Affirmative Action
Affirmative Action efforts were started in 1964 to end the long history of overlooking qualified people of color and women from higher education. Affirmative
Action sets standards for a business or office of admissions, so that a white man does not have the upper-hand over an equally or greater educated minority. The initial way the government tried to justify Affirmative Action was to develop a human resource approach: first identifying the problem, which is racism then establishing the solution
(Phillips 67).
The intent of Affirmative Action helps cut down discrimination in the work place and in schools, despite the fact that some believe that affirmative action is a form of reverse discrimination. In contrast, the first goal of Affirmative Action was to help people who were poor or badly educated, elevating them to positions for which they were not objectively qualified (Buckley 95). Cousens, author of Public Civil Rights Agencies and Fair Employment indicates that the Affirmative Action techniques have the advantage of not only persuading employers not to discriminate when hiring or accepting, but to expand employment and educational opportunities for minority groups (22).
Therefore, Affirmative Action is legitimate because it does reduce discrimination in the work place and related areas such as University acceptance of college students. In the end, it should in no way be abolished.
However, Affirmative action is highly controversial. Right now Proposition 209, in California which bans all programs involving race and sex preferences run by the state, has passed but it will not be put into total action due to some questions of constitutionality (Ayres 34). The law will start slowly first, ending Affirmative Action in the schools of California, leading up to the abolishment of Affirmative Action all together. An argument was declared by Mark Rosenbaum of the Southern California
Branch of the American Civil Liberties Union, “ Proposition 209 should be declared unconstitutional because it singles out women and minorities and, at a time when discrimination still exists, sought to preclude them from attaining constitutionally guaranteed right, like jobs and schooling.” (Ayres 34). As R...
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...Maybe the world hasn’t exactly found equality as a result, but with Affirmative Action, the world is a lot closer to equality than without it.
Works Cited
Applebome, Peter. “Affirmative Action Ban Changes a Law School.” New York Times
2 July 1997: a14.
Ayres, B. Drummond, Jr. “Affirmative Action Battle Moves to Courts.” New York
Times 1 Dec. 1996: 34.
Benac, Nancy. “Clinton Defends Preference Programs, Backs Reforms.” Associated
Press Writer. <http.//sddt.com/files/librarywire/dn95_07_19_09.html>. 19
July, 1995.
Buckley, William F., Jr. “The Two Sides.” National Review 14 Oct., 1996: 95
Cousens, Frances. Public Civil Rights Agencies and Fair Employment. New York:
Praeger, 1969.
Hair, Penda D. “Color Blind-or Just Blind?” Nation 14 Oct. 1996: 12.
“Once to Every Man.” National Review 16 June, 1997: 12.
Phillips, D. Rhys. Equality in Employment. Ottawa: Canadian Gov., 1985: 285
Porter, Horace. “Affirmative Action: 1960’s Dreams, 1990’s Realities.” Chronicle of
Higher Education. 29 Nov. 1996: B6
“An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge” by Ambrose Bierce starts off with the protagonist, Peyton Farquhar, standing on a railroad bridge twenty feet above the water. Farquhar stands on a plank with his wrist tied behind his back, and neck tied with rope. The Northern army surrounds him, waiting for the sergeants signal to release Farquhar upon his death. At this moment, Farquhar stares at the river below his feet, watching pieces of driftwood flow downstream. He notices the river flowing slowly. To keep his mind off the current situation, Farquhar closes his eyes, thinking about his wife and children. While thinking, he hears a loud clanking noise, which he soon realizes it to be his watch ticking. Farquhar visions himself escaping by jumping
Ambrose Bierce wrote “An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge” in 1890 for the San Francisco Examiner. Before this, Bierce fought in the American Civil War for the Union Army as a lieutenant. In the Civil War, Bierce fought in some of the most horrific battles such as Shiloh and Chickamauga. These battles were often gruesome and horrific due to the limited medical knowledge of the time. After the Civil War, Bierce went through a period of misfortune, where his wife left him and his son died in a gunfight. Interestingly during this time, Bierce wrote some of his best works. These tragedies made Bierce even more cynical, which inevitably made his stories better. Bierce’s cynicism is essential for the development of his stories. Another important part of his stories are the allusions to reality. A superficial reading of “An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge” might give the reader the impression that Farquhar has escaped. Upon closer examination, this outcome seems to be impossible. One of the most astonishing elements of “An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge Bridge” is how Bierce integrates Farquhar’s reality to his dream of an escape. In “An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge”, Ambrose Bierce creates a masterpiece of deception by using allusions.
