Just War-- or a Just War

What about America's world standing if we don't go to war after such a great deployment of military forces in the region? is a question posed in the article Just War--or a Just War? by Jimmy Carter. In my opinion whether we go to war or not at the point this was discussed wouldn't change America's world standing. In fact it would be stupid if we went to war just because we had deployed the troops. So I don't think that other countries would look down on us just because we didn't go to war but may in fact look at us with respect for not fighting unnecessarily. So I don't think that America's world standing would change if we don't go to war after such a great deployment of military forces in the region, but if it did at all only for the better.

A Just War

The prereading question that is asked is "does the War on Terror meet St. Thomas Aquinas' criteria for a just war?" Obviously it does not if you use his exact definition of a just war which includes the idea that the violence of the war must be proportional to the injury suffered to precipitate the war. Many more people have been killed during this war than in the attacks on September 11th. However is this determined by numbers alone? If 100 people die as a result of a terror attack and war is the last resort, but the war stop once 100 people are killed? Kind of unrealistic if you ask me.

Keep America Rolling

I thought that Wagoner had two purposes during his address. One was obviously to lift people up after 9/11. He did a very good job, I think, He showed people that the most important thing was to "keep America Rolling". If we give up and do not press forward, then we give the terrorists the upper hand by allowing them to cause more damage than was already done. This was very important for everyone to hear so soon after the tragedy.

Another purpose was to put in a plug for GM. I found this incredibly annoying. He kept comparing America to GM and how the entire country should follow GM's example. I think this is ridiculous. A country is very different from a car company. Granted he was was comparing it to something that everyone in the room knew and could understand, I still found this a little shallow. I think he had more on his mind than comforting people.

Wow...I dont know!!!!

When reading these three essays i found it hard to draw a connection at first. However, after thinking about them for a little bit of time I found that the only essay that expressed the "promise of america" as we know it was the very first essay, which i agree with the others was more of a promotional speech for GM than an inspirering speech. In this speech he talks about some of the values of American's that has placed the country ahead of all others.

In former president Jimmy Carter's essay he writes about how America's reasons for going to war do not make it a just war. His final sentence, "will enhance our status as a champion of peace and war." makes me think of how America percieves itself as a nation. We do indeed as Wagoner states think of our country as number one, and as Carter states the champion of all nations.

However, the last essay goes into something that we as Americans should be ashamed of. The torture of captured peoples by american soilders. Clearly this and the fact that we engaged in a war that is unjust is a reminder that America or Americans are not as great has it or we percieve ourselves to be.

Heavy terrors with a chance of manipulation

Reading Wagoner's speech put me in the wayback machine. I didn't go too far, just five or six years. Reflecting on the then and the now really forced me to speculate about the culture at the time. I mean, we were all around on the fateful day, but I don't think we were mature or integrated into the "real world" enough to recall the political climate of the time. Wagoner seems to have chosen his words carefully...very carefully. However, his diction gives key to the discrepancy between his intent and his thought process. For example, he claims his employees, as all Americans, are "grieving, they're angry, they're nervous, and they're distracted." Even though he couldn't have possibly talked to all his employees, it seems fair enough to say, given the circumstances. However, he asserts, "...they're looking for leadership more than ever." As head of the company, Wagoner is obviously the go-to guy for his employees if they're looking for leadership. How do we know he isn't just looking to assert his power further, using tragedy as an opportunity for personal gain? This whole "Keep America Rolling" campaign was built around the need to ignore the shakeup in America. However, it seems a little Big Brotherish to me that an authority figure is telling me to buy stuff for the sake of the state. Whether or not Wagoner, specifically, took advantage of the situation is irrelevant. What is relevant is the culture of fear 9/11 created, the power with which people unified, and the ease with which that power and fear was channeled into aggression. Methinks the rhetoric of those in charge knew how to transform the cloud of fear into a fog of war.

Keep America Rolling

While reading this article, I found some of his points to be valid, but it sounded more like a "sales pitch" to me. I agree with the author on the fact that when a tragic event, such as September 11th, occurs the nation has to continue as usual other wise our country will suffer more and the attackers will achieve their goal. Like, the author, Rick Wagoner, states, their will be series of firsts after a tragic event, but it is important to not let it fully impact our lives. While, I understand that it is important to keep a strong economy after these situations, I felt like the article wanted people to buy GM cars to keep the economy strong because GM cares about the country and works to help support the government. Overall, the tragic event impacted our society and the article I felt tried to use the event to promote sales.

Torture: Thinking About the Unthinkable

I found it funny how McCarthy seemed calm and joking in his third paragraph when he was talking about beheading and similar ideas, yet on page 654 he puts an exclamation point after women when saying, "the dark brutality of which men (and women!) have historically shown themselves capable".
But anyway, he does prove his point that torture does have its benefits. It does seem a bit extreme that a terrorist, who has killed people and/or who has information that could save hundreds of innocent lives, can't be interrogated fully because it may bring harm to him.

I think she's got it.

Reading Ehrenreich’s “In Which I Am Offered a ‘Job’”, I had myself an epiphany. She recalls, “Here we are, in a weird corporate niche created by the total failure of the American health-care system, and I am grinning with delight at the deepening misery.” So I racked my mind, trying to think of a job not built upon others’ misery. AFLAC makes money off of people’s inability to procure health insurance from the government. Later on, Mary Kay comes into the picture. How do they make money? By telling women they’re ugly. They play on the insecurity of people regarding their own bodies. Kutztown University wants us to believe we won’t land a job without a degree. Otherwise, why go to college? Our entire economy is built on the fact that people are miserable. And if they’re not, there’s a commercial or movie telling them they ought to be. de Botton is right, workers of the world should relax because the world’s workers are also its consumers. We don’t need our job to give us happiness anymore than we need some powder on our faces. Happiness should be derived from one’s own personal search. Huh…Buddhism in Economics. There should be a course on that.

Everyday Low Wages

Sales clerks at Wal-Mart make only $8.23 per hour on average in 2001. And they're complaining? The average supermarket employee makes $10.35 per hour, I want to know which supermarkets are paying that much! As a sales clerk at Sears I make only $7.29 and most of my co-workers make around the same. We would be thrilled to be making that $8.23 that Wal-Mart employees make. It is true that $8.23 is not enough to support a family on, but there are people supporting families on less then this. Let's face it, chances are if you are working at a Wal-Mart to support your family, there probably aren't many better opportunities out there for you and possibly you should be happy that you have a job at all. Sure some jobs are better and you get better pay, but there are also worse jobs with less pay so before complaining maybe Wal-Mart employees should take a step back and consider what life would be like if they didn't have the job that Wal-Mart has provided them.

Workers of the World, Relax

De Botton's essay was a little saddening to me, especially his last line; "...that work is often more bearable when we don't, in addition to money, expect it always to deliver happiness." I disagree, I think that work could and should deliver something more. Sure, it's not going to deliver happiness all the time, but nothing ever will. Everyone has good and bad days, but if you're lucky enough to find a job that you get some kind of personal fulfilment out of, then you're one of the luckiest people on earth. But I don't think that I'm ignorant for thinking this. Maybe I'm too optimistic, maybe too idealistic. I think that if we all lower our expectations a little, we'd be more satisfied and like our jobs more. Then perhaps the unemployment rate would stop increasing and productivity would go up. But then again, I'm too optimistic and too idealistic. But, somehow, I'm okay with that...

My Parents Think I'm Crazy for Hating Wal-Mart

For so long I knew of Wal-mart's devious activity. I remember reading the the headline of undocumented workers being fired from Wal-mart when I had went on to AOL that day (I switched a while ago so don't think I'm some hypocrite). Wal-Mart employed undocumented immigrants to act as a janitorial staff. I told my mom and she considered it for the time. My brother thinks my hatred of Wal-Mart thinks I'm imitating those who do and only trying to be "in". I like to buy movies and dvds, I'm a big pop culture buff. I insist on buying form no Walmart retailers or any corporate retailers if need be. My mom and brother believe I'm a fool for not wanting to by a Dvd for only 20 bucks, but i stick to my guns.
My mom does the large scale grocery shopping at Wal-mart or Sam's Club, Wal-mart's twisted sister. But yet my parents complain constantly about how products aren't carried routinely, lines are extremely long and how the store is packed with people despite the time or day. If they only knew how Walmart dares to treat it's employees, then soon I wouldn't need to feel so out of place with my hatred for Mal-wart.

