New at Reason: Earning Their Keep

July 28, 2008

From our August/September issue, Laura Vanderkam looks at a new breed of urban Catholic high school that asks disadvantaged kids to work for their tuition.

Comments

Naga Sadow|7.28.08 @ 12:39PM|#

This needs to be hidden from McCain.

|7.28.08 @ 1:03PM|#

By April, though, his ninth-graders were debating whether Emperor Augustus was better for Rome than the previous republican set-up. (Interestingly, most thought he was.)

And suddenly I'm less than impressed with the Jesuit's school.

|7.28.08 @ 1:21PM|#

Jesuits have to defend the Emperors... they eventually became Popes, you know.

The Roman Empire never ended, it just re-invented itself.

|7.28.08 @ 1:45PM|#

By April, though, his ninth-graders were debating whether Emperor Augustus was better for Rome than the previous republican set-up. (Interestingly, most thought he was.)

And suddenly I'm less than impressed with the Jesuit's school.

Might it be that a competent authoritarian regime is preferable to an incompetent republic? I love representative democracy as much as the next guy, but I have to admit at some times, in some places it doesn't work out for the best.

|7.28.08 @ 1:49PM|#

Warren,

I think the benevolent emperor theory always wins out, because he can get shit done and knows what power to use or not. Unfortunately, people rarely think past the benevolent emperor and the precedents set. Classic early roman studies mistake. And how do you know what the Jesuits were teaching anyway?

|7.28.08 @ 1:49PM|#

The damned papists have a long history of providing quality education to the disadvantaged. Even a cynical apostate* like mysely has to admit that.

* I was an alter boy and attended catechism classes into high school.

Naga Sadow|7.28.08 @ 1:54PM|#

The trouble with any benevolent emperor theory is that he eventually dies and leaves a terrible legacy. His son is mediocre, his grandson insane, his great grandson a butcher, etc.

Warty|7.28.08 @ 2:19PM|#

See Commodus, son of Marcus Aurelius.

|7.28.08 @ 2:40PM|#

J sub D | July 28, 2008, 1:45pm | #

Your blockquotes are backwards.

|7.28.08 @ 4:06PM|#

They didn't know how to think," Cochran says. "I had to teach them how to think."

Cochran gives himself way too much credit.

|7.28.08 @ 4:23PM|#

Good program. Good article.

Placing high demands on kids reminds them that they are expected to do things with their lives. But talk to students at Cristo Rey schools, and they tell you that, for all their hours spent graphing algebraic equations, it is their jobs that get them thinking most about the future. In their gleaming office buildings, they see men and women who earn enough to afford nice, safe homes. They see how people set priorities and deadlines and execute projects. It's easy to mock corporate America, but compared with the chaos of inner-city life, a cubicle with your name on it can seem like heaven.

The praise-for-no-reason mob could learn something useful from these kids. Low expectations virtually guarantee low performance.

|7.28.08 @ 4:28PM|#

"Jesuits have to defend the Emperors... they eventually became Popes, you know."

Actually, to the best of my knowledge, there has never been a pope who was a Jesuit. The Jesuits have always somewhat at odds with the Church hierarchy, for being too political, too worldly, too libreal, etc.

emerson|7.28.08 @ 4:36PM|#

Emperors, not Jesuits, numbnuts.

Mad Max|7.28.08 @ 5:24PM|#

Props to *Reason* for recognizing worthy educational initiatives, even from Catholics.

By the way, I will give a free, all-expenses-paid vacation to Las Vegas, with Madonna, Britney Spears, and Lindsay Lohan as tour guides, to anyone who can cite an Emperor who became a Pope.

jtuf|7.28.08 @ 5:46PM|#

These schools are encouraging.

|7.29.08 @ 5:45PM|#

What P Brooks, Mad Max, & jtuf said. Sounds like a free minds and free markets success. No wonder the usual suspects stayed away from this story in droves.