Summary Of Savage Inequalities By Jonathan Kozol

The book, Savage Inequalities, written by Jonathan Kozol in 1991, provides an inside look in to the public school system and the disparities that exist. The time sequence for the book is roughly 1988 through 1990 and although the current year is 2016, the same challenges and deficits the public school systems faced then are still present in our school systems today. Examples of segregation, lack of funding, teachers, and overall injustice being dished out to these lower income schools are all the basis of Kozol’s writing. He feels, “…that the nation, for all practice and intent, has turned its back upon the moral implications, if not yet the legal ramifications, of the Brown decision” (4). The Brown decision was the drive behind the reform

Many of the schools lacked advanced classes and did not offer music, arts or languages. Schools were forced to operate with a bare necessity mindset. The example of “realistic goals” was presented in regard to the fact that lower income schools should accommodate education needs based on, ”the kinds of limited career objectives that seem logical or fitting for these low income children” (74). For some the practice of bare minimum funding seemed acceptable. Extremely high dropout rates are interpreted as a poor investment for funding. Why give more money to something that is going to be wasted if fifty percent of the freshman class will drop out and only half will see graduation? For most of the schools Kozol visited, the dropout rate ranged from seventy-six to eighty-one percent. Poor performance was also seen as a deterrent (58). Funding was not available to establish pre-K programs to help prepare students for the classroom. As a result, almost all the high school graduates in the lower end schools read at sixth and eighth grade levels. In every area Kozol visited it was apparent that students seemed to be set up for failure based on the current education

His book provides insight to a trending pattern among the schools he visited and I am sure are representative of other areas he did not make an appearance at. While Kozol presents various areas in vast need of improvement, he doesn’t propose resolution to solve the issues. Remarks from school personnel conveyed what they would like to have or actions they would like to see, but no proposed actions were brought the table that would provide resolution. Kozol sees proposed solutions by the commission as, “something that resembles equity but never reaches it” (175). Only enough to appease is given, but true equity is never established. His belief is school patterns are established to have, “children in one set of schools …educated to be governors; children in the other set of schools …trained for being governed” (176). Several documented court cases were highlighted that demonstrated suits filed regarding vast differences in funding. A Texas court case referenced, “the State’s sincere concern for local control inevitably produced educational inequality” (219). Interestingly enough, a case in Southern California brought about reform, of course this was not met without opposition. “Today, in all but 5 percent of California districts, funding levels are within $300 of each other” (221). There may have been an equitable balance that was won in the case, but the small amount allocated for funding the system ranks them in