HODGE V. TALKIN Lower court ruling that the Supreme Court let stand. Allowed a ban on speech and assembly on the plaza of the Supreme Court.
IN RE GAULT Established that minors have constitutional rights.
MIRANDA V. ARIZONA Protected the Fifth Amendment right to remain silent.
MORSE V. FREDERICK Gave schools the right to limit student speech if it is disruptive of school activities.
OBERGEFELL V. HODGES Gave same-sex couples the right to marry.
PIERCE V. SOCIETY OF SISTERS Upheld the right of states to regulate schools and to examine both teachers and pupils.
SANTA FE INDEPENDENT SCHOOL DISTRICT V. DOE Affirmed Engel v. Vitale against prayer in public schools.
TINKER V. DES MOINES INDEPENDENT SCHOOL DISTRICT Gave students the right to protest at school as long as they don’t disrupt class.
WARREN V. BOARD OF EDUCATION Declared homework unconstitutional.
Gratitude
A book’s origins often reach back to childhood. This one reaches back to my children’s childhood, specifically to one evening during my daughter’s third grade year when I heard an abrupt sound from the dining room table like twigs snapping. It was the logical, even-tempered eight-year-old Sophie Frank violently breaking number 2 pencils.
She couldn’t solve Mr. Hall’s weekly sudoku for homework.
So thank you, Sophie, for that uncharacteristic destruction of property; and thank you, Mr. Hall, for the age-inappropriate assignment. (She loved him, by the way, for his clarity and calm.)
And thank you, Sam, my son who drowned in homework at that same dining room table, mere feet from the piano he longed to play.
And thank you, Mia, my daughter who really did bring home a word search puzzle in which she had to find the word “school” forty-four times.
I’m also grateful to Alfie Kohn for his disruptive thinking about education so passionately offered in books like The Homework Myth and Feel-Bad Education.
To my fellow teachers who struggle with the idea of homework, not just because they have to grade it, but because they wonder if it really helps kids learn.
Gratitude again to my agent, Kevin O’Connor, whose enthusiasm and insight made the second draft almost as much fun as the first.
To Margaret Raymo, still a dream editor: I didn’t have to break any pencils for you.
To Sharismar Rodriguez and Andy Smith for designing and drawing a cover that proclaims the power of kids with a cause.
Gratitude to my parents, Merona and Marty Frank, for being here.
To Julie Ferber Frank, a fierce advocate for the children in our home and the ones in this book. And for her wise contributions to the book itself.
Finally to you, Reader, for your gift of attention and time.
· 1 ·
An Opportunity
Charlie
“GUYS, WE SHOULD GO IN. It’s a school night.”
“Shut up, Charlie.”
“Why’d you have to mention that?”
“Yeah, Killjoy Charlie. You just ended our summer vacation.”
Like it’s my fault the earth spins? I brace for a tornado of punches. Instead I hear Keith say, “Charlie Ross is right. It’s getting dark.”
Capture-the-flag ends in a tie and we all head for home. You can hear air conditioners humming from side yards and crickets chirping from trees. Someone kicks an empty Coke bottle into the street. It sounds like a ringing bell.
You can’t hear much talk, though. We’re all thinking about you-know-what starting you-know-when. Most summers I look forward to you-know-what. But this year I’m starting sixth grade. If I start sixth grade, chances are I’ll finish it. And when I do, I’ll get older than my older brother.
“See you guys at the bus stop tomorrow,” I say.
“Won’t see me,” says Bobby Crane.
“Won’t see me,” says Mike Applebaum.
“Or me,” says Brett Deitch.
“Why not?” I ask.
“I’m going to Buckley.”
“I’m going to Carpenter.”
“I’m going to El Rodeo.”
Buckley is a private school in Sherman Oaks. Carpenter’s a public one in Studio City. El Rodeo is in Beverly Hills.
That’s three out of my four friends in the neighborhood changing schools. I turn to Keith, the one I look up to most.
“I’ll see you at the bus stop, won’t I, Keith?”
Keith has sandy blond hair, fair skin with freckles, and sea blue eyes. He carries a pocketknife in his jeans, started wearing puka shells way before they were popular, and lives in the pillow thoughts of practically every girl in Laurel Canyon. He calls us by our first and last names, which can make even a short kid like me feel tall.
“’Fraid not, Charlie Ross. I’m going to Carpenter this year. We gave my aunt’s address in Studio City so I don’t have to go to Wonderland.”
“What’s wrong with Wonderland?”
“My mom says it’s going downhill.”
“She say why?”
“Nope. Just that it’s a good time to be movin’ on. But don’t worry, man. I’ll still catch you around the neighborhood.”
“Cool,” I say, as in No big deal. But what I feel is cold. Like they all just ditched me.
Armstrong
The trouble with white people is, they’re white. It’s what I try to tell Mama when she informs me I’ll be attending a new school.
“What’s wrong with my old one?”
“It’s segregated,” Daddy says.
“How so? Black kids sit on one side of the schoolyard. Black kids on the other.”
“And where do the white kids sit?”
“Only white kid at Holmes is the one in Miss Silverton’s belly,” says Charmaine, my big sister third from the top.
“That’s segregated. And the Supreme Court has said it’s time for black and white to blend.”
I don’t see why. It’s not like we’re going to rub off on them.
“Where is this new school?”
“In the Hollywood Hills,” Mama says.
Hollywood Hills sounds like I’m going to be a movie star. I check myself in the shine of the toaster. Look like a young Sidney Poitier. Start practicing my autograph on the plate.
“How’s he going to get there?” Lenai, the oldest, asks. “We don’t have a car.” She’s the practical one. Parent Number Three, we call her, behind her back.
“He won a spot on the bus.”
Two slices of toast pop up like eyebrows. Two eyebrows—mine—pop up like the crusts on that toast. How can I win what
