The Final Essay

Cynthia Cruz

Prof. Williams

Engl 1A

Dec. 22, 2013

                                                    The Struggle for Education

            We live for the moment we cross the stage and begin the life we have been waiting for, we have no clue what it is, but we have been preparing for it all our lives. We realize it is nothing but high monthly payments to a school loan that accumulated over the past four years. The pursuit to be educated and to be different is no longer valued but a high price we must pay. There are two questions a college student must take into consideration is do I value my education or do I begin my experience in the working world. Education will take you far but experience gets you hired quicker. Many of us today lean towards education and begin taking out student loans we are manipulated to believe we will be able to pay soon after we graduate. The sad truth is inflation on interest is raised year after year that the payoff seems longer. Authors Tavis Smiley and Cornel West address that student loans automatically put students debt in their novel The Rich and the Rest of Us: A Poverty Manifesto. Student loans are putting the students in debt and are impossible to pay back from the lack of experience from attending school.

            Student loans have been the governments greatest manipulation is getting money fed into their pockets and the students without jobs. Many private banks no longer offer student loans but by the government who set up their own annual interest rate and the monthly payments they assume the student will receive. Receiving an education is highly talked about everywhere we go and everything we set out to do, even the commercials on television say it is as easy as picking up the phone. Jobs we apply for even ask for some kind of college education to even work an entry-level job. In the book The Rich and the Rest of Us written by Cornel West and Travis Smiley it stated, “America is experiencing the highest rate of long-term unemployment in a generation, with almost half of the unemployed looking for work”(65). As a student when you hear unemployment we think poor, uneducated people who chose not to go to school but in all reality they are jobs getting taken away by the government and moving them else where. Not just losing a job but a career that was set out to be your life goal and be the financial provider to your student loans.

            Financially student loans make more money by them just sitting there accumulating hyper inflated interest while students attend school and try to pay it off once they have graduated. Even though students are attending school to join society, it ends up back lashing on the student because they walk into debt right after they graduate. Unfortunately, there is no other choice but to take out school loans since school have hyper inflated in the past decade there is no way to pay for the tuition out of pocket. In the book The Rich and the Rest of Us written by Cornel West and Travis Smiley it stated “the number of people living in poverty rose by 2.6 million between 2009 and 2010”(16). Poverty has increased dramatically because a large amount of this rate are students coming out of universities with loans they cannot pay off, automatically putting them in a poverty state because the loan will not be able to be paid back. Inflation in poverty is only rising and the number of employment is lowering leaving more students with an education with a debt they will not be able to pay back.

           

            Student loans are putting the students in debt and are impossible to pay back from the lack of experience from attending school, a solution that will help not have a high loan will be applying for free grants that will assist students in going to school. That way the student can pursue an education without the fear or being in an economic deficit. Students want to be something extraordinary but the doubts that it will not be stable or not enough experience is what holds us all back. Students end up deciding on a career that we assume will be long term, economically stable and always around. In the YouTube film College Conspiracy by Cayle Rose “College tuition has seen 5.15 percent annual price inflation for the past five years…total student loan debt in the U.S. currently stands it 830 billion dollars and now exceeds credit card debt” (Rose). This is college tuition alone not including personal debt or the price of a student loan will add on. Student loans and the credit card debit go hand in hand because not paying either one will ruin your credit for life. Personally wanting to be in the fashion industry is what I lived for but when the odds are clearly against you, you go for a career that we assume will always be there and always be needed.

            College may be the most expensive education we will receive but it is not the most un-useful. Education is still the key to many opportunities and still is one above the employee with more experience because the student will have the mentality to work above an entry-level job. Student loans may be at their all time high but the grants are not just a theory but also an actual solution to the deficit of being in debt. Only possible solution holding one back is, are we choosing a career for the money or are we choosing the career to be happy. In the book The Rich and the Rest of Us written by Cornel West and Travis Smiley declared, “putting on the armor to join the fight against poverty demands that we confront our own fear- fear that allows us to remain silent or downplay the truth and tolerate lies; fear of losing campaign funds, an election, or popularity; or fear of retaliation or other unknown consequences. Courage is not the absence of fear, but rather the capacity to stand in one’s truth with integrity no matter the consequence” (115). Poverty in the sense that we live in a world we cannot afford, inflation at its all time high unable to pay loans, debts and bills. Knowing the truth behind each lie are we going to continue to let it happen or take a stance and fight for what is right. Willing to lose our popularity and most importantly the materialistic that come with it for the better of all. Student loans are like the hungry cockroaches looking for food once you set down a trap they don’t keep coming back. Students just need a way to work around the student loans and trap it before they get out of control.

