The children of poverty have many faces.
An urban exile from a barren farm in Appalachia.
An American Indian whose address is in American slum.
A farm boy who hitchhiked across half a continent to get an education.
A high school dropout who left school to care for a sick mother and seven children.
Every year poverty wastes the talent of the poor.
Because very few go on to college, their talents are lost for a lifetime to all of us.
A chance to redeem this lost talent.
A chance to find effective ways to educate youngsters from our nation's gifts.
This chance, a community action program the war on poverty calls Upward Bound.
It's the first class of the morning.
The place, a university campus in the Midwest.
The teacher, an English instructor from an inner city high school.
Her students, talented youngsters selected from a variety of rural and urban slums.
By conventional standards many are academic failures.
Others potential dropouts.
By Upward Bound standards all of them possess the undeveloped talent for a college education.
The university's job is to motivate that talent and equip it academically.
For eight weeks during the summer and on weekends during the school year, this teacher and these students will work hard at that job.
He helped the nuns because he cared for the nuns.
Him being a human being he had human qualities and everything.
But just part of human nature he had to do it because some people just can't, some people just mean but.
How many of you throw them at him? He just fell with his head.
She's right.
She's right because the part where in a way he received total freedom by building this church.
In his way he received it.
Now total freedom doesn't necessarily mean you don't have to depend on anybody.
But in the book the way he received it was because there was nobody to help him build it.
And he started it and he almost completed it by himself.
But the church was his own creation.
The colleges choose youngsters for Upward Bound with an eye toward those whose talents might normally be overlooked.
Underachievers whose academic record does not reflect their intelligence or ability.
They come to the program shy.
Suspicious.
Skeptical.
And silent.
Often for a very long time.
Out of this silence comes a torrent of thought and feeling.
Direct, honest and passionate.
Uh -uh wait but then you may die anyway if you don't get the Transfusion period.
So you mean to tell me you that ignorant that you won't take a chance on saving your own life.
If a man maybe 20 years old was unjustly convicted of a murder for example.
And he knew that he was completely innocent.
You think this man is going to just go off to death and not try somehow to get out of it.
All the teachers they're great people and they teach so that you learn something.
But I don't know you learn so you learn something here I mean something to do with school but I don't know what it is yet.
Apart from poverty and talent they share a common uncommon virtue.
A genuine hunger for learning.
An appetite to know and by knowing to reach for a better more fruitful life.
The Upward Bound day involves a full -time engagement in education.
That day starts very early.
The student lives and works fully engaged full -time out of his neighborhood in a complete educational setting that occupies almost every hour of the day.
The day begins in classes unlike any he's ever known.
All right how does this whole thing relate to the film we saw the other night High Noon? I bumped into you you bumped into me.
Big galoo looking at hair and the way you wear your pants.
What's the matter with you? Don't you know how to walk down the street? You ought to be in a jail.
That's one type of conflict isn't it? Conflict with dialogue.
Now let's walk down the street again you play the role.
Let's see if we can settle the conflict differently okay? I'll bump into you.
You hurt last night.
Excuse me.
There are exciting facilities where he can learn a new and challenging idea or give expression to a newly found creative urge.
There's a time and a place for fun and a chance to see a new world and to meet the people who are part of it.
Why is it so long? Well Robie Wright did not believe in the concept as I said of individual rooms but wanted the whole living area to flow through.
So to give this feeling he sort of even left a little space out in the fire above the fireplace.
So you get a feeling from there and there and from up there of the flowing through.
A field trip is a practical lesson in the value of education.
You generally would be looking for a departmental manager or salesperson this type of thing within a book department.
Someone with intellectual curiosity.
I'll destroy the evidence.
An original play for parents night is a group effort written by students directed by tutors.
I had to do it.
Don't you see? They wanted too much of me.
So if you've been bugging your fairy godmother, watch it! One night there's a rehearsal of a show that celebrates their talent and who they are.
On another night there's a trip to a downtown slum to teach other youngsters who want to improve their education.
What these students learn in Upward Bound they share with their community.
So if we got four sixes and you got four in each one, if we count all of them how many will we have? A...
Four.
Twenty -four.
Every week our student assistants and we have thirty -two student assistants.
And in its own way the college makes a practical commitment to the community, to the youngsters and parents it serves.
You'll have your girls back there in their own neighborhoods and we will tutor them.
We will help them in English, we'll help them in reading, we'll help them in speech, we'll help them in anything they need help in.
