Alternative Education: Successful and Underfunded
One central issue concerning inner-city school districts is that of presenting children with alternative education programs so that instead of simply dropping out of the public schooling system, these students may still have a chance of earning their high school diploma and even continuing on the path towards college. Unfortunately it is the general stereotype that most if not all students that require and/or desire an alternative education program are “bad” and those who remain in public or private schools are “good.” School districts, being already concerned with funding for their public education systems, what with keeping up with No Child Left Behind and constantly changing educational requirements, are often hesitant to provide extra money students who were unable to make it in their school. Therefore, most alternative education programs, especially in inner-city areas rely on minimal governmental funding and heavily upon private donations.
Regrettably, even if an alternative education program is proven effective and efficient, it is still subject to closing at any moment because of lacking funding.
One such alternative education program is the From Boyhood to Manhood Foundation (FBMF) located in the London borough of Southwark, an inner portion of London south of Thames. The primary focus of this group is to remove teenagers from “a nasty future dominated by guns and gangs” along with a vast amount of drugs and violence. Uanu Seshmi, cofounder and director of FBMF, runs the program out of an old church hall and revolves the program around a “mixture of education, counseling, exercise, one-on-one mentoring, and advice about self-control and self-esteem.” Aside from the general education, physical activities, and workshop/work training programs, FBMF focuses heavily on drawing youth out of the still increasing “gun and gang culture” reinforced by the fact that over 20 teenagers in London have been murdered in just the last year alone.
“Yet it is precisely at this delicate time that funding to the group has dried up. Staff have been laid off, the kids informed that as of January they will have to make alternative arrangements. Seshmi hopes the group will be able to reopen a few months down the line, but that will depend on getting new backers. “It doesn’t make sense in the current climate with all the gun crime that is going on,” says Seshmi, bemoaning the paucity of funding. “It’s ironic, really.”
Even though in the past 10 years FBMF has been able to pass thousands of teenagers through its doors with, as stated by Seshmi, a stunning 90% success rate, it is currently under threat of closing due to lack of funds.
“The crux of the problem is that FBMF has been a victim of its own success. When children started flocking to its programs, not all brought state funding with them. Those referred by their schools generally did, but the increasing number who enrolled on their own after having fallen out of the system came with no public money.”
The fact of the matter is that an increasing number of students who enroll in alternate education programs are those who are not referred by their public schools and therefore bring no money with them. Is it fair that successful programs such as FBMF be shut down resulting in a lack of education for all of these students? Especially in the United States, dropout rates are at an all-time high. The term dropout factory has now been coined by Bob Balfanz to describe such schools with high dropout rates.
We must admit that there’s a problem.
We must admit that we need to put more money into inner city and alternative education programs. If these programs can achieve such high success rates, just like FBMF, why not give them the funding they need? Just because certain students do not fit the standardized mold of No Child Left Behind, they are shunned and excommunicated depriving them of their right to an education. What’s more important, that new gymnasium and athletic field, or the education of thousands of children?
Most say that inner-city kids are in gangs, partake in violence, do drugs, and dropout because they like to cause trouble, because they are naturally no good, because they don’t care about education or their futures.
Maybe it’s you that don’t care about them.
“A London Program Teaches Inner-city Kids Reading, Writing, and Reformation” by Mark Rice-Oxley of The Christian Science Monitor from the December 17, 2007 edition. Full article
Filed under: Inner-city ED
Hi David,
I am writing about inner-city education as well, which is why I find your blog interesting. When I was searching articles after I chose my first topic (teaching methods), I found the article you have written about here. It tempted me to change my topic, so I did. From what you have written in this post, it seems to me that the gap between the succeeding schools and the less fortunate ones is increasing. One idea that came to my mind was that in the “regular” mainstream schools, where the drop out rates are high, more teachers like Uanu Seshmi might make a more positive impact on students, so that they are not forced into going to alternative schools that are underfunded.
I agree that teachers like Seshmi could make a large impact upon these students in mainstream schools. But then at the same time, if a teacher such as Seshmi were to teach in a public school, he would then be confined to teaching the set curriculum whereas in his alternative program he can shape his own curriculum to the needs of the students. Most drop-outs don’t attribute their primary decision to leave school because of their dislike of their teachers; it’s because of the institution as a whole. So I think it’s not only a matter of bringing these types of influential teachers into the schools, but also adjusting the programs.
This article is such a perfect illustration of how our narrow-minded view of education today is cheating students out of a quality education. I believe there is an image of a traditional classroom with thirty-or-so kids and one teacher leading out and lecturing that is engraved in the minds of citizens and lawmakers alike. Somehow this image manages to blot out any ideas that would make it possible for students to succeed in unconventional classrooms, and when one alternative school miraculously does succeed, the funding is not there to help it continue!
I agree with you that the world “alternative,” in an educational sense, is synonymous with “bad.” Correcting this misconception, as well as understanding that all students cannot be judged by the standards suggested by No Child Left Behind, would be a major step toward obtaining more funding for programs such as FBMF.
Thanks for blogging about this very interesting topic and for linking to this article. I look forward to reading more of your posts in the future.
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