Students Respond to LA Times Column about Manual Arts and MLA Partner Schools

While my teacher email lists were abuzz with the fact that Fremont High School is being reconstituted, the LA Times ran a more positive spin on education reform in the city and it focused on Manual Arts. I asked my students to respond to the article after we discussed it in class. The general consensus was that Sandy Banks’ perception of the school did not match that of our students. I typed up a smattering of student responses to share with Mike and the MLA staff that you are welcome to read below. Personally, I think there’s tremendous merit in the work behind the Doolittle mural project and the school’s garden. However, I was surprised by the vitriol my students had for these efforts – the fact that emphasis in the column was placed on seemingly cosmetic changes rather than on changes that directly impact student achievement. I do think that students used this as an opportunity to voice concern about the school as a whole – not necessarily what MLA is presently doing. And, at the end of the day, I think that’s pretty reasonable; should students really have to care who is taking care of the barriers to their learning? The fact that they exist should be enough for them to don a tone of vexation. Aside from some spelling corrections, student responses are unedited below.

Sandy Banks’ column on improvement in Manual Arts High School could not have been more wrong and infuriating. As a student from said school, I couldn’t help but laugh at all the emphasis put on Manual Arts’ “positives;” all seven of them. I find it to be like a joke in poor taste. We have a little garden and a couple of people being paid to keep freshman from dropping out, but compared to everything else about Manual Arts, those things are barely anything but trivial. The truth about Manual Arts and all other schools like it is that it’s negative qualities outweigh any positives. If anything, Banks should have written about how Manual Arts needs improvement. By building up that little shit garden or not quite mentioning drop-out rates or other failures, we are giving those in charge of taking care of the school the chance to just walk away. I don’t like the idea of our help walking away thinking we don’t need anything because we’re growing vegetables behind some crappy building!

At Manual Arts, the change is successful when MLA came. First they gave money to clubs to make a difference. As a member of the Science Club, MLA gave money to my sponsor to make a garden. We made a garden that I thought was for everybody in the community. But the garden is not even open for everybody. I feel like MLA is changing the school but not helping students to enjoy a beautiful garden. Even though I helped make the garden I don’t have access to go inside it. Also, the article talks about money that every student gets. As a senior, I haven’t seen any of the money go to my education. I see the same old computers in the same classrooms that are really old. MLA is just making MAHS look good but not changing how students feel about it or how we are being educated.

I believe that this school should be reconstituted like Fremont.

I believe that fixing the garden and the graffiti is a good idea! But have you ever thought of seeing how teachers work behind the administrators’ back? Well some teachers act so racist or just treat you like if you’re another one of their friends. Counselors should really try and listen rather than always trying to take the teachers’ side of everything.

I love the fact that they’re talking about the changes that are happening at Manual Arts but it is still not helping us. The painting (so called “art”) is not doing anything for us! The $400.00 I haven’t seen it payoff anything not even for the school. The TV in the cafeteria is not even turned on during nutrition or lunch so we might as well not even have that 30-something inch plasma tv in there. But now we need to help our seniors and my class of 2011 to get to college! Help me pursue my dream of attending Michigan or Michigan State.

Sandy Banks doesn’t mention uniforms, there is also a reconstructed senior quad and a new college counselor. However, in my opinion, there are many things not working at Manual Arts. For example parents are not being respected when decisions are taken. And of course this is something MLA should take care of.

I don’t agree with this column. I think that MLA should work more on checking students to make sure no drugs are sold or consumed on our campus. Also they should not keep tardy people for 30 minutes that way students that come late would be able to not lose class time. We should be aware of the plans that are changing on our school and not after they already happen.

At Manual Arts there are three tracks. These tracks are not supported equally. Also, teachers are being laid off but in my opinion students should have a chance to give an opinion on what teachers should be laid off.

I’m a senior at Manual Arts and I feel the change, also it makes me tell everyone that Manual Arts is a “positive” school and that the school is getting better.

MLA needs to realize that students here in Manual Arts are really struggling. A lot of seniors haven’t passed the CAHSEE.

MLA should listen to the students’ voice! MLA is at least making the school look different. However, there needs to be a solution to address or to force students to learn. For example, in my class there are at least fifteen students that don’t care about education. They go to class to distract other students and the teacher as well.

Manual Arts is actually getting better in some points of view. Especially because we have a new principal and I think that he is making a lot of difference at this school. I agree that the violence has decreased.

Instead of wasting money on cameras and garden stuff, they should focus more on wasting money on us the students, the future. They should focus on buying more books, computers, school supplies.

They put more attention on things like school uniforms than on our education.

I think nothing has changed in this school. We still have the same old broken materials and computers. We also have the same beat up books. We never get new learning materials for our classrooms. The school’s garden is not an achievement because that doesn’t help students be successful in life, it’s just there to make the school look nicer. Our school needs learning materials, not a garden that we’re not even allowed to study in.

Stop making us get detention for wearing a different colored sweater the color of a sweater was not required in the school uniform letter and it gives us less time to focus on our homework when we have to serve an extra hour after school just sitting and doing nothing for an hour.

In my opinion as a student here at Manual Arts, I think we should improve getting what the students want. Probably fixing the restrooms. What I mean is not changing the toilet paper holders but the walls, sinks, and toilets. The ceiling tiles should be replaced, it looks like they are going to fall. The bungalows should be fixed from the outside. It looks like the buildings are going to collapse.

7 thoughts on “Students Respond to LA Times Column about Manual Arts and MLA Partner Schools

  1. Daye Rogers

    Wow. Great stuff. Love that the students have some very critical and interesting things to say. I thought the description of MHS at the beginning of the article was very colorful. The look of the school definitely adds a bit of stress to the experience of being there. I’ve told you in the past how overwhelming the experience was for me the first few times I was on campus. I love the comment about the garden. Remember the first time I saw the garden and I was confused about why it was locked. Yea, I’m glad I’m not the only one, but unhappy to hear a kid who had a hand in its creation can’t even enjoy it.

    Great work as a teacher engaging your kids on this external representation of their environment.

  2. latsko

    makes me think of a list of responsibilities that would come with some of the critique that our students give above about conditions at school.
    asking the question of how the garden might be protected without having it locked all the time (imagining a solution’s probably not difficult really)…there are some criticisms with which i’d personally agree.
    to play devil’s advocate though, i wonder if students had read something disparaging about manual from the newspaper if they’d have been more likely to want to celebrate the ‘positives’ in response. i’m glad our students are so contrary. it’s like having a strong pulse.
    i also think we’re all really moody, students and teachers, moody and cynical. it’s hard to read such cynicism from young people. and yet, who would be surprised considering the hurdles we’re all asked to surpass? students AND teachers. afterall, a crappy looking building helps noone.
    it’s about the stu
    wow.

  3. antero Post author

    You know, Travis mentioned the same thing as you, Mr. Latsko. If the article was overly negative I would be right there with my students thinking about how the article doesn’t celebrate the positives at our school. It’s a slippery slope, but one that I think is necessary for students – they need to be ready to critique a world that is in constant judgement of them.

    I also have been toying with the idea of discussing the tragedy of the commons as an entry point into talking about the garden.

    And yes, I think the cynicism has been hard earned by the students – not something I’m happy to see, but something that can be played to their strengths… or maybe we’ll just ask the kids. That’s what this should be about, right?

  4. Mike McGalliard

    I think these student comments contain a lot of common sense – something missing from the convoluted school reform politicking. Kids are still struggling. Teacher quality is all over the spectrum. Management is still lacking. And maybe as a school we are still so far from the mark, it’s a little phony to celebrate progress. But at the same time, when prior to our collective effort to turnaround Manual we had 100 suspensions and fights a month and couldn’t protect students who came to school to learn and better their lives, and now we’ve cut that by 70% or more and created one of the safest schools in the neighborhood, this is something to celebrate. Great comments, and we all have a long way to go. Thank you for the feedback.

  5. Daniel Castro

    I am a junior at Manual Arts… Class of 2011 !!! It’s true about what some of the students that wrote this stuff said. we don’t get to go in the school garden and we don’t even use those Plasma T.V.’s in the cafeteria … i think it’s really dumb that some of the best teachers got laid off when there are some teachers that don’t even teach kept their job… and as a member of the Manual arts Football team i would like to say that the school doesn’t even get enough money to get new equipment that could be useful to players that don’t have any… we don’t even have money for lights at the school … we have speakers and some old light poles that don’t even work … we need to improve our school … before we didn’t have much school spirit but now we are starting to get more school spirit… i think the reason why we don’t have much school spirit is because we don’t have the best programs because of the good enough funds…
    but i think someday the school will be better by the help of the community and the government .. .

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