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City Schools and the American Dream: Reclaiming the Promise of Public Education
What will it take for urban schools to achieve the kind of academic performance required by new state and national educational standards? How can classroom teachers in city schools help to close the achievement gap? What can restore public confidence in public schools? Pedro Noguera argues that higher standards and more tests, by themselves, will not make low-income urban students any smarter and the schools they attend more successful without substantial investment in the communities in which they live. Drawing on extensive research performed in San Francisco, Oakland, Berkeley, and Richmond, Noguera demonstrates how school and student achievement is influenced by social forces such as demographic change, poverty, drug trafficking, violence, and social inequity. Readers get a detailed glimpse into the lives of teachers and students working “against the odds” to succeed. Noguera sends a strong message to those who would have urban schools “shape up or shut down”: invest in the future of these students and schools, and we can reach the kind of achievement and success that typify only more privileged communities. Public schools are the last best hope for many poor families living in cities across the nation. Noguera gives politicians, policymakers, and the public its own standard to achieve―provide the basic economic and social support so that teachers and students can get the job done!
208 pages, Paperback
First published October 1, 2003
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167 people want to read
About the author
Pedro A. Noguera
34 books20 followersPedro Noguera is a sociologist whose scholarship and research focuses on the ways in which schools are influenced by social and economic conditions, as well as by demographic trends in local, regional, and global contexts. Dr. Noguera is the Peter L. Agnew Professor of Education at New York University.
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Displaying 1 - 9 of 9 reviews
May 16, 2009
Noguera's views of education reform are colored by anecdote: he has been around the block, seen schools struggle with closing the achievement gap, and worked with poor minority students. "City Schools" has an optimistic tone, but many of conclusions are vague and politically oriented: the reference to Paolo Freire's "Pedagogy of the Oppressed" in the last chapter betray his leftist viewpoint. Which in itself is not a bad thing, but Noguera recycles a lot of the buzzwords - like "empowerment"- that have been in vogue in education schools since the '70s, with very little effect on the real world of the classroom.
February 5, 2020
I found it a bit redundant, and not real strong, though did make some good theoretical points.
April 18, 2021
Read for class. Agreed with much of it, stroked my chin thoughtfully at parts of it, shook my head in surprise occasionally.
January 5, 2017
This was the second of the three books required for my teaching credential class, “Teaching for Equity in Secondary Schools”. See my review of the first book,
Holler If You Hear Me: The Education of a Teacher and His Students
by Greg Michie, for more background on that class and my griping about it.
Noguera’s book (like the third book, “The Dream-Keepers: Successful teachers of African American children”) was wonderfully intentioned, and provides a lot of guidance and even wisdom. But also like that third book, it suffers from some fundamental flaws.
Now, I think like an academic. I like evidence laid out for my judgement without the burden of someone else tweaking that evidence as a result of their own conclusions. I respect advocacy: the world is better because people care deeply about things, and work hard to bring dreams to fruition — and sometimes that includes writing books. But the mission of an advocate and an academic are separate, at least in my opinion.
My frustrations with advocacy pretending to be academic are manifold, but two big ones kept me from appreciating Noguera’s book.
The first is that he, as a liberal/progressive activist, almost certainly lives in a liberal/progressive echo chamber, in which everyone more or less agrees on what is right and just and fair, and they universally condemn those that they don’t agree with as stupid, or greedy, or venal, or something else that makes it trivial to ignore their objections and concerns.
That is actually visible in the book’s full title: “City schools and the American dream: Reclaiming the promise of public education”. It doesn’t take too much investigating to discover there are a lot of people in the United States that don’t have dreams of public education, and there are plenty that see public education as a nightmare for a variety of reasons. So scattered throughout, Noguera points out how what he advocates will help “us” succeed in this dream of a mission, and he never acknowledges — much less accepts — that there will be people as impassioned as his is fighting to stop him to fulfill their own dreams.
So it’s a bit difficult not to groan when he speaks of increasing funding for schools, or “changing policy at the state and Federal level” as if we’ve just taken a few missteps and stumbled and need merely to stand up straight and get back on track.
