School of Dreams: Making the Grade at a Top American High School [Hardcover]

Edward Humes (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: September 1, 2003

A Pulitzer prize-winning journalist spends a year immersed in the high-pressure world of a competitive public high school—where teens chase 4.0 grades point averages, survive on as little as four hours of sleep, and chug lattes like water—and discovers the human story of what it takes to be a top student in America. Humes introduces a cast of passionate students, and touches on topics relevant to parents, teachers, administrators, and politicians, including destruction of equal education in America; standardized testing and cheating by students, parents, schools, and governments; public schools that succeed; and over-testing in our nation's schools.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

Journalist Edward Humes shows us a little-seen side of our nation's educational system: the side that works. Humes spent a year (2001-02) at Whitney High School in Cerritos, California, a small, middle-class suburb of Los Angeles, where he taught a writing workshop and observed the daily workings of this top-ranked public school. The book honestly examines the extraordinary effort (and elusive chemistry) it takes to achieve that status and the subsequent toll it takes on the remarkable students at the school. It also provides a wonderful portrait of American life. For all its distinction, Whitney High School reflects a cross-section of America, where immigrant families struggle with their American counterparts to guide their children toward academic excellence.

It comes as no surprise that at the heart of Whitney's success is a devoted staff of teachers and administrators who are as overworked and brilliant as their high-achieving charges. Nor should it shock us that the school's ranking does not come without a price. Whitney students are driven and well-rounded, but they are also sleep-deprived and often subjected to extreme parental pressure. The downside of life at Whitney is that a focus on high grades and college placement sometimes takes the place of the joy of learning, and worse yet, sometimes leads some students to cheat. Still, as Humes's engaging narrative reveals, the triumphs far outweigh the inevitable shortcomings. Unfortunately, the model Whitney provides is easy to identify but not easy to reproduce. As Humes observes, our nation's most successful schools "are small, intimate, and attentive. . . marked by high expectations put to work in tangible ways. . . [with] rigorous traditional studies (as opposed to rigorous drilling for annual high-stakes tests); longer hours of study and work; strong parental involvement. . . low absenteeism and few discipline problems; and leadership with a vision." --Silvana Tropea

From Publishers Weekly

Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Humes (Mississippi Mud, etc.) spent 2001 at top-ranked Whitney High School in Cerritos, Calif. While helping seniors with their college application essays, he was also trying to understand this public school's astounding success. Not only do its students, year after year, proceed to America's top colleges, but increasingly, families move to Cerritos-from all over the world-so their children can attend Whitney. The school is selective; an entrance test is required. But academic "cherry-picking" is only part of the story. Once at Whitney, students surpass similarly skilled students elsewhere-and not because of computers, standardized curriculum, "no child left behind" programs or high-stakes testing. Rather, Humes finds, it's an old-fashioned combination of high expectations and committed educators. They expect students to put in long hours, even "all-nighters." Discipline problems and drug use are unusual and taken seriously when they do occur. All Whitney's teachers are encouraged to educate for something more lasting and meaningful than the AP exams. Elsewhere in America, Humes learns, there's a "bias against the intellectually gifted," but at Whitney, students are expected to work hard, learn a lot and achieve. While Humes notes a few downsides to this culture of high expectations-stress, caffeine addiction and cheating problems-they seem fairly manageable at Whitney. As America's policy makers obsess over minimum proficiency standards, Humes, in his well-written, informative study, presents the Whitney model as a needed corrective, urging parents and policy makers to study success for a change.
Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information, Inc.

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Product Details

• Reading level: Ages 14 and up
  
• Hardcover: 400 pages
• Publisher: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt; 1 edition (September 1, 2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0151007039
• ISBN-13: 978-0151007035
• Product Dimensions: 9.3 x 6.1 x 1.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.5 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 3.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (36 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #664,304 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

QUICK STORY: A Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist and author, Edward Humes' latest book is FORCE OF NATURE: The Unlikely Story of Wal-Mart's Green Revolution (Harper Collins, May 2011). His other books include the PEN Award-winning NO MATTER HOW LOUD I SHOUT: A Year In the Life of Juvenile Court, the bestseller MISSISSIPPI MUD, and MONKEY GIRL: Evolution, Education, Religion and the Battle for America's Soul, now under development at HBO.

BACK STORY: When I was six I decided I wanted to be a writer, and I've been at it ever since. I started my writing career in newspapers, and I think I probably would have paid them, instead of the other way around, for the thrill of seeing my first byline in print. As a newspaper reporter, I gravitated toward stories that allowed me to dig behind the scenes and beneath the surface, looking for questions others hadn't asked or imagined. For me, the job amounted to this: license to find out the things I had always wanted to know, about anything and everything that interested, touched or outraged me. Then, within the space and time limitations of a daily newspaper, I had the chance to mold it all into a story to pass onto others. I loved that work.

