The Educational Contract

The difficulty in explaining why so many African American students do so poorly in school is in peeling back the layers of why their parents let them. What's even more difficult to explain is how the 1954 US Supreme Court case "Brown," which was intended to bring educational equality, actually has contributed to the phenomenon. "THE EDUCATIONAL CONTRACT" is a peek into the moral dilemma of a history that has shaped a cultural pattern of failure for more than sixty years in inner-city schools. Drawing on her own childhood experiences in high-poverty schools, and her work to transform some of the worst performing schools in the US, Dr. Sharon Washington presents a look at this pattern of failure through what she calls an /educational contract/; and she puts forward solutions that can set inner-city schools on a dramatically different course. "THE EDUCATIONAL CONTRACT" is a penetrating and powerful call to action that takes the conversation of failing urban public schools to the masses.