DEPARTMENT OF GOOD IDEAS

(Jonathan Kozol)

This is from my scary (but increasingly more enjoyable) Culture, Identity, and Interaction Sociology class:

It's an article called From affirmative action to outreach: Discourse shifts at the University of California (2000)

"In addition to the shift away from individualism the embrace of outreach, atleast in the current context, reflects a move away from the discourse of racetowards the discourse of class. While the Outreach Task Report begins with a ringing affirmation of the value of diversify, it is social class which quickly emerges as the dominant analytic trope. Thus the most significant recommendation of the Task Force Report was that the university pursue an aggressive intervention policy according to which each of the campuses would select a set of K-12 'partner schools' within their catchment area and make a commitment to allocating significant resources to enhance the likelihood that graduates of these schools would be able to successfully compete for admission to the University of California. ... In effect, the Task Force's recommendation was that the UC focus its efforts on helping raise the competitiveness of students stranded on the bottom rungs of the California public education system. In this respect, the logic of outreach draws upon the rhetorical power of an increasingly visible social critique of what Kozol (1991) has called the 'savage inequalities' of the American public educational system."

This is amazing, what a terrific idea. It makes total sense. Now, this article was written in 2000 and the law was passed in California in 1995. I am ashamed that I haven't heard of this yet. But anyways, I think it makes total sense to focus on class and not race. Focusing on race in affirmative action (I think) is racist. To assume that people of a certain ethnicity automatically need more 'help' in their education is embarrassing and offensive.