of a man, and even as a politician, I also have so many concerns about the direction (or lack thereof) that this country has headed in, I just have to put things out there. For instance, in the first week of school, I showed the video of you giving a speech to school children about the importance of education and for America’s kids to do well in school. I appreciated the gesture, as these sorts of open demonstrations of care rarely happened over the last decade or so. Then, I’m also nagged by the idea that Arne Duncan, Secretary of Education, as your representative for the top education chair in the country and thus, an extension of you, wants to keep pushing a reform agenda that corporatizes our public schools and asks already-cash-strapped states to develop reforms that reflect this more corporate view of public education … or else.

Then, there’s the issue with health care. As a teacher, I don’t have to worry about health care, as it comes with the job. I’m fortunately one of the people who is not directly affected by whether this bill passes or not, but as someone who has too many students whose moms have to work from 3pm – 11pm, whose dads see the inside of their taxis or the machines they work with more than their families. This isn’t just limited to my kids. I’m a man whose friends always have that scare from watching CNBC when their parent company’s stock drops or when the next merger may or may not happen, whose neighbors scratch at broken promises of the lottery and (un)employment agencies at the hopes of striking it rich, even for a few hours a day. In this capitalist society, I’ve been on the side of the triangle where there’s a much smaller chance of winning.

And that’s where I think so many of us who believe in you have our quandaries. What’s the direction that this country’s going? Why do we have conflicting reports about the state of every and anything regarding you, even as they keep changing, even from your own people? I’m not saying I’m in full agreement of everything you do, but the ambiguity and lack of affirmation surrounding you can lead many of us who voted / campaigned / spread the word / wrote songs, lyrics, blogs / defended / felt / heard / cried / held you down to mistrust you. While a relatively small faction of  I know that it’s only been 9 months, and really, I hated to write this knowing how difficult it is to eradicate inefficiency in an organization like a national government, especially one of this magnitude.

Even still, much like the voice you used to get yourself elected, we too must lift our voices. As Paulo Freire, another educator, once said, “The trust of the people in the leaders reflects the confidence of the leaders in the people.”

Trust.

Peace,

Jose Vilson, who has an audacity to hope, too …

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Dear Barack Obama: A Letter from an Urban Math Teacher to His President

by Jose on September 14, 2009 · 0 comments

in life

President Obama Checking My E-mails

President Obama Checking My E-mails

Dear President Obama,

First, I’d like to thank you for your speech on education last weekend in Arlington, VA to high schoolers. I actually found it rather informative and refreshing to hear a current President talk about topics such as responsibility and effort in school. Your life stories as they pertain to school give a good back drop for people whose only picture you as elitist, conformist, and condescending. The confident but humble man I voted for back in November showed up again in that video clip.

I was so inspired by the clip (and the revolting dissension to the showing of this speech), I simply had to take 20 minutes from the last period on Friday to set a precedent of inspiration and hope in my students. I wrote it into my lesson plan and timed it so well, the final bell actually rang a second after you said, “Thank you.” Most of my students also saw what I saw in the video: a president finally talking to them about the things they needed and wanted to hear, and talking and addressing them and their needs.

I also have to share this because it might also give context to my own preoccupations about speeches from government officials. My students’ main complaint was “Why didn’t he come speak at our school?” Superficially, I would gather that they’re just selfish, immature brats who always need to be coddled and don’t appreciate when the President comes speak to them. Then, I thought, “Outside of this school, who does?” Who comes to speak to my students about the importance of education besides teachers? They appreciate (in general) my position as a male math teacher of color, but your presence at another school didn’t help the image they have of their underprivileged situation(s).

I thought to myself and wondered just how disaffected so many of our young people feel by people who never actually come talk to them. For that matter, they probably also feel some type of way for not having a grand, open auditorium, overcrowded classes, uninspiring teachers, outdated materials, dingy apartments, rotten fruits and vegetables, and the occasional cop harassing them because they have on a Yankee fitted cap and baggy clothes, just to let them know whose boss.

They may or may not understand that Arlington, VA’s school may also have its set of problems. But for one day, my school’s kids were reminded that the gap between the have-the-Presidents and the have-the-President-nots broadens clandestinely. Until that gap wanes, I won’t let up and I can’t let up. I’ll always be critical of your administration, even though as a man, you have this inspiring history. I wish you the best and thanks for the reminder of the battles we all have to make sure our students get the best education possible.