Then once a month they come back here to us.
They come back on our campus and our whole faculty, all the teachers that we have out here will be part of this program.
And we want them to feel all year that we are working with them just the way we worked this summer, just as closely.
And you can help us.
In fact that's why I asked you to come.
We need your help.
If you will cooperate we'll be extremely grateful.
It seems to me it should aim at giving kids the space in which to grow.
And I'm not talking simply about physical space though that helps.
I'm talking about the kind of space that people feel inside them.
The kind of space that gives people comfort and security and courage and the ability to take risks with other people.
What we want to try to do, what we're hoping to do, is to help them learn how important they are, the significance of their own feelings, the fact that they do have feelings and that they can tell other people what those feelings are and what those thoughts are.
And that other people will respond to them and take them seriously and begin that way to expand from the narrow constricted lives and worlds that they lead and to discover that they have infinite possibility within them just to move out and to grasp at a world that's all there for them.
What these students want to learn, what they do learn, starts with a special kind of teacher.
He may be a college professor or a high school teacher, a college undergraduate or the head of a department.
A counselor, sociologist or graduate student.
What's special about him is his attitude.
He really likes these youngsters.
He really believes in their ability and communicates that belief.
He respects and values them for what they are and can become.
He's open minded and meets problems with a mixture of flexibility and firmness.
And what he teaches is interesting and relevant to what they know and think and feel.
If you have a problem, I mean any kind of problem, writing or you don't like something that's going on, you can go and talk to these teachers.
Well the teachers seem to understand you.
In regular high school they don't give you as much time like if you come after class and want to ask a question, they rush you but here they seem to give you more time.
They inspire you to learn.
They're not just always putting you down saying you can't learn.
Right.
We said that any number in that first position is going to be one because that's what power.
Classes are kept small so the teacher can develop a one -to -one relationship with his students.
He has time.
Time to know them as individuals.
Time to probe their weaknesses and fears.
To encourage their hopes.
Time to lead them from one small success through another to a new confidence in themselves and what they can do.
When there's a problem in learning, undergraduate tutors are available to give students the individual attention they need.
No, I meant you wrote down 11 here.
Now you factored, you found the two factors here.
Good.
Now what were the two factors in the square? The tutors assist teachers in class and are available to help students at almost any hour day or night whether the problem is personal or educational.
Oh, I see.
What makes you be thinking about her? How strong she is, you know, how dominant she is.
You think it's one of complete power then.
Because they work and live with the students, the tutors become a living example to the youngsters of what they can do, what they can become through education.
We're a lot happier.
All right, now how about that one? Do you know why that's right? That's the subject too.
Well, my father, he teaches us, you know, how to take care of, you know, guests when they visit like his friends.
The teacher creates an atmosphere of trust in which students can assume genuine responsibility for learning.
This is not a new idea.
Upward bound is a collection of old ideas.
Small classes, teachers who care, relevant materials, full -time engagement, genuine freedom and responsibility.
What is unique is that for the first time these ideas have been packaged together and put into practice and they work.
He has, you know, he can't do something outside the house so we have to go out, you know, get things for him, all that.
I didn't have this opportunity because my father doesn't live with us.
And many things that I learned I had to learn everything from my mother or learn it by myself.
What's this here? What's this? The diaphragm.
What's the diaphragm? What is the diaphragm? The breathing.
What is it? Is it fur? Is it skin? Is it the stomach? No, it's the muscle.
Muscle, exactly.
It's muscle.
All right, so we only want one.
It's right here.
Students learn in an atmosphere of genuine freedom, free from the fear of failure and arbitrary sanctions.
There are no penalties for mistakes, no failure, no personal ridicule, only encouragement to try again.
Just a very shallow decision, just enough so you have a clear idea of what the decision is.
Don't be scared.
The situation right here.
May she be a member.
Yeah? The time has come the nigger must seek his own place under the sun.
If Europe is for the Europeans, then Africa should be for the black people of the world.
God save us, white folks, from them niggers.
Brother, one hesitates to criticize a life which beginning with so little...
Role -playing is an occasion for students to articulate their feelings and frustrations, while at the same time learning to understand the complex points of view that surround an issue.
Because it is relevant to their experience, it has real meaning for them and is deeply felt.
The old attitudes of adjustment and submission.
He drastically accepts the alleged inferiority of the negro races and withdraws many of the high demands of negroes as men and American citizens.
