Church Again?

Garret and I have began participating in a church here in Boulder called Roots. This is the first time in over a year that we have choosen to be a part of a church community. We decided on this church for no other reason than our neighbors. The family that lives above us attends this church. There is nothing special about this church. It is a community of about thirty people that get together on Sundays, sing songs, listen to the pastor talk and share communion. The thing is that we have relationships with some of these people that have become very important to us. This is the driving force behind our involvement. This is what is compelling us to step out and confront something that we would rather keep hidden.

Going to church again requires dicipline. We have both come from a very negative experience that has left deep scars. Becoming part of Roots cause many of these wounds to resurface. I am choosing to be driven by the relationships that I am forming and not on the theology or personal thoughts of these individuals. I want to deal with what happened at Bethany and I hope that Garret and I both choose to allow our wounds to heal. I am joining a group of woman that meets on Saturday mornings and i hope to be able to share my feelings with them and be supported in this journey. Garret told me that he has been praying again, praying that God would find him. My prayer, however, is that we woule allow God to find us. For the first time in almost two years, I am excited about being a part of a church again.

Our neighbors and friends

On a lghter note, I had a really strange experience last night. I woke myself up in the middle of the night due to incessant laughter. I was laughing so hard that I even woke Garret up, who looked at me rather confused and demanded to know what in the world I was doing. I apparently thought this was even funnier and could not stop my laughter. After a few minutes, I finally woke up enough to realize that this was very strange. Upon this realization, however, I began to laugh even harder, because this whole situation was so strange. I do not remember what originally set me off, but it had somethign to do with the word "pop" and gorgonzola cheese.

No Child Left Behind and IDEA

I heard about this man named Kozel who wrote a couple of books called Shame of the Nation and Savage and Equities. In Savage and Equities he went into the school system and observed the inequities present. Fifteen years later, in Shame of the Nation, Kozel went back into the schools to reexamine and reveal the inequities that pivot around socioeconomic lines. I plan to read this book over Christmans break and I would love to hear from anyone who has already read this text. Anyway, beinging with the reauthorization of No Child Left Behind, Kozel, a profesor at Harvard, has gone a a hunger strike to defend those who are so ironically "left behind". In 2004 IDEA (individuals with disabilities education act) sought to align with no child left behind and do away with "special educaation" (special education still exists). This act requires proof of results in all areas of intervention, even with children birth-3. In Colroado we have a program called Results Matter that requires tracking children three times per year withe extensive checklists and questionaires. Each parent must operate under IDEA which implements dramatic changes when a child turns 4 year old. The parents must research these acts and find out how their child cooperates. They must be activists from their children and seek knowledgable and adequate professionals. Sure this seems just fine for the parent who does not work and still manages to have sufficient money. I find myself alligning more and more with Kozel's views on the inequities in our education system and I am reminded of a profesor in college, Dr. Yarchin, was sought after the least of these through fighting against these inequities. I feel that it is my duty, with the education and knowledge that I am priveldged to recieve, to join in this lucha and struggle against our system. Where do I begin?

Here I Am

This year, I have begun reading many of my friends blogs on the internet. I have finally decided that it is my turn to begin contributed to this new world that I have discovered. Yesterday, while writing a paper for class I thought, "this is something garret would post on his blog." Well, why not post it on my own blog. I typed blog into goggle and created this site. I hope that through this medium, I can contribute to the thought forum that seems to be taking place all around me.

Here is an excerpt from the paper I wrote yesterday that shows very clearly how the classes I took at APU continue to affect the way I think. This paper was in response to an article I read that stated that mother's education level and race may be risk factors for children with mental retardation of unknown cause.

I feel so defensive that this cannot be true; it just does not make sense. I suppose I must return to a definition of mental retardation. This is so subjective. Do the children in this study actually have MR or did they simply fail to be born into a privileged family who had money for doctors and education and possessed the same values and teaching styles of the majority of professionals in this country. I am so frustrated with the systems in place in this country. Privilege and power breeds greater privilege and power. There is one culture in this country that expects assimilation. The melting pot is a lie. Become like us, where us is the conglomeration of individuals that were born into privilege and whose cultural values steered and supported them as they developed their own power. Once clothed in this power, they stopped perceiving individuals and put on glasses of supremacy and viewed difference as a disorder.