Ideal Conversation

A conversation taking place about these issues would ideally be more of a debate. I think that all the issues we are talking about have two sides that should both be given equal time. There should be agreeing as well as disagreeing and everybody's opinion should be heard. The discussion would be fuller with more people voicing opinions as opposed to just a few. With more opinions comes more opportunity for debate and opposing views. Ideally the conversation would be more "heated" with everyone becoming involved and voicing all opinions whether they agree with others or disagree.
I don't believe we are having ideal conversations. We talk mainly about one side of the issue rarely bothering to argue or bring up an opposing point. Whereas we may just agree on things, it would be extremely rare for all of us to agree on every issue. I don't think that it is even possible. Everybody participates, which is great, but a few dominate the conversations giving little thought or even ignoring issues brought up by others. I think we need to listen more to each other and not be afraid to disagree. I think those two ideals combined with more participation would result in better, more ideal conversations.

How should a conversation ideally work...

The arguments should have their theses, implications to one another, and their general connection to our culture, society, etc brought to light. A controlled focus on the issues should be maintained with allowance of even the slightest germane point to be added, so long as it contributes to the progression of the discussion. If digression gets concentrated effort behind it, subtext and inklings that allow us to critique is refused attention, leaving the facade to be scrutinized and the interior yet to be exhumed.
Our conversation over the past two classes has failed to follow the previously mentioned model exactly. However, people have contributed thoughts actively and willingly, though not all. Too much personal input and lack of concentration on the article itself, leaving the conversation to hold more air than weight.

Does work make people happy?

It's hard to answet that question. However I will attempt to do so and if not answer it maybe clarify some of the defining factors. I will do this in an unbiased manor as well because that is my ideal conversation topic! See below!


I agree with De Botton that work being linked to happiness is something that is majorly done in the US. It is difficult to say that all americans are happy with their jobs. The rates of depressed people seem to be going up. If people are supossedly choosing careers that will make them happy why is this happening then? Although there is some link between work and happiness in most cases, there are also many other factors that influence happiness such as one's love life and family life, and personal stress and responsibilities. There are people out there who love their jobs and are depressed and their are people out there who hate their jobs and are depressed. Like most of the topics presented lately, such as success and losers, this question comes down to individual case studies all being different. Career choices and jobs affect a person's happiness at different levels for different people.

Response to the in Class Question

Since I will be absent for class I am combining two responses into one post.
ok.
I wish we would delve deeper into the text. I feel that there should be two components to our discussions the text and the issue at large. In my opinion there should be more emphasis on the text. We should use that as a map which can channel us through the larger scale of the topic. I would like to hear more direct quotation and more tie ins to the text. Also I would like to discuss the text on a different level as well. I think it would be interesting to analyse the text by looking at how it was written. We have read many different articles all with different authors and therefore with different stlyes and methods to approaching their topic. I think it would help us grow as writers to break down and pull apart how someone else writes.
The reading I found most interesting was Alain De Botton's "Workers of the World, Relax". I found it interesting because in the past several months I have thought more about jobs and career choices than anything else. This observation about american culture and work hit home, "We are unique...in allowing our choice of work define who we are..." When reading this I had one of those "lightbulb" moments and thought about how true this observation is. I find this especially true for college students who are in ann akward pre-work stage. We are very much defined by our majors ("work") within the campus life. I have lost count how many times I have introduced myself as , "Hello, I'm Emily and I'm a Crafts major." I do feel like my major defines me. Does that apply to anyone else?

Well I'm not sure how I'm supposed to go about this but I guess I'll just post two seperate posts.

With these issues, what is success and the workforces, the conversation whould be looked at and discussed in an outsiders point of view. The questions raised, such as what is success and who are losers are all questions that go back to an individual's personal beliefs, which are ultimately in some way influenced by our childhood expeiriances. Ideally it would be better if our personal experiances and individual beliefs were extracted in order to enable us to look at these topics from a different point of view without any bias. Of course we all know that this is impossible hence the word "ideal". However, this ideal conversationwould lead to unbiased discussions and discoveries. In comparing this ideal way of conversation to the past two class discussions it is very hard to say that they were conducted in an unbiased way. With a little effort the sescond class discussion was much more unbiased, and I believe this discussion went over much better than the one influenced by our personal ecperiences.

An Ideal Conversation

I thought that the past few discussions have gone pretty well. I wouldn't call them "ideal" necessarily. Personally, I think an "ideal" conversation is one that has a purpose, not just one that that is taking place just for the sake of having a conversation. I didn't find that the topics we were discussing were very appealing to anyone in our class, pardon me if I am wrong, and I felt that the reason our discussions were going nowhere was because no one felt very strong about any of the issues presented. I also don't feel like an "ideal" conversation is one that must include a debate. I honestly don't see the point of arguing simply for the sake of arguing. If people do disagree and can share their points of view with one another, than that's great. But if we all do agree, then what is so horrible about that? Maybe I just don't understand. What I also don't understand is that everyone is expected to contribute by offering their point of view. I know that I don't talk much in class, and that makes me appear lazy and uninvolved in the conversation. I don't talk not because I am uninvolved, I don't talk because I don't have anything worthwhile to say. And I am involved, I just choose to participate more in the listening aspect of the discussion that the talking one. I just don't like to feel like I have to say something just for the sake of saying something.

I think an ideal conversation is one where everyone gets something out of it. One that is productive and lets you see things perhaps in a different perspective. Now i know you're all thinking "what's up with this girl, she just said that arguing is not necessarily good". There are other ways of seeing things in a different light than having a debate. I think a good discussion is one that gets you thinking and one that you can both listen and talk with ease. An ideal conversation is one that keeps you thinking long after it is over.

The Ideal Convo

When dealing with such issues as immigration and the definition of success, a discussion could really go anywhere. In an ideal conversation, the participants must stay on task. Participants must know when they are getting off topic. Another must for a conversation is disagreements because without disagreements the conversation becomes quite bland. Not only does the conversation become bland, but only one side of an issue is exposed. When people begin agreeing with everything that everyone says, only one side of an argument is exposed. It seems that in order to fully discuss an issue from every angle, someone must be playing "devil's advocate." Also, everyone must show respect regarding all particpants and their oppinions.

How does this ideal conversation compare to our discussion on Tuesday? Well first of all everyone was very respectful. There were few interuptions and no blood was shed. There could have been less personal experiences, because that caused us to go off on a few too many tangents. There was not enough disagreements. This goes hand in hand with the personal experiences. People were afraid to disagree with eachother's personal experiences which resulted in little disagreement. We all agreed with eachother and were continually building upon one side of the issue. It is not a bad thing to build off what each other is saying, but when it happens too much only one side of the issue is talked about.

Alain De Botton makes it obvious that he feels that people should not expect any happiness to come from their jobs other than a paycheck. He feels, like so many other Americans, that money equals happiness. I do not quite agree with him. If someone actually enjoys their job and their job brings them happines in areas other than their pockets then good for them. I also believe that it is totally fine to expect a little more from your job, although I am someone who always has high expectations for everything. In a worst case scenerio someone should not have any expectations from their jobs other than money and anything else that makes them happy is simply a plus. The problem is that some people hate their jobs and are constantly complaining about them. These people act has if their jobs SHOULD ALWAYS bring them extra happiness. It is one thing to have a few extra expectations concerning your job, but thinking your job will constantly make you happy in other areas of your life is another story.

These topics are discussed-ing

Conversations should start with a “They Say.” This could be someone else’s “I say,” but it should ultimately be like dropping a boat into a flowing river. Of course, the point at which we’re dropped into the river depends on what the end result is. Better yet could be letting someone decide the entrance point. Let us decide at which point in the conversation we want to enter. For instance, do we start with the assumption that there is a god or debate the options of a deity’s existence before we start talking about abortion? It depends on the goal the moderator has in mind. Of course, ideally, I would say let us decide where the conversation starts. This aids the concept of equality in conversation – the greatest value in the ideal conversation. For the conversation to be effective, it is imperative that everyone contributes. We need a forest of ideas and opinions. People don’t even have to agree with the opinion they throw into the mix. In fact, they shouldn’t always agree with it. Dissent’s healthy in these conversations. And how can anyone disagree with the need for Satan’s advocacy? While everyone needs to talk, everyone should be pay equal time pay attention to what’s going on in the conversation. A balance between listening and talking is the constant challenge in contributing to a conversation. Regarding conventions, a person should be able to explain their idea completely before its subject to comment. Only after that person is sure they’ve represented themselves correctly should the cycle continue to the next person. Also, the comments should make a chain, with each new comment relating to the previous one, but also spanning into new territory. Maybe not comments, but the individual itself. I don’t know. The extended metaphors aren’t working out for me today. However, that, in essence, is the ideal conversation.These past two days of conversation have been on a steady path to this ideal conversation. They haven’t reached it, but we collectively realized the flaws in the conversations. For instance, Thursday’s discussion lacked tension and argument. On Tuesday, we realized made more general comments, trying to stay away the personal comments that hinder dissent. In the future, we’ll probably start to relate more stuff back to the actual texts, the chains from which our conversation starts. We move to the ideal in baby steps. Luckily, our baby has matured past crawling. Now we all need to change the diaper.