Mr. Vilson, who wants better for every student …

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Success Is A Process, Not An Event

by Jose on January 21, 2009 · 3 comments

in life

Barack Obama as Jackie Robinson

Barack Obama as Jackie Robinson

The following is an excerpt from CNN’s Wolf Blitzer interviewing Former Gen. Colin Powell, who commemorated the inauguration of Barack Obama, our 44th President.

BLITZER: Did you ever think, Gen. Powell, that you would be alive to witness this day?

POWELL: I didn’t know if I would or I would not. I knew the day would come eventually. I watched over the last 50 years, the 50 years of my adult life, as my country went from Jim Crow and discrimination and segregation, and I couldn’t get a hamburger in a hamburger joint in the South. And slowly but surely, things changed, things improved, America looked at itself with Dr. Martin Luther King holding the mirror up for us to look at ourselves. And we said, this is not who we should be or what we should be. This is not the inspiration to the world that we present ourselves as.

And so, slowly but surely, we changed. And then, in recent years, more rapidly, to the point where a man of enormous skill, enormous capability was elected president of the United States, and not just because he is black, but it’s a sign of our society and our democratic system that he is black and he made it. A lot of people said, white folks will go into the booth, but they wouldn’t pull the lever for him, no matter what they said outside. Well, they did. And he ran a brilliant campaign, an organized campaign, and it was a very successful campaign.

I had a flashback to a lively discussion I had with a few public safety officers when I was a “safety agent” in college. I just remember how everyone was still annoyed at the first election of George W. Bush. We witnessed the apparent travesty unfold, but wondered who were the viable candidates at the time other than Bush in 2000. Al Gore? John McCain? Maybe. Then, someone brought Colin Powell’s name up, and hysteria ensued!

“You mean to tell me that this country’s not racist when COLIN POWELL, a DEDICATED WAR HERO, would get shot, SHOT!, if he even contemplated running! He’s got as many credentials as anyone we’ve ever seen, but even liberals won’t elect him because they’re afraid he’s gonna get assassinated as soon as he takes his hand off the Bible!”

I’d never seen this White lady, bespectacled and in uniform, a former Armed Forces soldier herself, get so animated. Moments like that kicked some of my own theories about voting blocks in the teeth. Maybe Tupac was finally wrong: we were ready for a Black president. Maybe, as the Onion mentioned, it had gotten so bad that we were desperate enough to have a Black president who on the one end embodies our hopes and changes but also was such a clean slate that we could transfix our own views onto him.

But more importantly, Barack Obama’s ascendancy came as a result of time.

So yesterday, after watching the inauguration with my students, I immediately went into a few remarks (if anyone’s down for the soaring allegory, it’s this writer):

Today, ladies and gentlemen, is a result of a long series of events. Barack Obama didn’t just get to be President of the United States just because of who he is. Just the way that Civil Rights leaders paved the way for you all to be sitting here with the same calculators, the same books, in the same seats that anyone else can sit in, and have the privileges you do, in a time when they got arrested just for sitting in front of a bus or hosed because they wanted to walk into the same diner that others did, THAT’S the privilege.

So when people like me see that, and we get a little emotional, understand that we think about kids like you every night, and how events like the one you saw today only mean that now you get a chance to do what you want to do. You now have to carry that message of hope and change into the future generation. It’s up to you now.

Success is not an event; it’s a process. And the process is far from over.

Jose, who wonders if 80% of blacks really believe Obama sealed up MLK’s dream …

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Before You Become President (Dear Barack Obama)

