Our Doomed 'Paradise'

The vast consumption of environmental resources and never learning from our mistakes is my biggest concern.  We as humans are so self-centered and have an extreme tunnel vision of life and where we want to be that we usually do not care about how we get there and what is damaged or irreversibly destroyed in the process.  Before the overwhelming need for petroleum we had an overwhelming need for timber and coal, which is still prevalent but overshadowed by the need of oil.  There was vast deforestation and unsafe coal mines.  We made the land uninhabitable because of the coal mines and we destroyed many ecosystems that will take a very long time if not ever to recover.  Greed and impatience got in the way of our better judgment.  We want it now and we want it cheap. We notice the impact on the environment and always choose to ignore it, we see that now with our need of petroleum and the impact it has caused.  We have damaged the ocean and lakes, made more land uninhabitable again, but we really don’t care.  Instead of looking for other resources that are renewable and safe for use to create energy or materials for products.  We just keep going because its familiar and it would cost too much to research otherwise.  We are running low on oil and we know that, just look at gas prices today.  So instead of investing into other materials we invent fracking and absolutely destroy more land. This vicious cycle needs to stop, this world cannot take it much longer. If we want to continue to live and prosper on this planet, we need to start taking care of it or it will surely destroy us as we did it.

Occupy Oakland

Before this blog was assigned, I was not well informed about the events that transpired in Oakland concerning the occupy movement.  After doing some research, reading articles, watching videos taken by protestors, viewing news reals, and seeing how the movement was about the inequities of the distribution of wealth in America, I am better able to make an informed opinion.  The premise for the movement was sound.  I am in complete agreement as to why this protest was set into movement.  It is unfair that the majority of Americans face such inequalities.  The rich keep getting richer and the poor keep getting poorer.  Light needs to be shed on the atrocities of our government’s action on the bank bailout.  I am stunned by the fact that minimum punishment was doled out on the individuals who were stealing thousands if not millions of dollars.  If one of the 99% gets caught for stealing a loaf of bread to feed their family they are harshly punished and now have a black stain upon their background.  However, if those CEO’s/businessmen steal thousands of dollars, their actions are not only ignored, they are given more money by our own government and stockholders.  I feel the occupy Wall Street movement in New York City did a good job of bringing attention to this situation in America. 

While this occupy movement was sending a good message, it was poorly orchestrated.  There was no leadership, no counsel, and really no direction.  The protestors had a message and wanted it heard.  If they had a structure their message would have been heard louder instead of being heard as a cacophony of hypocrisy, violence, and unguided direction.  This was not the same for the occupy Wall Street protests.  The Wall Street occupy did a much better job than Oakland for getting the message across.  In my opinion, the occupy Oakland movement was a mess on all fronts.  The protestors did not adhere to the message.  They called the square they occupied after Oscar Grant.  This brought in a racial undertone.  Other groups joined the movement just to incite violence and looting.  They had their own personal agenda apart from Occupy.  On the other hand Mayor Jean Quan made this an even bigger mess with her indecisiveness and inability to act.  She started out with a clear and strong message to stop the protests.  She cleared the square and put a halt to the protests, but later succumbed to political pressure and changed her “hard lined” approach.  As a response they re-occupied the Ogawa Plaza which caused even more problems.  Even though the movement calls for a recognition of the inequalities of salaries for the 99%, the movement shutdown the Port of Oakland causing exactly those 99% they were fighting for to lose out on more money because of missed pay due to the protests.  Between the Mayor and the protestors, this was the “perfect storm” of how not to try to get your message recognized. 

This protest had a lot of unnecessary violence.  Was the violence justified?  To some degree I agree that is was.  There are countless videos on YouTube showing the protestors literally throwing the first stone.  The violence shown by the police force was way too aggressive and should not have been taken to that degree.  These protestors were civil, peaceful and just wanted their voices to be heard.  I believe the Mayor over reacted and caused a lot of the problems associated with the violence.  It is unfortunate that this got so out of control in Oakland.  The overall message for the occupy movement was positive, but the message seemed to have become lost in Oakland.  

