Current Issues Facing The American Education System Essay

Frederick Douglass was, and still is, a golden example of why education is so important to

Another major predicament that plays a large role in the amount of African Americans that do not receive a higher education is once they get to college, they do not have a typical or enjoyable experience once there. In today’s society, it is hard to imagine that there is still racism and segregation in schools and colleges today but the reality is, it still does very much exist. This is especially true when black students attend predominantly white universities. Even though most colleges promote themselves by talking about how diverse their

Today, African American students are under-represented in college and universities, and the reason is the ongoing disenfranchisement of African American students. Our education system needs be more responsive and needs to pay more attention to the college preparation for these students. People of color historically have been misrepresented, exploited, silenced, and taken for granted in education research (Dillard, 2000; Stanfield, 1995), (H. Richard Milner IV, 2008).

These days, a college degree serves as one of the few tickets into a socially and economically comfortable lifestyle. College itself, ideally, should vastly increase the knowledge, skills, and capacity for critical thinking in its students. However, in this racially imbalanced society, college is the culmination of a white-weighted education, and often ignores its own participation in long-standing racial injustices and inequities. Minority students are expected to jump headlong into white standards of behavior, without regard for the unique circumstances that render that expectation difficult, if not impossible, to meet.

College is a privilege that is now accessible to many people. It has not always been this way though. Lack of money, being deprived of representation, or racism hindered one’s chances in to getting into higher education, especially a minority’s chance. In order to raise against the barriers, President John F. Kennedy created the affirmative action program to provide equal opportunities for everyone, whether in education or in the workforce. Even if this was a program created in the 1960’s, problems continue to present itself as shown through the many court cases, such as Brown vs. Board of Education, Fisher vs. University of Texas, Grutter vs. Bollinger et al, and Hopwood vs. State of Texas. Thus, racial inequality and affirmative action

What can be defined as school in America or who created and contributed to the modern school system? My fundamental question was what are the significant contributions (and who contributed) to America’s present school system? Schools in America have gone back years since 1635 starting in Boston, Massachusetts which lead to the first school being named the Boston Latin school. With the opening of the first school many teachers and leaders focused on religious values instead of specific subject areas as we would today. However, there have been changes in the way we teach the future generations that are different from the 1600s. In order to see these changes we have to take a time machine back to the 1800s, 1990s, and 2000s. The 1800s brought Americans the common school movement, Horace Mann, the Committee of Ten, and the Prussian system in America. In addition great advancements have been made in the school system, but not as much advancement has been made since the 1800s. This can be a problem as the internet and technology blossomed in the late 1990s and today many teachers have questioned if we should really teach the same way we did almost 180 years ago. From the past we have gotten common core, standardized testing or teaching children as if they are on an assembly line which all come into question in today’s school system. Programs such as KIPP or Khan academy are showing how children can be in classrooms that are more student led. Also first year teachers can find a way

It has been 50 years since the Civil Rights Act of 1964 intended to end discrimination on the basis of race, color, religion sex or national origin. It ended racial segregation in the workplace, schools and in public venues, gave all Americans the right to vote, and protection against police brutality. The Civil Rights Act represents a national commitment to end discrimination in education and has resulted in removing barriers to educational opportunities for underrepresented populations of women and people of color. According to the U.S. Department of Education, enrollment for women and people of color in higher education programs has steadily increased. However, gaps still exist between underrepresented student populations with

I can really look back at high school and say, “what did I learn?” and “how is it helping me today in life?” Because it really hasn’t helped at all. Being in my second year out of high school I can honestly say I’ve learned more on my own and on the fly then what I learned in school. Everything I learned was just to turn in assignments and pass tests to pass school but really have me learn the curriculum. A student who has a straight F can have an exemplary IQ and a student who just turns everything in can be a lot lower. Jack Schneider said, “Everything in American education is broken”, he further explains that, the educational system simply stopped working, its aged, declined, and broke but also felt like the system certainly didn’t need to changed. In the Article the Schneider is very skeptical about supporting the topic. The Author does not completely support the topic because of his skeptics.

