Our experiences with social class help define and shape our expectations for education, it’s potential and its power. How is it fair that education is provided for all different economic backgrounds and financial circumstances, but yet not everyone is able to use the education system to its full advantage? For instance, in Mike Rose’s “Blue Collar Brilliance”, his mother to quit school to provide for her family, due to their financial circumstance. Most students choose to go off to the military or workforce because they understand that continuing their education is extremely expensive. Gerald Graff, author of “Hidden Intellectualism”, discusses the difference between “book smarts” and “street smarts”. Graff focuses on how smarts can take countless forms and even be hidden. Take the case of, the gap between the upper-class, and the middle and working class. There are far more obstacles facing the lower classes, such as financial worry, compared to the upper-class.
Social class has a large effect on the lifestyles of all Americans. But what does it really mean to be a part of the lower, middle or upper class? These divisions of social class are defined by aspects such as family income and lifestyle; however, education plays a large role in determining ones social class. That does not mean that it will determine success in ones life but to interpret, many people with a further education usually have a higher income as well. Those of the upper class have higher standards for education and career aspirations in contrast to those of the lower and middle class. Besides the differentiation of aspirations of the individuals of each social class, it is also used to determine who will go to college, depending on who can afford it or have no other priorities that can get in the way.
Unschooled people tend to be the outcasts of society and typically hold the least desirable jobs. Education is not only essential to attain a better paying job, but also elevates your individual status in society. Being knowledgeable changes the way others will perceive you and how they accept you. For those that don’t come from a fortunate background, education makes everything equal. Since education today is more accessible than years past, individuals from a less high social class are now able to compete with a larger number of professions. Having had a fine education places you on the same level as many others, which gives you an advantage to climb up on the social scale, lowering social inequality. For instance, Linda Chavez, the author of “We Were Poor, but I Didn’t Know It” and Cesar Diaz, author of “The Effects of Rio Grande Valley on a Scholarship Boy”, were both raised in a lower social class. They did not have much growing up but discovered that education was the key to
Provide at least three reasons why every student should be required to take general education courses. Explain your rationale.
Pursuing a higher education is a way of bettering yourself for the world. By bettering yourself, you can impact and change the lives of others, helping with education and being involved in the quality in which others learn to live. Higher education can help to create a work environment that will impact you and your family. Better education also means better wages to extend the value of your education by increasing your yearly income.
According to my studies, if we examine the literature around formal education that has appeared in the last thirty years or so, three main traditions or approaches emerge. Each of these has something to say about the nature of formal education and bring out different aspects of the phenomenon (Smith, 2002). Three various approaches of education known as formal, informal and non-formal all play a role in today’s society.
Children are important because they are the future of a country. So, education for children is necessary and compulsory education can make sure most of children can be educated. In the past, Chinese didn’t have enough money to execute compulsory education. After doing much effort, compulsory education was executed in 1986. The compulsory education system causes many effect and issues.
My education experiences are very uniquely different from the majority of college students. I was homeschooled for my entire life until I entered college. The only teacher I ever had was my mother and the only classroom I ever sat in was my kitchen table. Being homeschooled awarded me many distinctive opportunities that other students weren’t entitled to. It also meant that I was shielded from the parts of the education system that my mother didn’t agree with or support. For instance, I didn’t take graded tests and didn’t received grades on the essays I wrote. Instead when I took a test, I would help to check over it to understand any mistakes that were made. Similarly, the essays I wrote would be discussed and then often re-written as examples
Assuming that the best way to develop reasoning and judgement is by interaction with those whose views differ from yours – traditional schooling defeats that purpose of education altogether. Let us see how. We have already addressed the idea that children are not all the same. We cannot have a classroom with 20 children and all of whom can cope with the teacher. With the definition of classroom in the previous chapter kept in mind, let us try to remember what it is like to be in the classroom. Since the environment is so teacher-centric, the child remains unable to speak through the lesson till the teacher allows them to. Usually by the end of the lesson, the child would have forgotten the doubt it had in mind.
Graff begins by talking about the educational system, and why it flawed in many ways, but in particular, one: Todays schools overlook the intellectual potential of street smart students, and how shaping lessons to work more readily with how people actually learn, we could develop into something capable of competing with the world. In schools, students are forced to recite and remember dull and subject heavy works in order to prepare them for the future, and for higher education. “We associate the educated life, the life of the mind, too narrowly and exclusively with subjects and texts that we consider inherently weighty and academic. We assume that it’s possible to wax intellectual about Plato, Shakespeare, the French Revolution, and nuclear fission, but not about cars, dating, fashion, sports, TV, or video games.” (Graff, 198-199) In everyday life, students are able to learn and teach themselves something new everyday. It is those students, the “young person who is impressively “street smart” but does poorly in school” (Graff, 198), that we are sweeping away from education and forcing to seek life in places that are generally less successful than those who attend a college or university.
Freedom is the power or the right to act, to speak or to think as you like without limitations or hindrances. When you view schooling as a source of freedom and apply this definition, I question if schooling, is really a source of freedom. When you define oppression as unjust treatment or control, I question if schooling is a source of oppression. The terms are totally opposite by definition, but when applied to schooling as a source, they are more alike than opposing. The term schooling creates additional hesitation. Schooling as a noun means being trained or educated, this definition presents itself as a source of freedom and/or oppression.
Education holds power over determining one’s class. Knowledge and refinement can set one individual apart from another who lacks the qualities of successful individuals. Finances and opportunities distinguish class meaning the lower class has difficulty in obtaining the same conditions of the upper class. Education ultimately dictates success and power in society. Education is taken for granted and should be recognized for the significance it possesses.
Social class should not be used to define a person. Every person has the ability to overcome the roadblocks that society has placed in their path, so long as they have the determination and motivation. In Gerald Graff’s article, “Hidden Intellectualism” , he explains how social class is irrelevant when it comes to education, despite what society will lead you to believe. He displays how everyone is intelligent in his or her own way.Lynda Barry during her article, “ The Sanctuary of School” spoke about the importance of education to her and many other students like her.Another writer, Mike Rose shows how despite the thoughts that society puts in our heads we can still be successful in his article “Blue Collar Brilliance”.Regardless of social
There is a strong correlation between a person's education and class especially when a person is a from a lower class family. Higher class people have advantage in getting better education, getting into elite colleges, or getting better jobs. A higher class person has those sorts of benefits unlike the lower or working class people. In the book Class Matters, chapter 6, “I wear a tie everyday”, the author illustrates about a guy name Andy Blevins. Andy Blevins is a working class person who works everyday and goes to community college and is worried about being laid-off from his work. Lower class people have the fear of not being able to go to better colleges because of the tuition. They have the fear of not being able to make enough money to
What does the ideal education system look like? It is an interesting question. By looking at what the current model of the educational system is lacking can help to produce a clear picture of what the ideal educational system would be. Many people would agree that current the education system has failed in to produce positive results. In many ways the current education system does not meet the needs of students.