Argument 2

Argument:

How can the wealthy live in such opulence while the new poor live in such poverty in this day and age? 

“We have the resources, experience, and knowledge to virtually eliminate poverty, especially long-term poverty, but we do not yet have the political will.”(Rich and the Rest of Us pg.46)  For decades political leaders have made attempts at resolving the poverty crisis, but have not been successful at achieving their goal.  They were not successful at standing up to the wealthy of this country.

President Franklin D, Roosevelt instituted his “New Deal” program of relief, recovery, and reform.  His plan transformed the financial system in the United States for more than forty years.  Harry S. Truman during his two terms in office continued with Roosevelt’s New Deal Program.  However, his primary focus consisted of closely monitoring two wars which consumed his entire tenure in office.  General Dwight D. Eisenhower was an opponent of the New Deal coalition which was an alliance that wanted to implement less government agendas.  Therefore, even though Eisenhower was considered a conservative he favored the New Deal legislation.  President John F. Kennedy took office in 1960, by this time many foreign issues took precedence and the New Deal Coalition began to deteriorate.  President Kennedy’s focus was on other worldly affairs, primarily trying to prevent a nuclear holocaust.  Lynden B Johnson’s goal was to reestablish the liberal coalition.  During his first term Johnson declared a “War on Poverty”.  He instituted many programs including food stamps, Head Start, work study, Job Corps, Medicaid, and Medicare.  His “Great Society” was premised on the idea that the government should enlist these programs to reduce poverty.  Lyndon Johnson also signed the Civil rights act of 1964 attempting to elevate Blacks out of poverty and providing equality with the wealthy white population. 

Corporate America represents the greed in this country.  “Convenient or not, it’s a bitter irony when multi-billion-dollar banking and investment companies make millions more off the poor millions who are making less” (Rich and the Rest of Us pg 189).  Morgan Stanley produces and manages the food stamp cards (EBT).  The more poor people in the country with EBT cards the richer Morgan Stanley gets.  With each new card issued to a poor person only increases the profit margins of this big Wall Street Firm.  “… your chief financial officers shipped $206 billion in cash to overseas tax shelters last year, Bloomberg reported on Wednesday. The total amount of cash held in offshore havens rose to $1.95 trillion, according to Bloomberg, which is more than the combined market values of the six biggest companies in the U.S.  To add insult to injury, or maybe injury to injury, corporate CFOs are also staunchly opposed to raising the minimum wage, according to a new survey by Duke University and CFO Magazine (Huffington Post, 3/12/2014).  It seems it is okay for the rich fat cats on Wall Street to make money, but they do not want to share it with the rest of the population.  Corporate America is not only keep the poor from making money they are also sheltering money in off-shore accounts from taxes in the US that could go to support programs in this country that would benefit the poor.

“…as more and more Americans are figuring out how to feed families on $150 a month, the mega-rich have gone back to spending on luxury items… the market is zinging again with purchases like… $80K battery-powered bicycles; $525,000  time prices; $1 million yachts; and vacation homes in posh locals…” (The Rich and the Rest of Us pg 190).  In my opinion, there should not be such a disparity between the people living in Beverly Hills, Westwood and West Hollywood compared to the people living in South Central LA.  The homes in these wealthy areas are obscenely opulent.  The living conditions in South Central are deplorable and something you would see in one of the poorest Third World Nation.  This is America.  It is the richest country in the world.  As a society, we should be ashamed that this condition exists right in front of us.  This is our fault and we should not allow our elected officials to be happy with this condition.

Argument One

Argument: 

How can colleges like Harvard, Stanford, and Princeton charge such exorbitant tuition which basically shuts out the poor from attending and relegating the poor to the state schools?  The rich ensure the success of their children by giving them entry to the finest institutions of higher learning in the country and ensuring success in their life.

