This review has been accessed times since December 10, 2001 McDonald, Janet.(1999). Project Girl. Berkeley: University of California Press. (First paperback edition 2000, Farrar, Strauss & Giroux, Inc.) 233 pp. $16 ISBN 0-520-22345-4 (Paper) Ursula Casanova Arizona State University December 10, 2001 A few years ago I met and later became a close friend of a newly arrived graduate student who seemed to be having problems adjusting to the southwest after a lifetime in New York City. María (not her real name) had come to our program with outstanding credentials in student counseling from a small private college in her city of birth. I soon learned that she was also an excellent writer. We had several things in common: We shared a Puerto Rican/New York heritage and the Spanish language; we had both graduated from New York City colleges, and we were both avid readers. There were also important differences: María, then in her mid-twenties, had grown up poor in "the projects" in a large family (eight children among which she was the youngest), with an alcoholic father. I had grown up in PR in a middle class family (my parents ran a small business) where I was the youngest among three sisters. At the time we met I was beginning to contemplate retirement. María and I spent a lot of time together, first talking about her difficulties in getting used to Phoenix and to a large university campus. She found both environments cold and hostile and expressed her feelings best in her writing. Her poems and brief stories captured her ambivalence as a poor girl from "the projects" seeking an advanced degree. They also illustrated her deep connection to a family that was both loving and hurtful. While our early encounters celebrated the similarities that joined us, as our friendship deepened our differences became more important as a topic of conversation. And as the months and then years went by and María shared more and more of her life and feelings with me, I became increasingly aware of the ways in which our upbringing had affected our lives. I realized that I could never fully understand Maria's problems because they were deeply embedded within her childhood experiences of hunger, uncertainty, abuse, and discrimination. I had been spared hunger and abuse, and while uncertainty and discrimination are not strangers to me, María had spent her whole life in their company. My friendship with María took me far beyond the assumptions I had often made as a teacher. I had assumed, and preached to many of the poor, minority students I have advised, that hard work and persistence would inevitably lead to success in school and that, in turn, to a fulfilled life. I was wrong. María and Janet McDonald's story have helped me to see why. McDonald tells a harrowing story that draws the reader into a life that swings from the pinnacles of success to the depths of despair. We are forced to watch as she reaches and then sabotages each one of her achievements. Sometimes I became impatient with these extremes, as I did occasionally with María, and wanted to say, "Why are you doing that to yourself? You're smart, you now have the opportunity you have been seeking so stop it already!" And here I want to leave María, who never descended to the depths described by McDonald and has found her niche at the university, and turn my attention to Janet McDonald and her autobiographical Project Girl. "I grew up in an old-fashioned American family headed by a traditional working father and a tireless mother who stayed home to have children. Seven, to be precise …" Janet tells us. Her WWII veteran father had emigrated to NY with his girlfriend to escape southern racism and to ensure the achievement of the American dream for his children. It is a story that should be familiar to many of us. Her father, like so many other fathers, told his children to study hard in school in order "to get good jobs and make good money." Janet responded well to her father's admonitions. First because she "…had a knack for it," and second because that was a sure way to get her father's attention. By the fourth grade she, and four of her classmates, had been declared "college material." She was on her way to get that "ticket" her father thought a good education would guarantee. Feeling smart and powerful, Janet had no way to foretell the trials that awaited her. Janet tells her story against a background of urban deterioration where the entry of heroin turns "the projects" into the "ghetto." She stands by as her own younger siblings are inexorably drawn into the whirlpool of destruction that ensues. White teachers at the neighborhood schools she had attended with predominantly black and Puerto Rican students had taught them. Teachers who, Janet says, "cared about their work" because, at that time, "… the country's liberal political policies encouraged caring about the 'underprivileged.'" By the time Janet reached junior high everything around her was undergoing a "frightening transformation." She blames the gradual deterioration of standards for tenants in the projects, and the easy availability of heroin in the eighties, as well as an evolving political climate, for the changes in her community. The notion of a permanent "underclass" redefined the residents of the projects: "It was no longer a question of what we in the projects didn't have–it was what we were … we came to be seen as a class of people destined to be poor, undereducated, and unemployable." By the time her younger siblings were making their way through the system "… the public schools were so threatening … the one skill that really counted was survival." (Note 1) In a less toxic environment, and encouraged by her parents and teachers, Janet thrived. In junior high she was placed in a special program for gifted students where she had a chance to study French. A few years later she was the only one in her class to sign up and be accepted at Erasmus, "the best high school in Brooklyn." Janet's attendance at Erasmus required a one-hour bus ride to a school where she felt a total stranger. In the company of the best and brightest students in Brooklyn she encountered real competition for the first time. However, her larger challenge was the required crossing-over from the insularity of the projects to the wider world her new middle- and upper-class schoolmates had experienced. At Erasmus her classmates "extolled the virtues of socialism and condemned the evils of capitalism, the Vietnam War, ... and ... the 'military-industrial complex.' I had never even heard of a military-industrial complex, let alone how to battle it." (The emphasis here, as well as all others in this review, was in the original.) At Erasmus the girl chosen as most popular in her junior high "was intimidated into silence" and hovered around the edges listening. She felt her white teachers were not interested in her and so began to falter academically. When the drama teacher told her she had no future in drama because of her southern accent Janet's humiliation led her to blame her Southern parents: "Oh, how they had failed me! No piano lessons, no dance classes, no summer camp in the Poconos." All they had given her was an embarrassing southern accent. The contrast between the Farragut projects and Erasmus' Flatbush neighborhood sharpened as the projects deteriorated and Flatbush remained the same. Janet found herself straddling contradictory worlds and not fitting in anywhere: "Not in my own family, where I was Whitegirl-in-Residence, not in the new projects, and not at Erasmus, where I was tolerated mostly for the sheer pathos of my 'please-be-my-friend' presentation." Janet's inability to bridge the distance between herself and the more conventional students she had sought led her to buy the friendship of the first hippie at Erasmus by providing him with the homework he had missed when he walked out of class: "His rebelliousness attracted me, as did the fact that he was rejected, as I felt I was …" He and his friends were willing to accept her, the hippies were "on the trash end of lower middle class and welcomed anyone who shared their aimlessness." It was not long before the search for identity had the "college material" girl fully embracing the anti-establishment rhetoric and nonconformist behavior of her new friends. Thus begins the roller coaster Janet rides for a large part of her life. Her poor performance at Erasmus forces her into summer school and then an extra semester in a public high school in order to get an academic diploma. Her mother wants her to get a job but all she does is read until she hears about the Harlem Prep School where she's promised all the help she needs to get to college if she passes the test. She is accepted and by the end of the first semester she has become "College Material redux." Harlem Prep becomes a safe womb for Janet. In spite of her tutor's encouragement she's reluctant to move on fearful that she'll turn into a "white girl." In spite of his reassurances, two years passed before Janet was able to accept a scholarship to Vassar. Once again she's on top of the world while she also ponders: "Why do I always have to be the one to carry the flag and plant it on foreign soil?" (Note 2) Janet finds the Vassar campus seductive, "I wanted what Vassar had to offer: not the education but the life." The soft grass, the plentiful food, the freedom from fear were all the opposite of her experiences at the deteriorating projects. And when she meets some of the Black students at Vassar during her first visit to campus she decides it is possible to be: "smart, bold, and still black." In spite of the enthusiasm generated by her original impressions, the first day at Vassar is a shock to Janet: "We were in the lair of the big cat – the Wealthy White Anglo-Saxon Protestant. Not so much the real white people as the really white people." Once again Janet begins to slide as she realizes the distance she will have to travel: "I had left a unique subculture, a universe so distinct that we had our own mores, customs, style of dress, and even our own dialect. We were project people, a tribe apart. And I was apart from my tribe." The "black Vassar girls" turned out to be of no help to Janet. They had also grown up surrounded by privilege "and actually played golf." She was as much a "sociological oddity" to them as she was to the white students. Janet retreats to find refuge first in sleep and then in drugs when guilt over her privileged