When I left newspapers to write nonfiction books, I suddenly had weeks or months, rather than hours or days, to immerse myself in the inner workings of the places, characters and events I seek to understand and write about. I had found the greatest job I can imagine.

In my books, I try to take readers inside worlds most don't get to visit or see close up on their own. My first stories were about crime -- real-life murder mysteries-- and I still enjoy reading and writing true crime. But I've pursued broader and more varied narratives in my more recent books. I've written about the nation's crumbling juvenile justice system, the California high school that went from worst to best in the state, the harrowing but surprisingly humane world of a neonatal intensive care unit, the front lines of a modern-day Scopes Monkey Trial, a Gulf Coast murder mystery solved by the victims' own daughter.

Lately - in ECO BARONS and my next book, FORCE OF NATURE (due out in spring 2011) - I've focused on narratives about the environment and sustainability. I believe this to be the most important story of our age - for ourselves, and for our children.

OTHER WRITING: I've written for numerous publications, including Los Angeles Magazine, Sierra Magazine, Readers Digest, California Lawyer, the Oxford American, the Los Angeles Times, and The New York Times. I have taught writing and journalism at the University of California, Irvine, Chapman University, and the University of Oregon.

SPEAKING: I enjoy speaking about my work, and have been invited to address a wide range of groups and organizations:the National Education Summit, the National Steinbeck Center, the ALOUD series, the National Association of District Attorneys, the National Association of Criminal Defense Attorneys, the National Association of Juvenile and Family Court Judges, the Dole Center for Politics, the National High School Journalism Conference, the National College Newspaper Convention, the National Association of Teachers of English, the California Department of Corrections, the California Appellate Project, the American Psychology and Law Society, the Investigative Reporters and Editors, the Poynter Institute, the Crichton Club and numerous universities and other schools. I was called to testify about my reporting on juvenile court before the U.S. Senate and a joint session of the California Senate and Assembly. I've had the pleasure of delivering a commencement address at Hampshire College in Amherst, my alma mater, and have enjoyed speaking at venues throughout California as a contributing writer to MY CALIFORNIA, an anthology from which all proceeds were donated to the California Arts Council to support arts and writing programs for the state's school children. I served as a Regents Lecturer at the University of California, Irvine, and taught writing workshops at the University of Oregon graduate program in literary nonfiction.

HONORS: I received a Pulitzer Prize for my newspaper coverage of the military, a PEN Center USA award for NO MATTER HOW LOUD I SHOUT, a Casey Medal for Meritorious Journalism for "The Forgotten," my LA Magazine account of life inside Los Angeles's nightmarish home for neglected children, and a Silver Gavel honor for MONKEY GIRL. The Washington Post named SCHOOL OF DREAMS a best book of 2003; the Los Angeles Times named MEAN JUSTICE a best book of 1999.

BORN: Philadelphia.

EDUCATION: Hampshire College, Amherst, Mass.

CURRENT WHEREABOUTS: Southern California

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

54 of 67 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Simplistic and intellectually unchallenging book, September 2, 2003

By 

Hail to Whitney High (Los Angeles, CA United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: School of Dreams: Making the Grade at a Top American High School (Hardcover)

If you're interested in this book, you are, like me, probably an alumnus of WHS. Who else would want to read this book anyhow? It's not like the success of WHS can be easily duplicated in other places. There's not many places where you can have a small public school in a highly Asian demographic community with a restrictive admissions test that almost certainly guarantees a self-selecting and self-motivated student body that will excel academically. And for this reason, it's no surprise that WHS crushes all other public schools as far as standardized testing goes.

And for this same reason, it's silly of the author, Edward Humes, to posit that the critics of public schools have it all wrong because WHS is proof of a public school that succeeds. You see, underlying his narrative is his thesis that WHS is proof that an under-funded, under-staffed public school with lousy facilities can nevertheless succeed. His proofs, of course, are the dazzling statistics WHS produces in terms of SAT scores, standardized tests, etc.

This is rather simplistic because anyone with common sense would attribute the school's academic prowess to its self-selective and highly unusual demographic composition. I would give Humes more credit if he had the guts to admit the following: that the teachers don't really matter at WHS. Indeed, some of us would even assert that WHS students excel in spite of poor teachers. But this is a harsh thing to say and Humes has neither the insight nor the guts (nor the ability) to present it.

