Linda has worked in bps for 38 years. Found a three different schools and started many different Leadership Programs across the state and for that reason my brothers and i rarely saw her but linda is an amazing inspiration to me, why i am an education policy management i am inspired by her every day. I hope i dont have to do the 5 am wake up to be just like her but that is just my own wish. Shes also alongside carmen torres, where is she. Common and linda are my inspirations and are my inspirations and im so so lucky to be able to introduce my mom, my favorite educator and best mom to talk about when grit isnt enough. [applause] not always you get to be introduced by your daughter, kind of cool but they are opening up the back. It is hot in here. Anyone wants to get up, give it up one more time for those kids. Kind of why i do what i do because those kids came all the way over with her amazing teachers, lets give it up for those amazing teachers. So i am here to talk about this book that you all are going to buy because you dont make money writing books but you are going to bite because the royalties go back to the kids and that is really important to me. The royalties go back to the arts academy can and royalties for this book will go to them as well as the kid that tlc is so it is important that you buy it and buy it from independent bookstores as well so first i want to know who is in the audience before i launch in. How many of you are teachers . Raise your hands big and high. How many of you have ever teach to . Okay. How many of you are leading schools, leading organizations, how many of you have ever led schools and organizations . How many are grad students . How many of you are former grad students of mine . Thank you for being here. So i wrote this book to start a larger conversation about what we believe will help students succeed after high school. I also wrote this book because i am angry at what it takes to really create access and equity in this country. We continue in this country to think it is the responsibility of the most vulnerable amongst us, those with the least amount of access to create access for themselves. I wrote this book to say that is just not true. I wrote this book because in my first book, the hardest questions, i tell the story of shinny a. I get criticized a lot for this but i tell you that was a lot of my motivation. She was one of my students at Boston Arts Academy, she graduated at the top of her class. She was accepted to her dream college with the full scholarship. She was a firstgeneration scholarship student was how many of you are firstgeneration kids . Disappointing there arent more at harvard, there should be. For complicated reasons, she never set foot on her college campus. She lost her scholarship in the summer after high school because she missed a deadline to send in a deposit to hold her space. For reasons that combined lack of experience and absence of cultural and Financial Capital and im sure some shame, this one dramatic mistake, one mistake had a dramatic effect on the course of her life. That story became the impetus for this book. When i stepped down from daytoday leadership of the Boston Arts Academy i wanted to take a more critical look at what i had accomplished and examine some longheld assumptions of mine. I began to interview alumni. Those who had gone on to college and those who had not. Those who had done well and graduated, those who had started and left. In total i interviewed over 90 students and spoke informally to dozens more. I found out that her story was not an exception. I began to reflect on the promise i had made each year to my 125 freshmen. All of you i would say in an Assembly Just like this would go on to college or secondary school but i said it like that, if you are going to go on to a conservatory that was college but all of you will go on to college. It is the right promise to make. I still feel that way but my emphasis was wrong. I did not do enough to promote Career Opportunities along with college and as i listen to my former students five assumptions or myths became a clear refrain. If we carefully begin to interrogate them and that is the invitation of this book we will begin to build better bridges between Higher Education and prek having 12 education. The book is organized around these five. I want you to hear them. Money isnt an obstacle, their quote. Race doesnt matter. Just work harder. College is for everyone. If you believe, your dreams will come through. The College Acceptance rate of students from Boston Arts Academy is very high. I could have just been pleased with those statistics, 94 to 98 are accepted to college and nearly two thirds graduate within six years. These are extraordinary figures for any school particularly in urban school but i wanted to understand what happened to those who didnt go to college or werent successful and i wanted to understand the journey of those in college. It is too easy for us to assume that all students start in the same place, that everyone has access to the same degree of knowledge to navigate the college years. As a recent New York Times article says, this came out just as i was turning the book into the publisher, quote, for young people with College Educated parents that have to Higher Education may be stressful but there is a roadmap. If standardized test scores are too low they can pay for a prep course. Affair as a is lackluster they can hire a writing coach, no one will be any the wiser. If they are tempted to give up, their parents will push them on. Few of these supports are in place for low income or firstgeneration students and that is what this book is about. We assume deep social inequities can be overcome by individual efforts and everyone has an equal chance of success and if we just work harder we will be fine. We assume this because there are so many stories of young people who make it and i do in the book tell those wonderful stories too. Many of you have heard of Diane Guerrero in the country we love, she plays little latina in orange is the new