Is this what I see telling me right, that there are colored people in the back of the bus and not in the front? I guess that's the way it is.
I guess the way that's gonna be until we get something going for us.
We're in the back of the bus now.
We could be in the front.
He asked for equal rights.
How can he ask for equal rights when he's done nothing to deserve it? We are blood spilled for this land.
Our kinsmen died for it.
This is our country.
We died for this land.
What did they do? They don't even have the same rights.
I think, you know, it's not necessary.
I mean, I know what I was knowing.
Why do the whites want the negroes to fight in the war if they don't want to give them equal rights? Because if I had my way, you'd fight by yourself.
If it was left up to me, we would too.
I have seen very few people that call themselves white people that are white.
I mean, you explain to me what makes you so pure, because you're not white.
Really, you're in between orange.
Next question.
All right, Mr.
Shelton, in your speech you stated that negroes were dirty, filthy savages.
I would like to know what is your definition of a savage? A savage.
Ignorant, uncultured, and most of all, a nigga.
Next question.
No, wait.
You will answer my question correctly.
In my opinion, whites are the savages.
You stated yourself that white people came over here and took the land away from Indians.
Savages fight.
We did not fight for this country.
You took it.
You didn't ask for it.
You took it away from the Indians.
In this country, you fight every other minority group in this country.
So in my opinion, the majority are the savages, which are the white people, and you stated that yourself.
Yes, we took it.
But what did you take? We didn't take anything.
We didn't take anything.
That is the whole point.
The whole point is we didn't take it, and savages take things.
Conflict.
You recall we've been talking about conflict at an internal level, inside, as well as conflict at an external level, on the outside.
These particular kids have never really evaluated themselves.
They've accepted gross generalizations.
Many of them believe that they are the disadvantaged, and they intend to stay that way.
Unless someone can shoe out that something else would suggest, you can do better.
So I like to use the term why, because it requires thought.
Why are you going to be a boot black? Why are you going to remain on 42nd Street? Why do you feel? Why, why, why? And this constant jabbering at people can be irritating.
Well, maybe education is another word for irritation.
You like the rules in the teak house, Frank? Sure, when I'm obeying them.
You mean you don't obey rules, Frank? Well, for the most part I do.
You wouldn't want to tell us what rule you broke, huh? Well, I was out after curfew.
Yeah, what happened? Shnolt prompted him.
He knows how many times he was out.
I was dish washing for a while, and then there was this kangaroo court session.
Uh -huh.
I'd rather find something out myself and be told, no, this is not the case.
The teacher will go right along with you and correct you when you're wrong.
And usually he makes you correct yourself.
How do you know it was a kangaroo court? Well, you couldn't exactly call it a real court.
How do you know what I would call it? I wasn't there.
Well, I wouldn't call it a real court.
Why wouldn't you call it a real court? Because no one had a practicing lawyer's certificate or judging certificate or something like that.
Is there a conflict in your mind as to whether or not you're sure? Yes, there is.
Uh -huh.
Why is there a conflict? Well, it's human nature not the one of the...
How do you know what human nature is? No one wants to be a furniture shop.
How do you know what no one wants? Well, I don't want to.
Oh, is there a difference between no one and I? Yeah.
What's the difference? No one doesn't exist.
No one doesn't exist? I exist.
You're sure of that? Yeah, I think I exist.
You know what conceit is? Yeah.
Conceit is a person who has eye trouble.
It is.
That's capital I.
Oh, man.
You got you mixed up.
You had me mixed up.
What's another word for mixed up? Confused.
Confused.
What's another word for confused, Carl? Inward conflict.
What? Inward conflict.
Inward conflict.
I try and encourage them and holler at them in equal proportions so that if they get angry at me, they're only angry at me for one day.
And if they are angry, they try and show me that they can do better.
And I think perhaps a good measure of a teacher is a person who could infuriate and encourage in just the right proportions.
I'm sure that the shins are tight here so that the plaster won't slip through when you cast.
And if they're not, what I want you to do is slip the shim over to the other side so that you form a constant pressure band on the thing, okay? Remember, all of you, we're playing with planes here, not with lines.
Also here, make sure that there are no lines sticking out.
See this little piece here? Mm -hmm.
That will show in the casting and will show as an imperfection.
So take your tool.
These are the first sculptures ever attempted by these students.
Judged by the standards usually applied to them, these youngsters would probably never get a chance to show what they really can do.