Emma goes through life being selfish, obsessive, and unloving. In her search for passion, love and sensuality, she destroys the lives of her husband, Charles, and her daughter, Berthe. Sadly, Emma honestly believes she would find passion, bliss, and the love spoken about in the romantic novels she read. If she stopped searching for her fantasy life, and accepted her reality life with Charles and Berthe then she could have found happiness within those two relationships.
In order to be competitive in the higher education battleground, some academics believe that it’s essential that universities and colleges give minorities certain plus factors during the admission process. Many universities and colleges throughout the country believe that by instituting some form of affirmative action, the end result will be diversified campus demographics. The type of affirmative action each institution implements is different; however, each has the same goal of increasing minority admissions.
Some people do not consider certain acts of animal cruelty to be cruelty or they do not care. Normally the people who think like that are the ones who are actually causing the animal abuse themselves. Animal abusers sometimes do not see any wrong in what they are doing because they do not care what the animals feel. They do not think if the animals are happy or being hurt, they just continue doing what they are doing because to them it is not cruelty towards the animal. Some, though, do not believe that t...
Research has shown that many patients will benefit from paediatric palliative care programs and education, but studies have shown that out of 3,000 hospitals in the United States, less than ten percent have programs for end-of life care based toward children (Morgan, 2009, ...
Discrimination is still a chronic global issue, and drastic inequalities still exist at the present time. Thus, the Affirmative Action Law is an important tool to many minorities most especially to women, and people of color, for the reason that this program provides an equality on educational, and professional opportunities for every qualified individual living in the United States. Without this program, a higher education would have been impossible for a “minority students” to attain. Additionally, without the Affirmative Action, a fair opportunity to have a higher-level career...
Today there is considerable disagreement in the country over Affirmative Action with the American people. MSNBC reported a record low in support for Affirmative Action with 45% in support and 45% opposing (Muller, 2013). The affirmative action programs have afforded all genders and races, exempting white males, a sense of optimism and an avenue to get the opportunities they normally would not be eligible for. This advantage includes admission in colleges or hiring preferences with public and private jobs; although Affirmative Action has never required quotas the government has initiated a benefits program for the schools and companies that elect to be diversified. The advantages that are received by the minorities’ only take into account skin color, gender, disability, etc., are what is recognized as discriminatory factors. What is viewed as racism to the majority is that there ar...
Affirmative action has been a controversial topic ever since it was established in the 1960s to right past wrongs against minority groups, such as African Americans, Hispanics, and women. The goal of affirmative action is to integrate minorities into public institutions, like universities, who have historically been discriminated against in such environments. Proponents claim that it is necessary in order to give minorities representation in these institutions, while opponents say that it is reverse discrimination. Newsweek has a story on this same debate which has hit the nation spotlight once more with a case being brought against the University of Michigan by some white students who claimed that the University’s admissions policies accepted minority students over them, even though they had better grades than the minority students. William Symonds of Business Week, however, thinks that it does not really matter. He claims that minority status is more or less irrelevant in college admissions and that class is the determining factor.