black, shes one of my, she is amazing and she was being interviewed for this book. But we make the assumption that those who lack determination or are not sufficiently gritty are the reason folks wont get ahead. This great, pedagogy, if you will, is something that is popularized in schools, some schools of education, i hope not here, this just work harder kind of egos so i really want to critically examine that. I am going to read a little excerpt from the book where i describe two classrooms, one where the teacher is all about grit and the other where the behavioral expectations are a little more lax and i am reading this in the hopes that you will all run out of here, by the book and say grit isnt what we need to be talking about so here we go. Page 84 in case you want to follow. Im going to read it from my big print text. 25, thirdgraders sat crosslegged on the rug facing their teacher and a big video screen. We are about to begin our snake unit and this is the video i promised yesterday we would watch. A hand shot up. A little girl with many braids and ribbons in her hair asked is this the one where we get to see the snake walk out of its skin . Yes. We will see that and we will take notes like scientists as we watch and make some sketches. Everyone nodded eagerly, the teacher distributed clipboards and papers and pencils and nervous excitement rippled through the class. Clearly this was a lesson they had been eagerly anticipating. When we are already and sitting like amanda and juan, setting up and tracking me i will start the video. The students repositioned themselves and held their clipboards at the ready in their laps. However, two students in the back row were overtaken with giggles and seem to have a hard time either putting in the paper or paying attention. The teacher redirected them a couple times but they were clearly in a world of their own. All others had their eyes facing forward and were not paying much attention to the google is but suddenly the teacher said it is clear to me that the class is not ready to engage in learning, lets go back to our desks until we have 100 engagement, you are not respecting the learning process. You have completely forgotten about slanting. Did you lose your back muscles over the weekend, too many of you are slouching. Im going to begin to hand out the merits, i will make sure we know what slanting is. Raise your hand if youve heard that acronym, sit up, ask questions, nod, track the speaker. Part of the grid ethos is all kids know how to do that on demand. The little girl returning to the text whispered to her friend we arent showing respect. Her friend nodded gravely, students quietly got to their feet and with an air of despondency trooped back to their desks. Now we have to wait until tomorrow to see the video the little girl said sadly and i dont want a america was when the class is dismissed for lunch the teacher demanded everyone line up silently. As they proceeded to the cafeteria is a past a secondgrade class who were walking in bubble formation just so you know what that is, very common in lots of schools these days, these 8yearolds held their arms crisscrossed across the chest almost like they were in straitjackets, they were puffed out as if they had caught a bubble inside. They proceeded silently to the cafeteria where they dropped their arms and relaxed their expressions was there were 5 different classrooms in the cafeteria. And all of them aid in complete silence while teachers monitored the room. I will stop. In the book i dont tell you what schools these are from but this is not an exceptional school. I dont want you to think it is. I visited many many schools like this. I inquired if this silent lunch was a punishment for bad behavior and i was informed silent lunch with a regular occurrence. Who want students to be able to have time in the day they are quiet and peaceful but it felt anything but peaceful to me. Seems more like a prison with the teachers as guards. I was stunned that this had become regular practice is gone is the joy of meeting friends at lunch, chattering about anything or nothing, gone is the carefree kid, none of the students in this school are white. As in many schools, all of the teachers are young and white and female. What message does this send to kids who are not of the dominant culture . The school felt oppressive. While making eye contact and nodding at speakers is not wrong, this land system is not contextualized to a variety of learning environments, if it resulted in an emphasis on behavior over active learning, you are considered a good learner if you can demonstrate slant, but this is a minimal condition for learning in most situations. For many students this behavior has nothing to do with learning. Of course it is hard to teach of two students are cutting up in class, but the third class Science Teacher described clearly been trained to stop the lesson in the absence of 100 compliance. In our conversation later the teacher admitted to me she felt badly about her decision to abort the lesson in favor of behavior. In this school we believe if students are not practicing slant, then learning will be compromised, it is like a broken window theory, you have to take care of the small things before you can take care of big things or nothing will get fixed. But this lavish adherence to slant that i had witnessed in so many schools makes me wonder about the message we send to our young people. The word repressive kept coming to mind, little room existed for divergent thinking. I reflect on another school i visited which was the opposite of this no excuses school. In an urban Public School in new york city i witnessed a group of eighthgraders discussing the novel if hill street could talk by james baldwin. What struck me in addition to their professional level of discourse was how they had arranged themselves in the classroom, some sat on top of their desks. Others were on chairs, a few were standing. Not everyone was in a circle. One young man sat outside the circle and participated in the discussion even