My second difficulty is that split mission of advocate and academic. In chapter six he covers some research he led at Berkeley High School, and that one chapter is (mostly) a model of reasoned discourse and analysis. But elsewhere, he contradicts himself and misuses his evidence. For example, in chapter ?, he castigates other scholars for their defeatist “victimology” and describing the problem as one of an “inherited inferiority complex”, but then acknowledges that when his own son was struggling academically, he was worried about “acting white” and only succeeded when he distance himself from his former friends. The terms Noguera and his opponents use are different, but both are talking of the same thing.
The book does have these flaws, which is why I can’t wholeheartedly recommend it. Many folks reading it from within the liberal/progressive echo chamber won’t see its flaws and will perhaps become more radicalized (which is, frankly, what my professor wants), while those outside that echo chamber are likely to become irritated by the advocacy, as I have, and won’t get much out of it. That’s too bad, since Noguera’s experiences and suggestions are often useful.
Noguera’s book (like the third book, “The Dream-Keepers: Successful teachers of African American children”) was wonderfully intentioned, and provides a lot of guidance and even wisdom. But also like that third book, it suffers from some fundamental flaws.
Now, I think like an academic. I like evidence laid out for my judgement without the burden of someone else tweaking that evidence as a result of their own conclusions. I respect advocacy: the world is better because people care deeply about things, and work hard to bring dreams to fruition — and sometimes that includes writing books. But the mission of an advocate and an academic are separate, at least in my opinion.
My frustrations with advocacy pretending to be academic are manifold, but two big ones kept me from appreciating Noguera’s book.
The first is that he, as a liberal/progressive activist, almost certainly lives in a liberal/progressive echo chamber, in which everyone more or less agrees on what is right and just and fair, and they universally condemn those that they don’t agree with as stupid, or greedy, or venal, or something else that makes it trivial to ignore their objections and concerns.
That is actually visible in the book’s full title: “City schools and the American dream: Reclaiming the promise of public education”. It doesn’t take too much investigating to discover there are a lot of people in the United States that don’t have dreams of public education, and there are plenty that see public education as a nightmare for a variety of reasons. So scattered throughout, Noguera points out how what he advocates will help “us” succeed in this dream of a mission, and he never acknowledges — much less accepts — that there will be people as impassioned as his is fighting to stop him to fulfill their own dreams.
So it’s a bit difficult not to groan when he speaks of increasing funding for schools, or “changing policy at the state and Federal level” as if we’ve just taken a few missteps and stumbled and need merely to stand up straight and get back on track.
My second difficulty is that split mission of advocate and academic. In chapter six he covers some research he led at Berkeley High School, and that one chapter is (mostly) a model of reasoned discourse and analysis. But elsewhere, he contradicts himself and misuses his evidence. For example, in chapter ?, he castigates other scholars for their defeatist “victimology” and describing the problem as one of an “inherited inferiority complex”, but then acknowledges that when his own son was struggling academically, he was worried about “acting white” and only succeeded when he distance himself from his former friends. The terms Noguera and his opponents use are different, but both are talking of the same thing.
The book does have these flaws, which is why I can’t wholeheartedly recommend it. Many folks reading it from within the liberal/progressive echo chamber won’t see its flaws and will perhaps become more radicalized (which is, frankly, what my professor wants), while those outside that echo chamber are likely to become irritated by the advocacy, as I have, and won’t get much out of it. That’s too bad, since Noguera’s experiences and suggestions are often useful.
August 12, 2008
Okay, I lied a little.
I gave this a four not because I think it is brilliant but because I think Noguera is brilliant. If you have access to academic journals, I recommend seeking out his published articles in the place of reading this particular volume.
Regardless, if you are interested in schools and school reform, read Unfinished Business. Like now.
I gave this a four not because I think it is brilliant but because I think Noguera is brilliant. If you have access to academic journals, I recommend seeking out his published articles in the place of reading this particular volume.
Regardless, if you are interested in schools and school reform, read Unfinished Business. Like now.
December 13, 2012
An interesting academic volume looking at the failures of US urban public schools to meet the needs of their students. Noguera suggests that the solution lies in empowering communities and using resources to tackle the underlying issues. Lots of food for thought.
February 8, 2008
I'm a nerd. I love this kind of stuff. I also developed a serious professor crush on Noguera.
July 9, 2012
Critical look at how we are failing students in providing "a free & appropriate education."
January 12, 2008
For all the multicultral educators who can't stand inequity...
Displaying 1 - 9 of 9 reviews