Aaron Schutz

Home Is a Prison in the Global City: The Tragic Failure of School-Based Community Engagement Strategies.

Historically, schools serving impoverished families trapped in America’s urban “ghettos” have been resistant to community participation. Enhanced participation is critically needed, however, if long-term urban school-reform projects and efforts to develop more empowering, community-supporting forms of pedagogy are to succeed. This article examines the most influential and/or promising efforts to foster more authentic engagement between schools and inner-city communities. The author finds that while efforts to develop school-based models have largely failed, a range of community-based efforts remain promising. If educators, scholars, and policymakers are truly interested in improving school–community relations, then they will need to become more deeply informed about community forces and structures and more directly involved in efforts to strengthen community organizations.

Educational Standards, Assessment, and the Search for Consensus

In this article, we critically examine the nature of the “consensus” reflected in educational standards used to orient high-stakes assessment programs. We analyze two complementary cases of practice in the assessment of teaching. One focuses on the discourse of standards creation and one examines how standards like these are typically used to orient assessment development and judgments about individual performance. We offer two (partially competing) theoretical perspectives that might illuminate and guide our practices in this currently undertheorized and underexamined area of standards development. One is based in the discourse ethics of Jürgen Habermas and one is based in critical elaborations of Hans-Georg Gadamer’s philosophical hermeneutics. We argue that conventional consensus-seeking approaches to the development and public review of educational standards tend to mask diversity and relinquish authority for consequential decisions to assessment developers who work in far less public circumstances. We draw on hermeneutic philosophy to offer a more pluralist approach that allows dissensus to be represented and taken into account in the assessment process.

Rethinking Domination and Resistance: Challenging Postmodernism

The emergence of postmodern ideas in the educational literature has complicated the field’s understandings of oppression and resistance. While important, this postmodern influence has been problematic in its tendency to stress the relatively nurturing forms of “pastoral” control generally experienced by the privileged. Such a focus can direct attention away from the often brutal discipline experienced by those who are more marginalized. The article examines contexts where pastoral or disciplinary forms of control predominate, noting the limited forms of resistance (if any) generated by each. It then looks to more sophisticated visions of resistance developed by scholars and activists. The article concludes by exploring the limitations inherent in any single approach to understanding or resisting domination.

John Dewey's Conundrum: Can Democratic Schools Empower?

Developed at the end of the 1900s, largely in his short-lived Laboratory School at the University of Chicago, John Dewey’s vision of democratic education has remained influential for over a century. Yet, as he grew older Dewey himself increasingly lost faith in the ability of schools, alone, to create a more democratic society. Drawing on data available from the Laboratory School, this paper expands upon Dewey’s concerns. Ultimately, I argue that Dewey’s educational approach failed to equip students to act effectively in the world as it was (and still is), and, further, that Dewey’s model of democracy, while extremely useful, is nonetheless inadequate to serve the varied needs of a diverse and contentious society.

Creating Local “Public Spaces” in Schools: Insights from Hannah Arendt and Maxine Greene

AbstractHannah Arendt and Maxine Greene present similar visions of human freedom and possibility that hold great potential for the creation of more emancipatory school communities. This article argues that there are lacunae in the perspectives of both, however. By bringing Arendt and Greene together, I hope to exploit a synergy between their writings, each contributing aspects that seem missing in the writings of the other. At the same time, while Greene is cited often in the educational literature, she is often not engaged at the level she deserves as one of our most prominent comprehensive contemporary theorists of education. Taking Greene seriously requires us, I think, to engage her project critically, and as a whole —an effort toward which this article only modestly contributes. Arendt’s work provides an extremely productive standpoint from which we might grapple with her achievement. Finally, this article aims to clarify some of the complexities entailed in Arendt and Greene’s effort to promote the ...

Collective Action for Social Change

ions are not going to get feet marching. You must name who is responsible for [the problem] or those who are will slither out of reach with bromides like, “There is enough blame to go around.” —Nicholas von Hoffman, Radical: A Portrait of Saul Alinsky Targeting individuals prevents the real decision makers from hiding behind the protective walls of institutions. Any campaign can have multiple targets, and it is a sign of sophistication if we can manage such a scene. If a group is looking for a vote from its city council, for example, it should target each individual member. We would not treat the entire city council as a single target because each person has different attitudes, constituencies, and interests that we need to take into account in designing tactics. —Rinku Sen, Stir It Up: Lessons in Community Organizing and Advocacy In most cases it is best to target a single person rather than a group or institution. You want to generate enough outrage among your members to keep them engaged in a long-term campaign. And it’s easier to get pissed off at an individual. It’s hard to get mad at the state legislature or the city council, for example. They are too abstract and undefined. It is easier to generate outrage at the council president who is unjustly blocking your important legislation. “President Johnson doesn’t care about people suffering from addiction in our city!”

One-on-One Interviews

During the first half of the twentieth century, American culture was often grounded in tight-knit ethnic and religious groups, with many associated clubs and organizations. Cities in the United States were rich in community. It was in this context that Saul Alinsky developed his strategy of organizing existing organizations. He searched out respected “native leaders” whose opinions and directions others were willing to follow. The core challenge Alinsky faced during these early years was the history of conflict between these groups, and much of his work involved breaking down barriers of suspicion enough to allow community networks and institutions to come together to address common challenges.

Tactics and Strategy

In the previous chapter we discussed how organizers figure out what to fight for by “cutting an issue.” This chapter is about the next step: how to fight for the issues you cut.

John Dewey and a “Paradox of Size”

The previous chapter explored a range of challenges created by the collaborative progressives’ commitment to reasoned, joint dialogue as the central practice of a democratic society. The pedagogy of John Dewey’s Laboratory School exemplified key limitations of this approach in the real world, preparing students for the world as Dewey and other collaborative progressives wished it had been, not as it really was.

Power and Targets

What is “power”? Who has it? How do you get it? These are central questions for community organizing because the central goal of community organizing is the generation of power.