Schools Without Playgrounds, Children Without Childhood, a Future Without Hope

Danny Weil @ Truthout - The Milwaukee Common Council is expected to take up the issue within a week as to a proposed ordinance on whether any new elementary school approved in Milwaukee should include outdoor play space. Yes, while our children are savagely beaten down in the Dickensian landscape of high-stakes testing, zero-tolerance policies, school-to-prison pipelines, austerity measures that make the seedy and dangerous streets of American cities the sole source of recreation for many experiencing massive poverty and a sense of their own disposability, the city of Milwaukee is considering whether these children of Fagin should even have "yard time." Schools are more and more beginning to resemble maximum-security prisons, but at least at most of those institutions, there is one hour of outdoor time.  Read more.