by Jose on January 15, 2009 · 3 comments

in life

Barack Obama, Lincoln, Experience

Barack Obama, Lincoln, Experience

Dear President-Elect Barack Obama (or whoever handles your mail),

Like you, I’m just one man
A writer with a vision, a community organizer with dreams
Of an America where my President and Governer are Black in skin
Wise in their decisions
Vigilant in his ways
Persistent in his pursuit of justice
To do right by the American people
But sometimes I wonder if I’m asking too much from a man
Who preached change and hope to this author
When the sun rose over the White House,
It dawned over America the constant shadow
The last incumbent left upon the land
We live in a state where his ashes from the leaves in his stems
Float from sea to war-torn sea,
We see no refuge, but plenty of refugees
Your former opponent had enough houses to provide them shelter
And your future crib has enough rooms to put over a roof over these babies,
While water washes over former Cajun homes
Earthquakes crack brick
Brisk match-quick winds conflagrate rooftops of the rich and poor
Mayors and governors ignore the people’s will
Turn local governments into fiefdoms with a little money and a lot of PR
JESUS!
I’m not expecting you to work Messianic miracles
Walk across the Mediterranean,
Bring peace to Gaza and the holy lands,
Rub bandages to the Chinese protester prisoners
On their knees hoping for some restitution from this dictator authoritarianism
Sweep poverty from Russia and the Phillipines
Hold hands with the victims and survivors of diseases, infections, and afflictions in Darfur,
Zimbabwe, South Africa, and all points in between
Though I might ask you to pass around a basket with 1 loaf of bread and 1 fish,
And in the time it takes you to get a million or so fans on Facebook,
Have it FedExed to Oakland, CA,
with enough produce to feed the mourners
Of Oscar Grant and every dead civilian killed on account of their skin
Or their will,
Or their economic status,
Or who they choose to love,
Or whether they look like they belong in the land that postpones equal opportunity at will
So before you get cozy in the Oval Office,
Where many men have either uplifted or destroyed the lives of millions in one fell swoop
I want you to know that I’m proud of your successes
I want you to know that the shades that the White House now produce
I want you to know that this country, more than ever, needs your calm demeanor
Your spirit
Your willingness to listen
Your ability to champion the people as much as you champion yourself
As the sun sets, the shades on the other side of 1600 Pennsylvania now dance in your honor
Those shadows really the souls of MLK, Rosa Parks, Robert F. Kennedy, Madelyn Dunham
And the thousands of people who were laid to rest just for the one moment
And I want you to know that the Bible you’re asked to put your hand on,
You can hold
Wrap your fingers around it
Seize it for yourself first
But seize it for the rest of us who never could
Seize it for the rest of us who can’t
Seize it for the little boys and girls who haven’t yet …

Jose, who doesn’t want to wait …

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I Didn’t Vote

by Jose on November 4, 2008 · 21 comments

in life

Obama's Hope, by Chris Milk

I rebelled.

I didn’t vote.

Well, let me be clear.

I didn’t vote for a Christian, a politician, a populist, or any major candidate.

I didn’t vote because Facebook, Twitter, MySpace, and any other social spaces made me.

I didn’t vote because your profile pic, your text message, your constant blogs, and e-mails made me.

I didn’t vote because any particular candidates’ face was literally all over the place on Halloween, in the newsstands, on my television screen, or on some spiffy list.

I didn’t vote for “change;” that’s heavily dependent on who we’re looking at.

I didn’t vote for a Democrat or Republican, or a Black person or White person or male or female.

I didn’t vote on strategy either, because if I wanted to go with the strategy method, I could have chosen any number of campaigns or interested groups of voters, but I didn’t.

I didn’t even vote because I’m a teacher, and as much as I’ve griped about education and how I don’t like either candidates’ way of approaching us.

I didn’t vote because everyone else did it. I’m not usually one to just fall in line with those who generally share the same social interests with me.

I did it because I have a little boy in my math class who likes Barack, but thinks (and perhaps knows) that people want to kill him, so he shouldn’t even try because he’s going to get shot.

I did it because I have a young girl who, fiery and outspoken as she is, thinks John McCain himself wants to kill Barack and doesn’t believe that good people can come from either party.

I did it because I see the seeds are planted so students CAN be progressive and political at such an early age without discretion and without fear.

I did it because there’s someone else to look up to, away from the Soulja Boys of the world who give shout-outs to slavemasters or the Yung Bergs of the world differentiating between dark and light butts. They won’t follow those fools; they’ll follow Barack.

I did it because there’s nothing wrong with making a well-rounded family, loving one’s wife, and hugging your kids in public cool.

I did it because as much as the bitter man in me says we deserved Bush for 8 years since we didn’t fight hard enough against the maniac, the idealist believes that we didn’t, and shouldn’t, and this is the recompense.

I did it because, as I looked at and around the classroom, I was almost in (very quiet) tears knowing that these students would never be here if people didn’t literally fight to get into these establishments. Those fights help shift the national ideology, and made peace and progress in this country possible. From the schoolhouse to the White House, and we have the perfect man to bridge that gap.

