Framing a Guilty Man (with a changed conclusion)

I just finished watching the Frontline documentary "The O.J. Verdict" on the O.J. Simpson trial. In this documentary, a law student, discussing the case almost ten years later, states, "I think any jury would have come to the same conclusion. The LAPD framed a guilty man."

To some degree, I think that's what happens when schools close. We make bad stories look worse. But, without a jury to stop us from convicting, we close the school rather than realizing what we are doing -- that we are exaggerating the situation in order to make our decisions easier.

I dare any politician --Chancellor Klein, Mike Bloomberg, and the various liberals who have also ignored education in our city from Hillary Clinton to Jonathan Tasini (whom I wrote to in the hopes of enlisting his interest) to Bush -- to come into a bad school and not find one classroom which IS working. I also dare them to walk into a good school and not find a class which is not working.

Nothing is as easy as we make it out to be, and instead of trying to give more room for what works, we are throwing out everything at once. Why are we doing this? The best answer I could get from our FORMER superintendent, JC Brizard, is that it's cheaper and easier. Remember: I am part of an old car.

Readers of this blog know I prefer old cars. I'm about to get a ten year old Volvo which has been maintained and works perfectly. I'd take that over just about anything else brand new.

I'm not charmed by novelty and I'm also not enchanted by media blitzes. I watched the O.J. documentary more to see what Frontline would do with the story. I was at Stony Brook during the trial working on my MFA and I remember being surrounded by a sea of largely African-American students who were exalted when O.J. was found not guilty. I didn't care then, and I don't now. I did consider that, had O.J. been found guilty, it would have demoralized many people and, in hindsight, it probably would have lent more credibility to the LAPD than they had rightfully earned.

Maybe some young man at Rikers Island has actually been helped by the shadow of the doubt extended O.J. But no one is helped by the absolute closing of schools. If you go to
www.bcnhs.org you will find a link to student essays, one of which, by Tashaliqua Turner, a current student, detailing her experience at both the school once run by the now fired superintendent and a NEW SMALL SCHOOL similar to the one replacing us.