http://www.spinninglobe.net/againstschool.htm

http://www.alice-miller.com/articles_en.php?lang=en&nid=47&grp=11

http://www.commondreams.org/archive/2008/05/21/9099/

Well, it IS true that the kids are test dummies for benefit of the corporations that sold us on NCLB so they could "supply" the test services.

But the kids themselves cannot make that case. It was supposed to be us adult citizens knowing better and legislating better. But we didn't.

Fact is, some parents care somewhat while their kids are actually in a school. The "public at large", though, doesn't give a darn about any numbers from schools except the sports scores.

Well done ankle-biters!

I hope the idea spreads from this school to others. It's not like the kids aren't going to hear about this and think about going on strike rather than taking a meaningless test. Practice tests are what you use homework time for, not class time.

What an amazing story. My favorite bit is where the principal assigns him to an empty room. 'Cause, ya see, he still has to be doing his job, I guess, which essentially is being on the premisis and not giving any, uh, messages that are inappropriate, to anyone. That's what the principal considers the essence of his job.

Avella says he teaches them critical thinking. He, too, may be underestimating his role - I would hazard that those kids just learned more about "social studies" than they are likely to learn about any other subject before they're done school!

"This guy was far over the line in a lot of the ways he was running his classroom,"

Yes - he was teaching them to think for themselves. How will they be able to work at Mickey-Ds if they do that?

What would be more interesting that turning in blank tests would be purposely giving wrong answers. (And if you are not sure of the wrong answer, leave it blank.) Think what that principal would do then when his or her school rates as the worst in the nation!

It reminds me of a friend of mine years ago who got to the end of the exam and realized too late that he had misnumbered all of his answers. Oops.

The students and their teacher are an inspiration. May their example spread like a prairie fire across this dim and oppressive land. As a former teacher I know about the totalitarian strictures of standardized tests. Virtually every teacher I know hates them. The testing companies are making billions. It is a scam. Critical thinking is stifled, which is just fine with the powers that be. Teachers have tremendous power if they only had the courage to exercise it. A nation-wide strike against standardized tests would be a start. Standards, yes! Standardized testing, no!

Clearly, children in the United States are an oppressed group. They accept more than their share of poverty, malnourishment, advertising overload, narcotization by greedy pharmaceutical companies, and, in govern-sanctioned programs, excessive testing. The testing serves to monitor young people--to track them into acceptable roles as adults or into the prison system. Everyday, our schools treat children as if they are guilty until proven innocent. Now that the youngsters show some sings of life, some stirring of protest against this oppression, we'll come down on them with more force than is needed. More will be medicated into "acceptable behavior" as defined by the police state. Others will just follow their parents' tracks into the world of hyperconsumerism. Few will have a chance at finding meaning in their lives.

These kids are searching for meaning, hence we must squash them quickly!

Good for the students and good for Avella!! I know for certain that school kids today are being cooerced into a narrow stream of education...meaning they are all having certain info deposited into their heads (very much like I was but in a far greater degree) for the benefit of the textbook makers & politicians. Let's face it.....the youth today are far more minipulated and lacking a real education than 20 or certainly 30 years ago.

FCAT (in Fla) was a test program that came from a company that Neal Bush (yes, former Gov. Jeb Bush and moron Pres. George Bush's brother....you know the guy involved in the 80's S&L scandals) ran.....how nice it was to have your brother JUMP on-board using tax payer dollars to implement HIS companies program in the state school system!! It is so nice to have access in life isn't it????

Now kids in Fla are so unprepared for college and life in general...our jails are filling up with these young people that the state legislature just approved our 61st state prison! Real progress!!! (sarcasm).

Kids should boycott tests!! They are not even true indicators of what they know...just what they are programed to repeat! Critical thinking is what smartened-up these kids and MORE POWER TO THEM!

Power to the (young) people!!!

ms

"A riot!" Call in the SWAT team! Tase the little bastards! We'll teach them to be compliant little sheeple...er, robots, er consumers. That's it, consumers! Or burger flippers.

I would hope to see these boycotts spread nationwide. Critical thinking is exactly the thing any person needs to learn, and the thing our entire primary education system doesn't do.