The poor are disadvantaged from the very start beginning early in life.  The level of education students received in the lower income schools have many problems.   They do not have the best teachers, facilities are lacking, supplies are lacking, text books are inferior and the schools in many instances are not located in the best areas.  As noted in the book “Savage Inequalities” which shined the light on the East St. Louis schools, they had a high school next to a Monsanto Plant inflicting dangerous health concerns on the students.  Contrast this to wealthy neighborhoods, the students have the best of everything and have advantages the poor neighborhoods are lacking.  “Black children who grow up in neighborhoods with high levels of poverty and unemployment have a 76 percentage of graduating from high school compared to a 96 percent chance for black students living in affluent neighborhoods” (Huffington Post, 12/4/11).  So, not only do poor students get the shaft on their education many don’t even get the chance to apply to colleges because they do not graduate from high school.  The affluent areas virtually guarantee they will go to college guaranteeing a successful future.  The wealthy make sure their own children are successful and stack the deck against poor and underprivileged.   The poor have a very difficult and tough road to hoe.  For the poor it is like they are pushing a rock up a hill with the wealthy standing on it while they are pushing it.  I like in the Rich and the Rest Of Us it says “Are Americans just mouthing a cliché when they say “the children are our future”.  Or perhaps Americans aren’t talking about all of our children.  Maybe, in America, we’ve resigned ourselves to the fact that only those who live in the right zip codes deserve a quality education” (The Rich and the Rest of Us pg 119).

The wealthy students have a lot of choices available to them.  Schools like Harvard, Princeton, and Stanford have very strict academic requirements/standards and the tuition at a private school like one of these is cost prohibitive to any of the poor.  If the students in the poor communities do graduate they are even more disadvantaged.   These students need a 4.0 plus to get into these schools.  The environment in the less affluent Secondary Schools they come from does not foster them getting a 4.0 plus.  There are a lot of distractions and adversities they have to overcome.  They don’t have the same support system as the wealthy students.  If a poor student is able to achieve and meet the academic standards, they have to overcome the cost factor.  These schools are EXPENSIVE.  Harvard is very proud to advertise they provide “financial assistance” to low income students.  They advertise how they help the poor and disadvantage, but the reality is “Families with students on scholarship pay an average of $11,500 annually toward to the cost of a Harvard education” (Harvard Gazette 2011).  This figure does not include room, board, transportation, books and other living expenses.  This means a college education (tuition alone) will cost over $45, 000.  How many poor people can afford this amount?  The poor are relegated to the state schools leaving the Ivy League to the wealthy.   “I would say the surprising, shocking, disgusting thing is that not only do we not help people who are having trouble or are sliding down, we kick them a little further.  The whole system is rigged so that if you start to spiral down, you’re going to spiral faster.  There’s no ladder going up.  There’s a greased chute going down” (The Rich and the Rest of Us pg 75).

I feel this is deplorable in the richest country in the world and is a big black mark on our society.  This is something you do not see in the press and a fact that is not heavily advertised.  It really disturbs me to see how Harvard like to boast how they are helping the poor, but in fact when the average student on a scholarship is paying over $46, 000 for a four year degree (without room and board) is hypocrisy at its’ finest and certainly nothing to be boasting. 

Distribution of Wealth

The video “9 Out Of 10 Americans Are Completely Wrong About This Mind-Blowing Fact” I found to be shocking and enlightening.  I had no clue that the distribution of wealth in this country was that unjust.  That the poverty line is that high or that the middle class resembles more of the lower class when compared to the rich or the top 1%. 

It is unfair that those who work two to three jobs of grueling work are getting paid significantly less than a CEO or an actor or writer.  The movie stated that it would take the “average” worker more than a month to earn what a CEO makes in one hour.  A movie star makes millions for a few months of work when an average worker makes only several thousands of dollars for a few months.  Take a look at the men and women fighting in the military for our rights and freedoms.  They sacrifice their freedoms for ours.  They are shipped out into un-ideal living conditions, obtain very little sleep and our in a constant worry for their lives and the lives of their friends.  When they wake in the morning they do not know if they are going to comeback in one piece, yet they continue on.  The average monthly salary estimated for 2014 of an enlisted soldier that has served for less than two years is $2052.5.  Surprisingly there is a 1.8% increase than the previous year.  This is just not right.  I’m not saying that these CEOs and actors or anyone in those classes don’t work hard or didn’t work hard to get to where they are now, but they are not working as many hours and are not putting as much labor into their work or risking their lives.  It is actually really ironic I think.  All the other classes are actually paying these CEOs and actors or anyone in the top 20% or top 1% salary.  If it wasn’t for supply and demand (which the company’s make damn sure there is enough of) or a want to go see a movie, they would not be paid.  I find CEOs, lawyers, actors, investors, are actually all exploiters. They are all exploiting the needs and wants of people.  So no, I am not completely content with the way our country is structured with the distribution of its wealth.  The wealthy in this country just continue to get even wealthier while the poor just continue to stay poor.

