The Beat of a Different Drummer, Part 7

If a man loses pace with his companions, perhaps it is because he hears a different drummer. Let him step to the music which he hears, however measured, or far away.
Henry David Thoreau, July 12, 1817 – May 6, 1862,
 was an American author, naturalist, transcendentalist, tax resister, development critic, sage writer and philosopher. He is best known for his book Walden, a reflection upon simple living in natural surroundings, and his essay, “Civil Disobedience”, an argument for individual resistance to civil government in moral opposition to an unjust state.

…We have valued grades and scores more than learning. We have forgotten to teach you that all understanding begins with wonder and with following unexpected discovery in unknown directions. We have tried to stomp the wonder out of you by getting you to choose a track and stick with it. We have asked you to excel in every endeavor and to avoid anything that might diminish your record of excellence. When we rewarded you only for following all of our rules and not for making any of your own, we did more to close your minds than to open them. … I am sorry that we have taught you to value economic success over passionate engagement with your work. …  http://www.theroot.com/id/46623
Melissa Harris-Lacewell

If you were to combine the two quotations above, what would you conclude?  That we have taken the “different drummer” out of the classroom?

Let us continue our respite from talking about problems by talking about solutions.  Here we give another example from Tactics of Hope, a book which should be required reading in high school, but which no Montebello high schooler, perhaps no Montebello teacher, knows about (please do correct me if I am wrong):

My [Kailash Satyarthi] concern for children born into poverty started the morning of my first day of school.  On the school steps was a little boy of my age who asked if he could repair my shoes.  He was not a student at my school, and his father, a cobbler, was with him.  I was confused and asked the father why his son could not go to school with me, to which he answered, “We were born to work.  My son is doing what I did when I was his age and what my father did when he was a child.  And we have no money to pay for school.”  My lifelong commitment to help young children get an education rather than being forced into labor started at that moment. ...

RugMark rugs are made on looms and in factories that are inspected independently for child labor.  The rugs are certified with the RugMark® label, each with an individual number that can be traced through the supply chain back to the loom.  A percentage of the sale of a certified rug helps fund child rescue and rehabilitation, as well as daycare, literacy, formal schooling and vocational training for children who might otherwise be coerced into labor.

Demand for child labor is so high in the countries where RugMark operates that desperate parents often sell their children into bondage, including child trafficking, commercial sexual exploitation, domestic work and the recruitment of children for armed conflict and drug trafficking.  An estimated 14$ of children in India between the ages of five and fourteen are engaged in child labor activities, including carpet production.  Rugs are among South Asia's top export products and a high employment sector for the poor.  Some people think it’s better when all members of a family work, but child labor really makes poverty worse. ...

Child workers come cheaply and sometimes at no cost, driving down wages for adult laborers.  Children who work forfeit an education that could help them achieve a higher standard of living as adults.  If child exploitation is the norm in a country’s principle industry, there is little chance to break the cycle of extreme poverty.

RugMark’s strategy is replicable as a systemic approach to ending child labor.  Kailash and Nina [Smith] began by raising consumer awareness, and thus demand, for ethically made rugs.  This sent a message down the supply chain that child labor would not be tolerated. ... 

October 23, 2008