Making minorities feel more at home in school

Making minorities feel more at home in school: "Many high school history courses take a survey approach, giving students the highlights about many important events during a particular period.

Kenneth Smith has a different plan for the Pittsburgh Public Schools' new course on African-American history. Mr. Smith, a course developer, said students will study multiple perspectives on black history, gather information from primary sources and write their own interpretations of history.

When the schools want to invite Libertarians to lead a civics class or develop a text book -- let me know. I'm a minority too.

If the Founding Fathers were around today, they'd be in the minority as well. And, to be sure, back then, they didn't have a monopoly.

The entire celebration of Pittsburgh's 250th is a very European-centered educational event. What was going on in Pittsburgh 300 or 400 years ago?

The I.B. education is more of a world view too. But, with a world view, I dare say, you can't just have three text books.

Let's see a report card that lists the 100 steps that were part of the settlement with the PPS and the advocates. List them. Then list the plans. Then list the outcomes in the early years. Then list the present day outcomes. Then have a check off that shows complete satisfaction or not of the progress of that point by all involved (PPS administration, teachers, board, students, parents, taxpayers, advocates, government).

Who is on the district's equity advisory panel. When do they meet? Where are the minutes of their past meetings? Can those meetings be put on cable TV or else capture the audio and turn them into podcasts (such as with TalkShoe.com).