Nothing’s changed in fifty years.
William Hare writes on Amazon.com: This is the daring book by former teacher Robert Kendall that blew the lid off an indifferent establishment within the Los Angeles City Schools system and resulted in legislation enacting standards for high school graduation.
“White Teacher in a Black School” surged to international bestseller status following the outbreak of the Watts Riots, which Kendall’s riveting book seemingly predicted as African American community leaders joined Kendall and other concerned educators in urging a reformed educational system imposing standards for passage from grade to grade and ultimately high school graduation.
“White Teacher” is written in the manner of a fast-paced novel with an agenda which surpasses in sociological sweep the popular film to which some people compare it, “Blackboard Jungle” starring Glenn Ford and Sidney Poitier. The events depicted in “White Teacher” were drawn from fact, encompassing two years Kendall spent in Los Angeles area minority schools. Kendall’s rapid-paced first person narrative has him telling the story as “Mr. Brent,” an idealistic young teacher posted to a trouble-ridden South Los Angeles school where “weapons check” is the first order of business when students arrive. When Brent seeks to immediately impose a solid curriculum to challenge students he is confronted by the school’s principal, Mr. Towers, who explains that “as long as it looks as if the student is trying, then that student should be passed to the next grade.” The class consists of one retarded youngster, Captain Smith, who crawls on his hands and knees, sits at one point on Brent’s desk and blows on his hair, and finishes the year by proudly showing his teacher his achievement, an illegible attempt to copy the Yellow Pages of the Los Angeles Telephone Directory. One student, George Washington, is a class leader who helps Brent overcome adversity by unruly students. The chief class disrupter is Billy Parish, who at one point pulls a knife on his teacher.
“White Teacher in a Black School” was a book ahead of its time, one which helped lead the fight toward the adoption of standard testing prior to obtaining high school diplomas. Not only did it sell briskly in the United States. The book was also a major success in England, France and Switzerland, where it was published by companies in those nations.