In Which I am Offered a "Job"

While reading this article, In Which I am Offered a "Job", by Barbara Ehrenreich I noticed a particular part that related to our discussion last Thursday. The author states, "I have been found fit to represent a major corporation to the general public, apparently on no other basis than my ability to sit still and listen meekly for two long and dreary hours" (528). I found this statement interesting because it almost confirms our statement that their are jobs available if we are willing to invest the time and energy into pursuing them. In class we had mentioned that Americans complain the immigrants are taking the jobs that belong to the poor. But this paragraph to me says the opposite. If someone wants a job, they can have it, if they are willing to spend the time listening to the employer. The fact that she did not take that job, because it did not have benefits and it had a low salary also confirms that the stereotype of success in America is based on money. To relate this to the pre-reading question, about whether these jobs are completely without value, I would have to say no. As a society, we need people willing to pursue these jobs. I think that most people take part in these jobs for some financial security, they enjoy their work, or that they can not move up the ladder for fear that they will not have any income if they fail. While some of these jobs offer more prestige than others, they are all still important and valuable in our society.

An Ideal Conversation

An ideal conversation about these topics should take place as a debate. The debate should stay to the main point of discussion, whether it is the text, a specific question, or an observation. When we are discussing the articles, everyone should express a point or question someone else is view point. This is important because everyone has different experience and opinions and their ideas can give insight and a new perspective on an issue. It is important as a group that we play devil's advocate so that we can either strengthen our argument or change/reexamine the presentation of our opinion/argument so that the audience can understand our point. Therefore, in order to have an ideal discussion, we need to relate our personal experiences and opinions to the text, while questioning and including others in the discussion.

The discussion we had the last two days was pretty productive. We went through the articles by using the pre-reading questions, but I think we should have dove deeper into the text. As a group we did a to good job of including everyone, but the discussion was one sided. We need to try to debate more of the issues by challenging each others opinions and playing devils advocate. We also need to be more patient and let other people respond to the questions directed to them before stating their opinion. Overall, I think our discussion are getting better and are productive.

Class Discussion

Conversation should take place as a scholarly debate. It should focus on both sides of the issues and not focus on just our opinion, but also on why the other side of the argument can be justified or not justified. The value of a conversation like this is to see the opposing view and further prove our point or possibly disprove it as we learn and understand the other side more. The debate also gives us a chance to tie the readings together, which, in turn, helps us to gain a better idea of why things are how they are.

Thursday's discussion went well. However, I think it focused too much on a single side of the issues. Because of the presentation of more personal situations, no one went against anyone else and did not question the value and justifications of the "wrong" side. By adding in more debate today, the ideal conversation appeared more. It still lacks the "devil's advocate" somewhat. By presenting the definition of "success" as a question instead of a simple answer, the class contributed multiple opinions each and showed that there is no one right answer to the question. Also, the tie-in of Eric Scholosser's "Success" to Benjamin Cheever's Nobody Beats the Wiz: "What Do People Fear More Than Death" illustrated a crucial tie between the job market's effect on today's society. We are not living this way by choice, but more because we are stuck in this modernized world that could not survive in the past trading civilizations.

Workers of the World, Relax

Alain De Botton's book, Workers of the World, Relax, emphasizes the necessity of jobs to life. It shows that work has gone to the point that many people can never get the job of their dreams for fear of losing income in an attempt to get there. This once again backs the idea that money=happiness. I don't agree with this way of life because I have been given the opportunities to take risks to work towards the job I want. How many minimum-wage restaurant or retail employees really love their job? but how many of them can afford to quit and go back to school or risk not succeeding at a better job? Money controls modern-day society to an extreme but is there any way to fix it?

The "unprofessional" workforce

While reading all three of these essays one idea kept popping into my mind. This was the fact that most of the jobs discussed in these books are what we would call unprofessional jobs. For example in Schlossers essay on success he talks about a man who owns a Little Ceasers Franchise and the many people who made it by investing in the Mcdonalds franchise in the 1960's and 70's. If someone told be that they owned a Little Ceasers I would normally think, Wow they really arnt that drivin. But aparently i would of been wrong. I gather from this particular essay that owning a franchise is a rather hard task to handle.

So is owning a franchise and unprofesssional career. After reading these essays i'd like to say that I have changed my mind. Although its not being a lawyer or a doctor or even a teacher, to own a franchise you need some professional skills in order to keep the buisness running. I guess what my main point is that I now see that you dont have to be a conventional professional to be a successful person.

Catering to the Customer

I found it interesting that Nobody Beats the Wiz and How Corporate Law Inhibits Social Responsibility were placed next to each other in the text. The first was focused on how to treat the customer with respect while the latter was essentially the opposite. I wonder why the publishers did that...

Anyway, I thought that Nobody Beats the Wiz was very intriguing. It seems that the advice that the future salesmen were given on how to treat the customers well and to cater to them and not primarily focus on making a sale could be applied to everyday life. Those tips about treating people with respect and actually listening to other people would benefit everyone, not just salesmen. That statistic on listening did concern me. People only listen 45% of the time? That's absurd. It doesn't surprise me though, people are more concerned with their own problems than listening to those of others. But I digress. I think that students should be taught classes like these in school. These tactics would benefit society immensely. People skills are way too important to be pushed aside. Perhaps if we learned to get along early in our school years, we would have better interpersonal skills as adults. That would not only help our relationships, but is invaluable to other aspects of life as well. I think that training classes such as the one mentioned in the text would benefit all members of society, regardless of what their job titles are.

Nobody Beats the Wiz

I found reading Nobody Beats the Wiz to be very entertaining. It was very similar to some training that I had to do for my own job. The stupid acronyms and the customer comes first mentality taught for every job. It seems that no matter what your job is you are taught the basics of what you are supposed to do and are taught more in depth on how to treat the customer. Whereas we are all taught how to treat customers correctly, it is not the customers we care about. In fact, it is just their money. I believe that we are taught all this information on how to treat customers in the hope that with a good shopping experience, they will choose to spend their money at our store and tell other people to come to our store to spend their money. I think its partially ironic to sit at a meeting listening about how its "all about the customer" being fully aware that its "all about the customer....'s money." Many other things talked about in this article I could also see in my job. Such as, the warranties they were supposed to sell and asking about the Wiz card. These things make it seem like you care about the customer, but in actuality, all things are designed to make more money for the customer. I don't think it would be possible to find a store that truly cares about the customer and not just the customers money.

What is Success?

After reading the article by Eric Schlosser, the question of what determines success is reexamined. I feel that in today's society, success is determined by how much money you have. If you are successful in society then it is assumed that you have a decent house, car, job, and salary. But, when you think about what Christopher Reeve said, " I see people who achieve these conventional goals, none of it matters." This statement is very powerful and meaningful to me. Many people including myself get wrapped up in the today's stereotype of success. We push to have the better job, car, and home, but is that really what is important. To be successful in my mind, if all the material things were taken away and you are still happy, then you are successful. Many people are spending less time with families and more time at work in competition for a bonus or promotion. This leads to the point that if you do not get the promotion then you are unsuccessful and lost the competition I guess naming you a loser. However, I think that success is more about who you feel about yourself. If before you fall asleep at night you can say that I did the best I could, then you are successful and a "winner.'' I found it very interesting that the article and convention continues are Reeve's moving speech to the next speaker who says, "Tell me friends, in your lifetime, have you ever been on a diet?" This line, proves that society today focuses on successful people being attractive and wealthy. Overall, I believe that success is based on you being able to tell yourself that you did your best no matter what anyone else thinks.

Just a quick question...

These excerpts that I just read concerned. They should concern you, too. After all, these stories of Subway and Little Caesar’s pertain to our society, to us. Heck, the golden arches have practically replaced Uncle Sam as America’s mascot. Those arches are meant to represent work, dedication, and ingenuity. They’re to bring about a capitalist spirit that whips us into shape. “Quit sitting around,” these arches dictate. “Get to work! There’s money to be made! Food to be eaten! Fries to be…fried! Let’s go!” In Cheever’s story, people choose their destinies early. The women are cashiers, the men work the floor or stock room. That’s right, the men move and communicate while the women are confined to a single place and single job. Schlosser tells stories of people slaving away to make sure they don’t drown in debt. I don’t know about you, but to me, harder work should translate into more success. Instead, it seems just the opposite. It seems the less effort a member of our society puts in, the more money he earns. By no means do I insist that mental effort and nurtured have a place in this. That’d be stupid. However, the wealthy elites in Schlosser’s work fail to prove their intellectual worth. Not merely Groppel at the end, but Lowe and Charlton Heston (based on personal observation of Mr. Heston). Society promises us a land of opportunity whose only door can be unlocked by the key of work. We’re supposed to put in all this effort…but to what end?

