It is common knowledge that the education system in America needs work and that Texas is not exempt from this need. The Houston Chronicle has published numerous articles on the subject that address both the need for change and show what Houston has done to grow. As The Houston Chronicle releases its media agenda it is not forcing its readers to think a certain way but instead is presenting an issue in order to spark opinion forming thoughts. The articles all share a common thread of attributes that help develop the agenda for the reader. The eventual outcomes for the public differ based on who the reader is and what their current lifestyle is.
In most of the articles published by The Houston Chronicle the key attributes that are addressed are the educational gap that exists between low-income and high-income social economic groups along with a call for revamping the public education system, as seen in Enlow’s article on closing the income gap. The media frames their arguments to focus on the shortcomings of the existing system as it focuses on the statistical outcomes of the lower economic students, Enlow and Beard’s articles. (Enlow, 2014; Beard, 2013). The framing is narrow because it does not speak to the achievements of the other economic groups or private schools. The framing is important though because instead of being able to shrug off a few bad numbers with a group of good ones the articles focus only on the lower numbers that affect this one socio-economic group. All of the articles follow a similar path in that they prime the reader by discussing the issue and then develop the story into what is currently being done here and elsewhere. This can be seen clearly in the “Address the opportunity gap” article where the rep...
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...ected when they read these articles but most will consider the subject and develop an opinion in one way or another.
American media has fulfilled its agenda in regards to making the public aware of the current state of the educational system. By continuously defining the attributes of the issue they have sparked public opinion. The media has also cleverly used framing techniques in conjunction with priming to bring the issue to the forefront of public thought. Some readers will be unaffected by the issue because to put it simply a person does not care about something they do not think will affect them. The majority of readers will have an opinion though whether it is to make the current system better through reform or to leave it as is in order to prevent a tax increase. The Houston Chronicle has gone above and beyond in setting an agenda for the topic of education.