A deep dive into the American public education system with high school principal Keith Gledhill and high school vice principal Kate Howard-Bender.
Technically I am an American, but I wasn’t born here. I’ve always felt like an outsider, skeptical of the story we tell ourselves about who we are as a nation. I didn’t like school — I could sit still and be quiet, but for the most part I couldn’t buy into the curriculum. I just wasn’t interested in the perspective being offered. American schools lost me at Manifest Destiny, I was 12.
I finished high school and felt free for the first time I could remember. I skipped my graduation ceremony, slept through it actually — I was tired out from the decade and a half of trying to fit in and remember things I didn’t care about. I’ve spent most of my adult life on the fringes of society: bartending, freelancing, teaching ESL to refugees at small nonprofits. I don’t think I’ve ever used my high school diploma, but, I’m grateful I did this thing that nearly every American has done — I feel alien enough as it is.
In a strange twist of fate, I’ve become good friends with two high school administrators. They’re passionate about education, about equal access, about learning and about kids. Talking to them about school has given me perspective I didn’t have when I was in it. I wish I’d approached school for myself rather than as a hoop to jump through for everybody else.
I don’t have kids. I won’t be going back to school myself. And, better late than never, I’ve starting caring a lot about public schools and what they do. About what the system stands for, about why it’s important. In the face of huge changes to our public education system, Kate and Keith and I are making a podcast because we don’t know what else to do to get people to care, too.
Listen to episode one: Save our Schools
Listen to episode two: A Nation at Risk