The Achievement Gap: "Waiting for Superman"
One of the two honors experiences that I completed during my freshman year, this was a seminar taught by Jessica King on the causes and effects of the achievement gap in education. Although I scheduled this seminar simply hoping to learn more about the education system in the US, I realized after the first few weeks that this class would prompt a lot more reflection, and examination of both our own educations, and those of the people in the communities around us. Guided by Diane Ravitch's book "Reign of Error", we examined many aspects of education on both institutional and personal levels. While learning about these, we were encouraged to form opinions based on both our own experiences, and what we had learned. Being in a small class, this led to majority agreement just as often as it led to a complete divide in opinions. Lastly, adding to the classroom and discussion aspect of this seminar were class visits to various learning institutions throughout the Cincinnati area. These were done with the goal of adding a real world examination of the groups and ideas we were studying, as well as to prompt the class to become more involved in the community with regards to education.
Exploring topics such as No Child Left Behind, Teach for America, and Community Schools, I very much enjoyed this class for the self-examination that it prompted, and how it forced me to be honest with myself about how fortunate I've been with regard to my education. Purely by ignorance, I assumed that what I had experienced in my own education was the norm, but this seminar made me realize that this was far from the truth for an increasingly large number of people. Although i had simply hoped to learn more about education in the US, this class forced me to change my entire view of education, and has made me far more aware of the multitude of problems that are present in today's educational system. For one, different schools and districts are far from equal in a number of ways. Furthermore, the success of a child's education is dependent on far more than just the school they attend; education starts at home, and if a child's parents aren't involved well, this has the potential to hinder that child's education catastrophically. Although smaller examples of what we explored in this seminar, these facts touch some of the biggest issues that we explored, not to mention the avenues of solving these issues that we were introduced to. An exceptionally well taught class, this seminar was really the first major exposure that I've had to the magnitude of work that needs to be done to better the US education system. Lastly, it has also been a big motivator for me in looking for ways that I can help contribute to helping my community's educational systems, from political activism, to volunteering as a tutor.
Featured below is an end-of-year paper that we wrote for this seminar detailing our own educational story. The goal was to reflect on our own experiences using the information and ideas that we learned in this seminar. It was also my favorite piece of writing that we did for the class due to how it made me examine my past, and pull out major experiences that I had previously taken for granted.
Exploring topics such as No Child Left Behind, Teach for America, and Community Schools, I very much enjoyed this class for the self-examination that it prompted, and how it forced me to be honest with myself about how fortunate I've been with regard to my education. Purely by ignorance, I assumed that what I had experienced in my own education was the norm, but this seminar made me realize that this was far from the truth for an increasingly large number of people. Although i had simply hoped to learn more about education in the US, this class forced me to change my entire view of education, and has made me far more aware of the multitude of problems that are present in today's educational system. For one, different schools and districts are far from equal in a number of ways. Furthermore, the success of a child's education is dependent on far more than just the school they attend; education starts at home, and if a child's parents aren't involved well, this has the potential to hinder that child's education catastrophically. Although smaller examples of what we explored in this seminar, these facts touch some of the biggest issues that we explored, not to mention the avenues of solving these issues that we were introduced to. An exceptionally well taught class, this seminar was really the first major exposure that I've had to the magnitude of work that needs to be done to better the US education system. Lastly, it has also been a big motivator for me in looking for ways that I can help contribute to helping my community's educational systems, from political activism, to volunteering as a tutor.
Featured below is an end-of-year paper that we wrote for this seminar detailing our own educational story. The goal was to reflect on our own experiences using the information and ideas that we learned in this seminar. It was also my favorite piece of writing that we did for the class due to how it made me examine my past, and pull out major experiences that I had previously taken for granted.
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