Just a quick question...

These excerpts that I just read concerned. They should concern you, too. After all, these stories of Subway and Little Caesar’s pertain to our society, to us. Heck, the golden arches have practically replaced Uncle Sam as America’s mascot. Those arches are meant to represent work, dedication, and ingenuity. They’re to bring about a capitalist spirit that whips us into shape. “Quit sitting around,” these arches dictate. “Get to work! There’s money to be made! Food to be eaten! Fries to be…fried! Let’s go!” In Cheever’s story, people choose their destinies early. The women are cashiers, the men work the floor or stock room. That’s right, the men move and communicate while the women are confined to a single place and single job. Schlosser tells stories of people slaving away to make sure they don’t drown in debt. I don’t know about you, but to me, harder work should translate into more success. Instead, it seems just the opposite. It seems the less effort a member of our society puts in, the more money he earns. By no means do I insist that mental effort and nurtured have a place in this. That’d be stupid. However, the wealthy elites in Schlosser’s work fail to prove their intellectual worth. Not merely Groppel at the end, but Lowe and Charlton Heston (based on personal observation of Mr. Heston). Society promises us a land of opportunity whose only door can be unlocked by the key of work. We’re supposed to put in all this effort…but to what end?

Great Discussion

I'm pretty sure that I talked enough during our last class discussion for everyone to see where I stand on many of the issues concerning last weeks readings. So rather than talk more about the readings I would like to comment on the discussion in general. Not that we all do not value Dr. Mahoney's oppinions and his constant question asking haha, but it was pretty interesting to see where the conversation would go without the guidance of a teacher. The conversation was great. Everyone respected each other and I really think we did a great job of discussing the various issues in and in-depth fasion. We should do more discussions like that more often. It's great to hear everyone's oppinions and is a great way of seeing where we all agree or disagree.

Wiz

It makes me feel so much better that salespeople really do have a concrete agenda to swindle money out of you. Who knew they had to go through all those days of training. I guess The wizard of Oz may be necessary to show teamwork. I find it interesting how Cheever never even mentioned the store's advertising. It didnt even sound necessary because of their tactic to use fear in order to make you buy something. I think the thing that makes the article worth reading is that Cheever already had a higher status before he took the job and he says that status changes the way people see things. I think he saw himself as having high status. Not only is the article very informative about the sales business, but i kind of saw the writing as a biography of him. You can almost get a sense of his whole outlook in the chapter. His points that he is was racist and thought people were dumb for choosing certain positions really are unneccessary. Overall, his piece is entertaining. I think his knowlegde of the term SNAFU seemed to be learned from personal experience. Also the the seven meanings of yo really show how important communication skills are.

Money Does Not Equal Success

I pretty much learned 3 things from the readings:

1. Don't become a franchisee, especially not for Subway.
Well it seems that this form of opening your own business may prove successful, the amount of royalties and other deductibles like that ruin most chances for many franchisees to succeed. After all, as Schlosser said, money isn't true success. The only question that remains is, what does success mean to you?
2. Americans' greatest fear is losing their jobs.
I fully agree with this statement and how it effects modern society. Money runs the world and, without a job, it becomes hard to survive. People look at their success based on how much money they have but this shouldn't be the case. In the future, you won't be remembered by what job you had or how much money you made, but by the effect you had on the people around you.
3. Corporate abuse can't fully change until the law of corporate governance changes.
One quote summarizes Hinkley's entire article: "Corporations should have more than one purpose. they also owe something to their workers and the communities in which they operate, and they should sometimes sacrifice some profit for the sake of making things better for their workers and communities."

What affects our success?

I feel as if I can relate to the writer Sanders. Why? I grew up in a family where my father was as Sanders puts it the "toiler" and my mother was the "warrior". My father was a coal miner and he did work very hard. He is only 45 years old andover the years he has been in the hospital for numerous oberations due to his job. He also currently has a broken back and an infection in his lungs. My mother was the soilder, well not a soilder persay, but she was in the military. Although I can relate to Sanders in this way, I can not relate to his belief that he would grow up to be nothing more than a toiler or a warrior.

I always knew that I would go to college. I always knew that I would never work in a factory or join the military as a last resort. I knew this becuase I knew I didnt want to be like my mother or father, not that I'm ashamed of them in any way, I just felt that they worked to hard all becuase they had never gone to college. My parents indeed always stressed the idea of college because they knew the impact it would have on our futures. So though I agree with the idea that our future decissions and goals are influenced by the adults in our lives, I do not beleive that it means we will grow up to be mirror images of them.

Losing: An American Tradition

Charles Young states that "Calling someone a loser is probably the worst insult in the United States today. " This is understandable because, well, nobody wants to be called a loser. However, if you don't win, you are a loser. Many are offended by being called a loser and take it as a personal blow. Lighten up. It doesn't mean that you suck at life and should be ashamed. It just means that in this case you did not come out on top, you didnt win. It is nothing to be offended by, tomorrow you may win and be a winner. This status will change continuously. I personally do not agree with the statement that calling someone a loser is the worst insult in the United States, because I can think of many other things that being called a loser would be preferable too. Many would probably agree with me that being called a loser is not the worst insult they have ever received.

The Men We Carry In Our Minds

This article, The Men We Carry In Our Minds, written by Sanders I believe is very true. Most people are influenced by their parents and take jobs similar to the jobs their parents have. Like the article stated, we are influenced by our environment. The jobs we grow up around are the jobs we tend to pursue because we think that other jobs are not in our league. Either these jobs require more education than we can afford or are to menial for our social class. The adult figures we grow up around determine the stereotypes we set for each gender. Growing up as a little kid, I wanted to be just like my mom, so I guess I fall into this category.

Harvest Gypsies

Reading Steinbeck's essay, I was greatly intrigued. I don't know much about the frontier era and certainly never painted the picture of it quite like he did. Sure, I played The Oregon Trail as a kid. Remember that game? You had to try to get your wagon to Oregon without anyone dying... I never grasped the reality of it. I was young and naive, what did I know? But reading these stories sheds light on an era that is not familiar to our generation, one of great mystique. I thought that the way they set up their own governments was ingenious. We should all be inspired with what they did. The campers had very little yet shared everything they did have with those even more less fortunate. Look at what our country has become? People are unwilling to share their resources and even their time with those less fortunate. I found this essay humbling, there is so much that our country has taken for granted and yet we do not often reach out to those in need in our own country, let alone throughout the world. Now, I'm not speaking about everyone, there are people who are very generous in America, and I commend those people. But as a whole, our country is pretty selfish. But it does comfort me the our country was not always like this. Maybe we should study this era of history more often. Maybe then we could turn this country around...

The Harvest Gypsies

The Western American culture is a frontier of American culture that is still left in the dark for me. Steinbeck's essay shed some light on the subject. The idea of the government camps was one that was very interesting. I have the (limited) view that government welfare programs are basically just handouts and that the recipients don't have any responsibility to work for it. This concept of a self governing sort of camp was very interesting. Especially since it did so much more than restore their finical situation it restored their sense of dignity. Which was the one thing that seemed to destroy them the most. I felt like the ever valued American spirit was revived in those camps. However I must pose the question, would those camps thrive today? Is hard work still up held by the American spirit? Are people willing to work for the betterment of the whole and for the dignity of the whole rather than for the individual?

Also something I want to mention was that I really liked Steinbeck's writing style. It helped me to connect the dots with some of the TSIS concepts.

It's not all bad

Young makes a good point that everyone who doesn't win is a loser, no matter the competition. After all, it's perfectly reasonable to assume that there can only be one winner. Our society raises us to independent, and above all else, successful. No wonder we have such a negative view of ourselves if we don't win. However, what if, for just a moment, most of us weren't losers? What if Steinbeck's harvest gypsies weren't losers? Young points out that in his time, there was Bill Gates and 260 million losers. The superlative here is obviously the richest American. However, if there is a richest, there is a poorest. As sorry the shape Steinbeck's farmers’ was, there was always someone in worse condition than they. It could be the impoverished farmer still stuck in the dustbowl. It could be the farmer's son who had mere days to live. Either way, there was always someone to point at and go, "At least I'm not that guy." How awesome a feeling is that? Provided, you’ve faced your status as a loser at this point, but the duality is beautiful. I’m not the best writer in the world, but I can sure write better than a 3rd grader at my old elementary school. From that perspective, I’m a winner. The only difference between me and Bill Gates is he’s got more people to look down on. In fact, he lost the contest to be America's poorest! Bill Gates - what a loser. Not like those harvest gypsies, having reason to rejoice in their encampments and servitude. They knew they had escaped the poverty still suffered by others. They toiled with the security of a place to live. They had become winners.