The second commentary in the May 9 Green Dog Democrat e-mail e-zine is one of the best you will read about the current overblown spate of testing in schools -- allegedly to ensure accountability under the aegis of George Bush's NCLB. The issue, headed "School daze," has a bunch of good commentaries about the issues affecting education today.

The May 9 GDD is posted on MyTown.ca at http://tinyurl.com/3zl4uc

American Education in Action. How do you spell S C A P E G O A T? Some of you are of an age that this statement will be meaningful, "Our Blacks wouldn't have done nothin' without them 'nigger loving' white agitators from up North." Of course teenagers could NEVER conceive of such actions without some 'student loving' adult agitator.

They will cut off his head. Their "street cred", their "POWER" has been challenged. They will also go after the children and screw them any way they can for as long as they are in their power and if they leave the monsters will call their 'friends' to poison any environment they go to. THAT IS WHAT POWER HAS DONE SINCE MCCARTHY IN THE 50'S. They rule through intimidation, threat, and violence. This is Authority in Action. No doubt at some point Mr. Avila will be called a "Terrorist".

We are a debased and degraded people. We start with the children.

Thank you Juan Gonzalez, you broke the Twin Towers EPA fiasco when it happened and you have given us the years of your life speaking Truth to Power, and you're still alive, many aren't. Absent Friends. Welcome & Be Blessed (in ancient Aramaic it means to become Ripe).

Please somebody hire Mr. Avila! One of the purposes of schools is to raise citizens, people who out of the goodness of their hearts put the community's future and democracy first. What has your school taught?

According to Huffingtonpost.com
NY State bought 1.7 of McGraw-Hill test prep material. I wonder if the real upset about the students' action is that they were boycotting McGraw-Hill - loyal friends of the Bush family for over 80 years. I wonder if "Ignite, Inc," Neil Bush's test prep company, sold testing material in NY...it is sold nationwide, worldwide, and especially in FL?

Alleluia! This is wonderful to see. The whole "Child Left Beyond Act" is just another way of robotizing education and kids. Think of the moron-in-chief who is its chief proponent. You can't test creativity. You can't test imagination. Like Albert Einstein quoted, "Not everything that counts can be counted, and not everything that can be counted counts." It is time to revolt against this revolting trend in education to turn our kids into testing machines. And now kids are thinking for themselves. Praise to the eighth grade kids!

The revolution has started, people thinking critically for themselves. What a concept.

The action of these children gives me hope for the furure of America. They are showing us "adults" the way to fight the machine. It's too bad the "adults" forced them to stand up for themselves instead of standing up for them.

I too hope that this action spreds far and wide. And I hope that the "adults" start to act like true citizens and help these children get the education they deserve.

And I also second the idea of giving this teacher the reward of a great job somewhere as an educator where teaching critical thinking is appreciated and valued. This would truely encourage other teachers to stand up for the kids and their proffession.

Thanks kids! Job well done.

P.S. Is there any way that we can get messages to these children, their parents, this stupid school administration, or to Mr. Avila?

I urge you all to read "The Underground History of American Education" by John Taylor Gatto, several times "Teacher of the Year" in New York City and New York State.

You find it here:

http://www.johntaylorgatto.com/underground/index.htm

Annebrit. Thanks for the Gatto reference. I concur. I did an educational conference with him in the 1990s on the West Coast. His work, his heart and his commitment are fabulous. Everyone should read Gatto, a teacher in NY who won the "best teacher of the year" in both New York City and New York State. He has other books as well. Or read his Harper's article:

http://www.rahoorkhuit.net/devi/hs/against_school.html

The references to Alice Miller on child abuse are also very important. Or see www.nospank.org to get to the heart of one of the problems—violence against students.

Forward this to younger folks. This is something that could spread quickly.

Now the little nose-miners are either off to Gitmo or church.

Oops. My link to Jordan Riak's Nospank website is actually:

http://www.nospank.net

Sorry.

Great article Juan, about an inspiring event. The Feds and the state education administrators have ruined education. It is extremely rare to see any classroom discussion these days, the state mandated curriculum doesn't allow time for it, what with all the mind numbing details to be memorized.

