ROBERT (CHIP) WOOD

JEANNETTE HAVILAND-JONES, Professor of Psychology, Rutgers University
(see chapter 8), related the following account during an editorial gather-
ing of the authors of this volume. I found it a fitting exemplar for the
points I wish to make as I try to tie Asher and Rose's research to the real-
ity of everyday life in today's public schools and to the challenges of in-
stitutional reform. (Thanks to Dr. Haviland-Jones for permission to share
this account in her own words.)

"One of my students had been a grocery-store checkout person in
the summer for her job and she was all adamant and embroiled with
how nasty mothers are to their infant children in grocery stores--
we've all seen this--the child reaches for something and the mother
smacks it; the child cries and the mother smacks it. And you sit there
as the person in the grocery store and you say, 'This is terrible, this
shouldn't be happening, what should I do as a concerned citizen?'
But mostly you're saying to yourself, 'This is a terrible mother!' You
really are saying that; I find myself saying that--looking at this
mother and saying, 'This is a terrible mother.' But why don't I say to
myself, 'This is a terrible situation!' If I really think about this, if I
stand back, I know this mother has been at work for 8 or 10 hours, I
know she's been on the subway stuck somewhere, I know she's got
home and discovered she now has to go to the grocery store with
children who have been in day care who are miserable--she's miser-
able--but who's going to do her grocery shopping if she doesn't?
Who's going to watch her children if she doesn't take them with her?

"If you really said to yourself, 'So all that I do in this world is that
own a grocery store and I don't like the fact that mothers smack
their children in my grocery store. What will I do about it? Will I
train mothers? No, I'll be much more innovative. I'll make a corner

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