The Buffalo News ran
a man article and an editorial asking "Why no City Honors II?"
When you start with
the wrong question, you can only arrive at the wrong answer.
In a capitalist
society, education s not an individual right or a social
responsibility – it is a commodity to be given to the elite 1%, as
determined by class, race, and gender. And in a minority white,
majority African-American, Asian, and Latino/a community, it's the
power elite that get the best while everyone else gets the rest.
If one follows
Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs, self-actualization is limited to a small
group at the top while the lower levels are more densely populated, with the bottom being the most dense level of all, no pun intended. Like the
capitalist distribution of wealth, the majority are on the bottom
struggling for basic necessities while a small elite group is at the
top achieving the dream of a lifetime at everyone else's expense.
In a capitalist
education system, not everyone needs a City Honors education. Only
the best. The rest? Give them enough to get through. Make them
employable and disposable by the 1% at the top.
If one looks at
education and society through the lens of Maslow, one can see the
poor of the city barely getting by, struggling to get any sense of
stability in their lives. These are the students that go from school
to school to school in a year, living wherever they can find a home
for a while. And the only food some of them will get are the free and
reduced breakfasts and lunches at school. And their education is just as piecemeal and unstable.
That's the capitalist
way. Many people struggling at the bottom for the basics while the
top coasts along just fine, getting everything they want, when
they want it. Or else.
The Buffalo
education leaders argue that a second City Honors is impractical and
unnecessary as there are other “high quality schools” that
students can apply to and receive an excellent education. None of
those other “high quality schools” are ranked in the Top 100
Schools in America. And some of them are not all they are cracked up
to be either.
But let's let's face
the facts – the cost of City Honors. The AP course and
International Baccalaureate programs require top notch equipment and
teachers. That costs money and rather than spend money building up a
quality educational system for all, the power brokers set up a system
in Buffalo where the 1% get the best and everyone else gets the
rest, which happens to be slim pickings. And I am not talking about
the blues guitarist either.
The question is not
“Why not a second City Honors?” The real question is “Why
hasn't capitalism provided an Olmstead Elementary and City Honors
education for all students in every school district across the
country?” Which it claims it can do, if given the chance.
Pick up you pencils
and pens. You have one hour to come up with a logical answer.
Start now.
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