though he looked angry the entire time. Another student sat at the teachers desk which when i asked the teacher if theres seating arrangement was distracting to him or other students he looked at me curiously. Why should it matter how they sit if they are participating and respecting one anothers opinions, that is my goal. Can they talk to one another from the text, can they find evidence about their points of view, can they build off of what each other says. What about the fact that not everyone was living by the same rules, clearly the directions were to sit in a circle. Look, he began somewhat impatiently with me. What i like everyone to sit in a circle, of course. Do i want to sacrifice valuable teaching and learning time to be constantly reminding students of those expectations and more importantly do i want to make sure the classroom is a place where there is breathing room . I know what is going on with carlos and edward, i know why they moved out of the circle, the rest of the class doesnt care. I wasnt sure i was satisfied with these answers. I wanted to know if Mister Johnson had seen the no excuses schools where rules were quickly and easily adhered to and teachers felt teaching could begin. Of course, he told me, many of these students have come from schools like that and were asked to leave these schools because they were not disciplined enough. Carlos is still smarting from the memory of his last school and by the way you wont see those ubiquitous college banners all over my wall. My job is to teach my students, this may sound political, to get them to think for themselves. I agree with that goal but i was uncomfortable with the lack of structure or consequences for behavior in his classroom. I wondered if some of the no excuses grit pedagogy could be used in this case. Couldnt this teacher see how well behaved students were in those schools and wasnt impressed with her test scores . Clearly they had learned to listen to one another. He countered i know that many of my colleagues believe my following that formula slant and no excuses kind of practices kids will get into college in large numbers and get out of the ghetto but i dont think they are asking the students or the community the students come from what success would look like for them. What is missing is learning about selfdetermination and advocacy for oppressed people everywhere. I know it is a lot to ask of teachers but we cannot keep seeing ourselves as ahistorical beings, we as teachers and particularly white teachers like me need to understand students of color are in this situation because of systemic racism. We have to critically examine how we might be perpetuating that. Mister johnson went on to describe how his students were doing in high school. The ones that challenged me the most are often the students who do the best in high school and college, they know how to think critically. In this book, i ask whether these no excuses, slants kind of interventions are actually successful. I question their longrange effectiveness. I question the race and class implications, i question whether training teachers in these methods will create the classroom our teachers deserve, the benefit of lockstep learning and grit may have been overrated and traits like curiosity and creativity given short shrift, the boys google the most may be the most curious learners later on, those 21stcentury competencies of critical thinking, collaboration, communication, creativity, that employers and others insist are the key to a productive and competitive economy are not well facilitated by the no excuses approach. Another assumption i also address in the book is one that says college is for everyone. We know that is not true and not realistic but we have done little in our schools to truly prepare students for careers that will allow them to lead middleclass lives. We must change our language from college and career ready and move away from what i see in too many secondary schools which is everyone will go to college. My new call is success and dignity for all with the promise of earning a living wage or more succinctly college and career for all. Here are the national statistics, 52 of High School Graduates and role in college. That means nearly half of students do not. What kind of preparation are we giving them, i looked locally and internationally, here is what i conclude. We must do a better job with career and Technical Education with internships while young people are in high school. I want you to consider the next statistic, took a long time to get this in my head. Teens with the highest employment rate come from families with incomes above 120,000. Teams with the highest employment, Work Experience come from the families with incomes over 120,000. We are perpetuating again and again income inequality. Those young people from low income sectors are in the greatest need of Work Experience but the least likely to receive them. In switzerland, Students Experience a more cohesive approach to education and work. At least 50 of 16 to 19yearolds are involved in Vocational Education and one of the hallmarks of the swiss system is it is permeable, students can go back and forth between career and Technical Education and more academic education. There is a real sense that apprenticeships are a high status way to learn. I saw this level of career and Technical Education at some schools in our country, not nearly enough. In the book i talk about one school 40 miles from here located in a workingclass community outside boston. Is what one student said to me. Using college as a place to grow up is very expensive. Im glad i have been exposed to so many different areas. I might want to specialize in. Another student told me he was graduating from high school allied Health Program and was certified as a nursing assistant but he knew he didnt like patient care. He will be going on to college to major in Clinical Lab Science which he found he didnt like direct Service Worker but rather the Science Behind diseases but i could have said in another book about my exper