As this year comes to a close, my heart breaks for Tamir Rice's family and to all the many others who have lost children to such senseless and violent acts with little to no accountability or justice to follow.
How could anyone watch the video of police driving up directly in front of Tamir and instantly shooting him without feeling the force of that bullet in one’s own chest?
We have entered and are gaining equality in many fields that were male-dominated just a few decades ago—medicine, law, business and economics to name a few—and we are now earning more college degrees than men, but we remain behind in attaining careers in some of the fastest-growing and highest-paying jobs in America.
Girls may bring natural ability and curiosity to math and science, but somewhere between Kindergarten and high school they lose their enthusiasm and leave the more advanced classes to the boys. Research suggests that even teachers may unconsciously discourage them.
In DeRay Mckesson on Why Blackness is Not a Weapon, TEACHED creator Kelly Amis sits down with the young civil rights crusader who, since driving to Ferguson, Missouri to take part in the protests surrounding the police shooting of Michael Brown, has since become one of the nation's go-to visionaries on how a future America would look if equality became our true priority.
I was invited to write a Director's Statement about Code Oakland for a film festival submission, so I thought I'd share it here:
I recently watched President Obama giving his beautiful eulogy for Reverend Clementa Pinckney, one of those dear souls shot in Charleston, and it inspired the following writng. I'm not feeling very eloquent after two weeks of deep sorrow about what's happening in our country (there have been so many horrific tragedies, but what happened to those in Charleston.....it's impossible to fathom what those innocent people went through) plus personal reasons (suddenly losing a very dear friend, also in a way terrible to imagine). I can barely remember what day it is. But maybe that's why I want to speak honestly and without filter and challenge myself and others to consider the following.
By Kelly Amis
Last night as protests and riots were unleashed in Baltimore, I avoided Facebook knowing what would be out there. Someone actually tagged me in a ridiculous statement just to start a fight (I didn't take the bait).
These are tragic times -- and they are a consequence of generations (of CENTURIES' worth of an entire people) experiencing the same racism, injustice, belittlement, a million daggers at the soul and body, and the severe, relentless consequences of economic opportunity inequality (which I think is worse in a society when there is SO much wealth and so little concern for how anyone makes it -- for example, using loopholes and placing your "headquarters" offshore to avoid paying taxes. That's also looting, but it impacts everyone, everywhere.)
I am GRATEFUL that I was teaching in South Central during the 1992 riots, because I knew the reality of what was happening there every day (though the media only focused on the Rodney King verdict, which was the match that lit the kindling): behind every insane story we hear on the news, like the King beating and now the Freddie Gray murder, there are a million big to small injustices we the general public doesn't hear about. It is tragic that we are still seeing this, but the underlying causes haven't changes (maybe they've even gotten worse).
Where does anger go when it must be swallowed for so long? I don't promote violence. But this is a reaction to violence, too.
Have you ever heard a white person say something like: slavery is over, why don't blacks ____ (fill in the blank)? I wonder the opposite: how does anyone continue to have spirit, strength and hope in a country where this story can happen (and where Trayvon can happen, and Walter Scott can happen, and millions and millions of stories known or unknown to the public can happen...over centuries)?
I know. I talk about this a lot. It's because I have had the honor of teaching and working in black communities (not to mention being "adopted" by my second family in DC) but also because I know HISTORY. On the black-white issue, we have comparisons to make to South Africa's apartheid, but another comparison we need more people to see has to do with Germany and the Holocaust. Michelle Alexander calls what is happening to black men in America a "silent holocaust," and I agree. (Read her book The New Jim Crow if you haven't).
The important question is, I think: if you could go back to Germany in the 1930s, recognizing what was happening around you (or to you), what would you do? Today is Yom HaShoah, or Holocaust Remembrance Day. what a good day to reflect on history and change the future.
What will you do?
Kelly
Here's the link: http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/morning-mix/wp/2015/04/15/closing-the-book-on-jon-burge-chicago-cop-accused-of-brutally-torturing-african-american-suspects/?tid=hp_mm&hpid=z3
Yom HaShoah: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yom_HaShoah
This is interesting, from Education Week (article follows):
"One in 4 (American) teachers report leading class longer than the length of the school day, according to a new analysis of a national survey"...."That's only possible...if teachers are lecturing in empty classrooms, have no lunch breaks, team-teach, or teach students in overlapping shifts. While the last two do happen—rarely—the first is ridiculous...and the second would typically run against teachers' contracts."
So American teachers have been over-reporting how many hours they spend in front of a classroom (over-reporting to a degree that can't be argued: 25% claim they are working longer than the actual school day itself). And these numbers don't even begin to look at the massive variation in what teachers are actually doing when "leading class," only how long they say they are doing so.
