A Kind and Just Parent: The Children of Juvenile Court - Hardcover

Ayers, William

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0807044024 ISBN 13: 9780807044025

Publisher: Beacon Pr, 1997

Synopsis

The author traces his five years as a teacher and observer of Chicago's Juvenile Court prison, the nation's first and largest institution of juvenile justice, and offers real-life portraits of its inner-city youths. Tour.

About this title

Review

William Ayers brings a reporter's eye and an activist's heart to this well-written and profoundly disturbing book, A Kind and Just Parent: The Children of Juvenile Court. Ayers, who teaches offenders in Chicago's juvenile court system, is a brilliant storyteller, the damning fly on the wall. His book portrays the lives of his students--both within the juvenile temporary detention center and on the "outside." Ayers puts their stories into historical context; argues passionately about the roles of media, poverty, and neglect; refutes the idea of teenager as "superpredator"; and challenges parents--all of us--to ask the question, "Is this good enough for my child?" when determining the standard to use when we think of justice for kids.

From the Back Cover

A Kind and Just Parent gives us a transformative view of kids caught up in the justice system that we could never get from nightly news and newspaper stories. William Ayers has spent five years as teacher and observer in Chicago's Juvenile Court prison, the nation's first and largest institution of juvenile justice, founded by legendary reformer Jane Addams to act as a "kind and just parent" for kids in need. Today, immensely confused and confusing, it serves as a perfect microcosm of the way American justice deals with children. The book follows a year in the life of the prison school. Its characters are three-dimensional: funny, quirky, sometimes violent, and often vulnerable. We see young people talking about their lives, analyzing their own situations, and thinking about their friends and their futures. We watch them throughout a school year and meet some remarkable teachers. From the intimate perspective of a teacher, Ayers gives us portraits, history, and analysis that help us to understand not only what brought these kids into the court system, but why people find it hard to think straight about them, and what we might do to keep their younger brothers and sisters from landing in the same place.

About this edition

• Publisher: Beacon Pr
• Publication date: 1997
• ISBN 10: 0807044024
• ISBN 13: 9780807044025
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 206