<p>Background information: I’m a rising senior attending a liberal public high school in CT. When I say liberal, I mean the faculty and a very limited number of students who actually care about politics. We are ranked in the 300s by USNews. The graduating class of 07 is the most successful in 2 years, and will remain that way for another 4 years.</p>
<p>Student Councils has been largely dormant over the past years, and as next year’s president, I hope to do something [insert positive adjective here]. I am thinking of making an AA bake sale.</p>
<p>Parents, I need your intelligent and clairvoyant opinions. Should I host such a bake sale? Could it be successful? Please take into account the background information. </p>
<p>If you believe it to be viable, please also give some suggestions to the logistics of such a bake sale.</p>
<p>**Once again, please please PLEASE do not attack or defend me on the AA issue itself. But rather, enlighten me with the possible consequences of such a bake sale. **</p>
<p>Sounds like a bad idea at a high school, because then you’re just protesting the policy in general and not actually protesting a specific policy at your school. You ask “could it be successful,” but I don’t think I quite understand what your definition of “successful” would be if you’re not trying to get anything in particular accomplished, besides possibly “raise awarenes” for your cause. If “raising awareness” is your aim, then I doubt that you would be successful, because the people who agree with you already agree with you, and the people who don’t will just get angry. I doubt that a confrontational thing like that is likely to change anybody’s mind.</p>
<p>Cowardly answer: Don’t do it. You’ll stir resentment among faculty who you’ll need for recommendations & fair grades.</p>
<p>Contrarian answer: I think the AA Bake Sale can be effective in opening people’s minds and encouraging debate. If it is tied to a forum in the school auditorium, or a school-wide essay requirement, or op-ed pieces from all points of view in the school paper, it can be viewed as a quest for knowledge rather than just a stunt. (That’s the claim many will make.) If you do move forward, definately run the idea by your parents & the student council advisor first.</p>
<p>Not holding this event is not cowardly; holding it is. It is saying “I don’t need to know the deeper issues and realities involved–I’ve already decided that it’s an arbitrary process that needs mocking, so I am.” </p>
<p>It’s not a way to investigate an issue, or a quest for knowledge, because it proclaims that you already have the answers.</p>
<p>I know you don’t want to debate AA; frankly I don’t either. But you better be ready to if you hold this.</p>
<p>They did that bake sale at our local state U.- Kutztown University this past school year and boy, were the African-American students ticked off. The implication that they had paid a different tuition or got accepted because of their race was untrue according to many students. I think the president of the club that did the bake sale was kicked out afterwards. Maybe you need to ask yourself why you are really doing this, because I don’t see the point.</p>
<p>As President of the Student Council your actions in that capacity should be in accordance with some objective of the council. If you see a lot of affirmative action within your school or school system and wish to protest it, that is one thing. If you wish to protest affirmative action at colleges, etc., then I would suggest you organize such a bake sale but without incorporating your status as Student Council President.</p>
<p>**Raise political awareness, encourage voting, and spark debate, on AA or other topics. Why else would the Student Council exist? To organize homecoming dances? All such events are covered by the Senior Class Board. So I think maybe Stud Co should be strictly political.</p>
<p>As an objective observer, what do you think? Would the bake sale successfully serve the above purpose well? Would it do so without getting someone hospitalized or jailed?**</p>
<p>What if it was a “Jocks Eat Free Bake Sale” and it opened up discussion about our obsession with sports & celebrity? I’m curious to know if that would be acceptable to anyone who posted.</p>
<p>I think the bake sale concept is a clever one. A bit gimmicky, but there is value in exploring the reasons why dissimilar groups are treated so differently & the ensuing consequences. A bake sale gets more attention than another symposium. Clearly it oversimplifies the issue, but it will certainly get the ball rolling. </p>
<p>Race & AA are touchy subjects. But I think the sale could expose kids to new perspectives they otherwise would not have considered.</p>
<p>kathiep: In the case of Kutztown, did any follow-up editorials or statements from the U come out on the topic? Maybe AA is really NOT a factor in Kutztown admissions. Or maybe it’s a divisive issue that could benefit from shining some light on it. Maybe a superstar minority kid would like the opportunity to shout from the rooftops that he got in on his own merit. Who knows. I think honest debate would be a good thing.</p>
<p>Well, in college, it would exist to advocate for students in the context of school policies. I wouldn’t know about high school. I avoided it there.</p>
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<p>No, it will just **** people off. I applaud your desire to spark discussion, but I think something that gimmicky is a bad way to do it. It will lower the level of debate, on all sides, rather than raise it. Why not get the school to sponsor debates, in the auditorium or whereever you’d hold large events, between local politicians - or the leaders of the school’s Democrat and Republican clubs, if you have them?</p>
<p>It’s been done several times, each time the guys who put it on look like a bunch of jackasses. Go ahead by all means if you want to make people angry. Some people get off on that kind of stuff.</p>
<p>I think the bake sale is a terrible idea. I think a MUCH better way to achieve your goals (debate, etc.) is to organize an assembly featuring speakers on both sides of the issue. This way, people will actually get to hear an in-depth discussion by experts. A “bake sale” projects an opinion and will offend/alienate people, instead of actually educating them so that they can have more sensible debate.</p>
<p>I think to if your student council wants to open eyes how about exploring disability?
