Transit Strike Plans

dan.h · December 2005

LEAVE ORIELLY ALONE. NO SPIN!

[/kidding]

citizen jane · December 2005

Kensingtonmom wrote: Really? Do you really not see a class and a race divide in our country? I am not sure if you are walking around with blinders on or don't leave your neighborhood but many many people are struggling. And their children are getting lousy educations in crummy neighborhoods where they are not going to have much of an opportunity to get a scholarship to a college. I can't believe you are a social worker and don't see the inequity of our society and how the divide is growing?

How many of those children in crummy neighborhoods do you know? It is certainly possible to get a good education without paying full fare to an Ivy. I happen to be a minority woman, child of decidedly UNwealthy immigrants, who studied like hell in average NYC public schools and eventually earned a scholarship to a decent college. And I am here to tell you that the assumption that money is necessary for achievement or even recognition, even in a city as large as New York, is grossly oversimplified. I know of many, many first-generation Asian and Russian students in a pretty terrible high school in Coney Island, for example (Abraham Lincoln), who come from nothing, whose families are sleeping in one room together in some crappy rental, and the kids earn themselves full scholarships to college. One good friend is the daughter of a former physician and scientist in China who both now work at restaurants in Chinatown. All five family members share two rooms. The daughter is completing her PhD in pharmacology at Columbia.

I get defensive about this kind of issue because so often in New York despite our resourcefulness and diversity, it's assumed that there's only one path to success: money. It's just simply not true. We have friends who earn almost $140,000/year between them and can't afford to buy an apartment. Why? They pay incredible amounts for breakfast, lunch, dinner, drinks out 4 nights a week, clothing, vacations, etc. The idea that you have to be a trust-fund baby to get anything done is just wrong. What you have to be is willing to sacrifice. This theory isn't anything groundbreaking to the millions who come here from abroad, work hard, save like crazy, and succeed in breathtaking numbers.

On a personal note, I have never earned more than $43,000 here in Brooklyn (I made the mistake of aligning myself philosophically with nonprofits!) and I want for nothing. I go to stoop sales, I wear the same pair of damn shoes ($30 Payless boots!) every day for three winters in a row, I cook my own food, I use the library, and I can pay my mortgage.

Whew, I feel better. There are my two cents. And now for the rebuttal. . . .

anonymous · December 2005

Subject: not so true

look, i don't think anyone is saying that NOBODY ever prevails over great socio-economic odds. of course some folks struggle and succeed. but the great american myth that everyone can do this has been, statistically, proven a flat out lie. race and class certainly are major factors in the probability of one's ascendency to the middle and/or upper classes.

your chinese friends, i don;t think, are a good example. your talking about two extremely educated people who obviously moved here for personal/political reasons. but their kids already had a leg up - the parents were extreemly educated folks who probably pushed them, even at the cost of immediate economic comfort, to get a higher education. a lot of people don't have that type of support and, in fact, need to do whatever they can RIGHT NOW to make ends meet.

my point was (and i know your post was directed at kensingtonmom, but it seems we are close on viewpoints) that solid, blue collar union jobs play a vital role in allowing people from underpriviledged socio-economic backgrounds access the middle class - here's my example: i have a friend who collected tolls on the triboro out of hs cause she couldn;t afford college full time. if it wasn;t for that job (i.e., if she had to flip burgers for $5 an hour) she never would have gotten her degree. now she's a social worker for the state and, luckily for her, a union member there as well.

anonymous · December 2005

I do sadly knowing kids in crummy schools and don't know if a good family is enough always to compensate for peers and a substandard education. The examples that Citizen Jane mentions are wonderful but they are becoming the exception to the rule. The American dream mythology that we all share is becoming less and less a reality as people can no longer pull themselves out of poverty and into the middle class with decent paying jobs.

We want our tax breaks at the expense of head start, school lunches, Pell Grants and other programs that are the other tools out of poverty. We buy clothes at Targets and Wal-marts and ignore the new slavery that produced those clothes. We sadly cannot be shamed anymore as a society into doing the right thing. We have become too individualist and too capitalistic with no helping hand to the less fortunate. I got mine.

And by the way, I don't define success by money but it does take an education often to achieve things and I don't believe we have equal opportunity to education anymore.

j0518 · December 2005

Subject: Re: class divide

Kensingtonmom wrote:

honestly, that's quite offensive. getting an education is not something reserved for the priviliged. it's something anyone, and i mean anyone, currently eating, sleeping, and drinking in this country can get.

Really? Do you really not see a class and a race divide in our country? I am not sure if you are walking around with blinders on or don't leave your neighborhood but many many people are struggling. And their children are getting lousy educations in crummy neighborhoods where they are not going to have much of an opportunity to get a scholarship to a college. I can't believe you are a social worker and don't see the inequity of our society and how the divide is growing?