I did it because, when my unborn children look up at me a few years from now and ask me what I did on this day, I can tell them,

“I voted for you to be whatever the hell you want to be.”

I didn’t vote for Barack the politician. I voted for Barack the man. And with him, I voted for his legacy.

jose, who will either be celebrating or mourning tomorrow. godspeed …

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A Better Class of Criminal

by Jose on August 17, 2008 · 7 comments

in life

Imagine a viable presidential candidate 75-100% funded by the people.

Not that that’s going to happen for a generation or two, but let’s imagine that for a second. The idea that the person holding the top public service position in the country would actually be beholden to the people which he / she’s supposed to serve is almost foreign to us. Our idea of government these days is all types of fucked up, and unfortunately, this presidential campaign has only further made me believe in the government’s underbelly of constant corruption, not of some ill-conceived change.

In the most recent Robert Downey Jr. covered Rolling Stone, Matt Taibbi (a liberal writer if I ever read one) goes in deep on the two viable presidential candidates John McCain and Barack Obama. We know without question that John McCain kowtows to the needs and wants of multi-million dollar corporations. No one would equivocate his intentions with populist intentions. Barack Obama, on the other hand, is a whole ‘nother situation.

My biggest question with Barack comes from the almost proletariat rhetoric he’s given us for the last few years. He says he wants to signal a change of the guard, disengage lobbyists and special interests from interfering with government, raise taxes, and ultimately change the mentality of the people. Great. Yet, as we look at the facts, we start to see that, regardless of who’s going to be the incumbent for these divided states, green speaks louder than any red, white, or blue arrangement.

Check the following from Mr. Taibbi:

Sadly, the answer to that question increasingly appears to be that Obama is, well, full of shit. He has made no bones about his plans to raise income by soaking the rich, promising to roll back the Bush tax cuts for people making over $250,000, increase the top tax rate on capital gains to 25 percent and raise the top rate on qualified dividends. He has also pledged to deliver a real stomach punch to hedge-fund managers, raising the tax rate on most of their income from 15 percent to 35 percent.

These populist pledges sound good, but many business moguls appear to be betting that the tax policies, like Obama himself, are only that: something that sounds good. “I think we don’t want to make too much of his promises on taxes,” says Robert Pollin, professor of economics at the University of Massachusetts. “Not all of these things will happen.” Noting the overwhelming amount of Wall Street money pouring into Obama’s campaign, even elitist fuckwad David Brooks was recently moved to write, “Once the Republicans are vanquished, I wouldn’t hold your breath waiting for that capital-gains tax hike.”

He goes on in the article to discuss Obama’s main contributors, and how some of Obama’s moves came from a lobbyist or former employee of a corporation giving him a little phone call and asking him not to place some vote or change course with a previous statement. I honestly believe that Obama went into this campaign with the best intentions, but setting all-time records in spending won’t come from the 2 million or so individual donors to his campaign, but that coterie of a few hundred who gave 5-6 figures so he’d do their will.

Ladies and gentlemen, we’re dealing with a better class of criminal. It’s not anyone we can see right in front of us, but the ones we don’t see. They’re somewhere on vacation off the coast of a “Third-World” country, or in a private meeting with some of our elected officials. They’re in board rooms helping to write talking points to fend us off. They’re lining the pockets of an army of people to create special effects way more sophisticated than smoke and mirrors.

We’ve had the wool pulled over our eyes, if I’m using the right metaphor. Then again, if we honestly believed that any individual would somehow usurp the system by penetrating the system without serious major support doesn’t understand what’s at hand. For the last 8 years, I’ve been reminded of how egregious the powers that be can be with their corruption. It wasn’t enough that for the 8 years before that, some of us were under the impression that all of us were doing that much better. GWBush was a test to see what we’d do if pushed past the limits of the previous generation. Our answer: not that much.

In countries all over the world, people have literally sacrificed life and limb to see to it that their governments were afraid of them and not the other way around. this country has lost that concept. Even the media, who we often criticize for not giving the full details, have slowly started to help the general populace read between the lines in subtle and not-so-subtle ways. Yet, we’re still not angry enough to do anything other than draw up signs and walk down streets.

