On a mid-September afternoon, I rode the indirect route that public transportation provides to the core urban North End Community School. The trip from the middle-class neighborhood that borders North End – two or three miles at most – takes multiple bus rides, and more than half an hour. The bus dropped me about a block and a half from the school, outside the public housing project where many North End students live.

Approaching the school building, I was surprised to see that the vast majority of the children playing outside wore uniforms: plaid jumpers with white blouses for the girls, gray pants, white shirts, and red ties and jackets for the boys.

I had come for an interview with the principal, Natalie Carson, to arrange to conduct participant-observation research in a fourth grade classroom throughout the academic year, and to work as a volunteer at the school. Our meeting was short. Carson asked what I expected to learn while at North End. She asked which days I wanted to come, and which hours. She asked me for references, and she told me that the central district office would require me to undergo a security check.

Leaving Carson's office, I saw in the hallway a group of students who looked like fourth or fifth graders. They were standing in line, some pushing each other, some dancing. A teacher spoke in a raised voice, correcting children who talked and those who stepped out of line.