Almost all of us are completely guilty of jading ourselves to the harsh reality of our country.  We are jading ourselves because it is not made to be well known the way wealth is distributed in this country.  This is not a topic that is discussed or well-advertised.  Clearly, when 9 out of 10 people did not know the reality of the wealth distribution, there is something wrong.  This is not a common knowledge and people need to be educated on this topic.  This is the best kept secret.

There a lot more opportunities available for the rich than there are to the poor.  Higher education is more available to the rich due to a socio-economic status.  They are able to afford schooling and given the quality of education they received in the primary and secondary schools, equips them much better for college.  The poor are at a disadvantage compared to college acceptance and affordability.  This inequity shows itself in availability of jobs.  The poor need to work two jobs to afford their bills and college.  This takes a lot of time away from focusing on school which in turn makes it harder and a longer process to graduate.  This illustrates why the rich get richer and the poor get poorer.

            In conclusion I was very dismayed to learn about the wealth distribution from this YouTube video.  I was also very surprised to see how many people didn’t realize it as well.  I’m glad to see that I’m not the only one that did not understand this fact.  What is even more troubling is that I don’t see anyone trying to fix it.

"2014 Military Pay Scale - Effective January 1st, 2014." 2014 Military Pay Scale. N.p., n.d. Web. 13 Mar. 2014. <http://www.militaryfactory.com/military_pay_scale.asp>.

First Essay: The Goliaths of Education

Sean Carbrey

Professor Monique Williams

English 1A

28 February 2014

The Goliaths of Education

The chasm between the have and have nots in education is huge. We need a radical reform in our education system. The overall goal being to make it equitable. We live in the wealthiest country in the world from an overall standpoint. We spend an exorbitant amount of money to provide aid to countries all over the world. What about our country? The way in which the poor are treated in America is deplorable. The children of this country should come first. Not that I don’t agree that we should be helping other countries, but we need to help ours first. Assessments need to be implemented, and plans need to be carried out to correct this problem. Our country’s leaders need to face the challenges, flaws, and inequalities that exist in our educational system because this system is failing.

It is evident that many flaws exist within our educational system that negatively impact student learning. In my opinion the primary issues are the inequities of: educational facilities, teacher tenure, improper allocation of funds, lack of a “good teacher”, high class size, and lack of needed materials in the poor school districts vs. the wealthy school districts. “Average expenditures per pupil in the city of New York in 1987 were approximately $5,500. In the highest spending suburbs of New York City…funding levels rose above $11,000, with the highest districts in the state at $15,000. “Why…,” asks the city’s Board of Education, “should our students receive less” than do “similar students” who live elsewhere? “The inequity is clear.”

Teacher tenure is a road block to success in the schools. Teacher tenure is certainly contributing to the problem. I feel that teacher tenure should be eliminated and that teachers should have to work and be held to a disciplinary standard like other working individuals.  Teachers need to feel the fear of being unemployed which, in most cases, will have an impact on their work ethic thus complacency would be replaced with motivation. The elimination of teacher tenure would insure the expulsion of ineffective teachers who have become “burnt out” or those teachers who are just not cut-out for teaching. There was an attempt made to eliminate teacher tenure in the Washington D.C schools by the superintendent. That superintendent, Michelle Rhee was brilliant. She recognized the problem and set forth with a passion to fix it but was shut down by the lazy, and fearful individuals heading up the teachers union. “There is a complete and utter lack of accountability for the job that we’re supposed to be doing, which is impacting our kids.” Please understand that job security is important, however, there needs to be guidelines for teacher performance. The measurements for teacher performance are not cut and dry.