position vis á vis her siblings overtakes her: "I no longer wanted to be special; special meant different and different meant lonely… I would be true to my peers, and if they were tumbling downhill, then I too, would tumble." So she turns to drugs. Although Janet's classmates realize she is using drugs, they opt for asking her to purchase some for them rather than offering the friendship and help she needs. Thus, in her desperate quest for friendship Janet risks herself to help some of her rebellious wealthy classmates get the drugs they want. The friendships never materialize but the increased stress results in a failed suicide attempt and Janet is sent home for a semester on "medical leave. "I was banished from the castle, a project girl again," she says. But it is not for long. Janet finds herself equally unable to fit in within her family and deteriorated neighborhood and soon decides that as difficult as it had been to leave home for an alien world, coming back was worse: "I realized it was far better to be from the projects than in the projects." Janet returns to campus with renewed energy and ends the year with "respectable" grades. She also decides to declare a French major and spend her junior year in France, a decision that turns out to have a major influence on her life. In France Janet feels free from the stereotypes that had plagued her. Her own self-imposed ones as well as those imposed by others: "The French saw me as just another American, though I didn't see myself that way at all … which meant I no longer had to worry about making African Americans look good. Or bad. Whatever I did was attributed to Americanness, not blackness." With new assurance, Janet returns to graduate from Vassar and have her father see her grab "the ticket" he so revered before his death. The following year she returns to Paris to complete a Master's degree and then goes on to law school in Manhattan where, after an unimpressive first year, Janet finds a summer job with a legal firm. There she finds someone who takes an interest in grooming her for a career in law and she returns to law school with renewed determination. And then she is raped. The crime, and its aftermath, ushers Janet into the darkest period of her life. The roller coaster continues. At the end of her story Janet McDonald emerges triumphant. Her life is a testimonial to persistence and strength. It is painful to watch her falling repeatedly, strenuously gaining her footing again and then falling once more. One cannot help but admire her ability to stand up again, and to resent the forces that impede her progress. On the cover of the book, Rosie O'Donnell is quoted as saying that Janet McDonald's story could be "… an inspiration to poor kids everywhere …" I don't think so. Inspiration rises above reality, it is ethereal, elusive. Janet's story is anything but ethereal. It forces reality, with all its grittiness, upon you. It is an honestly told story and so forces the reader to be honest as well: Would I be able to handle that situation? Would I be willing to befriend someone like Janet? Would I want her in my class? For poor adolescents and young adults who live in similar circumstances, Janet McDonald's story can convey a realistic picture of the challenges that await them. But I'm afraid that reading the book alone a young person in Janet's situation might become more scared than inspired. A book like this should be read in groups that include caring adults who can participate in candid conversations. Then the honesty of McDonald's autobiography can be a valuable catalyst for discussion. It can then challenge students to examine their determination as well as their fears. The problems of identity, social ostracism, shame about one's family, and "survivor guilt," (Note 3) are among the barriers that impeded Janet's progress and the progress of many others who share her background and experiences. These are large burdens for anyone but especially a young person to bear, and these are only the ones that come from within. There are also the financial burdens, the real dangers of life in many of our poor neighborhoods, the lack of resources in their schools and the lack of guidance about possibilities. Janet bears the scars of the struggles that children like her have to survive before they can rest. Like the heroes of yore who set out to seek the Golden Fleece, Janet had to undergo test after grueling test in order to win her rewards. Like the heroes in the myths, Janet had to face the challenges alone and without prior guidance. And, like her also, the heroes were often outsiders subjected to ridicule and suspicion. I said earlier that I had learned much from Janet (as well as earlier from María) because I thought that inspiring my students was enough. I didn't realize the privilege I enjoyed as a white, middle class woman. Yes, I am Puerto Rican, yes I have been the target of prejudice but I happen to be light enough to be acceptable, at least until my accent is noticed. I am also fortunate because I grew up comfortable in the knowledge that I belonged, and I never doubted my ability to succeed because I had plenty of models to look up to in my family. I didn't have to become something other than what I