Oak Cliff High School

In the film, “High School: Best and the Rest”, four schools were toured with the help of its students explaining the economic and educational status of their school. Based on their descriptions, they touched on some examples of individualism, traditionalism, and moralism.
Individualism was shown in all four of the school districts; however, in different ways. In Highland park, they fixed their financial issues by themselves and without any government interference. They used their money to fund their school such as fundraising through car washes and having parents volunteer in the cafeteria. In Oak Cliff high school, several students lived in bad neighborhoods and it was perceived as an area where bad uneducated people lived; however, Jarvis
was able to prove them wrong by finishing his education and going to a private university. In addition, Aaron made a statement about how his family valued education; therefore, he chose to mold education into his life and also succeed in going to a good school.
Furthermore, in the article, Traditionalism was identified by the huge difference in privileges the wealthy school and old school had. In W.W Samuel High school, the government failed to change the issues occurring in Ana’s school. There was no economic improvement in funding sufficient educational materials for the school; therefore, this decreased the motivation for teachers to teach and students to learn. In Highland Park, the school was privileged with good academic resources. Due to that, there was no crime or violence and Christianity was emphasized in their community. In addition, moralism was identified in this community collected $100 million in property taxes and 74%of that money went to other schools. This shows that the government was taking and action to help the general public by implementing local property taxes help aid poor communities.
Population shifts made an impact in the poor school district by affecting it educationally and economically.
In Nimitz High school, Aaron explained how there were several refugees coming into the community that was poor and financially disadvantaged. Due to that, the percentage of economically disadvantaged families rose from 14-60%. Academics began to deteriorate as standardized test scores were dropping and Aaron made a statement that his family was going to relocate to another community to provide the better education for his siblings. In South Oak Cliff High school, the population of the community was 90% black and Latino. Characteristics that shifted due to the population was that 80% of families were economically disadvantaged and it had the poorest neighborhoods. There were several gangs and drugs in the community; therefore, the school had a 60% of students drop out. Lastly, in W.W Samuel High school, there was a large percentage of Latinos, and several of them did not know English. The school had to have specialized classes and teachers; however, the dropout rate was still significant. Apparently, reasons for students dropping out of school were because of the language barrier and students valuing family over education; which meant they left school early to find fast
income.
Based on the film, my view of it would be traditionalism because of inadequate change. The film was comparing the different privileges that one school had compared others did not but there was no improvement. Nick even asked where was all the property taxes going since there was not much improvement in the poor school districts. After watching this video, I felt that there were no modifications made based on the how much money is provided other schools. Apparently, 90% of Dallas school district budget comes from local property taxes; however, some of these schools have a shortage of staff, textbooks and basic equipment for restrooms. Based on traditionalism, it means the resistance to change; and based on the video, there were not many alterations.