Among School Children

Nonfiction | Book | Adult | Published in 1989

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Themes

Race and Nationality

Race and nationality play fundamental roles in the book. This theme shapes the interactions among students, teachers, and townspeople. It permeates the characters’ lives at every moment. Mrs. Zajac is concerned for Puerto Rican students because of the racism she sees and the statistics that show they are more likely to have children early or drop out. She tries to minimize her own bias, taking advantage of opportunities to go to Puerto Rico and to go to bilingual services at her church. She tries to notice when she is having a biased thought and to see the situation from a different perspective. However, Mrs. Zajac is rare. Most of the teachers around her complain about their Puerto Rican students, and many townspeople around her complain that Puerto Ricans have caused all the town’s problems.

Mrs. Zajac tries to provide her children with experiences that show that both white and Puerto Rican people are capable. She pairs Alice, an upper-class white student, with Judith, a poor Puerto Rican student, to give them both the chance to learn from each other and develop positive perceptions of “the other group.” However, both Judith and Alice develop more typical friend groups, and while they like each other and become friends, they do things like eat lunch with their same-race friends.

There is a feeling of inevitability surrounding the racial divisions. Mrs. Zajac often feels like the only one trying to create positive impressions between the groups. The Puerto Ricans simply create their own churches, live in their own neighborhoods, and handle their own lives. The white townspeople are fine with this arrangement and do little to try to get to know the group that now makes up a large part of the town and even more than 50% of Kelly School students. This apathetic acceptance is disheartening; at least when people are angry about something, they try to fix it. There is no large effort to improve the situation, simply uneasy acceptance of de facto segregated existence.

Race clearly affects the students, including their teachers’ impressions of them before they even arrive at school. Judith is the best example of this issue because she does not conform to the stereotype that Puerto Rican children aren’t smart and don’t do their work. She faces outright disbelief that she is Puerto Rican, and even lives in one of the poorest areas of town. However, when adults and teachers are open with students about their prejudice, they give Puerto Rican students no reason to try. Puerto Rican students who excel are met with disbelief, and those who don’t are judged as less competent because they need more instruction. It becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy, where Puerto Rican students are immediately given the signal that they shouldn’t both trying, they don’t work hard in school, and the teachers feel validated in thinking their Puerto Rican students aren’t as capable. By 5th grade, Mrs. Zajac sees a lot of students who have lived this reality for many years, and it takes time to overcome those ingrained impressions and bring back an interest in school and the feeling that they are worth teaching.

Effects of Time Constraints in Education

Time is a consistent theme throughout the book and is one of the major challenges of teaching. The school year and each school day are so regimented, with set times for each lesson, that there is little extra time for struggling students. Teachers must balance spending enough time that students learn the material, but not too much time that they fail to cover required topics. Teachers also have a random set of students with different abilities. Therefore, any time one set of students is struggling, it is likely that another set has already mastered the material. It becomes difficult to balance these needs across the day. Time becomes almost the enemy to learning, as Mrs. Zajac has to sacrifice either time or learning to teach her students.

Time is also a larger theme in that Mrs. Zajac always wants more time with her students to help them overcome obstacles in their lives. The book ends with Mrs. Zajac claiming she feels she was making progress with all her students and simply ran out of time. If she could, she would want to have them multiple years so she could continue to work with them using the same system that she found to be effective this year. However, as another quirk of the teaching system, it is rare for students to have the same teacher two years in a row. If students had teachers for more than one year, they may be able to continue to progress more readily instead of starting over each year. Teachers who had already given up would then be more detrimental to their students who would have them year after year. However, knowing they would have the same students for a long time, teachers may be less likely to give up on difficult cases. Regardless of the system, all teachers feel the inexorable pull of time that limits what they can accomplish.

The Role of History in Education and Racism and the Education System as a Relic

The history of Holyoke affects the students and teachers through race relations and the knowledge that Holyoke has declined as a town for many decades. There is a sense of former glory that increases feelings that newcomers, like the Puerto Ricans, cause problems, even when those problems have existed for a very long time.

The history of the education system shapes Kelly School and many of the challenges the students and teachers face. Teachers are not seen as having much prestige because, early in public education, women filled the lower-paying job. However, teachers have considerable responsibility. This mismatch between societal expectations and societal status contributes to resentment among teachers. It also means that the education system is almost guaranteed to disappoint. Society places incredible expectations on teachers and what schools should accomplish, and yet contemporary teachers still receive a minimal salary, have little say in policy decisions that affect their job, and work in buildings that are rundown and failing without budgets that can fix the problems.

Over the decades, the education system has seen few changes from its historical counterpart. America still uses a similarly regimented and long day that was instated in colonial times. The year is still based on the agrarian lifestyle, which allowed children in years past to help with the harvest in the summer. Corps of teachers are largely women, and society still sees teaching as a “women’s profession.” By not evolving with the times, the education system has perpetually been a source of frustrated literature and societal debate. Unlike what teachers experience in the classroom, with time going by too quickly, time has not progressed the overall education system, and the results contribute to other issues like teacher burnout and low-achieving students.

Social Class

Social class is a theme that appears throughout the book in a more subtle way. Teachers notice social class because of the clothes the students wear, how clean they are, and the way they talk. While students likely notice these differences in social status, they are often happy to interact with any other students in the class. Popularity among students often has little to do with social class, with both Alice and Judith being popular in Mrs. Zajac’s class. However, social class, similar to race, affects how teachers view a student’s ability to do well. Some teachers see students from lower income areas already behind their peers and they assume their parents don’t care as much. Mrs. Zajac shows that isn’t the case with Felipe and others who are poor, but whose parents insist on good behavior and doing their schoolwork.

Students become aware of the role of social class over time. The section “Science Fair” shows this issue most clearly. The students with the best projects are typically from wealthier families with parents who can help. The other students notice this difference in the quality of the projects and whose projects win competitions. Over many Science Fairs and similar events, students begin to see that the system isn’t entirely fair. For students from poor areas, it can start to seem like they shouldn’t bother trying too much because they won’t reach the level that comes easily for the wealthier students. This approach feeds the teachers’ perceptions that poor students aren’t as capable, creating a positive feedback loop that only gets worse over time.

The issue of social class affects perspective quite a bit. Teachers see the lack of homework assignments or low-quality projects from low-income students. The students don’t see their projects as low quality, but instead see the effort they put in, which can often be more than a wealthier student because they have fewer resources. The result may not be the same, but the effort can often be equal or greater. Because most teachers don’t have this perspective, the student receives a lower grade and wonders why they put in that level of effort in the first place. Mrs. Zajac often tries to reward the effort as much as the outcome to show students that effort is worth it, even if they miss the mark on the final product. These differences in perspective often feed other issues, such as behavioral issues and teachers thinking it’s not worth teaching some students, effecting the students’ entire education.