What a loser is

While Young makes the point that losing is something that must take place in any competition, I think his best conclusion is that most of the time winning is not based on being good but by beating someone else. From an early age you always hear the saying Never give up. It is a good thing to do, but I think not giving up is what makes someone a winner. They may not be beating someone else, but they are beating their personal best. That is how you can seperate an athlete from a sports player. An athlete loves the game, but a sports player just plays. I think that the reason Young takes such a positive stance on losers is that he really has never loved playing a competitive sport. His practice of zen meditation and loving the butthole surfers should be a clear indication of this. He does hit on something interesting when he says that up to 90 percent of children drop out of organized competitive sports by the age of 15. I think that a small percent of that is due to his point that kids do not want to be stigmatized as a 'loser', but i think a larger part is due to the fact that around the age of 15, most kids can finally grasp the concept that they really are not good at what they are doing. That may be harsh but it still doesnt classify them as a loser until they quit.

Harvest Gypsies

So I have to say that the second and third articles seemed to focuse more on the everyday knowledge that we all have. The first story, however, is one we've heard before too but I guess it's more of even though we're always told places like the squatters' camps exist, there's still that part of me that never fully understands how bad it is until reading something like this. Honestly, (since I don't like reading the intro blogs first) the first few sentences made me think of a war bunker or fictional story. The family stories that it presented were horrible, all I could think of is "why does no body help them? what would I do if something like this happened to my family?" I'm glad the government started to help but you can't help wish there was still better.

Our Essays

Hey everybody, I'm 70% sure I won't be coming to class today (I think I caught a stomach bug, I heard something was going around), so I wanted to discuss my essays with the class and I figure this is probably the best way to do so.

My first essay, after reading it a few days after writing it, is wordy and goes into likely unnecessary details about the works I picked to write about. It does come to some points, but it's not perfect. Cutting just above 2 pages, the paragraphs are long and unorganized. I am proud of myself for using quotes, though, because that is something I have trouble doing in my writing. Although unorganized, I did find it difficult to make my writing more brief. I tend to ramble and feel as though every point should be explained and stressed in its own way. Hopefully with this class and "TSIS" I'll be able to make my said points more narrow and less wordy, per se.

For my second essay, I took my first essay and edited it using "TSIS" templates as instructed. It did get shorter, and I feel as though it comes to better points that I wanted to stress. I deleted anything I felt that did not belong, and ultimately I think it strengthened my paper. Revising is a smart move for essay-writers because you never know when you might come across something that sounds awkward or even unnecessary, or confusing to the audience. I would totally recommend "TSIS" to any college student in a writing class or who finds themselves writing anything period, especially if it argues a point.

I hope everybody did well on their essays! Mahoney - I emailed you both of mine if you would like to take a look at them. See you guys Thursday hopefully.

Confusion over 10/9 Assignment

OK...several of you have emailed me a bit confused over the assignment for 10/9. I think I understand the confusion when looking at the syllabus. The missing piece, I hope, I what we would have discussed in class on Thursday.

Here's what it says on the syllabus for 10/9:

"Assignment: TSIS, pp. 101-122. Complete Exercise #1 on p. 113 and Exercise #1 on p. 122.

Assignment: Write a two (2) page, pointed "They Say/I Say" brief that demonstrates the "conversation model" of academic discourse and indicates your position on some of the issues raised in the readings. Utilize some of the templates presented in TSIS."

It's true, this looks suspiciously like the assignment for 10/4. There is a reason for that. What I wanted you to bring in on Thursday was a 2-3 page initial response, summarizing some issues you pulled out of the readings. The assignment for Tuesday,10/9 is to "formalize" this a little more by "trying on" some of the templates in TSIS.

The whole idea of a "pointed brief" is that you will be unable to flesh out the arguments extensively (you only have 2-3 pages)...so you have to write "pointedly" in a "brief" format. For example, a legal brief does not lay out ALL of the arguments. It provides a sketch of the key points and supporting precedents. That's the metaphor I was using on the syllabus.

So, on Tuesday you should have two papers--an intial 2-3 page draft, and a second, 2-3 page "pointed brief" using some of the templates from TSIS.

I hope that helps.

Kevin

Earning the Grade

I am a lazy procrastinator. It's true. I never do anything on time. This is the perfect example its 10: 30 and i'm doing an assignment for a class at 12:00. Although I hate to admit it, I will.
Just yesterday one of my professors exclaimed how even she was a procrastinator and that she had only ever met one person in her life who wasnt. When you look at things such as grades and the amount of success someone has obatained you would n ever think of them as being procrastinators, but as people who prepare for the future. Why, then do we have so many successful procrastinators? My answer comes from the text about Harvard. I believe that we are lowering our standards and letting people slide through just because they "need" to. Although it is unfair to say that no one works for anything anymore, I believe that many of us dont.

This is a big problem. Many people are doing only what they have to in order to succeed and "make money". I believe that when your not working hard for what you get then you really dont deserve it. My senior year at highschool the grading scale was changed. An "A" was no longer anything between a 90-100, but was now between a 94-100. therefore in order to keep up my grade point average. I found that working for and recieving the 94 was a lot more rewarding than working for and recieving the 90. In my opinion the professor from Harvard is right. It is important that the grades we earn are the grades we trully deserve.

Education at last?

So what is the final set of factors to determine a succeed in education quality?

(I know that I would not post a blog this way, but it actually composes all my doubts at the moment. More explanation and discussion in class will help me clarify it out, I hope so.)

"Education is..."

"Education is one of the few things a person is willing to pay for and not get." This quote by William Love Bryan really caught my attention. I thought it was an interesting statement and once I thought about it I saw how it was true. College is not cheap, in fact it is the most expensive form of education. Still, many college students do not take full advantage of it. It seems that many college students pay that high price just to sleep through class and show up only to do mediocre on tests. I think its a shame that students are willing to pay such a high price to come and learn and not take full advantage of all the opportunities given to them. Would you buy a sandwich and not eat it? Probably not. So why pay for an education, but not show up to learn? It is sad that this quote is true, but you see it happening everyday and I do not see it changing anytime soon.

As I read Douthat's essay on Harvard....

I found myself wondering why I retained little shocka nd wonder at the treatement of Humanties studies at Harvard University. The lack therein of genral liberal art edication leaves for a steady one-track intellect for a student, constrained by a economic, business curriculum. I personally find that with such an emphasis, Harvard's conservative majority to seems normal. There is a line I find most interesting; "All this is merely reinforced capitalism's insistence that the sciences are the only important academic pursuits, because only they provide tangible, quantifiable (and potentially profitable) results." At my high school, arts and my gifted class, which acted as a generalized liberal arts course, were put down by taxpayers and some administrative members, even going to such extremes as stating a false price on a gas kiln my art department recieved several years back, in a local newspaper. My art teacher, furious at the libel committed, gave a half hour long speech to my art class. In it he said that all schools want to push in math and science, among other ramblings. This point sunk deep with me. Why do we need peolpe good at math: calculations for sciences and numbercrunching? The biggest way numbercrunching comes into play into the job market is statistics and accounting. Money and Ratios. ratios give us information on people and who needs what, and how many out of ten will have terrible allergies during the spring or lack a proper hair care product. Then with science, you have numerous fileds, from chemicals to technonologic developements, physicists travel to weapons. At this point I, too, am rambling but all in all, arts fall short because they don't do anything to help Joe Businesspants make a buck and invest it well. Questioning one's rolein the universe and posessing a thrist for knowledge and how one can gain it, can only be of any good to a conservattive Harvard professors if it stimulates the economy, hopefully in the form of a self-help motivation book from Simon &Schuster publishing.

Beautiful thread stuck to a dull tip

While I can agree with Dacia Charlesworth's general theme of contributing to a society of learned citizens, I have to say I do not like the techniques she uses to make her point. She poses a question to her audience, asking whether they will be voters or non-voters, volunteers or non-volunteers. She quotes statistics to dehumanize the members of her audience, assuming that peoples' merits and potential can be stripped down to numbers. The students' options are a simple "yes" or "no", good or bad, right or wrong. Never mind that 50,999,897 of the 106 million voters chose Gore, that 50,456,002 selected Bush, or the fact that almost 1,000,000 people voted "none of the above." 106 million people voted and the rest were bad people. What of the 100 million who chose to not vote? How many of them knew the superficial issues, crappy candidates, in addition to the futility of voting for a third-party individual who reflected their personal views? Charlesworth ultimately fails to accomplish her goal of empowering students when she starts with belittling their individuality.
Her discussion of the importance of a liberal arts education and the evolution of education is somewhat effective. It demonstrates her personal of the subject matter, thus qualifying her to speak about it. However, she doesn’t elaborate on her link between education and civil rights. She attempts to appeal to emotions by conjuring images of escorted students, but then quickly moves on to her personal frustration.
Personally, I wanted to strangle somebody throughout the last third of this piece. The length of the statements associated with her acronym destroys any possibility of remembering the whole message. On top of that, she manages to quote a principle figure in history for each of the four tenets. Here, I can only think she’s trying to use their words as endorsement for her own. Again, she makes an emotional appeal with Anna Howard Shaw with little explanation. She throws in a biblical quote (it seems just because she could). Finally, she throws in the opening factoids to bring every full (however misshapen) circle.
Dr. Charlesworth status as an expert on communications puzzles me, given her inability to relay her ideas in a coherent, relevant fashion. As a reader who sees her point, it’s frustrating to see it made in such a poor way.