                                                            Bibliography

Smiley, Tavis, and Cornel West. The Rich and the Rest of Us: A Poverty Manifesto. New York: Smiley, 2012. Print.

College Conspiracy. Dir. Cayle Rose. 2011.

College Conspiracy

            Talk about bias. But this video this home! Every year it is a struggle to attend college and finally we know why. What worries me the most is that my degrees really won’t get me anywhere. Struggling to make something out of myself is really not going to do anything. This is something very relatable to me because my friend never attended college and she works at Sephora headquarters with no degree and I am working two part time jobs just trying to finish school to hopefully do the job she is doing. Along with another girlfriend who is now an RDA who actually had no experience in the medical field yet the job she worked at helped her through the process. Are we not supposed to go to school than? That is the real question, I can get many beginning jobs but where will I end up? Because jobs look for experience not education anymore and that is the reason we are all here today going into debt. After watching movies on the government and the wealthy living high lives and spending else money I find that the most unfair because coaches and athletes are getting paid ridiculously amounts of money for just being able to run the ball, yet the people who are keeping this economy going are the ones who are getting sent to collections for a late bill or not being paid enough. The cycle is continuous and we must stay in our lane or else we will get ran over by the big spenders.

U.S. Prisons: Myth Vs. Mayhem.

     The article is about the jail system. How it consumes a huge part of our tax paying dollars and how people use to as an excuse to make people better but in reality there is a truth behind every jail cell. Prison is definitely not a good solution for gang members because once one of them are inside the prison more will come and the gang just continues to grow. Nothing changes from the outside to the inside because they still have to fight to survive and the most important thing is that they still have the gang mentality to kill in order to survive. honestly the only was prison would work is if we took the drastic majors that need to be taken into consideration. In the article it states that literally thousands of dollars go into keeping someone fed and alive a year. there are plenty of people on the outside of those walls that need the help but cannot because funds are being thrown to keep these people alive. I find it interesting that the guards know what is going on the inside of the cells but do not do anything about it. the guards know there is rape and gang affiliation inside the cells i believe that they should use that as a way to push up these mens deaths or cause for a change. i did not find the article confusing i find it confusing how the government goes out of their ways to make these prisons a home for people. if people want to kill themselves inside these walls they can but do not go to drastic majors and making the prison bigger than what it is.

3 answers to 3 questions

      Main necessities to any student are the materials provided by the school. Schools usually supply books, computers and materials for projects. This year my nephew is attending kindergarten and when the teacher sent home the supply list we were surprised to see that the parents would be providing everything on the list she asked for five packs of 100 piece computer paper, 50 piece crayon set, two box of Kleenex, glue, erasers, and even anti-bacteria wipes. “This degree of equanimity in failure, critics note, has led most affluent parents in Chicago to avoid the public school system altogether”(Kozol 65). Schools do not know the situation these students deal with at home, asking for material may be out of the question. Parents will altogether avoid the situation and see that their children are getting taken care of while they are busy. In our very own school district we have these difficult problems of the necessity for materials.

       Part of the curriculum is to get to know all aspects of education whether it is language arts, math, science and physical education. From there each one of those categories get broken into subcategories into the curriculum you prefer to learn about. Science is something all students love to learn in since it is 50 percent education and the other half is actual hands’ on work. But if there is nothing to put your hands on, than the reason to learn is not efficient anymore.  “A chemistry teacher at the school reports that he does not have beakers, water, Bunsen burners, and he cuts down plastic soda bottles to make laboratory dishes”(Kozol 64). When the materials are scarce or none at all science becomes another victim of unentertaining education for students. The teacher improvising materials definitely is a wake           

        Materials and education go to together like peanut butter and jelly; one without the other would be no point. Students are already having a hard time getting to know the information with out books and with out the proper instructor. But this can all be the plan to keep the cycle going. “One cannot dispute the fact that giving poor black adolescents job skills, if it’s in self-evident that they do not possess the academic skills to go to college is a good thing in itself”(Kozol 92). Keeps the same routine going and keeps the social cycle in place, to not educate those who we need to do the work others will not do.