We need to make sure we have only excellent teachers in our school system. There are too many ineffective or unmotivated teachers. “We have teachers…who only bother to come in three days a week. One of these teachers comes in usually around nine-thirty.” This is not acceptable. Excellent teachers are those who aid in the growth of a student’s self-esteem, help encourage their students to learn and to not give up, and have an excellent grasp of content knowledge. A good teacher can find a correlation with the student and the material being studied to make it real. A bad teacher is one who cannot connect with a student or is unmotivated to sculpt the curriculum to the student’s needs in his/her classroom. The effects of a bad teacher are very detrimental. The effect a bad teacher has on a child promotes a lack of motivation, the classroom most likely reflects a negative environment. The student’s achievements will most definitely decrease. This will greatly affect the student, and any learned information will be lost which will impact the subsequent educational years if it’s not corrected.

            An obvious illustration of the inequities of the educational system is evidenced by the facilities where the children attend school. In East St. Louis the children where sandwiched between Pfizer and Monsanto. The soil surrounding the school is contaminated with lead and human waste. The environment in which these children are placed is extremely toxic and detrimental to their health, and imposes serious threats to their safety. This environment is not conducive to learning. This is a highly toxic industrial waste dumping ground for this school.  The children cannot play on the playground. Attracting teachers to this environment is very difficult, you do not receive high performing teachers in a heavy industrial and highly toxic setting. Because of the impact this has on attracting teachers, the resulting outcome is high class sizes. High class size can have a negative effect on a student’s achievement. Students benefit from lower class sizes. “Teachers who have fewer students are able to provide each student with more individual attention. Fewer students means teachers have more manageable workloads and more time to work one on one…” There are significant benefits to lower class size. There was a study conducted on the effects of class size on students. “The study concludes that…a small class increased the rate of college attendance by 11 percentage points.” Schools in wealthier areas do not experience the same facility issues that exist in the East St. Louis district. These students in the affluent areas are not handicapped by their environment and experience a much better outcome. This is appalling that conditions like this continue to exist in the United States. We are not a third world country.

            Student materials are necessary for success. Not all materials are important, however fundamental ones are. A school district that does not receive proper funding needs to look at the needs of the student population and prioritize. For instance, desks are not really necessary, but books, paper, pencils, and teacher manuals are. It’s all about resources and per pupil funding. If the money is not available you have to weigh the needs and the wants. More affluent areas depend heavily on parent supplementation for funding. In my school district, parents were expected to contribute a substantial amount (called a recommended donation) to cover various costs/programs. This money went into a ‘Learning Fund’. A percentage of this money was allocated to the teachers depending on grade level needs to use for supplies. If the money is not available, or parent assistance is not possible, then many of these ‘needs’ are scratched which is a huge disservice to each child. It then may become the classroom teacher’s responsibility. Most classroom teachers spend a substantial out-of-pocket expense trying to assist the needs of each and every child. There is no getting around it. Basic school supplies are needed to facilitate a learning environment. “A teacher at an elementary school in East St. Louis has only one full-color workbook for her class. She photocopies workbook pages for her children, but the copies can’t be made in color and the lessons call for color recognition by the children.” Unfortunately, the poorer school districts lack even the basics. 

Society in general has not recognized the severe inequities in the educational system. In the book, Pedagogy of the Oppressed, Paulo Freire spends a great deal of time studying the teacher/student relationship. I find the Pedagogy of the Oppressed to be insulting when it comes to the poorer school districts in this country. “A careful analysis of the teacher-student relationship…involves a narrating Subject (the teacher) and patient listening objects (the students).” The basic premise of the Pedagogy of the Oppressed is that students are being oppressed by the teacher/student relationship. Really? In the East St. Louis schools you cannot even get teachers let alone worry about the teacher/student relationship oppressing students. I find the Pedagogy of the Oppressed to be very esoteric and not germane to an impoverished school system. “Education is suffering from narration sickness.” I am sure the students of East St. Louis and other impoverished districts would not mind suffering from “narration sickness.”