We really need to answer the challenge these great students have laid out for us and rescue them from their corporate dominated education/incarceration system.

Tatiana, Tia, Johnny and Douglas. You did a great thing, hang in there and good luck!

POWER TO THE PUPILS!!!

I am a classroom-high school teacher. I truly understand how this incident could make most people cheer. BUT we must have standards. Every state has set standards that they believe students should meet. It is the duty of teachers to make sure these standards are met. If teachers were allowed to teach what ever they think is important we could end up with childern learning quilting and nothing else. Yes, our educational system is broken when high school graduates cannot find their own state on a map. We need good solid teachers who have a love for their subject and an administration that will let them teach.

BRAVO!!!!
May this be just the beginning!!!! Thank you so much for standing up for your rights as thinking human beings....
May we all QUESTION AUTHORITY and once again become CIVIL DISOBEDIENT

A prejudice I have is that when a teacher is fired, that the administrators who hired that teacher be fired as well.

dbesco, it sounds like you are part of the problem. Back when teachers taught, more or less what they wanted we had way better knowledge of geography and every thing else as well. Doesn't it insult you that the state thinks you are too stupid to determine what your students need?

The states have ruined education and turned it into programing. You should be able to see this from the classroom. Here in California it is estimated that it would take two years to cover a school year's standards. This assures that there is no time for discussions about current events or political issues. I know some teachers overcome this, I suspect that Douglas Avella is in that category, and I hope you are too.

One of the chillingly interesting things about standardized tests is that they are multiple choice. This makes them easier to grade, but they also promulgate the notion that there is always ONE RIGHT ANSWER to everything. Such a notion appeals to authoritarians, whether they are political, religious, scientific, or parental. There is one right answer, I've got it, you learn it, or else.

What's happening to this teacher is basically what happens to people who try to think for themselves, no matter what the job is. But it's especially bad when the job is to teach children to think for themselves.

I guess the teacher should have just toed the line and, while he was at it, made arrangements for military recruiters to invade the school. That probably would have made the school board pleased as punch.

Here in Canada, we organize public school systems much the way USA does.
In the early 1960s I started in the ed biz in a small farm town high school. My school had 300+ kids. We were 14 teachers. We had a full time principal and a secretary who came in mornings twice a week. Our school district had about 3500 students. Our district admin was a full time superintendent and his secretary.
During the 1970s universities were encouraged to reach out more. One place they reached out to was pro d funds for teachers. So teachers began to work nights and summers on admin degrees and special degrees 'in -working-with-one-kid-at-a-time. These people got out of the class rooms, but not out of the ed system.
School Board offices were expanded, offices added, trustees gulled into creating all kinds of specialist positions, and those former classroom teachers never did go back to the classrooms. The admin bureaucracy bloomed.
And they cost a lot more.
These admin and specialist types spent more and more resources flying around the country meeting with each other and glad handing with increasingly eager to please private corporation sales people.
Not surprisingly, these ' educators,' to keep themselves on their career tracks away from the classroom(and those kids) worked more and more with the corporate world.
So, today we have a system in which most ed $ goes to a well educated, well travelled admin bureaucracy which is constantly making deals with the corporate world. The former wants to climb the career ladder, the latter wants to make a few bucks.
(By the way...two groups that dirty their diapers at the idea of charter schools, or any system where the money goes first to the school, rather than to the central office, are teacher unions, and this centralized bureaucracy)

If anything goes wrong, they can be sure that the teachers and their students will be blamed.

Just one more:
I came across info in the 1980s that the problem Gorbachev faced in bringing glasnost ot his land was an entrenched bureaucracy of 11 bureaucrats to every worker. At that time, my, relatively rural school district, had 10 admins to each teacher.
What is the ratio in yr public school district of admin/specialist types to teachers?

Hey!...just don't get me started on this...