     Teachers are the ones who inspire us and to thrive us to do better but when teachers are getting fired for their lack of teaching, the failure of students is laid in their hands. The book mentions when teachers purposely do not teach because they know the students will fail since they attend a poorly funded school. As much as the school system wanted to change the school system they couldn’t because teachers were always on the ten-year plan. Finally the federal government puts a reform on schools.  “Reforms the federal government would require in order for school districts to receive several sources of federal stimulus funds include… firing principals and staff, closing the schools or converting them into charter schools”(Aldax). In order for reforms to be effective drastic changes must be made. Even if it includes firing teachers and closing down schools to better them. The teachers are the ones we rely on and they are the same people who let us down.

     Attending a high impact schools involves lottery and the hope that lucky will be on your side and on the students life. Dealing with a bad school district you are willing to take your child to any school no matter how far it is to make sure they have a great education. Many parents will wake up early to drive the extra miles just to make sure the school and education is better than the one in their own community. Watching the movie Waiting for “Superman” Francisco’s mother along with other parents in the film all hope that their child will be the one to get accepted into a better school but, “only chance of getting into a good school is all pending on a number”(Guggenheim). Thousands of parents will unite and only ten students will be able to enter a new school district to hope for a different future than the one they live in now. In the book many students mention they know there are better schools out there but there is no reason to compare schools since they know they will not attend these schools. Faith is gone when the schools you attend no longer strive and the faith you have on a lottery in most unlikely to happen.

      One of the most biggest moments growing up is graduating high school, showing your parents and family you made it to adult hood but for some people adult hood starts when you help your family provide. Kozol interviews hundreds of kids all knowing they were not going to graduate high school or even make it to college. There standards are low but what really is important is getting a job and making money to help your family.  “Reverend Charles Kyle, a professor at Loyola University, believes that 10 percent of students in Chicago drop out prior to their high school years, usually after seventh or eighth grade- an estimate that I have also heard from several teachers”(Kozol 70). Surprised by how young these students are and they are in doubt and dropping out of school. Not even making it out of middle school and only one in four students will graduate high school.

      surprisingly there are bad people I this world that do bad things and do what they please, something those people are our very own bad teachers. As a student you know the difference between a good and a bad teacher because they will go out of their way to make you a better student. Growing up you think a bad teacher is someone who give you homework or that make you stay later to help you more but in reality that was in fact a good teacher. In Waiting for “Superman” a student actually recorded his teacher reading a magazine and actually not doing their job. “”If a kid comes in not reading,” says an English teacher at Chicago’s South Shore High,  “he goes out not reading”(Kozol 64). A teachers job should be to help and want to help to not let see a student fall behind but to improve. Growing up Spanish was my first language and I took English as a second language for two years every week just so I did not fall behind and make sure I understood everything that was happening. No matter the school system or the situation every teachers job is to want to help student succeed.

      growing up money is always something we always have to deal with once you are a little older instead of a job you decide to get a career and if you love what you do than its not a job anymore but this does not involve teachers. Teachers’ especially public school teachers do not get paid as well as they should but enough to not complain to their students. Luckily I have never had a teacher speak about a paycheck or that they rather be somewhere else than in the classroom. Unfortunately that is not the case for everyone, some students know perfectly well that their teacher doe not want to be there. Even in popular movies today showing teachers going to work being a drag. “The salary scale, too low to keep exciting, youthful teachers in the system, leads the city to rely on low-paid subs, who represent more than a quarter of Chicago’s teaching force. “We have teachers,” Mrs. Hawkins says, “who only bother to come in three days a week””(Kozol 63). Teachers not attending school and having other under paid teachers take care of their job or actually in other words babysitting.

       working in harsh conditions can lead to a harsh environment that can lead to harsh teachers. When teachers are not given the supplies, books or even a classroom to work in they are bound to do a bad job. Students are unwilling to learn if the supplies are not in front of them and teachers do not want to teach someone who is unwilling to learn. “A teacher observed by the Tribune’s reporter gives a sharp tongue-lashing to his 33 sixth graders. “If you’re stupid, sit there like a dummy,” he says to a boy who cannot estimate a quotient”(Kozol 79). Showing that teachers do not have the patience to teach anymore and do not strive for their students to be better. The person we hope to push us are the ones who are purposely keeping us down. 

