Wednesday, February 25, 2009

Teach the Children

The President has said that when kids, especially inner city kids, drop out of school they are not only letting themselves down, but they are letting down their country.  A noble thought, but what does it take to get these often poor children to to compete with their middle-class peers. Geoffrey Canada, asked himself that question, and proceed to found the Harlem Children's Zone, where he is testing ideas about eduction, poverty, parenting and trying to turn around the lives of Harlem's children. 

Paul Tough, a contributing editor to the New York Times Magazine, and one of America's foremost writers on poverty and education, has written WHATEVER IT TAKES, an inspiring portrait of Geoffry Canada and the children and families whose lives he's trying to save.  

My conversation with Paul Tough: