I am so happy that Larry James, CEO and President of CitySquare, will be our guest presenter at the December 7 First Friday Book Synopsis. Larry has most graciously agreed to substitute for me while I attend the annual communication of the Masonic Grand Lodge of Texas, in my capacity as a member of the Education… Read More CitySquare’s Larry James Presents at December 7 FFBS
For practically every family, the ingredients of poverty are part financial and part psychological, part personal and part societal, part past and part present. Every problem magnifies the impact of the others, and all are so tightly interlocked that one reversal can produce a chain reaction with results far distant from the original cause. If… Read More Putting Our Minds to Finding Work Solutions for The Under-Skilled May Be the Most Patriotic Thing We Can Do
There are people with plenty. There are others with far from plenty. The poor are always at the top of mind at the Urban Engagement Book Club (sponsored by CitySquare). Today, I am presenting my synopsis of Teaching with Poverty in Mind: What Being Poor Does to Kids’ Brains and What Schools Can Do About… Read More Children and Poverty – Here’s a Problem Worthy of our Most Focused Attention (Eric Jensen, Teaching With Poverty in Mind)
We can’t do everything at once. Literally, we cannot do everything at once. And so, a lot that needs to be paid attention to; a lot that needs to get done; a lot that is important, maybe crucial; is simply never dealt with. And the advocates of such concerns speak, and write, and yell, and… Read More We Can’t Do Everything At Once. Literally, We Cannot Do Everything At Once – (insight prompted by Michele Alexander, The New Jim Crow)
I have written before about this simple concept: you get what you pay attention to. (read this earlier blog post). I am convinced that this is as true a maxim as you can find. What gets attention determines the areas in which progress is made. What is ignored goes downhill… pretty quickly. My friend, Larry… Read More You Get What You Pay Attention To — Consider Brazil’s Focus on Extreme Poverty
For the Urban Engagement Book Club for Central Dallas Ministries tomorrow, I am presenting my synopsis of There Goes the Neighborhood: Racial, Ethnic, and Class Tensions in Four Chicago Neighborhoods and Their Meaning for America by William Julius Wilson and Richard P. Taub. At this book club, we focus on books related to social justice… Read More Thoughts About Change From A Book About Racial, Ethnic, And Class Tensions
The children in Dallas County are facing trouble – at least, many of them. I speak monthly for the Urban Engagement Book Club for Central Dallas Ministries, and my assignment for August was unusual. I presented a synopsis of the findings of Beyond ABC: Growing Up in Dallas County, a study conducted by the Children’s… Read More Poverty and the Children in Dallas County
As I have written often, I live in multiple worlds. Today for the Urban Engagement Book Club, sponsored by Central Dallas Ministries, I presented my synopsis of Push by Sapphire. It was the toughest book to read – maybe the toughest I’ve ever read! In this book-based gathering, we look at books that raise our… Read More What is a normal life? – Push By Sapphire (The Book Which Prompted The Movie Precious); A Reflection
Most of the people I write about in this book do not have the luxury of rage. They are caught in exhausting struggles. Their wages do not lift them far enough from poverty to improve their lives, and their lives, in turn hold them back. The term by which they are usually described, “working poor,”… Read More “Nobody who works hard should be poor in America” writes David Shipler
“I’ve had enough unchosen encounters with poverty in my lifetime to know it’s not a place you would want to visit for touristic purposes; it just smells too much like fear..” Barbara Ehrenreich (Nickel and Dimed: On (Not) Getting By in America) It was August, 2001, when I presented my synopsis of Barbara Ehrenreich’s best-selling… Read More Nickel and Dimed Stands the Test of Time — and Barbara Ehrenreich has a New Book Coming Soon
First Friday Book Synopsis 