Reality vs Book Reading

    In the book Savage Inequalities, everything you read sounds so unreal. The book describes classrooms as being auditorium to not just one class but up to four or even five classes. The actual school not up to a school standard the school is describesd as being a previous roller skating ink. Finally teachers do the minimum of their job, nothing more nothing less.  When you look at our own school system everything seems so perfect, the schools we went to didnt have these harsh conditions as in the book. But these schools do exist and in our very own community, the bad environment, unwilling to teach teachets & lastly as simple as supplies are in need. 
    Growing up and on your first day of school the only thing you would look foward to is the teacher you were going to be stuck with for the next year. You look for a nice teacher someone who will motivate you through the school year and someone you can connect with. In Savage Inequalities  some teachers have stated that  they would go the entire school year not knowing the names of the students in their classroom because the classes would be too large. Teachers were  actually hoping for their students to drop out of school just so that there would be space for the students who do decide to stay.  Teachers to me are always the most thrilled and eager to teacher, butt for a teaceher to drag into going to work and not  wanting to  get to know the students they dochave and making it work , asks why be a teacher. 

Ch. 3 The Savage Inequalities of Public Education in New York

     Educational segregation causes less opportunity for students in poorer communities because of the lack of funds put into the school. Many students who attend a school in a less fortunate neighborhood deal with over crowded classrooms, no windows and deal with no teachers. Compared to a wealthier neighborhood where there is a class for every type of child along with a seat and more than enough teachers. The school board states that parents do the fundraising and offer their own time to volunteer in the schools. In reality "an official of the New York City Board of Education who remarks that there is "no point" in putting further money "into some poor districts" because, in his belief, "new teachers would not stay there.""(120). Many teachers already deal under the harsh circumstances something as simple as giving them more funds will help out the teachers tremendously. The district invests millions of dollars on one school alone that they feel anything taken away from these children would ruin their opportunities later on in life.

part 3 || Rule of 3

We all seem so different from each other with different backgrounds and growing up in different places, we are all the same. Our parents always seem no know what is best for us, preaching the future plans they have for us. As children you touch something you are not suppose to touch or you push a button you are not suppose to push, usually for curiosity than to find out you learned a lesson. When we enter school we are encouraged to voice our opinion but yet keep your remarks to yourself. Being disobedient in an educational setting is frowned upon, since your only job is to listen and follow your teachers’ directions. Many don’t see that being disobedient can also be revolutionary like it has been in the past. Speaking freely in class, protesting or not learning the correct way and wanting to change these ways can also look frowned upon. The public school system looks down on anyone who disobeys in the classroom for their individualism.

As we grow up, many of us students go to school to make our parents proud, go to school for what our parents or society want us to become and to get a job that pays well and has good benefits. Keeping quiet and obeying our parents will later realize everything we have done was never for ourselves. In the Passion Project by Skye Ontiveros, Romeo states, “it’s hard for me sometimes because there’s something where they expect you to become what they want to become. No one should tell me what to do but um my mom and my dad is trying to my business in the future and then force me to take it”(3). Along with many other students in the passion project stating that their parents want them to work in a career that has money and than later think of your happiness.

If a teacher does not honor the students voice than no one ever will. Teachers may see it as time consuming a waste of their time. In the clip by TED Ken Robinson mentions how he spoke to a man in the bookstore,

“And he said, "When I got to the senior year of school, my teachers didn't take it seriously. This one teacher didn't take it seriously. He said I was throwing my life away if that's all I chose to do with it; that I should go to college, I should become a professional person, that I had great potential and I was wasting my talent to do that." And he said, "It was humiliating because he said it in front of the whole class and I really felt dreadful. But it's what I wanted, and as soon as I left school, I applied to the fire service and I was accepted."”

Imagine your very own teacher not respecting your belief and doubting something you believe in will definitely make you work harder.

TED Talk Sir Ken Robinson: Bring on the Learning Revolution

What in education is out of date like the wristwatch, "a single function device?"

Even the most basic of school will never change. I have family in each stage of school preschool, kindergarden, elementary, middle school, high school and myself in college. The most out of date function in school is that the school system believes all students learn the same. Teacher speaks student listen and the information is retained. School systems see us as a single function watch. Now in a new age with new technology and we are in a digitized time we learn in many different aspects. Some may learn by listening but many learn by watching, doing, performing and interacting. As teachers they will go out of their way to teach students no matter how silly or time consuming it may be. Schools do not offer programs or ask parents for example how your child learns best. As simple as learning is something that is not so easy any more, students drop out or students do not continue after school just because "they do not have the spirit"(robinson).



