[bjones22]

I grew up in Redwood City and maintain very close friendships with high school teammates from EPA. This article caused me to make an account on hacker news so I could share a not so unique, but perhaps unheard, perspective on what it means to have a community like East Palo Alto (a.k.a. 'EPA') in the middle of silicon valley.

EDIT: this post quickly digressed into a four page behemoth that was too long to post in a single comment. It's long and I fear the formatting would have been awful. I will put up a WP site sometime tomorrow so that I may edit it and format it nicely. Below is a brief excerpt from the end. I'll make an edit to this post as soon as the WP site is up.

----------------------

If anything is to be taken away from my experience and these stories is that the men and women who are forced to grow up in this environment live in cyclical state of despair. A vacuum that requires quite nearly a winning lottery ticket to escape.

For it to be located so close to the affluent areas of silicon valley is practically criminal. It is eerily close to being the pit in which Bane grew up in during the Batman movies, the one where he lived in a prison that could see freedom and happiness just a couple hundred feet away.

If I make any sort of dime in Silicon Valley I fully intend to research and hopefully participate in philanthropy that will contribute to problems such as these.

I believe it becomes our responsibility when it is in our own back yard.

[mc32]

To me this community being next to an affluent community is neither here nor there. It would not be better if it were in Yolo county. If I were in the same economic position as a resident, I'd prefer to be close to an affluent area --at least there are second and third tier jobs to be had not too far(probably anyone who is able to secure a first tier job would no longer stay in the community). But if you're in a trailer park in Yolo county, what are the prospects there?

Also, let's not forget the myriad trailer parks which dot bay area cities and towns. They're hidden behind freeway sound abatement walls so people forget about them but they have it pretty tough as well.

[bjones22]

I was just considering the same point. While I didn't answer it in the first draft of the accidental essay I just wrote, I'll include it in the second.

The jest is that by having two disparate groups so close to each other, it encourages an us versus them mentality that discourages community members from embracing some of the attributes of the other group (in the case of my essay it would be education, because I write a lot about the different ethos that students had depending on which region they lived in).

Regardless I believe your points still have a large amount of merit. Especially the last which points out how those that are fortunate tend to alternate between fads of 'caring' for various less fortunate groups, in this case it is that of East Palo Alto.

[mc32]

I think your essay will end up being an interesting read. Not to derail things much but perhaps the ethos is not so much from the place but from the parents. In my experience new parents who care about education, if they can afford it will move into an area with good schools perpetuating this virtue. Of course there are some parents who have a lot of money and stay in locales with poor schools but then send their kids to private schools. I know it seems like one in the same thing but its not. Parent mentality and culture have a huge influence on how education is perceived. Some kifs I grew up with --middle class I'd say, saw school as something in the way of their fun. It was a burden to some extent. But there were a few who saw it as a necessity down the road to an imagined future of success. So parent influence and involvement is key. Some parents think its the school's responsibility --no they are there to supplement parental influence but they very well can't supplant it. You see this in kids who despite parents talking down school seek to do well because they see what their parents don't see or despite parents jealousy, etc.

Regarding the reporter's sincerity about caring, it's hard to tell, it could be just getting brownie points on a topical issue or they may really care. However if they actually really cared and wanted to make a difference doing it from TC does not inspire too much credibility. Typically people who really care move closer to the issue (meaning working on the issue constantly. If I cared about feral cats then I'd be involved directly with doing something about feral cats -- otherwise it's just a nice opinion.