"East of anywhere," writes a reporter for the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, "often evokes the other side of the tracks. But, for a first-time visitor suddenly deposited on its eerily empty streets, East St. Louis might suggest another world." The city, which is 98 percent black, has no obstetric services, no regular trash collection, and few jobs. Nearly a third of its families live on less than $7,500 a year; 75 percent of its population lives on welfare of some form. The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development describes it as "the most distressed small city in America."

...

It is, according to a teacher at the University of Southern Illinois, "a repository for a nonwhite population that is now regarded as expendable...

Now and then the possibility is raised by somebody in East St. Louis that the state may someday try to end the isolation of the city as an all-black entity. This is something, however, that no one with power in the state has ever contemplated. Certainly, no one in government proposes busing 16,000 children from this city to the nearby schools of Bellevue, Fairview Heights or Collinsville; and no one in tends to force these towns to open up their neighborhoods to racially desegregated and low-income housing. So there is, in fact, no exit for these children. East St. Louis will likely be left just as it is for a good many years to come: a scar of sorts, an ugly metaphor of filth and overspill and chemical effusions, a place for blacks to live and die within, a place for other people to avoid when they are heading for St. Louis."

-from Savage Inequalities by Jonathan Kozol.

I was thinking about East St. Louis this afternoon and how I never went there during my four years at Washington University. It's not like I had any reasons to go there; I didn't go very far from the campus as it was. But I clearly remember the warnings that I received about the city and what could happen if I crossed that bridge.

The closest I got was at an elementary school that I worked at as part of a psychology of education class, but it was still on the west side of the river. The front gate of the school was always in a new mangled form, because, apparently, crazy drivers from East St. Louis would take the exit ramp off the highway and plow right into the gate every single time it was replaced. The secretaries also told me never to leave anything in sight in my car or the window would invariably be smashed. That school was not as bad as the schools that Kozol describes in his book, which I had to read again this summer, but there was evidence of blatant differences between it and the school that I teach at now. Lunch was always a crazy unwrapping of every single piece of plasticware and food from plastic covering. All the food was highly processed. The lead teacher in the preschool classroom where I worked often left during the day to go get drive-through and answered her cell phone during class. And on career day, children were encouraged to go into the fields of city service, lawncare, or maintenance.

The conservative philosophy of teaching believes that America needs to be separated into those who can succeed in more educationally demanding professions and those who fill the jobs that require less schooling. I'm not saying that any career, in service or production, is not distinguished or honorable. I think that any (or almost all) professionals done with goodwill, honesty, and dedication are assets to our society...and worthy pursuits. But I believe that schools should present limitless options to students. Is there any reason why the African American student body at an elementary school in urban St. Louis should be presented with different options than the kids in Ladue? In terms of resources, yes, success will be more difficult. It may also be in terms of preparedness outside of school and financial eligibity. But in terms of each child, I don't think that that kind of delineation should ever be made.

I started thinking about all of this while I was lesson planning this afternoon. I was trying to think of a famous Latino or Latina who I could use in a biography project with my students. Honestly, the first person who popped into my head was Selena, but obviously that wouldn't work so well. Then I thought of Bill Richardson, but he was raised in Connecticut with many advantages. I think it is extremely important to present my students, who are mainly latino, with a role model of someone who worked hard to learn English, stay in school, and follow his or her dreams. And while I was searching for this mystery person, I came across a famous name who had actually grown up in East St. Louis. Although it wouldn't be meaningful to my students, few of whom are old enough to have gotten deep into geography (not to mention sociology and demographics), I was encouraged that this person had moved on from a childhood in East St. Louis. I found out that one of the most famous athletes in the world spent part of her life in the city that Kozol described as unliveable and inescapable: Jackie Joyner Kersee.

Although she eventually became the fastest woman in the world, she had horrible asthma as well, possibly a side effect of the chemical pollution in East St. Louis. It made me so happy to know that there is a native child of that place who could be an inspiration to future generations (albeit she was mainly successful in sports, not academics, but that's really a different argument).

Please leave me a comment if you know of any non-native-English-speaking Latino-Americans who have worked their way to educational and professional success. Although I've found websites about successful scientists and mathematicians, I'm sad that I can't find even one that I've heard of before.