Ideas from the clip:

• no need for an evolution we need a revolution
• brought up in a different world
• single function
• now is digitized time is every where, dont need to do it
• education: lunarity: do something now go through it and do everything right you will be set in life
• organic life: create our life while we explore our talent
• trying to get students to college
• doesn't feed the spirit
• manufacturing model of education
• do not model the people
• not mechanical it is organic
• creates the conditions

http://www.ted.com/talks/sir_ken_robinson_bring_on_the_revolution.html

Reeling in Research

Reeling in Research

            In the “Rule of Three” my developing focus in our educational system is that students should stand up for the change they want. Growing up in an education system it is pounded into our heads that we cannot speak unless we raise our hand, if you have nothing to say to not say it at all, we have to be a judge free classroom, but when is it ok to speak your mind. When we go home after a day of school the same mentality is in our comfort zone, our parents even tell us not to speak unless we are spoken too. We keep quiet to not disobey our parents, teachers or anyone with authority.

            As we grow up, many of us students go to school to make our parents proud, go to school for what our parents or society want us to become and to get a job that pays well and has good benefits. Keeping quiet and obeying our parents will later realize everything we have done was never for you. In the Passion Project by Skye Ontiveros, Romeo states, “it’s hard for me sometimes because there’s something where they expect you to become what they want to become. No one should tell me what to do but um my mom and my dad is trying to my business in the future and then force me to take it”(3). Along with many other students in the passion project stating that their parents want them to work in career that has money and than later think of your happiness.  In an article “I hate my Career Choice” writer states, “I still feel wrong. Uneasy. Each time I think about going to work I feel physically sick. I hate that feeling. And it's nothing my workplace has done perse.” Hating your job for no reason is the worse feeling because you have wasted time and money into something you are not satisfied with. Louise Thompson in “Needing parental approval” claimed, “I can't tell you how many people stay in a situation that is not right for them because they don't want to lose the approval of their parents. From students doing a degree they hate, to professionals slogging up a career ladder that is high in following in familial footsteps but low in personal satisfaction”.

Together all these stories have the same objective to disobey your parents or you will be stuck hating the job, life and person you have become. The teacher tells you to hold your comments, speak up tell them what is need to be said. Parents are planning your future, step up and tell them you have one planned already. Speak up and stay committed to what makes you happy. Later on in life, you will not hate yourself for making this career choice, people say when you love what you do you never have to work a day in your life again.

Work Cited

"I Hate My Career Choice. Now What?!" Offbeat Home RSS. N.p., 4 Jan. 2013. Web. 03 Sept. 2013

Thompson, Louise. "Louise Thompson: Needing Parental Approval." The New Zealand Herald 20 May 2013: n. pag. Web. <http://web.ebscohost.com.proxy1.clpccd.cc.ca.us/ehost/detail?vid=3&sid=b6f6f86a-22db-493f-893a-f7cd6fa369de%40sessionmgr111&hid=124&bdata=JnNpdGU9ZWhvc3QtbGl2ZQ%3d%3d#db=n5h&AN=HOB139280018313>.

the first time.

How does the blog space reflect you: the title PeaceOfCyn is pretty much who I am put together in one. A piece of me, but yet everything about me is about peace and unity. Life it self isn’t any fun without any sin in it and i have always loved my name. The background of my page is space or a galaxy because i never believed the quote the sky is the limit since the sky is the beginning and you always have more to achieve.

What is most important to you? What are you passionate about: in life, the most important thing for me is security. I want to make sure that whatever I decide I do in life that it will keep my family and I secure and never have to worry. Honestly, I have never been passionate about anything. I love to do things but never where I was head over heels in love with.

Why are you in school: school is the ticket out. There is no success without school. I go because one day I want to support and help my family. Also, I go to learn more than basic information, I want to have a conversation with people I don’t know somewhere in the world. For me, going to school shows a sign that I am still young and still have my whole life to do great, this is my time take classes I don’t need, find my career and change it again, meet new people and learn from my mistakes.

What do you hope to get out of this class: be more attentive when I read. I just highlight key points but never get into the story where I have a "conversation" with the story.

How do you see what you value most helping you with your college career: I value my family, and they are what keep me going since what I do in life will be for them.