Public school administrators are selected almost exclusively from the staff of the athletic department and not the academic departments. Jock, coach/teacher, assistant principal, principal, assistant superintendent, superintendent is the process. Top to bottom our public schools are run by athletes and not academics. Typically coaches tend to be domineering, academically dull, obsessed with control, distrustful of academics, crass, and Republican. Teachers soon learn that to remain a teacher one must fit themselves into the narrow world view of the coach. Those who do not quickly become the object of focus and a case is slowly built against that teacher for the purpose of eliminating him prior to tenure. So what remains are little Fascist republican enclaves of jock itch and little else. Then, when the schools don't perform academically, who gets blamed? Of course the teachers get blamed. In business when a company does not perform the management gets sacked. In education when the schools do not perform the teachers gets sacked. What's up with that?
I was fired thirty three years ago for having the courage to teach. I have always regretted that my teaching career was cut short. I taught history, psychology, and economics. From personal experience I can tell you that an academic teacher in a high school social studies department is an endangered species bordering on extinction. Coaches populate the high school social studies departments across America. So the next time you wonder why Americans are so apathetic and ignorant regarding their citizenship responsibilities, thank a coach.

Ah the Audacity of hope in our future. If anyone were to lose their job it should be 'David Cantor. "He was pulled because he was inappropriate with the kids. He was giving them messages that were inappropriate."'

This comment is a absolute disgrace. David Cantor represents our department of education, I will have to look into home schooling.

hello_kitty: I was wondering when someone would make a Pink Floyd reference. In this case it should be "Hey, brainwashers, leave those kids alone!" The last thing those in power want our educational system to do is turn out citizens capable of critical thinking.

More than 'Barely Human' to introduce this thread with a link to Alice Miller. PLEASE read everything she has written if you haven't already - and look at the dates when she was writing.

Kudos to the resisters. It sounds like they are somewhat smarter than the school board.

South Bronx has produced and incubated some of the best in the arts and letters - and it certainly wasn't by standardized testing.

we have to take the PSSA's, Pennsylvania's test, and we spend all year preping for the tests. then we take them and our teachers dont know what to teach us after we take them in april. they also told us if we scored less than proficient on our exams that we would have to take a make up course next year. this story is quite inspiring to us here and we hope to do the same in our junior year when we take them again.

zephyrbag -- excellent point, and it's even more mind bending because lots of times the instructions are
'to choose the BEST answer' to the question. Whose best ? Isn't that sometimes subjective ? Whole reams of these tests could be thrown out if they were challenged on the basis of the word BEST, which is NOT defined.

Teachers have bought into the whole educational hierarchy which johnwyclif describes so well. Our school bus drivers have what I consider the hardest and most important job of all, buses run every day here except when the black ice is so bad you can't stand up, and because parents work the schools stay open even when the temps are colder than the 'official' minus fifty degree cut-off. The school bus drivers are responsible for even very small kids in those temperatures. I think they make something like $12/hour
and they work split shifts. Teachers easily make at least three times that much.

While the teachers struggle with standards, the administrators relax in their nice plush offices.
No chaining up school buses full of kids on icy hills in subzero weather, no playground duty with twenty below wind chill (twenty below being the 'official' cut-off for outdoor recess) and no frustration in the classroom forcing bright young minds to do endless mind-numbing bubble exams for the admins !

Teachers shouldn't be so afraid to speak out on behalf of themselves and the children in their schools.

"My students know they are welcome in my class to have open discussions," Avella said. "I teach them critical thinking."

As Tom Joad's mom said toward the end of "Grapes of Wrath" -- "The people just keep on coming!"

Mr. Avela, as Studs Terkel would put it: "You're a peach!"

Likewise your students.

This is what the powers-that-be are in constant fear of -- people (and, God forbid, CHILDREN! CHILDREN! oh, my word) or-gan-i-zing!

In a moment, in that one moment, their "power" shrivels up, apropos the cowards they so unfailingly show themselves to be.

But wait, hold on; in this corner, we have one of the aparatchik's mouthpieces. Behold, he speaks!

"This guy (Avela) was far over the line in a lot of the ways he was running his classroom," said Department of Education spokesman David Cantor. "He was pulled because he was inappropriate with the kids. He was giving them messages that were inappropriate."