No, I don't think so, but I think you should build down the neck a little bit more.
So it's a straight cylinder.
If you could imagine a straight cylinder squashed a little bit on the sides, that's basically the shape of the neck.
What do you think about the expression and all the other aspects of the thing that you've done now before you cast? Is there anything you'd like to do to change it? Because this is it, you know? Once we cast, it's over.
I was thinking of putting a smile on it.
Putting a smile on it? Then we'll have to change the whole form of lift.
Okay? Figures that have been done.
Oh, if you're working off that photograph, remember one thing, and that is that your father's ear isn't nearly as fat as this at the top.
Check that out right now with the photograph.
It's much, much more slender all the way through.
And then take his mustache and still make it thinner and longer.
It will make a younger man out of himself.
You'll take five years off of him.
In a sense, they're very worldly.
In fact, more worldly than the kids at a suburban high school.
They're real.
They've been in the world.
They've experienced a lot of life by the time they're 14 or 16.
We picked mainly films of alienation, of the alienated individual.
And so it was very easy for these kids to identify.
I could tell that the kids knew that it was them.
But they talk about it in a third person.
I think he really wants someone to care for him or love him or be friends with him.
But he's afraid.
And this fear is what holds him back.
They really have to find somebody who they really think really loves them.
Like Stalin's mother, in this case, that little girl.
What was her name? I think they called her Hope.
Hope.
Yeah.
Well, he really loved that little girl.
That little girl loved him.
And that's why he came back.
Otherwise, I don't think if he had been found, he wouldn't have come back.
The word love once stood for honest, bleeding, hurting, passion.
And by that we mean the suffering, compassion for other people.
Supposing this rock out there, you decided that you see something besides the rock, right? What might you see? That he feels that he is a rock.
There's not only the teacher expressing his or her views.
Everyone is participating.
They're talking about it.
They're expressing their feelings.
There's gotta take a person who has a feeling strong enough, an understanding strong enough to penetrate, get into this inner self, and that was wrong.
He just said that he remembers only a part of it.
He doesn't remember the whole concrete part of it.
He doesn't remember seeing her.
That's all he remembers.
And he might have thought that whoever was in love with loved him, but found out later on that she didn't.
The band thought about it back there.
He won't let anybody know that he was helping.
See, she comes like whoever he was hurt by probably wants to still be friends, but he doesn't want to because he remembers the wanting of the love that he once had.
And so he doesn't want to even have anything to do with it anymore.
Because if I can't have it, I'm not going to take any of it.
I feel Socrates had one of two commitments.
He could either leave the country as they stated or he could have stayed to die in prison.
He didn't leave the country because he knew that his teachings would be of no value.
So he stayed in the prison and therefore I think it was his personal commitment to die.
He didn't think that there was any exception to the rule.
So therefore he took his punishment as he thought it to be, and that was death.
Now, I think earlier we discussed why there are laws in society.
Because the teacher values what they think.
He brings them beyond the fear of failure and ridicule to believe in themselves in the future.
He sets them free to think and by thinking to learn and to grow.
Some of you haven't felt they're good reasons.
Gail, you look kind of like you disagree.
Why? I think that if a group of people, political or otherwise, take laws and switch them around and that they can unjustly convict the person, then I think that it's all right for you to go against that law.
These politicians that were against Socrates who broke the law, they used the law against Socrates.
Socrates still believed that the law had helped to screen with him, just the man behind the laws.
Now, who disagrees with Socrates? Wanda? Well, the first thing I'd like to say is that for every law, I believe there's an exception.
Because there's so many people and they're diverse and they're needs and so on, there's going to be one or two people that this law doesn't apply to.
Well, in Socrates' case, his dying was more proving his point.
It was sort of a martyrdom.
And he expected that in the future he would be judged in the right.
And he knew this because he knew he was in the right.
On the other hand, there will be a principle.
However, Socrates' case was more or less exceptional.
And in this sense, he figured that he should devote his life.
I mean, I think it was good to the extent because, well, somebody has to.
And if he didn't, if there weren't men like him, if there hadn't been men like him, then where would we be today? The educational apparatus of this country is potentially good enough so that it could just take a butterfly net and sweep out into the society and collect young people.
And if it approached them properly in ways that are very meaningful and sincere in the minds of the young people, and if it used materials of great interest to them and of great relevance to them, that it could teach almost any youngster almost anything.
