Beyond The Lines of Color and Race with Ian Rowe (S3 Ep.26)
Aug 12, 2022
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Ian Rowe, senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute and founder of Vertex Partnership Academies, discusses his book "Agency" and the obstacles facing low-income Black and Hispanic kids. He challenges the "blame the system" and "blame the victim" mindsets, explores the challenges faced by charter schools, and discusses the role of religion in upward mobility.
Blaming the system mindset overlooks individual agency and the role of family, faith, education, and entrepreneurship in overcoming barriers.
Blaming the victim mindset neglects systemic barriers and the significance of factors like family, education, and community support in shaping opportunities.
Charter schools face opposition but offer greater accountability and can provide high-quality education, making the discussion on supporting education initiatives more important.
Deep dives
The Problems with Blaming the System
Blaming the system mindset argues that structural racism and oppression make individual success impossible. It ignores the importance of individual agency and the power to overcome barriers. It fails to consider the role of family, faith, education, and entrepreneurship in empowering individuals.
The Problems with Blaming the Victim
Blaming the victim mindset emphasizes individual responsibility, ignoring the systemic barriers that some individuals face. While personal responsibility is important, it overlooks the significance of factors like family, education, and community support that shape individual opportunities.
The Third Way: The FREE Framework
The FREE framework emphasizes four key elements: family, religion, education, and entrepreneurship. Family refers to both the importance of the family you form and the support it provides. Religion highlights personal faith commitment and the values it instills. Education emphasizes the role of quality education, including school choice, in empowering individuals. And entrepreneurship fosters an entrepreneurial mindset, enabling informed risk-taking in personal and professional pursuits.
Controversy Surrounding Charter Schools
Charter schools are public schools managed privately by nonprofit organizations. Critics argue that charter schools undermine traditional public schools and their unionized teachers. However, charter schools offer greater accountability, as underperforming charter schools can be closed down. The opposition to charter schools often stems from the perception that they are not truly public schools.
The Importance of Charter Schools and Opposition from Teachers Unions
Charter schools face opposition from teachers unions due to their exemption from union contracts, allowing for easier hiring and firing practices. While some teachers unions argue that charters violate the charter cap, it is crucial to recognize that charters are authorized by the government to provide high-quality education. The need for excellent schools is significant, especially in communities with low graduation rates. Therefore, the opposition to charters, primarily from the Democrats, who historically supported them, is seen as counterproductive. The increasing awareness among parents about the effectiveness of charter schools may likely shift the discussion towards supporting education initiatives that work.
The Role of Agency and the Value of Religion
The concept of agency, encompassing free will guided by moral discernment, plays a pivotal role in personal and societal success. The pillars of agency, including family, religion, education, and entrepreneurship, are key components for achieving extraordinary outcomes. Religion, in particular, offers numerous benefits such as lower rates of loneliness and depression, stronger social interactions, and academic achievements. While the relevance of religion may have diminished among certain groups, its positive impact on individuals and communities should not be overlooked. Creating a framework that embraces these pillars can empower individuals to make informed decisions and pursue an exceptional life.
My guest today is Ian Rowe. Ian is a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute and the founder of Vertex Partnership Academies. He's also an educator who ran a charter school called Public Prep in the South Bronx for many years.
In this episode, we discuss his new book "Agency". We talk about the obstacles facing low-income Black and Hispanic kids at the schools Ian teaches in. We discuss the problems with the narratives handed to these kids by both the left and the right which Ian calls the "blame the system" mindset and the "blame the victim" mindset respectively. We talk about the challenges faced by charter schools in general and the political opposition they face. We also talk about the role of religion and upward mobility and much more.
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