Now, I would think, I would assume, that of all the newspapers to report this story, that the New York Daily News (the New York Daily News, fer crissakes!) -- right-wing rag, that it is -- WOULD GO OUT OF ITS WAY to find out just what "messages" Mr. Avela is foisting on these poor, innocent students that are "inappropriate."

What *are* these inappropriate messages?

Evidently, the Daily News didn't come up with any.

Although, one must admit: teaching students how to think critically, act democratically and, in turn, empower themselves locally, effectively and AS A GROUP -- well, sure, how "imappropriate" can you get!

What will these people be demanding next? A meaningful education?

Sadly, many of the posts here at CD.org, intelligently-expressed though they may be, are all-too-cynical and all-too-defeatist. But, to paraphrase The Good Book (and I do so as a critically thinking agnostic): Be not deceived, history is not mocked. For as the ruling class sows, so shall they reap.

Meaning: WATCH OUT! The ruling class keeps telling us that this-is-defeated and that-is- defeated. That ideology is dead. And socialism has breathed its last. And labor unions are passe. Bullshit! They only wish.

My response to those (nervous) predictions is ... Wait, just wait.

Those "in charge" understand quite well that their power is hanging by a thread, once the general population awakes to just how systematically they're being exploited.

Soon these local, seemingly isolated "awakenings" will, in aggregate, reach a critical mass.

Today, kids in the South Bronx are questioning standarized testing. Wait and see. ... If there's a draft here in the US, do you think those kids are all of a sudden going to *stop* thinking critically?

Mr. Avila, you're a goddamn subversive, you know that? I don't know what else to call someone who so upsets, so discombobulates those in charge, SIMPLY BECAUSE YOU LOVE YOUR TURF AND THOSE WHO OCCUPY IT.

Oh yeah, now I remember: they call those kinds of people patriots.

The South Bronx is one tough neighborhood. But you didn't sell your guys and gals out. In some locales, amongst certain people, it's just not done.

Shortly before he appeared before HUAC, John Garfield, the actor, was asked: "Are you goning to squeal? Are you going to name names?" To which Citizen Garfield replied: No. We don't do things like that in the neighborhood I came from.

So, be afraid, elitists and elitist-functionaries, be *very* afraid. Courage and the courageous acts of engaged citizens -- and children! -- think: black children in the South during the civil rights marches of the 1950s -- just keep on coming.

And lest you think poorly of my warning to the ruling class, CDers, consider how several democratic and socialist movements in, for example, South America and Latin America are putting a righteous fright into the powers that be there; not just in those countries but throughout the corridors of corporate and political power.

And the people in those 3rd world countries --like the students herein reported who live in the South Bronx -- are MUCH worse off than the average CD reader.

So DON'T be cyncial or pessimistic or defeatist!

Because, as Ralph Nader puts it: "Pessimism is a function of inactivity."

Indeed, those in power count on -- they COUNT on -- pessimism, cynicism and defeatism.

Those are, evidently, the life-negating, pig-gods they pray to.

Finally, if I could, I'd high-five every single one of those 8th graders! In fact, if I was still back in the old neighborhood in Newark ("Down Neck"), instead of where I am now, hundred of miles away, I swear I'd do it first thing tomorrow morning.

Instead, a snail-mail letter of congratulations is on its way to them, via their teacher.

Why not do the same, dear reader?

And don't foget a what-for to their sad-ass supervisors.

One other thought, if I may ...

To the extent Mr. Avela is known in the South Bronx, I can assure you that he walks those mean streets safe ... and respected.

Count on it.

As for his over-socialized, quisling supervisors, well, they do have each other.

Let me get this right. Mr Avella wants to teach students to think for themselves rather then teach to some stupid test and he gets the ax? And everyone wonders why I am critical of public education. Anyways, my respects to the 8th graders for standing up for what they believe in. The kids are allright!!!

"This guy was far over the line in a lot of the ways he was running his classroom," said Department of Education spokesman David Cantor. "He was pulled because he was inappropriate with the kids. He was giving them messages that were inappropriate."
__________________________________________________

How dare this subversive wacko suborn mutiny by validating messages like "Rage Against the Machine"?

The only appropriate message to transmit in Amerikan Public Schools is the Prime Directive: Color Inside the Lines.

It is such a shame that America has to rely on 8th graders for leaders while the adults act like lemmings.

Do the students know about the empty classroom?

EARTHIAN: Thanks for posting the Harper's story link. Excellent stuff!

ZEPHYRBAG/ALASKA MAID: Very interesting point. Those analogy tests got to me, too. What was the BASIS for any connetion among unrelated things? One could create any NUMBER of bases for analogy depending on the texture and creativity of the mind and imagination.

DOOM & GLOOM: Excellent post.

It's here:

Pink Floyd - The Wall
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=7537901785624234406

Let everyone know...

Multitudinous cheers for the 8th grade students at IS 318. Back pats and a grateful handshake to Mr Avello, that all too rare reply to the adage that those who can't do teach: those who can teach do and from Socrates on are slapped down by the powerful for doing so. Gobs of unmentionable fluids on the head of lackey Lopez, just doin' his job like the Auschwitz guards.

Just the other day I was talking with, well, got talked at, by a friend from Singapore. Now Singapore is famous as the most fierce of the Asian Tigers. One of the alleged reasons for its "success" is that it has a very rigorous (state financed) public educational system, complete with regular standardized testing. The public system is supplemented by informally required after school "tuition"(for those who can afford it). There is relentless pressure on the students to perform, i.e., to get good grades. The system has been in place for a fair long time. My friend was on a rant about the system after reading yet another account of the polite neat obedient students it "successfully" produced. It seems he has regular contact with students and finds them almost universally dreadfully boring. They want nothing more than a place in the rather lucrative corporate structures of the "island powerhouse"; don't matter what they'll be doing there. He admits that they are fast as hell at answering questions (including in good English)for which they have gotten training. But ask them something they haven't been spoon fed and they are completely at a loss. They have no idea how to go about inquiry into what they have not already be told. Imagination, critical thinking, problem-solving, open discussion, anathema to the authoritarian government/corporate rulers, are totally beyond these polite, neat, obedient students.

But surely even the authoritarians need those abilities, especially as Singapore's economic situation changes.

Yes indeedy, it does. It solves the problem by importing folks who can do these things at very high salaries on temporary work permits. Get outta line, bye-bye on your own nickel with a serious financial penalty for "non-performance".

It is quite clear that the Busheviks and their ilk around the world would love to make all children, adoescents and adults into polite, neat, obedient Singaporean consumers/drones. My question is where they're going to go to outsource imagination, problem solving, critical thinking, and open discussion when they need them if their plans for numbing and dumbing succeeds. Their own ranks is obviously a non-starter.

"My students know they are welcome in my class to have open discussions," Avella said. "I teach them critical thinking."

That makes you a dangerous man and enemy of the (fascist) state.

That the rest of the faculty supported the "rules" shows just what compulsory education is all about.

Sit down, shut up, and learn how to be good cogs in the wheel!

Support this teacher!!!!!!!!!!

There are better tests, here:
www.performanceassessment.org

Russ Feingold has an amendment in the Senate that would provide funding for this better form of accountability. Support it. S. 2053

Dozens of national organizations are rallying around this better way of assessing kids in school.

Support this teacher! Indeed. Support the kids too. I don't think people are generally aware how much testing goes on relative to time spent learning. It's like pulling up the seed every 5 minutes to look for signs of germination. At best NCLB is artificial bean counting meant to economically benefit cronies. At worst it's just a way to not educate the masses while appearing to do so. It's another ritual dance which, as is always the case with teenagers and ritual dances, shuffles many of the best and brightest away to areas of greater interest and a more relevant reality. Dump NCLB ASAP, as a SNAFU of the "Mission Accomplished" variety.

I live in the same school district where Lyndee England grew up. Last year I gave a local social studies teacher a copy of the book "Addicted to War: Why the U.S. Can't Kick Militarism" by Joel Andreas. I figured he might consider using it in his classroom, and I had plenty of additional copies to loan him. He never returned my calls. In fact, none of the social studies or history teachers returned my calls. I'd might as well have suggested they teach Playboy magazine.