And I do mean, we. It’s not enough to just vote. We need to organize in our communities and educate in whatever capacity possible. Because if our own elected officials won’t look out for our interests, we’ll need to fend for self. I’ve become ambivalent again about Mr. Obama. Not that I’d ever vote for John McCain and his thuggery, but I almost feel like … my vote’s going to waste, and I’m just waiting for him to say and do the right thing to persuade me in one direction or the other.

If the will of 2 million individual donors wasn’t good enough to persuade him to take care of his people, then it is we who’ve been robbed.

jose, who thinks this isn’t what we need or want right now, but it’s what we deserve …

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Juneteenth: From Curt Flood to A-Rod

by Jose on June 19, 2008 · 2 comments

in life

Juneteenth: for many African-Americans in this country, this is the true day to celebrate the emancipation of slavery. Though the Emancipation Proclamation came out late September of 1862, it really didn’t free the slaves per se. From what I’ve read, slaves in the North were still beholden to their slave-owners, and it didn’t have much of an effect on the slaves of the day anyways. Juneteenth celebrates Texas’ (and eventually most of the union’s states) enforcement of the abolition of slavery.

When I think about that, I think back to an original post I wrote about the Holocaust and the Maa’fa, and the various (and disparate) opinions on whether these tragedies could even be compared to each other. I also thought about the systematic implications it meant for the groups that it primarily affected negatively. And lastly, believe it or not, I thought about baseball, and the argument that Curt Flood brought up when he filed a lawsuit against Major League Baseball.

See, Curt Flood was a pivotal figure in MLB, and the one man everyone points to when they look at baseball’s free agent market today. In 1969, he was almost traded away from the St. Louis Cardinals to the Philadelphia Phillies, an offer he didn’t feel like accepting. Actually, he stated that not only was he going to look at the Phillies’ “offer,” but look at what other teams have to offer for his services as well, thus setting the language for what we consider as free agency this day. He strongly compared the reserve clause, which made sure the team that first gave you an offer to play baseball kept you in their stable forever even after your contract has ended, to slavery, which in this country kept getting more technical as slaves became more creative with their rebellion.

His eventual loss of the lawsuit to MLB forced the baseball players to bond together and fight the reserve clause, thus opening the era for free agency. Fast-forward to today, and baseball players enjoy 6 digit salaries at minimum. The highest paid player in any major professional sport happens to be a Dominican man who makes close to $300 million, not including endorsements, hedge funds, and other investments. Alex Rodriguez has got it made.

But while that Dominican man’s making that kind of money, there are whole blocks in Washington Heights, a predominantly Dominican neighborhood, whose combined salary doesn’t even match what he gets a year. Tons of poor Latinos can only wish to have his success, luck, and fortunes. We all know this. What we often don’t ask ourselves is, if A-Rod’s making that type of money, imagine how much money the people paying him make. I mean, whatever the baseball player’s making, it’s got to be a small percentage of what the boss makes off his image and his and the other players’ play.

To this day, we still blame other workers for whatever change the next boss makes. People still get mad at teachers for having pensions, tenure, and summer vacations, but never ask why they’ve never demanded that of their own bosses. We still look at immigrants, illegal or otherwise, and blame them for taking all the jobs when many of those jobs are still available in abundance (this, I’ll definitely get into sooner than later). We still talk about unions who strike as inconveniencing us when they’re really fighting the unfair wages that most of us decry privately when we think about the price of gas, milk, and rice.

So on this Juneteenth, I can’t really say slavery is over except by law and overtly. We’re not in chains (though interestingly, the number of jails almost went up exponentially when slavery was over, and the number of jails is predicated on how many kids fail the 4th grade statewide tests). We do have a lot more opportunities than our predecessors have. And the mere candidacy of Barack Obama would not have been possible without the fight that so many others of all different backgrounds fought for. Yet, people still have a slave-like mentality in that they would prefer to blame the others instead of looking at what their getting compared to the bosses.

I’m certainly not saying that A-Rod’s not making waaaaaaay more than the average worker, but maybe we should realize that the opportunity he recieved came from the work others before him did to protest their bosses.

jose, who wonders if people are really going to think deeper about their relationship with their own bosses …

p.s. – Special shout-out to Carmen D. for your reminder of my prompt to the AfroSpear …

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