Which NUMBER? I don't think so.

I'd like to respond to the first passage I read for Oct. 2nd's assignment: Dacia Charlesworth's Which Number Will You Be? First, I'm not a number, nor will I ever become a number. Second, she definitely twisted around an Einstein quote and made it her own; he wasn't talking about "breaking illusions" about beliefs, he was talking about physics in a literal sense. At least, that's how I interpret it. How does she know that he was leaning towards an insight about educational beliefs? I'll tell you how; she doesn't!

As for the theme of the passage, I would like to say that I do agree with her speech about a decline in positive interest in higher education. The idea that you can make more money doing something you like by going to school for a few years is one of the most appealing ideas for any teenager graduating high school. I'd say I was one of them, but elementary school teachers don't make an extraordinary amount of salary. Anyway, naive (I apologize, I can't do the crazy double-dotted i) college students need to realize that they're going to these classes for the real thing. It's not just "get a good grade and get out" deal; this is what's setting you up for your life and your career. I think it would be best if college students applied that sort of attitude to their studies, as Charlesworth said in the passage as well. I do not agree on placing all the blame on teachers, however, because I have come across teachers who preach this belief. The students should realize that there is no "real world", there is only the world you see before you, and every bit of it makes it "real", even television in ways (hey, it's there, so it's real).

The Economics of Education

All the economic and numeric references strikes a chord with me during this week's readings. The ones that I wish to highlight are: Charlesworth's " student-as-consumer", Leonhardt's "socioecomonic theme", as well as Douthat's views on student's"GPA".
I agree with Charlesworth and her views on how students have shifted from a civic minded education to a consumer mentality. The"consumer" mentality lends itself to all aspects of American culture and to most of her citizens. One of the nation's (if not the world's) most powerful cities is New York City,which from conception has been all about commerce. The settlers bought Manhattan Island for a meager 22 dollars (or so the lengend has it). NYC is one of the few great cities to have no religious or war-related origins. Its simply all about the economics. The reason I bring this up to show that Americans have this consumer mentality embedded into our fiber because we have a commerce based society. We have a strong tendency to distill everything into a game of give and take. College is the norm now a days because it will give us job opportunities and we will take from it the GPA that we need in order to fulfill those said job opportunities.
However things aren't so black and white when you factor in Leonhardt's theme of how socioeconomics play a role in the equation. Socioeconomics turns everything into shades of gray. There are significant contingencies of wether or not one will have a successful collegiate experience based on their economic status. The static that Leonhardt shared that "only 41% of low-income students ...[of] four year colleges manage to graduate within five years...[while] 66% of high-income students did" so in the same amount of time was startling. It concerns me that there is such a discrepancy. Especially when you consider that the factors aren't always GPA related, which is now the leading guidepost for job placement. To which Douthtat indicates by saying, "What you do, in turn hinges in no small part on what is on your resume, including your GPA." Now if the students who are in college were legitimately earning their GPA's 100% of the time we would have a different story with different "citizens" and a different system of education, but since that is not the case we have the tale of grade inflation. Thus far I have no experience with grade inflation at college, but I have a catalogue of such experiences from high school, both personal and observational. This reality of grade inflation lowers the integrity of the educational system yet helps the students obtain a higher position in world. And since I believe one's knowledge base is an ever present shadow I would argue that grade inflation lowers the integrity of the student as well and may even bring damage to the way they are able to position themselves within the world.
I have no clear solutions to offer. Only a belief that if students return to the mentally that their education is apart of a bigger picture which encompasses their country and also the world at large, then Education may find itself on the road towards salvation.

The Truth About Harvard

Douthat made the point that higher grades are being given out more freely in today's universities not because students are becoming more intelligent, but because professors are feeling pressure from students, colleagues, and themselves. They are beginning to realize that grades are much more than numbers or letters in today's world. They are increasingly becoming the keys to better jobs, getting into law school, and any other aspect of a student's careerism. If you asked a group of students if they would rather have a C on a paper rather than a B, I am quite certain that the general consensus would be no. I do not believe that Douthat was complaining when he got an A on his 10 page paper about two artifacts from the great frontier era either. However, is this the correct way to go about things? By in fact giving out higher grades in an attempt to assure their students good jobs, are professors actually selling their students short? To be quite honest I would rather be given the truth about my knowledge on a certain subject. If my paper on World War II is horrible then I need to become more knowledgable on the subject. There is nothing more harmful to a student who will shortly be going into the real world than leading them to believe they know more than they really do.

Which Number Will You Be?

I have to say that I agree with Dacia Charlesworth. Her students response to "Why are you in college?" is completely true. Almost everyone agrees that one goes to college so they can get a good job and make money. College is becoming the norm. Rather than deciding whether or not to go to college, the decision becomes where to go to college. I also completely agree with her statement, "Contemporary US culture, being as individualistic as it is, does not easily lend itself to vita activa." In our society today, most people put their individual needs ahead of their country, other citizens, family and friends. Today, most people follow the opposite order that they did in the Renaissance. Now, people tend to put their needs first, followed by family and friends, and ending with others and the country. I feel that today, people get an education for their own benefits and not to become good citizens. Everything that we do today, is in competition with others. Take for example getting into college or a job promotion. Charlesworth also claimed that her way to link education and citizenry is through the mnemonic device NSCS. I believe that each of these steps/advice is important to getting a meaningful and fulfilling education while becoming a number that makes a difference in society.

The Truth About Education

I think Douthat brings up a good point that education today is not a relection on learning but what an individual does to get good grades. I never really stopped to think of my purpose in getting a degree but now I realize my foremost goal really isnt learning. It is conforming to a role that society tells me will get a good job. Douthat shows that grades have risen over the decades not due to better students, but because society has changed. One can no longer get a good job without getting good grades. Teachers realize that a students future really is dependent on good grades in class and I have seen from personal experience that many have become lax in giving better grades. If the grading trend continues at the same rate, it seems that teachers will have to give out As to students just for showing up for class. I think this would be very likely. To try and correct the problem now would put the students of that institution at a disadvantage compared to all the other schools. If the outcome is an A for attendence, maybe learning would start to enter the picture again.

I would agree that our system of education is in dire straits. I think that we must revise our foundation and completely reconfigure the mehtods used to build upon the said foundation. As I said in class I was homeschooled for my Jr. High years. Traditionally Homeschoolers don’t believe in tests. They endorse the philosophy that knowledge should be learned for the purpose of integrating into your life rather than proven its retention once for a test. I felt that I truly learned my material while I was homeschool because I was free to learn it rather than memorize it for a designated time. When I returned to public school regular tests didn’t phase me but when it came time for standardize tests I was freaked out. It wasn’t because I didn’t understand the information or that I was unfamiliar with how to study for or take a test, it was the fact that it was so rigid. Whenever I got one of those scantron sheets I felt like was academically under attack. I seemed like all the knowledge that I had ever learned was being stripped of its worth and integrity by my #2 pencil and those stupid bubbles. Instead of ranting for eons about all the aspects of knowledge that standardizes tests don’t show, I’ll just simply say that they are the bane of my existence and to think that our system of education will be dependent on them is beyond discouraging.

“It is harder to reform education than it is to remove a cemetery.”
I took this metaphor seriously as center of the argument: controversial solutions, complex relationship among various factors, and unwillingness to execute yet high excitement to propose.

The matter should be judged from different perspectives. While it is true that education is affected by “gender, ethnicity, socioeconomic status, special education”, indicating a mixture of standards to be expected, it is also necessary to define some state or federal proficiency level “to determine what the students need to know and what they should be able to do […] to benefit from higher education or to work productively in the real world”. Inconsistency in education standard from the very basic start, as Carus has named, leads to consequent degradation in coming years, resulting in teachers’ reluctance to apply new materials or teaching methods and vice versa. Counter-effective law with its over optimistic anticipation, as Bracey substantiated, alludes to an even more cynical situation in which “no child left behind”, or in another way – all children left behind, for all school find it hard to satisfy the requirements. Is this the standard that education planners yearning for?

What Blouke Carus had to say.

