Local Issues:
Inside the Marriott Public Charter High School

The Marriott Hospitality Public Charter High School is 100% CAPITALIST EVIL!

A school that trains highschoolers how to open doors for customers, on the job etiquette -Ever thought that school was just boot camp to teach you how to work for rich people? At least other high schools try to hide their motive and at times you can find teachers who really care and want you to learn. But at the Marriott Hospitality Public Charter High School administrators try very hard to produce happy waitresses and doormen.

Nazanin Samari, a long time volunteer tutor of a Marriott High student, became very suspicious after speaking with the school's guidance counselor, JoAnne Hurlston, who told her that the school was established "because Marriott was having a hard time finding properly prepared employees in positions like desk clerks, waiters, and housekeepers. Samari also noted that the entire student body is Black and Hispanic, and that most of Marriott High's recruiting is done in Black and Hispanic communities like Shaw and Columbia Heights. Each junior and senior is required to work 15 to 20 hour internships in the foodservice hospitality industry. This is eerily similar to the prison industrial complex. Only this time, the whole trouble of court, the police, and finding criminals is out of the picture-why enslave prisoners when it is cheaper and easier to brainwash and enslave children?

In its first year of opening, Marriott High spent an entire academic year without a single book in any class, including textbooks. This posed obvious difficulties as a ninth-grader noted: "Some of the things I don't understand, and I can't go back and try to learn it my own self." If you looked at the funds Marriott High had in its first year of openings, you would wonder why they didn't have any books. The Marriott Foundation gave a $1 million grant, the Hyatt Corp. gave $250,000, and $100,000 contributions were given by Loews Hotels and MeriStar Corp. The lack of books makes for a dependency on the teacher, and doesn't encourage a student to learn outside of class. This way, teachers will less likely be challenged when they never mention the word "union" in their curricula. But it's not surprising coming from this student- commodifying form of education.

Marriott Hospitality Public Charter High School was opened in 1998 by three business associations: Hotel Association of Washington, Greater Washington Hospitality Foundation and the Restaurant Association of Metropolitan Washington. 2002 will be its first graduating class.

Location- 410 8th Street NW near the MCI Center (between ESt. and D St.)

Contributors: J. Willard and Alice S. Marriott Foundation, Clark Construction Group, Grand Hyatt Washington, Loews hotels; Anton Airfood, Conrad Cafritz Charitable Trust, Kaiser Permanente, American Institute of Food and Wine, Virtualogic

NEWS

Are you being served?

How will the hotel and restaurant industry recruit a new generation of public-school graduates? By running its own public school.