Joanna’s brother was murdered a block from her house just a week before she registered for school. He literally died in her arms.
Damon lives with his grandmother who struggles to make ends meet by working the overnight shift at K-Mart. Damon’s mother died from breast cancer when he was 14.
Bryan sleeps on the couch while his younger sister sleeps next to him on the floor in a tiny garage conversion apartment. His dad supports the family doing mechanical work. Bryan says his parent’s breakup was over “economical problems.”
As a producer, I was incredibly touched by their trust, courage and candor when I interviewed them earlier in the school year and now, they’ve interviewed themselves. We loaned each student a “flip-camera” and asked them to share their thoughts and feelings after watching “Inside Locke High” when it first aired on December 4, 2008.
Check it out and see if you don’t agree that these “typical” teenagers break a lot of stereotypes that kids are shallow, self-involved and uncaring.
RELATED STORIES:
Inside Locke High - Angela Shelley - For years, Locke High School in Watts has been a poster child for failing inner city schools. In the summer of 2008, a charter company - Green Dot Public Schools - took over from L.A. Unified and vowed to turn the troubled school around. This is the story of three typical Locke students told in their own way. In their own words.
Departures - Watts - By KCET Web Stories Team - Watts can be considered the epicenter of Los Angeles' working class history - a microcosm of America's dramatic demographic shifts. It is a neighborhood that has endured the most daring tests of our local history, an area that has been demonized by some and cherished profoundly by others. Produced by students from Locke High School, this installment of KCET Web Stories' Departures gives an honest portrait of the people and places who claim Watts as their own.
WEB ORIGINAL:
School Work - By Web Team - A day in the life of Ramon Quevedo, student at Verbum Dei High School in South Central, L.A.
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I hate to sound like a bleeding heart liberal here, but these kids really have been given up on by the teachers. I spent two days during the start of the first Green Dot classes putting computers together on an independent contractor basis.
I had to interact with all of them one-on-one as a techie teaching them how to log in to these computer systems with individual usernames. I talked to them all, including the one half white, half-mexican in the entire group who was, it appeared, the outcast. Students with tattoos, students with scars, living a hard life and dying for the glory of success. But not in a pitiful way... much more prideful.
These kids don't seem to act well because the teachers that I SAW teaching them could not keep their cool in the class, did not treat them like people and came down hard when wrong, but didn't reward in equal measure. The only thing these teachers are instructing the kids is learned helplessness and how to read a book in front of a large group.
The kids were simply more advanced than the teacher would give them credit for. They were robbed of a childhood; feeling 20-23 years worth of stress and life experiences in 16-18 years. They have life experience, but not the education to back it up.
The system is flawed when teachers do not do their job correctly and are absent the observation and rigorous evaluation to make sure they are not abusing or misusing their influence over these children; like when they isolate and humiliate instead of treating children and teens as people with unique experiences. These kids seem to be just heads in the classroom to them, and it is the teachers that have failed to give them the tools and incentive to learn from them or want to teach themselves. The kids have responsibility in this situation, but also are naive to their own boundaries of intelligence. Who isn't at that age?
Blaming individuals does not get anywhere in this situation, however. It is the ideology that motivates these supposedly "abandoning" teachers that must be attacked if we are to make any progress. They are motivated and stressed by money, since teachers are paid far less than they should be worth (assuming, of course, they are teachers doing their job effectively).
If we were to pay them enough to get by comfortably and to compensate them for their time and effort, there might be a more relaxed and passion-driven environment in which the best teachers could survive and the weakest removed. Those without passion and with a bad work ethic would be given walking papers so that the teachers coming out of colleges would have a more dynamic and fair work environment driven not by who will take the job, but who wants the job the most.
Money is going to schools from government agencies, yet in order to keep educating these children most of it goes towards new computer systems bought on special contract from large corporations, or new desks or maintenance on the school. Fine and well when done in proper fashion, but the money is stretched so thin only the most inexpensive and breakable computer equipment is purchased, with the company profiting and the school left with what they can get, not what would be the most useful tools.
These are the struggles of life in Watts as I saw it, through three days of work (only two of which were with students).
This program opened my mind and my heart to the real and life-altering issues these kids and their families deal with on a daily basis. Praise God for KCET for bringing this to us. And you guys, hold tight to your family ties, embrace your mentors and believe in your abilities. You can achieve much more than you ever dreamed when you apply your talents. Your light shines and don't let it go out. Keep Hope Alive.
Hey KCET or who this is going out to i wanna go to Inside Locke High it is hard to figure out were im exseposed to be in school i have a dream to become a firefighter and i wanna go to a good high school so i can make that dream come true. and if i can come to this school please email me my email is up there so thank you from making a great show and school : )
I just finished watching the documentary. I hope to have my own children watch it because it is a real eye opener. After coming off of the christmas holidays and listening to what my own kids asked for, it was very refreshing to hear each of these individual stories. To hear a teen ask for a 'decent life' when he grows up is very moving. I, like others, am guilty of spoiling my kids to some degree and these stories put a true perspective on what is really important in life. I found all three of the teens well spoken, extremely thoughtful and very grounded. Thanks for the show and keep up the good work.
I feel you on your comments. However, some of us did care and do continue to care. Even though I'm no longer associated with Locke (nor in the city) I keep in touch with and keep pushing my former students who are in college (as well as those who aren't) via social networking sites.
So even though there were too many 'teachers' who were at Locke sitting with their feet on the desk reading the paper, waiting for the last bell to ring, there were a significant number of us who were fighting every day - fighting the inept system, the apathetic teachers who no longer had the fight in them and fighting and giving the students the fighting spirit for them to not settle for what other people labeled them.
It has taken me over a year to mentally "recover" from my years at Locke, but I wouldn't trade them for the world. The students were/are amazing and I am so proud of Green Dot and for the teachers who voted to make this change. I look forward to this movement continuing and for more documentaries like this which shine a light on what's really going on.