have wheelchairs available ( can be borrowed or rented) even a couple hours trying to get around, can really open some eyes.
Use earplugs to simulate hearing loss or blindfolds…
You will be surprised to find that even when others * know* you are just doing an experiment using a wheelchair, they will * still* talk around you like you arent there, and when talking to you, talk louder.
THat is, if you are really interested in exploring differences</p>
<p>Don’t get us wrong Bobert. Raising awareness and educating people about issues is always good. But the Bake Sale wasn’t the best way to do that.</p>
<p>To use a bake sale as a measure of support or opposition to Affirmative Action proves what in the court of public opinion? </p>
<p>Frankly, I believe your price structure is actually upside down. Affirmative Action programs, whether at the university or corporate level actually cost time, resources, money and requires a commitment to a stated set of goals. To accept or hire a white male should cost next to nothing. Since AA opponents believe white males are the most qualified, they should require little or no additional education, training or mentoring. The real cost of purchasing a “white male” gingerbread man should be .01 not $1.00. And, by that metric, Asian gingerbread men/women should be free. The associated costs of recruiting URMs should be reflected into your cookie pricing. African-American and Hispanic cookies should cost the most, not the least.</p>
<p>Now the question is this: Based on the bake sale results, did students support or oppose AA based on their purchasing pattern or did they just buy the cheapest cookie because they were hungry? If I filled up my gas tank with Exxon/Mobile gas, do I support the $400 million “gift” to their former Chairman or was I running out of gas and the nearest gas station happened to be an Exxon/Mobile one?</p>
<p>Make up a petition listing these AA supporting companies (mostly Fortune 500 corporations) and have students sign a pledge not to work for any company that favors AA or, that, if hired by said companies, you will not attend meetings or sign pledges that support AA…(be sure to forcefully state your opposition to AA in your job interview). If you object to AA at your school, you should object to AA programs in the work place.</p>
<p>Ir’s an excellent idea for college students, where events like this can spark interesting discussions and is part of the college experience. I don’t think it’s a good idea for a public high school to schedule an event in which the main purpose is to spark discussion, unless you truly believe that AA is an issue at your school and the bake sale would highlight that issue. As a public school, however, it’s hard for me to visualize how that would be a problem.</p>
<p>michuncle – I think you misunderstood the concept of the bake sale.</p>
<p>As I understand it, the idea is this. You hold a bakesale and sell a bunch of identical cookies. However, you charge different amounts of money for identical cookies based on the race of the person buying them. So White males pay more for their cookie than black females, etc. This is supposed to replicate how Affirmative Action applies different standards for different kinds of people in college admission and supposedly makes it a lot easier for minorities and women to get in to college.</p>
<p>michuncle: The AA bakesale is supposed to demonstrate how certain minorities and females have an advantage in a quota crazy world. You don’t buy white or black cookies. You are charged a different price based on your race and/or gender. </p>
<p>Now, theoretically, you could hold a “Past Institutionalized Discrimination & Racism Bakesale” and charge a descendant of southern plantation slaves more than a Mayflower descendant to make a similar point. </p>
<p>It reminds me of those “brown eyes/blue eyes” exercises we did in elementary schools. Brown eyed kids get stale bread for lunch, blue eyed kids get pizza, etc. The exercise was trying to make a point about racism and discrimination.</p>