I have to admit that when reading this text I got a little aggrivated. Althouhg, like Becky said our education system is not perfect, I dont believe half of what Carus had to say was fair. Is there an education system out there that is completely perfrect? I think not! Yes, there are certain things about our current education systems that should be changed. One of the few things I agree with in Carus' speech is the fact that our math departments are seriously lacking in highly qualified teachers. I do believe that there is something that can be done about that issue. My point is although the american education system is not perfect, it is substantial.

My main reason for getting aggrivated with Carus, was the fact that he basically called the majority of high school and college students incompetant. This statement would not have been so bad if he hadn't put so much of the blame on the teachers, professors and institutions themselves. It is not the instructors fault for the lack of quality education so much as it is the govenments. Besides, putting my personal experiance into the mix, I feel that the majority of my teachers did a superb job at teaching us what we needed to know to both succeed academically and in life in general.

NCLB

I totally agree with everything Bracey has to say about NCLB. This law sets schools up to fail. The only leeway is that the states have different definitions of the "proficient" level. However, this will probably change also. If the government wants to ultimately take control of the public school system, what makes us think that they will not set a national proficiency standard? The federal government is already attempting to control other things that should be left to be dealt with at the state level such as gay marriage and abortion. By taking control of education, the government moves one step closer to controling every aspect of our nation.

NCLB and other things...

After reading these two passages I came to the striking realization that the education system in this country (or any country for that matter) will never be perfect no matter how hard people try to make it be perfect and that if do try to make it better, there will be more people that criticize your efforts than who agree with you. In the first reading, all Carus did was criticize the education system and had little advice on how to improve it. The next reading was all about NCLB; an act that was passed to help reform the "failure" that it is the American Education system according to Carus. However, this article only criticized the act and did not uplift it. So first we read about how our education system is terrible,then we read about something that was actually done to correct it, but then find out that that is failing also. It seems like in today's day and age all we are taught to do is think critically. Now don't get me wrong, I think that critical thinking is very important; however it seems that we put these skills to use by criticizing everything and do not use them to fix what is "wrong" in our society. No wonder there are more pessimists than optimists in today's society.

It seems to me that NCLB is not the horrible act that everyone is making it out to be. Does it have its faults? Absolutely, but what piece of legislation doesn't? Carus says that we need to make our teachers more accountable for what they teach their students. Isn't that what NCLB is all about? That all children be taught properly? Yes, the main goal of it is that every child will be proficient by 2014. Is this probable? Of course not! But think about all the children are receiving a better education as a result of it. Schools that would have given students less-than-adequate schooling are now being held accountable for what they teach their kids. I don't think this is a "failure". But according to most critics, NCLB is failing. Well do they have a better idea? So far I don't see Congress coming up with one. Perhaps we should put our effort into teaching our students to be "proficient" rather than complaining about NCLB. I know that's the kind of teacher that I want to be...

reform

Well at least one thing is very clear to me: Blouke Carus was obviously educated in one of the American elementary schools he bashes. He surely couldnt have been proficient in English composition. It might just have been me but a three page overview of his life accomplishments at the beginning of his argument really just made me discredit him and the rest of his whole essay. It was kind of strange how he said American education sucks so bad but then said that 50 percent of graduate students are from overseas. Some things he says are interesting though. Many teachers are not qualified to teach the material they are teaching. It doesnt matter how much money you give to a group, money is not going to fix an underqualified teacher. I agree that most people that would be the best teachers are out doing work in other professions. I really dont agree that education reform is really as impossible as he makes it to be. It would be hard, but it is still possible. It just requires the people working from the bottom up and the people working from the top down to meet somewhere in the middle successfully.

Ba, ba, Bush sheep

Much to my giggling delight, Bracey’s “The Perfect Law” likens George W. Bush’s educational legislation to the Party of Orwell’s 1984. In Orwellian fashion, I contend that the best books are the ones that tell you what you already know. “The Perfect Law” did just that. Bracey’s argument cuts right to the fundamental, yet genius flaw of the No Child Left Behind act: it is the exact opposite of what it claims to be. I’m not sure if who the brain trust was on this one…probably Karl Rove. Still, to create these impossible standards making the top echelon of schools seem basic, at best, is a pretty amazing feat. Even the sudden failure of Asian students across the country boggled my mind. However, the really dumbfounding aspect of all this is that the American public rated its schools based on the No Child Left Behind results and standards. We’ve become sheep by our own choice. It’s frightening that citizens in a democracy can just surrender their power to the elite, with no qualms of the impending doom. Yeah, it seems a little melodramatic and cliché. However, this NCLB represents just one small aspect of the puzzling paradoxes and befuddling logic brought on by this administration.
I appreciated Bracey’s use of comparison throughout this piece. Not just the parallels to Orwell, but also the perfect storm bit in addition to the “common yardstick” on page 185. His ending uses the appropriate technique of short bursts of information and the bold, defiant clincher. Frankly, I enjoyed quite a bit.

Which Number Will You Be?

Sorry guys, don't get confused- this post is going up a class ahead because I'm not going to be around Fri.-Sun. and trying to get a bit ahead.
The first paragraph of Which Number Will You Be summarizes the 3 readings for the next class. Only 27% of adults over 25 have a bachelor's degree. With the increasing technology and growing need for education, this statistic surprised me. College seems like a necessity in today's society. In The College Dropout Boom, statistics report that 43% of nongraduates and 32% of high-school dropouts said that they believe college is important. However, studies showed that over 50% of college students will take 5 years or more to graduate, if they graduate at all. These statistics seemed flawed since, looking around you, it seems like everyone is getting through fine.

Education Reform: Teachers and Schools

Carus talks about the inadequacies of universities and how the problems start from elementary school. He suggests the reforms should start from the lower levels which should improve the upper levels already without even having to put a lot of effort into reforming them. I agree with his idea and how not being taught enough in elementary schools causes students to take lower level classes in secondary schools. Taking the lower level classes in secondary schools then causes the problems that universities are having with students needing reform classes. To fix this problem you must start from the bottom and work your way up reforming first elementary schools, then secondary schools, and then the universities. Each step of the way will help all levels of education hopefully fixing the education system that is failing today.

NCLB

The No Child Left Behind law does exactly what the book said. As an El. Ed. major I heard a lot about it in the school district I worked in last year. The standards are so ridiculous that most schools (even as the book said- some of the top schools in the world) cannot meet the expectations and, therefore, fail to gain the additional government support. The law contains 37 categories and requires 95% of students to be there on the national test day and pass. If the school fails any one category, they fail everything.
However, to explain everything in one sentence: The Bush administration set up this program. What else can you expect but for there to be a catch that just happens to make public schools fail and make government funding available to private, mostly Catholic, schools. Bush serves his interests again by hindering the American school systems more.
Also, the voucher system the Bush administration was voted down numerous times by the Senate. This same proposal just happened to be attached to a $328 billion omnibus bill that Bush knew was too important for the Senate to vote down just because of the vouchers. His manipulation of power has already created a strong resentment towards him throughout America. How much further can he go than harming the education system of the nations children?

NCLB

The No Child Left Behind Act is very controversial. I tend to agree more with Bracely and disagree with Carus. I feel that many people support the No Child Left Behind Act because who won’t support having all children proficient in math and reading. However, I do not think that the NCLB Act helps schools. Judging a school based on a standardize test is ridiculous in my opinion. I feel that one test does not determine the value of a school, especially when you have to account for students that are poor test takers or have disabilities. I realize that there are problems with our education system and that it does need improvement. I feel that the governments solution to this problem is not a solution at all. The government just says by 2014 everyone needs to be proficient. It does not give any help or advice to the school in how to accomplish this goal. It also does not make sense to “punish” the schools that are not proficient. The government should help these schools meet government standards. I also believe that more and more schools are going to start teaching to the test as opposed to a “normal” curriculum. This I disagree with because it you are preparing students for the real world and college it is not all based on a test. I believe that schools are more than a place to learn academics and that opportunities and activities offered at a particular school are just as important as the passing of a standardized test.

My understanding of the issue of affirmative action is a jumbled mess of thoughts, ideas, and arguments I've collected and have used to understand the definition and purpose of affirmative action. In my opinion affirmative action is apart of the bias cycle from which it tries to break free. Even though affirmative action's purpose is to level the playing field it fails. It doesn't cure/aide the cultural sore spot that certain socioeconomic classes or races have a disadvantage but merely shifts the tension from one class/race to another. This just creates another layer of inequality. I remember the last year of high school we were given several surveys usually relating to our future plans for furthering our education. It always bothered me when they asked for my ethnicity and socioeconomic status. Why must race and socioeconomic be such an issue in terms of education? Rather than trying to please one people group why can we eliminate the race factor and look that each person as a student in the pursuit of education. Why can't we all be seen as students who are all teeming together in the same effort to better our lives with education?

Discrimination?

