Savage Inequalities Paper (1/31/08)

O’Abern LaCroix Professor Kathy Sweet

English Composition 1 – EG101 1/31/08

In “Savage Inequalities”, writer Jonathan Kozol talks with students and faculty members of Morris High School in the Bronx and examines the social and academic challenges they face. In his visit, Kozol witnesses the unsafe structural form of Morris High School that inner city students must endure. Inside the building, Kozol comes across a huge hole in the ceiling of a stairwell, exposed structural brick within the walls of classrooms, a leaky window in the counseling office, and an unattractive auditorium with missing stained-glass windows and rotting support pillars. Among school’s structural problems, its graduation rate is inefficient to its enrollment. Blacks and Hispanics make up the school’s population. Some students consider the fact that their school is in the condition it is because of race and financial stability.

New York City’s has a number of well-funded selective high schools with astonishing special programs and facilities. The enrollment process of selective high schools has not been honest to students that may have met the criteria for those schools. Jackson High School as well as other schools are seen he as a “dumping ground” for students who were not admitted to the schools of their choosing. According to Kozol, selective high schools are injustice to some deserving students of New York City, leaving them behind in overcrowded and low-funded schools. Ultimately, the board of education may be the key reason to the “savage inequalities”.