the Trickle-Down Theory

I used to think that a reverse-Peter Principle applied to the public school system. Somehow a bad teacher would get a job at a school that couldn't get a good teacher and they both would be stuck for life. Schools don't do much firing and that teacher would never be able to get a transfer. Better schools that found mediocre teachers would force them to transfer, and the only open slots to them would be at the bad schools. By bad schools, I'm thinking inner-city, as depicted on the television show, Boston Public.
It made sense to me that nobody that could escape the old, beat-up schools and the population of students that have many other issues besides learning how to read.
Then I got a part-time job fixing computers in an inner-city school. Then I learned about something first-hand that I had only heard of before...there are really good people that are motivated to help, and would rather be where they are needed than somewhere easier, or where they could make more money. I remain in amazement of these people. Maybe that's why I chose to stay, even when the pay for tech people is less than half of what the private sector pays. I just hope that in some small way I am helping as well.

Tempered Steel

Every once in a while, you will see an ordinary person getting interviewed on television. The person has gone through some hardship or tragedy and the interviewer is asking them how they feel about what has happened. The subject invariably says that they don't like what happened but they feel like they have somehow improved themselves by going through the experience.
I don't know if all of us can relate to that, but I think many can. I went through years of bad times at work and now enjoy a workday of peace and happiness. Did I have to go through the bad times to appreciate the good times? I wonder about that because I work with other people that are unhappy, yet they are working at the same place I do.
In the same vein, maybe the kids that survive the ghetto and live and succeed in our society, have succeeded because of what they went through rather than in spite of it.
Could it be that the best members of our society are the ones with the strength of character and intellect to struggle out of hardship and make it in this world?