To be honest, what I have grasped through the assigned text is a sense of skepticism. Is the issue of discrimination really that critically complicated?

Having considered terms like “racism”, “oppression” or “domination” a part of the past, I thus taste a little surprise realizing how much considerably the issue is still open to question. It seems that this controversial issue is not totally operated and settled down to its final judgment. That means black and “yellow” Asian are still subject to discrimination, either physically or mentally. That means an unsecured situation. That means threats.

Through the 3 texts, I happened to sympathize with the "black", the "unprivileged" persona dilemma in the two last ones. I happened to figure out a slight discrimination in the relations of those readings compared to the "Our School" overall implication. If ever the "Our School" is to emphasize on the illiteracy, the incompetence of academic abilities of black folks? Does it indicate that the "merit" factor should have more decisive power over the admission process, ensuring white males not to lose their opportunities in entering honorable universities to "inferior" black males, the ones who seem to receive "compensation"? Is it fair after all?

I have not found out the answer yet.

Reverse Racism

This passage was very enlightening in an "in-your-face" kind of way. At first I thought "this is the twenty-first century, racism doesn't happen that much anymore." As I read on I realized that it happens just as much as it did post-Civil War, except not as blatantly. We all have stereotypes for all the different races, even our own. Does that make us bad people, no; it makes us human. It does become bad if we act on them and discriminate on the basis of race alone.

With that in mind, is affirmative action a type of discrimination? I don't believe so. Minorities have been discriminated against for centuries, somewhere along the line they got screwed for being born into a certain race that whites have determined "inferior". It's because of this that most people living in poverty are minorities, and because they live in poverty they do not have access to quality schooling and jobs that most whites have. They do not score as well on standardized tests because they have an insufficient academic background as a result of their economic status. So if you think about it, minorities are discriminated against in an indirect way when it comes to getting into college and getting a job. So when whites complain that affirmative action is "reverse racism" we should blame our ancestors for treating other races so poorly. If they hadn't, maybe the playing field today would be truly "level".

RR or HtPGTCTKB

This subject has been tossed around as it's of the meater variety of the two being discussed. The arguements previously made focus on Fish's examples of people of different racial backgrounds make claims that don't come into the exact context they're trying to demonstrate it within. When someone pulls the discrimination card it must come into the context of what the situation it's being use to retort. My point is thus; When the Israelites are questioned for their treatment of the Palestinian refugees, they call us Anti-Semitic. Yet we haven't said anything of hatred or prejudice toward them, demanding some form of inferior treatment of them. Instead we only make a simple critique. This reverse racism used to defend oneself from any attack is a gutsy move on anyone's part, for it not only makes one looks ridiculous to the aware and changes the defnition of racism to the ignorant or uninformed.

Back to the Pot Calling the Kettle Black.

Out of the three readings for this past assignment I believe the most compelling was that of Stanely Fish. When i first started to read this passage I thouhgt to myself, "This guy is crazy why does he think its ok for Blacks to be chosen over Whites!" I come from an all white school with all white teachers, however, for about two years I went to a school in which white people were in the minority, at least thats how it appeared to me, I'm not sure if thats an accurate statement. My point is I was able to see the views of "whites vs. blacks", if u will from, two very different communities. In my all white school we never thought about racism, it was never a topic that we discussed, because obviously it wasn't a factor. In the other school however, i was introduced to the world of racism in which we now certainly do live. From the blacks we would hear complaints of discrimination when a student got a bad test grade, whether jokingly or not. From the white students we would hear complaints of black students getting special treatment.
And i realized after reading this text that arguments about discrimination and special treatment only help to further divide us as a nation. I think both white people and black people should as they say, "grow-up" and just get over it!

Are They Truly "High Risk?"

I agree with Kim that education is important to today’s society as well as the future. Rose brings up an interesting point when he talks about his observation of students in the English A section. These students are consider “high risk” or “at risk” students primarily because they did not perform well on scholastic achievement tests. Once inside the class, he notices that after awhile these student come out of their comfort zone and participate in the class discussion. I agree with him that some students are poor test takers, but are truly intelligent people given the opportunity to express their opinions and thoughts. I feel that most of the problem comes from fear of failure. However, I do not think that classifying people with the terms “high risk” is appropriate based solely on a test. I think that Rose summed it up best with his sarcastic line, “These are the truly illiterate among us.” Today’s society places so much attention on results of tests, graduating high school and going to college. This is completely clear in the No Child Left Behind Act which is based solely on test results. Schools today teach somewhat useless information instead of practical lesson. Therefore, leaving the impression that if your not going to pursue higher education then taking calculus and biology are a waste of your time. I also agree with the chapter when it talks about the struggles of freshman. I think that it is true for most people that they have the fear in the back of their mind, “will I make it.” College is a new and different experience and causes us to change some of our former habits. The article continues by asking: is the educational system on the decline? I do not feel that it is declining because many students are pursue college or higher level education, however, it is not helping to prepare students for the real world.

A Bad Future for Education

I think that Rose brings up an interesting conversation about the welfare of America's schooling system. He makes the point that education is not judged by a particular standard, but that assessments of literary and scholastic acheivement involve cultural fears. I fear he has not stepped back from the situation. I think that education is the most important aspect of any society because without it, the future of society and the next generation would fall apart. America has the problem that it cannot decide what direction is best for education. Every year millions of kids graduate from schools that have not prepared or taught them enough to continue education or survive on their own. I think the reason for this is that culture on one hand has emphasized higher education and on the other hand dismissed it completely. Oprah had to travel all the way to Africa before she found children that actually wanted to learn. I think if they really wanted kids to continue schooling they would add classes that have practical value in the real world. Chemistry class is not going to help you with a flat tire or keep you safe in inner-city New York. Going to a job instead of school to support yourself is really a much more practical thing to do with the state of most schools today. I think the high school dropout rate is more a reflection of the schooling than on the individual student. I think the question that needs to be asked is not what needs to be done to teach kids, but what kind of generation do you want to leave for the future.

Reverse Racism, or How the pot Got to Call the Kettle Black

Another aspect of racism we need to think about is the fact that all races that were treated unfairly did not react the same way years later. African Americans surely hold it against the Whites for slavery. There is nothing Whites can do to take away the pain of what the African Americans suffered years ago. So of course the only solution should be to remind the Whites of the horrible things they have done and make their lives more difficult. African Americans should spend their lives searching for restitution. Any time that calls for the " Whites unfairly treating Blacks card" it should be played. This should not be the way to act, however many African Americans do act this way and society is beginning to accept it. This is why they are getting into college easier, receiving scholarships more easily, and receiving financial aid more easily. Now please note that the only thing African Americans initially wanted was to be treated equally. Do they realize that complaining and asking for special privileges makes them unequal?
Now lets take a look at the Jewish people. They were a part of a complete genocide. Six million of their brothers and sisters were wiped out for no reason. So what do they do now in the present? Do they walk into a grocery store, get treated badly, and walk out saying " They treated me that way because I'm Jewish." It seems as if they do not. They made better lives for themselves. Surely they do not forget or even forgive what happened to them years ago, but they realize that there is nothing anyone can do to turn the clocks back and make it never happen. So they live their lives as equally as everyone else without asking for special privliges. I could be wrong with my generalizations about these two groups of people but it is what I have found to be true in my life up to this point.

-Paul

Revising Affirmative Action

I agree with Ali that the current approach to affirmative action is openly racist. Beyond that, it's inefficient. The goal of affirmative action (at least as I see and through my understanding) is to assist underprivileged students in securing educational opportunities equal to that of well-off students. With this goal in mind, it's vital to remember that poverty is not a racial issue. There is certainly a correlation, but being poor does not make one black, just as being middle class or wealthy does not make one white. What I would like to propose is an affirmative action system based on socioeconomic area. I've seen middle-class, minority students receive grants and scholarships that could've and probably should've gone to economically disadvantaged students (who could've been of any race). How is it fair to a white student in inner city Philadelphia or Harrisburg to have a black student at Parkland or Cumberland Valley receive special treatment because of the assumption that black students are inherently screwed in the system? Yes, I know, long question. Sorry if the geographic references lost some people.
Am I suggesting that discrimination is no longer an issue in this country? Absolutely not. I recognize that many minority students, even once they get into a school of their choice, face bigoted viewpoints that can hinder their education. It sucks. Big time. I also recognize that many white students don’t appreciate the opportunity they have. For me, college wasn’t optional. My middle class family merely assumed that I’d go onto higher education. Of course, I couldn’t go to Harvard or Yale. I’m pretty sure I wouldn’t want too, either. For other families, the decision of post-secondary schooling isn’t so clear. Heck, post-elementary education isn’t always a guarantee. These disparities of opportunity are not synonymous with racial disparities, though. We need to reevaluate our approach to leveling the playing field.