It seems that single-sex education perpetuates gender stereotypes and promotes gender bias among students (Taylor). Gender-separate education requires schools and teachers to create gender-oriented courses, facilities, and learning environment. As a result, sing-sex schools exacerbate sexist attitudes and “feelings of superiority toward women” (Guarisco). It is fair to argue that the best way to achieve gender equality is to promote rather than eliminate interaction among girls and boys. However, girls in the sex-mixed class receive less attention from teachers than boys, which may lead to gender bias. More precisely, boys always have disciplinary issues, such as interruption; teachers have to pay more attention to boys’ behaviors in order to proceed the lecture more smoothly. Girls may feel less important and supportive in male-dominated classes; boys may think that males are smarter and far superior than females. Single-sex schools can address both girls’ and boys’ issues of gender stereotypes directly and accordingly. Male students may be freer to engage in some activities they have not considered before in mixed schools. For example, boys feel pressure to follow some non-macho interests when girls stay around them; however, the all-boys schools eliminate their pressure toward gender stereotyping to pursue music, dance, and drawing. Single-sex schools would help boys explore and develop themselves. Also, girls in sex-separate schools show more confidence and power (Guarisco). They could receive full attention from teachers and express their opinions in science classes without worrying about the boys’ banter. They may realize that they are as important as boys. Hence, both girls and boys can be free from gender stereotypes and benefit from a same-sex learning
The single-sex format creates opportunities that do not exist in the coed classroom. (Edison 1) Researchers are unaware that both genders brains function differently. This lack of knowledge may be why the real truth about single-sex education being more efficient than co-ed education has not been discovered. Some say single-sex education may be the key for a brighter generation. It shows to improve test score dramatically. The number of public schools experimenting with single sex classes is now reported to be more than 350. (Silva 130) Some research also shows that single-sex classes have a more welcoming atmosphere. Single-sex education improves grades while coed educations keep an average pace.
Education is a vital tool that every young person needs to be able to start a life of their own. Without education it becomes harder to find a steady job and a stable income. As with any important resource, there are so many debates surrounding different styles of education. One major style of education being debated today is the idea of single sex education. The idea of essentially segregating students based on sex seems outrageous to some people. However, dividing the sexes may be a necessary and important new way to heighten the learning experience.
Many people who abuse animals do not realize that they are actually hurting animals, this is known as unintentional. When some people try to discipline their pets they use tactics that they think is acceptable, when in reality is probably not the best way. People also abuse animals due to lack of attention, such as forgetting to feed and water the animals for a number of days. A family may take the animals with them when they leave the house, and forget to leave a window down with the animal inside. One of the biggest unintentional ways of animal cruelty is a way that many people think is helpful but is actually has a negative impact on all of the animals involved, this idea is trying to take in more animals than one can handle, they have good intentions but this is harmful to animals because it forces them to live in unhealthy conditions. There are many new cases of animal hoarding every year, with over 250,000 animals falling victim. Puppy mills are large dog breeding’s that care more about making money than the wellbeing and health of the animals. Many dogs become ill with diseases such as kidney or heart disease as a result of the conditions in which they live.
Education has been an important factor of all of our lives for an exceptional amount of time, but unfortunately, America has been falling behind from other nations in their education system compared to other nations (Pahlke 444). Almost all of our public schools in our country are coeducational and only handful of them are single-sex educational schools. Single-sex education should be taken into high consideration for most students to attend because of the benefits they might gain from them. It is important to look at all possible ways to try and better our education system for the benefit of the children and teenagers attending school. The most important years of schooling that provide a solid background for all students would be kindergarten through senior year of high school. It provides the basic knowledge and problem solving skills that will be utilized for most of our lives. In order to ensure that the children and teenagers today are provided with the best quality of education, we want to make sure they are engaged and focused in school and single-sex schools will be able to make that possible for students. Not only will it help our students remain focused in the classroom, it will also provide a comfortable environment for them in which they can enable themselves to learn.
Single-sex school is a school in which males and female attend school exclusively with members of their own sex. Some single-sex schools have separate classes other have separate buildings. It has been incorporated as the foundation of educational systems from many years ago. Now, Educational environment has brought back a strong enthusiasm toward single-sex schools. It is an old approach that is picking up new momentum. Schools have an important role to play in preparing girls and boys to listen and communicate effectively. Single-sex schools are very bad because it affects children attitude, learning skills and make them think negatively.