Readers Response In the August 22, 2015 edition of the New York Times by Jennine Capo Crucet wrote an article titled “Taking My Parents to College.” Crucet was born in America, while her parents were born Cuba. Crucet and her family all took a trip to Cornell University in Ithaca, New York from Miami Florida to attend Orientation. She talks about her own personal story about the time she took her parents to college. Throughout the article she talked about the things that let you know she was a first generation college student. Although Crucets parents did not know they were supposed to leave right after orientation Crucet, still did not want them to leave her. Crucet talks about everything that happened to her during orientation. Crucet …show more content…
That did not go nicely for Crucet at all because she did not understand a single thing. Crucet states, “I might as well have been my non-English-speaking grandmother trying to read and understand them. “The language was that that exotic to Crucet. She called her mother and told her, “I had to come home, that I had made a terrible mistake.” Crucets mother could not help her with her paper because she did not know anything herself. Crucets mother tells her, “You’re right, you’re screwed.” Crucets mother never went to college so she did not know what to tell her. Crucets mother did not know about the many things the campus had to offer to students that needed with papers. I am guessing Crucet did not have any friends at the time because if she did she could have asked them for help. Cornell University were the ones that recruited Cruet to come to college there. I feel like they should have done a better job with that. The university should have given her a better tour, and let her know all the many help support systems the school had to offer for her. I could not imagine being in her place because I call my mother every time I need help with something. I would not know what to do if she told me I was “screwed” or “I cannot help you with this.” Crucet finally got through the paper by herself. According to Crucet “She did o.k. on it, earning a
I cannot help but believe that there are some very valid points to Professor X’s article, for example, when he states that some students are simply unfit for the academic level that college requires. The author states, “Everyone wants to triumph. But not everyone can-in fact, most can’t.” (X, par. 47) In other words, Professor X believes that some students desperately want to succeed, however, they are unable to do so regardless of the amount of help offered. Sometimes, no matter how many people are set up for success there is not anything else that can be done, but letting them down gracefully. Professor X writes about his student Ms. L, the professor expresses his frustration with this student and how he knew he would face difficulties with her. The wall had gone up, she was no longer interested in what was being said. X expresses that Ms. L is not smart nor is she a bad person, however, he does elaborate on how she was never a fit for college level academics. Professor X writes, “Ms. L had done everything that American culture asked of her. She had gone back to school to better herself, and she expected to be rewarded for it, not slapped down.” (X, par. 36) This may be exactly how Ms. L was feeling, furthermore, let’s elaborate on why Ms. L expected to be rewarded for work that did not meet the expectations of her assigned
The author, Julia Brookshire Everett commenced the article, “Public Community Colleges: Creating Access and Opportunities for First Generation College Students”, by first characterizing first- generation college students and also expounding on the difficulties first-generation students encountered when acquiring post-secondary degrees. According to Everett (2015), the term ‘first- generation college student’ was first coined in the 1960s in order to regulate student eligibility for federally financed programs to aid students from low-income households.
In Jennine Crucet’s story, “Taking My Parents to College” she really explains to the reader how challenging it was leaving home and starting a new chapter in her life. When the author and her family first arrived to Cornell University, they were sitting there when the dean ended his speech with: “Now, parents, please: Go!” Being a first generation college student Crucet nor her family had any idea that they were not supposed to stay for orientation and had to leave her as soon as they got her settled in. They did not even have all the right materials and supplies that she needed to begin with by stating, “Every afternoon that week, we had to go back to the only department store we could find, the now-defunct Ames, for some stupid thing we hadn’t known was a necessity, something not in our budget: shower shoes, extra-long twin sheets, mesh laundry bags.” Both Crucet and I suffered from similar issues during our first few weeks on our new journey in college and we both had no idea what was ahead of us.
While thinking about what problem at Harper to address which affects a large amount of the student body, a conversation with a writing tutor made me realise that a problem most of the population had experienced was registration, orientation and transitioning from high school to college. I thought of possible reasons why the transition was difficult for so many people, then I thought about my own experience and how bumpy it had been from registering online to dealing with paying for classes and financial aid.
The story is about her daughter-in-law’s (Beth) friend. A women with no college degree and how she is very ambitious for her son to complete a further education from high school degree. Miller gives us an inside look of how the women tries her best to make sure that her son do his work for school, even though she cannot provide any help with it for him. The disadvantage of a parent who only has a high school start to reveal. In Paragraph four Miller provide evident for her claim. A chart by Tom Mortenson which provide a correlation between children’s grade and their parents education. “60.6 percent of children whose parents have advanced degrees get mostly A’s, whereas only 27.8 percent of high-school dropout’s children do” (page674). With this correlation Miller back-up her argument that the women from the story earlier could not help her son because of her education level.
