Re: What do you think/ideal forms

SMAGOR who-is-at aardvark.ucs.uoknor.edu
Wed, 20 Dec 1995 15:38:29 -0600 (CST)

Michael, the NYC schools sound much like Chicago public schools,
where I student taught and then substitute taught while doing
doctoral course work. The hat business is not trivial. In Chicago
they discouraged any overt gang affiliations, and hats were
part of gang attire. I remember wearing a hat into a building
on a brutally cold Chicago winter day and reporting to the
office, where I was severely told to remove it by an
administrator (I was about 30 years old at the time and didn't
look like a high school kid, either). The primary business
of the school was to provide a safe environment, presumably
without which no one could pursue an education--yet as you
point out, providing that safe environment was often about
as far as anyone got. Very frustrating.

Peter Smagorinsky