I agree with you Kensingtonmom - that satement has to be one of the most shortsighted, uninformed opinions I've come across short of something on Fox news.

it's funny to call this shortsighted, since my point would be that the problem is more much complex than either of you are making it. sure there's a race and class divide. i see it loud and clear as i sit here in my office, but there's a hell of a lot more to who makes it, individually, and who doesn't than that. if i really cared to change your mind on the subject, i would have plenty of examples of teens who have overcome the most insane of odds and worked their absolute asses off to make it to college.

maybe you both should think before you type a bit more before you come on this board as guest and call someone shortsighted and uninformed.

j0518 · December 2005

i didn't even notice Citizen Jane's reply before replying myself. you hit the nail right on the dot. i wish i would phrased it all as well as you did right off the bat.

vanilla · December 2005

this city has SO many options in terms of public education. excellent parents know how to beat the system & do not let their kids slip through the cracks. maybe it is unfair that parents have to struggle so hard just to find their kids a decent school, but it is possible. whining is simply not a productive solution.

anonymous · December 2005

vanilla wrote: this city has SO many options in terms of public education. excellent parents know how to beat the system & do not let their kids slip through the cracks. maybe it is unfair that parents have to struggle so hard just to find their kids a decent school, but it is possible. whining is simply not a productive solution.

Sadly not everyone is born with an excellent parent. I don't think it is whining to expect equal education for everyone. I thought that was one of our unalienable rights. So what about all the millions of kids born with just average parents? Or overworked parents? Or plain old shitty parents? Should they be doomed to poverty because they don't have the exceptional ability to pull themselves up by the bootstraps?

Are you a parent? It is not so easy to navigate the system to get into a good school--even for excellent parents. Poor people often don't have the resources to do that (such as being rich enough to buy into the right zone or having friends who live in wealthy neighborhoods to use their addresses).

Is this the Republican Board?

vanilla · December 2005

my point is that equal education is currently not a reality. parents have to seek it out & fight for it!! just expecting things to improve or be ideal is not enough -- there are ways to be creative.

anonymous · December 2005

vanilla wrote: my point is that equal education is currently not a reality. parents have to seek it out & fight for it!! just expecting things to improve or be ideal is not enough -- there are ways to be creative.

Since I have two children who are about to be school age. Could you tell me how to be creative? I would really like to know how to get into a good public school. Most parents I know are perplexed with the no child left behind act preventing many variances which used to be available? I am being sincere here because nobody I know can figure it out.

anonymous · December 2005

Subject: blah

:shock: :shock: :shock: :shock:

sterling2000 · December 2005

Since I have two children who are about to be school age. Could you tell me how to be creative? I would really like to know how to get into a good public school. Most parents I know are perplexed with the no child left behind act preventing many variances which used to be available? I am being sincere here because nobody I know can figure it out.

The Park Slope Child Care Collective does an annual open house with reresentatives from all surrounding neighborhood public elementary schools. My wife and I went to it and met a lot of parents, met a lot of school representatives and shared a lot of info/stories.

Getting your kid into a decent NYC public school is a mix of who you know, what you know, how hard you're willing to work and a little bit of luck -- but these things could apply to anything in life that you feel strongly about striving for, particularly when you are living in a challenging/exciting place like NYC.

Give them a call and find out when the next one is happening.

Park Slope Child Care Collective
186 St. John St
(718) 399-0397

As for all of the other above comments, I'm going to go out on a limb and say everyone has a point and everyone has a story that either plays into or runs contrary to the mythology of the American Dream. In my case, it's taken about 100 years from when my relatives first hit America's shores to get to the point where I and my family are living a relatively comfortable life in Brooklyn today. The preceding 100 years of my small town rural family has been defined as work as mostly teachers (including much union activity) and carpenters and progressively more education in public schools and state colleges through the generations. There's been no "trust funds" and no "Ivy League" or any of those other lazy hotbutton catchphrases people use as shorthand crutches in a downright 101ish discussion of class. What there has been is reasonable expectations, smart priorities, patience and some simple (and a lot of) hard work.

And in summary, as a very good friend of mine says:

"The harder I work, the luckier I get."

anonymous · December 2005

sterling2000 wrote: The Park Slope Child Care Collective does an annual open house with reresentatives from all surrounding neighborhood public elementary schools. My wife and I went to it and met a lot of parents, met a lot of school representatives and shared a lot of info/stories.

Getting your kid into a decent NYC public school is a mix of who you know, what you know, how hard you're willing to work and a little bit of luck -- but these things could apply to anything in life that you feel strongly about striving for, particularly when you are living in a challenging/exciting place like NYC.

Give them a call and find out when the next one is happening.

Thanks, I have heard of them and will look for the next one. Did you manage to get your children into a school you are happy with through information you found from the seminar?

I would like to clarify that the American Dream did work for millions and millions of people--my grandparents included. But I think with manucturing jobs pretty much non-existent and good paying factory jobs being sent overseas there is not a salary available for poor people to pull themselves out of poverty. This has been documented repeatedly through various studies this past 10 years. Reagonomics was the beginning and Free Trade was the final nail making it harder and harder
for a family to make ends meet and save enough to buy into the American dream. I am surprised nobody is really seeing that? It has been in the Times quite a lot.

8thandprez · December 2005

Subject: No love lost for TWU in my book.

Subway operators earned an average of $62,438 a year, including overtime, under the previous three-year contract, the MTA said. Train conductors averaged $53,000, subway booth clerks $50,720, and bus drivers $62,551.

That's from this morning's Bloomberg news. I have to say (and I'm speaking as a union member (DC37) myself) that I think they're pretty damn well compensated already. Customer service among toll both clerks sucks royally AND the union stands in the way of system modernization by implying that the train conductor is the only thing preventing a London-style bombing. I have very little sympathy for the TWU.

Transit Strike Plans

Comments

Howdy, Stranger!

Categories