district. after we made these changes and improved the education in newark, i think these are the guys to get it done. ben is a guy who got it done. he s the former of principal indian public charter school in oakland, california. and we ll get to him right now. he is also the author of crazy like a fox. a good day to you, ben. good day. i know that you turned around a failing charter school. can you first of all tell us how bad it was and how you did it? well, we were there, and we had the school was set up for computers, high-tech, but they didn t have any textbooks. they were sitting around playing, they had culture and technology. technology is not the answer and culture is not the answer. the answer is hard work. and a textbook. you really need a textbook in a school if you re going to be successful. i heard this school in miami, that they re going to offer
zuckerberg. he absolutely deserves that respect with the $100 million donation. but they say the schools underperform because they are underfunded. if that s not the case, what do you think the problem is? i think the problem is the teachers union, i love what the teachers union president said, she s concerned about of the teachers. not once did she mention the students. she talks in the documentary that they don t mention teachers in the good schools. her job is to take care of teachers. a principal s job, my job is to take care of the students. and that s the problem. we re so concerned about the teachers, we re so concerned about the school board members, the union, we re concerned about everybody but the students. ben, can t you do both? can t you take care of both the students and the teachers? i think in our school, we do both. but we make sure that our teachers understand our priority is to educating the students. and when the students get a great education, we reward th
paid teachers in oakland, california. but in oakland public schools, you have over 10,000 blacks and not one palsed a.p. calculus. those that passed came from one school, american public indian high school, which is a charter school. not one black passed the calculus? they should be embarrassed. so ben, if you have the power to change one variable in the education equation, what would it be? what do you think is the most urgent change that needs to be made? really, it s two, math and reading. every child in the public school needs an an hour and a half of mathematics and language arts every day. it s that simple. now, ben, there are some people for whom math does not come easily. you hear that right brain/left brain. if you have students in your school that are frustrated
technology. let s look at their test scores, look at their s.a.t.s. i guarantee you, our school which does not have technology, will whip them every day. in neighborhoods where i found with technology and poor neighborhoods, we got robbed. they broke in our schools and steal the technology. they re not going to steal a book. you can t pawn an algebra book. what s interesting here, you also said money is not the answer. why not, and in terms of all that money, $100 million going to the newark schools, what s the best way to spend this donation? well, mr. zuckerman, i think he s got good intentions, but his $100 million is not going to have a dent. if you give the money to the newark public school system, they re going to waste it. as mr. bill gates already knows, he gave money to the oakland public schools. we didn t get one penny. and we have five of the best schools in the state. all right. i want to make sure we get his name right, because it s