September 7, 2016 - 16:58
Princess Jefferson
Through The Looking Glass
My identity has been shaped since my junior year in high school, in Houston, Texas. I was “privileged” to take part in a news segment that was intended to be on cultural diversity within the classroom. Instead this segment turned into one of the most emotional raw cut videos you will ever see. https://www.facebook.com/IsiahCareyFOX26/videos/1174317212590718/.
This link only tells part of the story and will never began to capture the feelings that were felt within that room. The spin out for me was that I wanted to reform education, not just in Houston, Texas, but nationwide. I knew since the end of my middle school year that I wanted to enter the field of education. I cannot clearly decipher what drove me to that realization, but I do remember telling myself, “This world owes me nothing, instead I will show the world what I can offer it.” From that day forward that became my mantra and I swore to live by it. Taking part in that news segment with those girls of different cultural backgrounds allowed me to see something. We are all at an unfair disadvantage. Unlike author, Mary Louise Pratt, I believe that education should be homogeneous among people. I believe that every individual should start at equal standing when it comes to school.
Every state in the U.S. has a school district that teaches differently and applies principles and methods with different mechanisms of learning among youth, and instead of simply, “unifying the world in the classes’ eyes” (Prattp.39), we are embracing the ideas for students to all be on different levels. In the Art of the Contact Zone Pratt speaks about her sons attending a school and being driven by rules that didn’t exist. The text reads, “Last year one of my children moved to a new elementary school that had more open classrooms and more flexible curricula than the conventional school he started out in. A few days into the term, we asked him, what was it like at the new school. “Well.” He said, “they’re a lot nicer, and they have a lot less rules. But know why they’re a lot nicer?” “Why?” I asked. “So you’ll obey all the rules they don’t have.” (Pratt p38-39). At the beginning of the text, Pratt speaks on her other son and says, “I was delighted to see schooling give Sam the tools with which to find and open all these doors… At the same time I found it unforgiveable that schooling itself gave him nothing remotely as meaningful to do.” (Pratt p33). The point that I am trying to make is that schooling should offer kids all the right tools needed for building their foundation and laying the track necessary for them to excel once out of school and you are on your own. Far too many schools and programs are like the one that Sam went to and unlike the school Pratt’s younger son went to. I agree that the way students take in information should be different because each individual is unique in his/her own way, but I firmly believe that the information should be homogeneous.
In the Arts of the Contact Zone Pratt does a unique job of placing a document written by Felipe Guaman Poma de Ayala titled “The First New Chronicle and Good Government”, which was written in 1613. This document is 1200 pages long and can be described as “ungrammatical.” “No one had even bothered to read it or figure out why.” One of the most important aspects of education is language; without a common language the interchange of education would be nonexistent. If Pratt was to analyze my paper should think that my idea is nearly preposterous and I know this because she states, “The abstract idea of the speech community seemed to reflect, among other things, the utopian way modern nations conceive of themselves as what Benedict Anderson calls “imagined communities.” (Pratt p.37).
I would like to reiterate that I am not aiming for a utopian society, because I believe that would be a figment of my imagination. No, what I envision is far greater than a utopian society because what I envision can actually be achieved. I envision a world where every individual will be taught the same material, test will not hinder or stop their growth, and that the way you chose to take the information given to you will determine your course in life. The word I envision allows students to break through contact zones and excel beyond their wildest dreams.