So, in the midst of an insane, and I mean INSANE, midterm schedule, I feel compelled to procrastinate on the studying and write.
First of all, yay Chinese New Year! I'm pretty damned traditional when it comes to this stuff, a lot more so than 90% of the Chinese people my generation here in America, but 90% more blase than our parents' generation. This is probably because of ignorance on my part, and ignorance on most people's part. But hey, America assimilates, and the customs of our own culture are just one of the few things that happen to be tossed out of the salad that is American culture.
...Which brings me to an interesting point.
In Education class, (Yes, I'm prolly gonna be a teacher. I'm getting the scholarship for it, so why the hell not?) the "America is a melting pot" statement has been refuted and argued to the ground by myself and my peers. America is hardly a melting pot. You only need so far to look as an average elementary school playground. People seek sameness. America seeks to assimilate everyone, so that we're all the same. White-America, specifically, if anything, is the ranch dressing to my tossed salad, where each of us are individuals, and where we may be the fringe (the lettuce pressed up against the bowl, surrounded by carrots) at any given time. Most of us never leave this tossed salad bowl, preferring to let the salad rot and go bad. It's the most poetic metaphor to America I've ever heard, and it's absolutely refreshing.
...and this leads me to yet another thing I want to talk about, Jumpstart.
Jumpstart is a program that I'm in. We're a part of Americorps and is a program that goes out into communities with low income families and sets up afterschool programs for children ages 3 to 5. Santa Ana/Costa Mesa is the middle class' lowest of the middle in terms of education. With a 65% drop out rate and budget cuts everywhere, kids these days are getting the shaft before they can even spell the damned word. While lots of kids are thriving, my particular issue is with my own partner child.
Isaac is 4, and he's been in Preschool for 2 years now, he's 4, and will go to kindergarten next year. Problem is, while his peers are getting 20 out of 26 capital letters right and 22 out of 26 lower case letter right on average, Isaac is getting 7 capital letters and 3 lower case letters. He doesn't even come remotely close to understanding what words are, though he knows some. His speech is pretty broken, and he only knows what he needs to get by. And this is an improvement, says his teacher. So while all of my co-workers' kids are spelling and reading and doing simple maths, my little tyke writes the I in his name and leaves the rest of the name line blank. When we sing songs he hums. When we read, he picks out the pop up books and keeps flipping the pages to see the pages go 3D. While I know none of this is really my fault, and that his teacher and my Team Leader says that I'm doing an exemplary job given "Isaac the severely learning impared study case," I can't help but feel that the adults are over-intellectualizing his situation and are actually taking it easier on him than they should be.
America's education system has always been a pussy pathetic. I knew that long before I took the Education in America class to tell me that for a fact. With Math and science scores in Asian countries scoring close to 200 point higher (out of 1000) than the US, we don't need to be told that our compulsory school systems is full of shit horrendous. So what if the colleges in America are world famous? Who cares that it's kids from American schools that get accepted into these higher institutions of learning? In the end, if the overall quality of education continues to drop, we'll only be degrading the value of higher education in the long run. My little Isaac is basically doomed to an education that is unfailingly segregatory, meaning that he won't even aspire for any of this high-brow upper education that we like to rest our laurels on. (Yes, MY Isaac. I've become that attached. The little guy really is that cute, and I would adopt him in a heartbeat if I was financially able myself, and if he didn't have heart-wrenchingly grateful parents). I'm frustrated because I know this kid has so much potential, and yet I'm stuck here knowing that I can't do anything more about it than to play my part in Jumpstart, where almost everything is about the "hands-off" education approach. Even if I were to have my own way, I'm at a loss as to how to make him improve. I stick by not tearing away the invincibility that all children feel, but when a child you so painstakingly pseudo-raise all year is apparently being sent on a downward spiral, something has to be done.
I don't know. Between pity, and angry, and scared of what might becom of my partner child, it's just sad knowing that even if the world is unfair, shouldn't the kids at least get a break?
And the wind brought Clive @ 9:03 PM
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Monday, January 26, 2009 |
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