Relentless Pursuit: A Year in the Trenches with Teach for America » (Bargain)

Donna Foote is a freelance journalist and former Newsweek correspondent. She lives in Manhattan Beach, California with her husband and fourteen-year-old son.

When Locke High School opened its doors in 1967, the residents of Watts celebrated it as a sign of the changes promised by Los Angeles. But four decades later, first-year Teach for America recruits Rachelle, Phillip, Hrag, and Taylor are greeted by a school that looks more like a prison, with bars, padlocks, and chains all over.

With little training and experience, these four will be asked to produce academic gains in students who are among the most disadvantaged in the country. Relentless Pursuit lays bare the experiences of these four teachers to evaluate the strengths and peculiarities of Teach for America and a social reality that has become inescapable.

The Washington Post - Jay Mathews

In this richly detailed, sometimes hopeful, sometimes depressing account, Donna Foote, a California freelance journalist and former Newsweek correspondent, reveals what has happened to Kopp's brainchild. We learn why Teach For America has become so popular with top college graduates and why it has done so little to lift the apathy and mindlessness that infest urban schools…the most interesting account of inner-city high school life in many years and only whets my appetite for more.

Lockdown     3
The School and the Movement     15
You're in the Army Now     41
The Men of Locke     70
Locked In     97
Dropping Out     119
What the Hell Am I Doing?     139
Disillusionment     166
The Corps     184
Who Do You Screw?     210
Si Se Puede!     227
Rats on a Ship     242
The Road Show     259
Significant Gains     282
The End     301
Epilogue     323
Acknowledgments     337