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Brandon Ellrich's avatar

I didn't witness this in my school, but I wouldn't be surprised if it came from a lived experience. Teachers (and parents) often used intimidation to invoke fear rather than respect.

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Jonathan Harvey's avatar

The very worst school system I was in was during my final year in a suburb of Dallas, Texas (7th grade). It has been preceded by one year in Oxford, England, easily the happiest year of my childhood. The contrast between the two was astonishing, breathtaking, stupefying. In Dallas, No corporal punishment but a lot of obvious teacher ignorance and evasive answers. It seemed like a little red schoolhouse even if it was in a suburb,

Oxford is a classic example of a town which is politically quite progressive, but culturally conservative.

What I eventually came to see as the difference between Oxford and Dallas, was the Oxford embodied the conservatism of enabling a tree to put down deep roots, while Dallas was the conservatism of gratuitously amputating the limbs and branches of the tree for no good reason.

Disclosure: 5 years before my final year in Dallas, I was there (age 8) during the assassination of JFK.

2 months later, I lost an election for homeroom President to John Hinckley Jr, who 19 years later would fail attempting to shoot Ronald Reagan.

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