I wasn’t a total bookworm, and I definitely could have studied more, but I wasn’t a slacker, as I still studied a decent amount.” I was wondering what the toughest part of college was for my mom, so I asked, and she responded, “The toughest part of college for me was the clinicals at Rush, because the professor I had for them was awful, and that's heavily sugar-coated.” There were some things she thought about this teacher that I have decided not to repeat, as they were not sugar-coated. College did change my mom, and definitely for the better, as I expected the answer to be when I asked how college changed her, and she responded with, “College makes you learn how to accept other people and other cultures that were different from what you had experienced your whole life within your family, where your culture is the only one that exists within your family, with a few exceptions here and there, as it also made you realize not everyone was like you, people don’t always do things the way you do, or react to things the same way you do, which is an extremely beneficial learning experience.” My mom had a role model in college, one that confused me when she said it, as it does not really pertain to college, as when asked she responded by saying, “My role model in college, as it is today, was Mother
The purpose of this study is to explore the unique challenges First-Generation-Latino-Male Students face when adjusting to community colleges in California. Literature has revealed limited information on the unique experiences First-Generation College Students face and their perception of the barriers they face in higher education. As tens-of-thousands of students become the first in their family to embark on the journey through higher education it becomes clear they have taken many different paths to get there and face many different obstacles that continuing-generation students don’t. With the influx of first-generation college student’s campuses are beginning to discover their institutions are underprepared to fully support the needs of
Their Families To Go To College." First GenerationThe Documentary. N.p., n.d. Web. 14 Nov. 2013. .
An example of this community dynamic is the activities available for children: summer camp, sports, and involvement of the arts. These activities allow kids the opportunity to have a place to be curious and direct their energy toward a specific subject of their interest; eventually, when time does come for a child to go to college he or she will appreciate the skills developed in community colleges. Not only does Pierce provide children with a place for kids to unleash who they truly are but it allows parents of these children to facilitate the process for them. Community colleges allows parents the opportunity to take classes - like child development- to understand what specific topics their kids are thinking while exploring several subject which will potentially lead to a career. These courses provide a strong connection so when children ask their parents for guidance. Their parents will actually know what to do and will be ready to answer any question and will facilitate the process toward the pursuit of a college career. In, “The case for (community) college” by Christina Pazzanese she explains, ”I come from poverty, and I knew my parents were never going to be able to help me out with college.” (1). This piece of the article serves as Pazzanese’s hook to captivate the audience and to explain the fact that sometimes parents are not able to help
Growing up in a minority family college has always been a priority. It was the main reason why my parents immigrated to America. They wanted their children to have more opportunities than they could have in Guyana. However, I never really knew anything about college. It would be my next step in life, but I had no idea what was required for college applications until I started the college process. I only knew about “big” time colleges like the Ivy leagues. Harvard and Yale were the dreams of every student, but growing up in Minnesota and being from the Midwest, Northwestern became my “big time” college dream.
In my community, education is not the priority for many; school is a place to keep your kids out of trouble and high school is not a stepping-stone to college, but rather the end of your education. Thankfully, my parents, who only went as far as middle school in Mexico, have taught my brothers and me that an education will lead to a better life. It is my family who encourages me to pursue my dream of attending college. Although my parents can’t offer homework help or educational advice, they are always giving me their support, whether it is by checking in on me during a late night of homework or leaving notes of encouragement inside my textbook for me to find, they are by my side.
Based on our similar research interests, I also believe qualitative data is very useful to research students’ experiences. Those using this paradigm have the “empathetic understanding” viewpoint, or “verstehen,” when conducting their research (Johnson & Christensen, 2017, p. 36). It is vital that the researcher put themselves in the students’ shoes to fully understand how their experience may be affected by being the first person in their family to attend college. They must be empathetic to the students’ precautions, fears, and culture. Particularly as first generation students, these scholars may have different anxieties that legacy students do not.
Cathy Small known as her pen name under Rebekah Nathan is a professor and a graduate coordinator of anthropology at Northern Arizona University. During a leave of absence from teaching, during the fall of 2002 at the age of 52 she enrolled as a student at Northern Arizona University, signing up for a standard first year range of courses. During that time for Nathan as a student life, she saw, observed and felt the social life between US students and international students which became her main target and purpose. Nathan’s main point argues about how “international students saw “individualism” and “independence” as a characteristic not only of a roommate interactions but in relations with family and friends as well” (Nathan 73). Which can be said in easier terms that US college life is a life where you have to live alone, stay alone and work alone, means doing everything independently. One of her topic and focus is on the Social life and making friends on US university campuses. From my point of view, I agree with Nathan’s claims and observation because many young adults imagine vivid pictures of what college might be like for them. However, once these young adults mature into independent men and women, and enter into the school of their choice, they soon realize the reality of the college lifestyle. Students must learn to adapt to their new surroundings as quickly as possible to accomplish the sought after degrees. Students come to the realization that life is not as easy as they might hope for. They understand the fact that they have worked hard from middle school to high school to enter in into their dream college and fulfil their dream job. Where some US students decide to isolate themselves from being in a social life and inte...
As I sat in the swing with my grandpa, our conversation approached the topic of college. “Erin, are you ready to attend college and learn about the world?”
My parents went to school in Africa and graduated college too, but since they came to America, they had to relearn everything they learned from the motherland and start all over. They are very smart people, but the struggle of English was real. They got great grades and scholarships to colleges. Also, they did it with me which put a lot of loads on them. They lived on the family campus and had no car, so they biked or walked to school. They didn't have a lot of help from the school because of its college, so they persevered and helped each other. They had four more children in the end but