As WHS alumni know, the self-motivated kids at WHS exceed not because of standards imposed by their teachers, but because of standards imposed by their peers/predecessors/parents. Of course, there are notable exceptions. But Humes (largely) ignores the most exceptional WHS teachers (and there are only a handful). Instead, he wastes time describing the current principal as being a huge factor of WHS's success. Really? The truth is, any WHS principal has the easiest public school job in America. Just sit back, ride the students' coattails and take credit for their achievements. This is what all the previous principals did, all of whom enjoyed terms where WHS was the #1 school in CA, and none of whom were responsible for it.

To Mr. Humes credit, he does devote some attention to Mr. B, the U.S. history teacher, who is indeed one of WHS's few faculty gems. But this kind of treatment is sparse. How could there be no mention of the fabulous Mr. S, another history teacher and one of WHS's noteworthy faculty members?

If Mr. Humes were intellectually critical and honest, he would also give us vignettes of some of the really lousy faculty members at WHS. It seemed like as a courtesy he just ignored those facets of the faculty completely.

Another weakness of his book is that he focuses on one school year: 2001-02. I understand why he does that in terms of having a coherent narrative, but by focusing on just one year, and skipping over WHS's history (he devotes a few superficial pages to it but nothing substantive), he fails to raise and explore these issues:

How has the parental/peer pressure to succeed academically affected alumni later on in their lives?

How do WHS students perform in college, where success comes more from creative and original thought as opposed to rote memorization?

Have WHS alumni over the past 20 or 30 years done anything remarkable or exceptional? Or have we just churned out a number of doctors, lawyers, and businessmen who have taken a safe, pre-packaged road to success?

These are difficult questions, and Humes has no position, no ability, no insight, and no way to answer these. So he eschewed the more complex issues and wrote an easy book filled with easy answers. I don't blame him for this. Neither do I commend him for it.

Finally, Humes has this obsession with taking cheap shots at the Bush family that manifests itself throughout the book. It's seriously annoying and his obsessiveness makes him an even less credible author.

15 of 18 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars School of dreams...future of reality, August 20, 2003

By A Customer

This review is from: School of Dreams: Making the Grade at a Top American High School (Hardcover)

It was a special opportunity to read a book about something so close to my heart. It's been more than a decade since I wandered sleepily through the halls of Whitney High School, but through Hume's honest portrayal it's as though I never left. Memories of feeling "never good enough" came hurtling back only to be replaced with the gratifying realization that like me, the kids in the book will soon find it's what they learn in the proverbial classroom of life that truly matters. Whitney gets you to college, you get you through life. I urge parents who view Whitney as the Holy Grail to read this book carefully and then read everything in quotation marks again. These are the voices of your children. These were the words in my head that never found a voice...until now.

8 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Deserving of the praise, December 25, 2003

By 

Brian M. Ayres (Valrico, FL USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: School of Dreams: Making the Grade at a Top American High School (Hardcover)

Not far into David Hume's acclaimed book about the life inside one of America's most pressure-packed public schools, the author quotes a teacher who sums up high school life succinctly. Schools are like organisms, the teacher said, because you never can identify exactly how and what makes them go. For those who claim to carry the quick fixes to an education system said to have been broken off and on for the last 50 years, take that advice.

And just when you think you have all the answers, read Hume's book about Whitney High School.

Using a formula of high expectations, partental involvement and a selective admissions process, Whitney has built one of the jewels of the California educational system with about 95 percent of the students college bound and SAT scores to drool over.

But before principals nationwide begin to copy the forumla, Hume illustrates the neagative variables to such success. This school has been built on the backs of automatons who begin their quest for the HYP (Harvard, Yale, Princeton) track as early as third grade. Hume characterizes life at Whitney as a six-year experiment in nerves. Like the physics projects illustrated in the book, some students are one Alka-Seltzer short of an emotional explosion. AP classes and numerous extra-curriculars are means to the HYP end, not necessarily instrinsic desires to gain knowledge and life experience.

While Hume's portrayal represents a microcosm of Whitney, it reveals the predicament high-stakes plays in the educational accountability movement. Success is not in the subjective and personal nature of knowledge, but the impersonal (hence the faceless student on the cover of Hume's book and pictureless inside) ranking on standardized tests.

While Whitney may be at the top, others school continually try to knock it off, using the same twisted reason a Whitney junior spends $1,000 to increase his SAT score to 1560 then decides to retake it again -- "You can never have too high a score."

I believe in high expectations and no excuses for schools and students, but I am wary of a federal system trying to devise a formula to improve the education of tens of millions of children controlled by tens of millions of variables. When you try to control the beast, the beast ultimately ends of controlling you. Whitney students are perfect examples.

However, if Hume's book shows anything, it is that not just parental involvement is key to educational success, but local (not state or federal) control is vital to the success of any school. For whatever negative side effects, Whitney's formula works well for them. It is up to other schools to create their own.