As expressed in the movie Waiting for Superman, the society in which you are placed will determine your educational experience and outcome. If you are placed in an underprivileged area, you are going to get a poor quality education. Our educational system is discouraging our students instead of propelling them forward. This is a very complex issue with a lot of moving parts between the federal, state, local city governments, teachers union and parents. “No individual is necessarily to blame, but collectively they are the goliath of the system.” The educational system is flawed. We have put into place educational acts and doubled the money per student thinking it will help. But there is no improvement. “The things we’ve done to help our schools work better, have become the things that prevent them from working.” The flaw is not just with funding, it is with the system. There is no clear answer.

            Our educational system is in desperate need of reform. I get so frustrated when I hear ‘education reform.’ They have been doing education reform for so many years with no positive outcome and we still have a myriad of inequities in our school system, i.e. East St. Louis. The question is this, how can we provide an equitable education for all students? I do not have the answer. However, I will do what I can to foster change and will support measures to improve the quality of education for all students.

Works Cited

Kozol, Jonathan. Savage Inequalities. New York: Crown Publishing, 1991. Print

Paulo Freire. Pedagogy of the Oppressed. New York: Continuum Books, 1993

Brozak, Jennifer. "The Importance of a Low Student to Teacher Ratio." Everyday Life. Demand Media. 28 Feb. 2014 <http://everydaylife.globalpost.com/importance-low-student-teacher-ratio-8579.html>.

Dynarski, Susan, Joshua Hyman, and Diane W. Schanzenbach. "Experimental Evidence on the Effect of Childhood Investments on Postsecondary Attainment and Degree Completion." Class Size Matters. 16 Oct. 2011. 26 Feb. 2014 <http://www.classsizematters.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/10/dynarski-120426.pdf>.

Guggenheim, Davis, dir. Waiting for ‘Superman’. Walden Media, 2010. DVD.

Waiting for Superman

Waiting for Superman shed light on the injustices of our society and the flaws in our educational system.  The movie really goes to show everything that I have been saying in my blogs. Our educational system is discouraging our students instead of propelling them forward. This is a very complex issue with a lot of moving parts, between the federal, state, local city governments, teachers union and parents.  “No individual is necessarily to blame, but collectively they are the goliath of the system.” (Jonathan Alter, Waiting for Superman) The educational system is flawed, we put into place educational acts and doubled the money per student thinking it will help. But there is no improvement.  “The things we’ve done to help our schools work better, have become the things that prevent them from working.” (Narrator of movie) The flaw is not just with funding, it is with the system. There is no clear answer.

                The movie discussed multiple issues. One topic in particular was teacher tenure as a road block to success in the schools. Teacher tenure is certainly contributing to the problem.  I feel that teacher tenure should be eliminated and they should have to work and be held to a disciplinary standard of other working individuals.  Teachers need to feel the fear of being unemployed which would make anyone want to work harder and not become complacent. Get rid of tenure to get rid of poor teachers who have become “burnt out” or those teachers who are just not cut out for teaching.  There was an attempt made to eliminate teacher tenure in the Washington D.C schools by the superintendent.  That superintendent, Michelle Rhee was brilliant. She recognized the problem and set forth with a passion to fix it but was shut down by the, lazy, and scared individuals heading up the teachers union. “There is a complete and utter lack of accountability for the job that we’re supposed to be doing, which is producing results for kids.” (Michelle Rhee, Waiting for Superman)

I’m in complete agreement with this movie. One of the former superintendents of Washington D.C., Lt. General Julius Becton, is quoted for saying that he has “never faced a more difficult task then reforming the schools of Washington.” This goes to illustrate how dysfunction the politics are in the educational system. Lt. General Becton was awarded two purple hearts and a silver star, I think he would have an understanding on what is difficult. He resigned sixteen months later.