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Why Do Only White People Get Abducted by Aliens?
- Teaching Lessons from the Bronx
- Narrated by: Romy Nordlinger
- Length: 7 hrs and 27 mins
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This book traces the history of the Manhattan Project, from the first glimmerings of the possibility of such a catastrophic weapon to the aftermath of the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. It profiles the architects of the bomb, including J. Robert Oppenheimer, and how they tried to reconcile their personal feelings with their ambition as scientists. It looks at the role of the politicians and it includes first-hand accounts of those who experienced the effects of the bombings.
Editorial reviews
While the title might make listeners think this is a work of humor, the reality is more interesting. This is an honest and reflective account of what it's like for an earnest white woman from the suburbs to teach public high school in the Bronx. There's no narrative of the "hero teacher" here, but a frank account of what it's like teaching in the midst of drugs, gangs, abusive relationships, and cockroaches. Despite it all, author Ilana Garon makes real connections with her students, and listeners will enjoy watching her grow in empathy and wisdom. Narrator Romy Nordlinger does a great job bringing Garon to life, and capturing the variety of beautiful and challenging students she meets.
Publisher's Summary
The true story of a young teacher attempting to change lives in a troubled educational system. According to Ilana Garon, popular books and movies are inundated with the myth of the "hero teacher" - the one who charges headfirst into dysfunctional inner-city schools like a firefighter into an inferno, bringing the student victims to safety through a combination of charisma and innate righteousness. The students are then "saved" by the teacher’s idealism, empathy, and faith. This is not that type of book.
Here, Garon reveals the sometimes humorous, oftentimes frustrating, and occasionally horrifying truths that accompany the experience of teaching at a public high school in the Bronx. The overcrowded classrooms, lack of textbooks, and abundance of mice, cockroaches, and drugs weren’t the only challenges Garon faced during her first four years as a teacher. Every day, she’d interact with students dealing with addiction, miscarriages, stints in "juvie", abusive relationships, and gang violence. These students brought with them big dreams and uncommon insight - and challenged everything Garon thought she knew about education.
In response, Garon - a naive, suburban girl with a curly ponytail, freckles, and Harry Potter glasses - opened her eyes, rolled up her sleeves, and learned to distinguish between mitigated failure and qualified success. In this book, Garon explains how she realized that being a new teacher was about trial by fire, making mistakes, learning from the very students she was teaching, and occasionally admitting that she may not have answers to their thought-provoking (and amusing) questions.