was in order to reach my goals. Most importantly, I didn't have to reject my family. Janet, and many, many others are forced to make those choices. I will never forget the statement that crystallized all this for me in her book when she reflects on her experience at Vassar: "College was one step along the road of opportunities, connections and choices for my fellow students. It was for them a means not the end. Most had at least some notion about their future and Vassar's role in it, whereas my dilemma was Shakespearian. While the others were in college to be – stockbrokers like their mothers, lawyers like their aunts, or professors like their fathers – I had been told to go to college in order not to be: like my mother or my aunt or my father. The affirmative purpose of college eluded me … From elementary school, college itself had been the future to which I was to aspire. By bringing the only future I had known into the present, Vassar had left me without one." How many of us have, in our eagerness to encourage our students to pursue higher education, suggested the rewards of escaping their own families' limitations? I have but I will never do so again. Now I can glean some of the struggle many of my students have faced and how I might have contributed to it. I find it easier to understand why so many of them quit before the race is over. I'm not sure I could have persisted through those rigorous tests. It is not surprising that she was the only one of the five children identified as "the best and brightest" and skipped along with Janet in the fourth grade, to fulfill their teachers' expectations. The other four succumbed to drugs. Most of us by virtue of class, family background, or any other set of benevolent circumstances have had an easier time of it. But we badly misunderstand the struggle faced by children who having grown up in communities isolated by virtue of social and political circumstances beyond their control, seek to reach beyond that limiting sphere. It is not about being smart, or being ambitious, it is about endurance, the endurance to overcome the Sisyphusian quality of a struggle where every move forward implies one backward. As Janet says, " … there are no free lunches. What I gained in possibilities was nearly outweighed by my loss of grounding. The message I received … equated home with failure; fortune could only be found elsewhere, with people unlike me." She left home to find a home in France. She has "chosen to be a stranger." McDonald's book is not an easy read but it is a must read for those who teach the children of our marginalized populations. It will help us to be more honest with our students and to find ways to strengthen their resolve. In the meantime, through political and personal effort, we must seek to redress the inequities that require the extreme efforts demanded of Janet McDonald and other children of poverty. Notes Canada (1995) describes a similar process of urban deterioration during those years. He traces it to the laws passed by NY Governor Rockefeller imposing lengthy mandatory sentences for the possession of even small amounts of narcotics. This led dealers to recruit minors into the drug trade and, eventually, to the proliferation of guns and crime among urban youth. Carolyn, one of the informants in Anson's (1988) biography of Eddie Perry, uses similar language to describe her experiences as a newcomer to a an elite prep school: "...you grow up in a place like Harlem, you are taught that you are powerless, ...You talk about 'the man' all the time, but you almost never really see 'the man.' Then you go off to an elite boarding school, and 'the man' is right in front of you." (p.90) "Survivor guilt" is the name given by social scientists to the tendency of survivors to blame themselves for not going to great lengths to save others. According to Primo Levin (in Haas, 1990), himself a survivor of Auschwitz, a survivor may question his/her right to live when others have died. References Canada, G. (1995).Fist, stick, knife, gun. Boston:Beacon Press Anson, R.S. (1988). Best intentions: The education and killing of Edmund Perry. NY: Vintage Books. Hass, A. (1990). In the shadow of the holocaust: The second generation. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press. About the Reviewer Ursula Casanova College of Education Arizona State University Tempe, Arizona Email: casanova@asu.edu Ursula Casanova is emeritus professor of education at Arizona State University. She is a former elementary school principal in Rochester, New York; a Senior Research Associate in the National Institute of Education; and a Research Associate at the University of Arizona Bureau of Applied Research in Anthropology. She is author or co-author of numerous articles and books including Modern Fiction About Schoolteaching: An Anthology, (Allyn & Bacon, 1996, with J. Blanchard), Bilingual Education: Politics, Practice & Research. (National Society for the Study of Education, 1996, with Beatriz Arias), and "A Future for Teacher Education" in Handbook of Research in Teacher Education , (MacMillan, 1996, with T. Barone, D. Berliner, J. Blanchard & T. McGowan). [ home | overview | reviews | editors | submit | guidelines | announcements ]