"Here was this poor white kid from the streets of the Bronx teaching many poor Black and Hispanic kids from the same streets. I knew their conditions. I knew how poverty kicks you in the ass and “Down The Mean Streets” of Piri Thomas. I knew the factors that allowed some of those poor kids to succeed, but most to fail. I had seen both, but the failures all too often, some leading to murder and suicide.

I still understand these factors. Those sets of experiences never leave you. So when I read our public school detractors not correcting for poverty as the most pressing issue in public education I get furious.

But when I also read those who try to turn that poverty into bias, often racial, against these kids, I also get furious.

I hope you all do too."

Read the rest here.

https://dcgmentor.wordpress.com/2015/01/07/more-on-its-the-poverty-stupid/