Currently the U.S. has a major problem on its hands, education today is constantly losing money while we put more of that money and time into our prisons rather than our schools. By showing kids that it is more important to be tough on crime than it is for a proper education is wrong. If these practices continue you can expect to see higher drop-out rates and larger prison populations. Education should be the U.S.’s top priority and we should take pride in the greatest education system in the world. Education provides students not with just knowledge but ethics, character development and self-esteem which are important skills for the workplace and in life. That is why it is

“Minority Serving Institutions (MSIs) are an understudied institutional type. The dearth of data has not only resulted in general misunderstandings about them, but also means that there are many rich veins of research waiting to be explored” (Commodore, Abiola, Ramos, & Gasman, 2015, p. 2). The “misunderstanding” that often surrounds MSIs extends to both women’s colleges and Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs) and the students who choose to attend them. These institutions must balance their unique histories and specific missions, while simultaneously adapting to an ever-changing social landscape. While women’s colleges must fight the traditional ideas of what a woman is and is not, HBCUs must address systems of

In 1635, the first American public school was founded (historyeducationinfo.com). Located in Boston Massachusetts, and soon to spread all over, our American Right, to a free and public education still exist today. Unfortunately recent studies suggest that the American Education system might be broken. In the 2013 PISA Education Ratings of international developed countries, America ranked 28th out of 34. These results were mind blowing as America at the same time, also ranked fifth, in most amount of money spent on education. These uneasy numbers led to change in congress and in 2001, under President Bush, the “No Child Left Behind” bill was passed.

Although many Americans attest to the validity of a sound American education, the darkest secrets of this glorified giant have yet to be revealed to the public to expose it as the greatest enemy of the rising youth in contemporary culture. Beginning with the rise of the Common Core Initiative as well as the No Child Left Behind Act; youth has been tossed into an industrialized education where the government has top priority in reformation of learning techniques while schools, who shape the students themselves, have the lowest priority. This is all possible due to the rising number of teachers heeding the “Initiative,” using invalid strategies for instruction—homework becoming the dominant source for reinforcement of fundamental concepts. The habits formed by students in high school indubitably carry over to post-secondary education; as a result, the recent graduates are unprepared for what awaits them in the next steps of rigorous education. Public American Education was founded upon fine values; however, the end results don’t justify the means of education as more and more youth are thrusted from the “Race to the Top” into a competitive “Race to Nowhere,” ill-equipped to face the real problems of the world; thus, the public education system is inadequate to bring up the future leaders of this nation.

about because of how much it has changed from the past to the present. Education first was

In a publication titled ‘Black Women in Academe’, author Yolanda Moses describes how “isolation, invisibility, hostility, indifference, and a lack of understanding of the Black women’s experiences are all too often part of the climate Black women may face on campuses” (Moses, 1989). The detrimental environment surrounding these women frequently results in sullenness, lack of social assertiveness, and belief that they are less competent than male students. Even if time spent at an academic institution is minimal, with this kind of prejudice faced at an early age, any woman- black or otherwise, would suffer the rest of their life. In response to the discrimination faced at universities, some have created programs to aid black students and other minorities; these programs tend to generalize the needs of all its black students and do not fully support black women specifically.

Karkouti (2016) states that, the dedication of higher education to students of color has continually to be destroyed and the environment of the country as contributed to this issue regarding racial issues in our economy. Higher education is a predominantly White environment and students of color have to fit in this culture that is not necessarily made for them to be there. Even the faculty is outnumbered greatly with only “17%” of faculty is of color at institutions (Karkouti, pp. 60, 2016). After graduating from high-school attending college is considered a “social mobility and gateway” that helps people raise their level of education on a social and economical level that can create many opportunities for their future. Ethnic minorities were