We love good teachers. We honor good teachers. Good teachers and schools are arguably the most direct way to eliminate inequality and promote democracy in America. But we also see that the profession has become one dominated by a culture of non-accountability, negativity and refusal to acknowledge reality that is sometimes, as this article reflects, truly unbelievable. How did the research mentioned below get used so much (U.S. teachers were supposedly teaching class up to 73% more than in other countries?!)?
Dear Readers,
Most of my writing of late has been on my Facebook page, and in discussions with friends & colleagues who are as outraged and saddened by the verdicts in both the Mike Brown and Eric Garner cases as I am. Below are a few of the things I have written plus suggested articles by others:
Dec. 6, 2014
I am really honored to be mentioned in this article by one of my favorite writers, RiShawn Biddle, in his must-read blog Dropout Nation(.net): Silence of Reformers on Ferguson is Deafening
I worked in education reform for years before the term became politically-loaded; it meant anyone trying to improve our public education system. The traditional public system was in dire need of improvement then, and it is today, especially with regard to education equality: urban, minority students continue to be blamed (along with their parents & communities) for lower academic achievement instead of given the same educational opportunities, funding and expectations as their peers.
The parallel second-class treatment by U.S. law enforcement and our judicial system via racial profiling, harassment, unwarranted violence and even lethal treatment, disparate sentencing patterns and the over-incarceration of males of color (black males in particular) is the other side of this coin. In our public institutions and policies, we -- the U.S. -- are systematically under-educating and over-incarcerating people of color, but especially black males. Given recent verdicts, it appears that a police officer can do anything to a black male-- including killing him with his bare hands, on video, in front of witnesses-- and there will be no consequences.
Please read the article below and also this one-- Stop Bad Cops & Bad Teachers - by RiShawn, which discusses the lack of accountability that pervades both the law enforcement and teaching professions. These are both difficult jobs. Police officers put themselves at great personal risk. We all know that. But for our institutions to protect individuals no matter what they do once they enter those careers is insane. Nobody is forced to become or remain a teacher or a police officer, but the "cultism" that RiShawn refers to includes a sense of entitlement to keeping a job regardless of the outcome in the classroom or on the streets.
Please also read Michelle Alexander's The New Jim Crow if you haven't, and watch my first short film, The Path to Prison. In the coming year, maybe you will consider organizing a community screening of The Path to Prison and a new film Think of Calvin (coming soon) about a young black father unduly arrested in front of his two sons and the unbelievable no-win situation he is then presented by our law enforcement and judicial systems. Synopses of all the TEACHED short films are here Volume I and Volume II (coming soon).
-KA
Dec. 3, 2014
For anyone who thinks I or anyone else is overly consumed with race issues in our country, I just want you to watch the Eric Garner video. An officer literally killed this man with his bare hands, while several other law enforcement officials looked on, and all over whether the man was selling cigarettes or not. It is hard to watch knowing that he is going to die. These stories make the news because the consequences were actually lethal (e.g. Eric Garner, Mike Brown & Trayvon Martin), but for every one of these stories there are, what, hundreds? thousands? millions? of stories of race-based injustice in America that you don't hear about in the news, and that don't involve any hint of criminality whatsoever on the victim's part.
"Strange Fruit, Eric Garner Edition" by Rishawn Biddle.
-KA
November 25, 2014
(from Omaha, Nebraska)
This is me, reporting from a corner of the world where the concept that you could be walking down the middle of the street in your own neighborhood, and a cop would pull up next to you and say "Get out of the f'ing street," is just not something you can fathom happening. Because it wouldn't. And where what happens next is your multiple-shooting death wouldn't happen (if you are white). Or if somehow it did, it would go to court. This is also where the media tells everyone (at least reading the primary newspaper) some parts of the story, but not all. Where the front page of this newspaper on any given day --- but especially today -- tells you all you need to know about race and equality in America. (And weirdly that paper is owned by Warren Buffett, who many people know is from Omaha....but somehow no one knows that Malcolm X was born here??....and there's no museum about it?! One of the most world-famous historical figures from the U.S.???). I'm just reporting at this point. It is easier and less frightening I guess to "believe in" the police, and "believe in" a race-blind and fair society (that doesn't exist in the view of many of us) especially when the media is making it easier for you to do so.
Peace,
Kelly
by Kelly Amis
I think this op-ed in Sunday's New York Times was really interesting; it's almost as if the answer to the title's question "Why Don't More Men Go Into Teaching?" was right there on the page, but writer Motoko Rich isn't quite ready to see it.
Here's the article: http://www.nytimes.com/2014/09/07/sunday-review/why-dont-more-men-go-into-teaching.html
Below is a quick Letter to the Editor I wrote in response. Two things I left out of the letter for brevity's sake were:
