... But Not as Much as You Think

The parts of the data I found most interesting was the counter argument on how it doesn't pay as much as you think.  It didn't seem right that when you set the high school education value at one, then look at the graphs of higher education numbers and see a value of 1.61 on the Lifetime Earnings graph for bachelor's degree.  To me that doesn't seem like a large enough increase.  Maybe it's because growing up my parents would say constantly "if you go to college you'll make hundreds and hundreds of times more money than just high school".  Well, according to the graphs it's not even twice as much money.  And when it comes to graph accuracy, does it factor in the expenses of college?  And the 4 years time a high school only student gets to have a full time job rather than just part time or no job like a college student would have to?  If those weren't factored into the graph then the lifetime earnings for the college student would be even lower.

It just seems like, based from the data presented on the graphs, our time we put in at college isn't valued nearly enough by employeers.

Culture & Eductaion

On Thursday, we talked about how education pays and we had to create a claim about one of the charts. For the group that I was in, we made the claim that because asian males make the most earnings and get the most education, that it is in their culture to work hard and be the best in education.
Compared to the Asian culture, America is very spoiled and lazy, even statistics show that. If it was pushed more or a part of American culture to work hard and be the best in education, we could be doing just as well or even better than Asians. Which goes back to the support of family and schools. If the importance of education was pushed more by our leaders, families, and teachers, students would think of this as "the ONLY way"; this would become a part of our culture.

Waiting for Superman

We didn't really talk about much on Tuesday's class so I'm going to comment on the Waiting for Superman documentary we watched. I found a lot of the information provided very interesting. One thing I wonder about is the failing neighborhoods and schools. Are schools failing because of the failing neighborhoods or are neighborhoods failing because of the failing schools? Quite frankly, I can see a little bit of both. If the neighborhood is failing, it is likely they aren't providing a lot of tax dollars to make the schools great. At the same time though, if the schools aren't providing good students, those students will grow up and end up the same way their parents did, it will be a never ending loop of failure. In the end I think at some point it is the school's duty to make better students to stop the loop of failure.

I also thought it was very interesting how it cost more to house an inmate then it did to send a child to a private school. An inmate costs $33,000 per year. If they are there for four years it will cost around $132,000! Per year, a private school costs around $8,300. That multiplied for 13 years of schooling through high school is only $107,900. For the cost they pay to house inmates with no education to set up a nice life, they could be sending them to private schools where they can set up a great future. It is something that needs to be considered. Especially because in the end, they are saving money!

Waiting for Superman: Parents of the Students

As I was watching this in class on Thursday, I thought about what I would do if I was a parent of one of these children that we saw in the documentary.  What would I be willing to do if I lived in a lower class area high in crime, with a large drop-out rate?  If I couldn't leave the area because of finances, I would do ANYTHING I could to get my child to have the best education possible.   I found it awesome that Fransisco's Mother was willing to leave the house at five in the morning so he could be in a place where he would excel and be safe.  Would you be willing to do this for your future-kids? What if you were working full time and had to wake up 4 hours early to get them to school and gas was really expensive? Or does it not matter where kids go to school, because a lot of people make it to college that have gone to public schools with sky-high drop out rates.  Is it possible to just raise a child to do the right thing and stay in school, and put them in any school and expect them to be successful? I think that a school has everything to do with the success of a student.  Watching this documentary really opened my eyes to what is going on all over the U.S. and made me think about the future of our schools as well.

Waiting for Superman

       Today in class we watched Waiting for Superman and it was about education and  how flawed our system has been.  I agree with Mr. Canada that our education system is flawed and needs fixed for the students and for the teachers.  To fix this problem first the teachers unions need to be dissolved.  Unions were great when teachers were being unfairly treated ,but now there is no need for them and they are holding up progress of making education better in America.  Tenure needs to be rid of for teachers, because the bad teachers hide behind it and don't give it their all to students which creates a bad atmosphere in the classroom and in the school.
       In the movie it talked about dropout factories and how there are so many of them in the united states. To get rid of the dropout factories states need to evaluate the schools and get rid of the bad teachers and equip the school with supplies and update the building.   States need to close down the schools that have schools that are falling apart and the schools that have low scores on tests and build new schools that give the students the chance to have a new start and better teachers.  Private schools have an advantage over public schools because they have their own rules and can hire the best teachers.

                In class on Thursday we listened to a radio talk show host interview with a man who recently published the book “The Dumbest Generation: How the Digital Age Stupefies Young Americans and Jeopardizes Our Future.”  Mark Bauerlein, diligent researcher and professor at an Ivy League school, is the author of this book and his interview with the host of the talk show.  During the interview Mark failed to show an unbiased opinion the entire time.

                Mark compares Ivy League students to students of other universities and says that the ones attending the prestigious schools know how to research properly, they actually use books for research and not the internet, and they are “better” in a way.  I wanted to bring up an argument that not many kids can afford going to colleges as expensive as those.  I’m sure that if we tested every kid at every university there will be numerous kids who score just as high as Ivy League students on tests.  The fact that Mark insists that these kids are better enrages me.  Another point Mark himself brought up was the fact that parents/ grandparents will criticize their kids/ grandkids on the fact that they are on the computer too much, or they aren’t reading enough books.  This could be argued in that we are using the computer to do our homework, and finish up projects.  Elder people think the computer is just a leisurely activity that teens now-a-days use to socialize, and just as a web browser.  I, for one, use the internet as an ultimate research tool.  It helps me complete my physics homework every week, and if it wasn’t for the internet I’d be failing many classes.  The internet is a place that has every tool you need to do almost anything you want to.  Technology has changed and people need to understand that with that change means we are becoming a lot more efficient.  Almost every book, encyclopedia, dictionary, writer (Microsoft Word), presentation (Microsoft Powerpoint), etc. is right there on our desks at home. We don’t need to go to the library to find an article or type a paper.

                As one of my class mates said kids now-a-days have a lot more drive to go to college.  If we don’t go to college, we will not amount to anything.  The fact that our parents criticize us on being lazy is complete hypocrisy.  Back in their day, college was not a necessity; one could get a job just by knowing someone in the business.  Mark should know that we aren’t lazy, we are EFFICIENT.  We find ways of doing something in half the time that it would have taken him to do it back in the 70s.

The Basic Step to Achieving the Path of Success

Education is a tricky subject to debate. Some would say that education is unfair to certain students who do not learn as quickly as others, and some would say that there are only minor flaws in the system but that it is working well for the time being. I do not believe that there are monumental flaws with the education system today. However, I do believe that people need to find something wrong with systems whenever they do not adequately fulfill their needs. The education system does have flaws because we are human and mistakes are made by everyone. But, no system is perfect and we can better it by supporting the path of success in education for the students involved.

            Support from family members and teachers is something that the education system must have in order for the children to want to be involved. The child must also want the education but I find it close to impossible if they do not have a teacher or guardian supplying them with the materials necessary to learn. For example,  parents pay the education fees to send their children to school and the teachers believe that the students are capable of learning the material. Both are playing key roles in leading the child down the path of success; the path to achieving the American dream of today.

            However, the support must not stop at these basic steps. The students must have the proper psychological support as well. Many studies have proven that if a child has a bad relationship at home then that will lead to developing more bad relationships outside of the home. One study that proved this would be Erik Erikson's Psychosocial theory. In his model he compares how parents treat their children and how the children respond in habits afterwards. One of his stages in the model is Initiative versus Guilt. This stage is during the preschool years for toddlers and is centered around the exploration and discovery during play in the classroom. This is helping the child to establish purpose and direction in interacting with others. But, if the  experience is unpleasant or is lacking entirely than the child will learn to be ruthless and/or inhibited to learn the right purpose and direction of the action of interacting with others.

Therefore, children who do not get the proper respect and care from their guardians will expect that same reaction in other environments, school being one of them. Support at home is important to a child developing the skills necessary to interacting at school with other students and teachers. The relationships at home must be supportive and respectable for children to be successful in relationships which will help further their education and lead them toward the path of success.

            The main point of all of this is to get the point across that the education system is not perfect. But, if we can help support more students in other ways outside of school than the system will be that much closer to perfection.  The relationships outside of school are the places we should start working on in order to get the students into the right mindset to achieve in class.