Don’t Let Anything Stop You and Your Dream Big

“Class, this is our new student, Amanda Laine.” the girl’s new teacher, whose name she learned is Ms. Rybin, says to the class. She tells the green-eyed girl where to sit, so she sits. Amanda didn’t talk much the rest of the day.

What we call the American Dream, the founding fathers called the pursuit of happiness. The American Dream is built on the promise that individuals from all walks of life can find success and prosperity here. It shapes from our opinions, desires, interests, cultures, geographical locations, and religions. Some presume the dream of becoming an engineer, a medical doctor, an athlete, a politician, or even maybe following their father’s footsteps and carrying on the family tradition of owning a restaurant. Sometimes, achieving this success is associated with the conception of receiving an education, especially a college education. The common debate of today’s society has always been whether

We have all heard of this intense rollercoaster ride that we are on called the American Dream. The term was coined by James Truslow Adams in 1931 defining it as “dream of a land in which life should be better and richer and fuller for every man, with opportunity for each according to his ability or achievement.” Since it’s arrival, the Dream has evolved from a pursuit towards “freedom, mutual respect, and equal opportunity” (Shiller) to later one of greed described by Shiller as being “excessively lustful about homeownership and wealth” beginning in the 1960s. Traditionally, the American Dream included features of a nuclear family, that is one with a breadwinning father, a housewife, and two kids, owning a white picket fence home, thriving without financial worries, and a happy family. There has been a shift in focus for the Dream caused by the Millennial generation and in turn they have included features that place an emphasis on equality in all aspects of their lives from family life to the workplace placing their own twist on the Dream. The American Dream has evolved over time to include equal opportunities, college education, and happy family.

Young men and women choose to further their education with aspirations of achieving the American Dream. However, the American Dream is a vague outline of what everyone wants to be. It is someone who attains this who is an individual established in a thriving career, and has a loving and caring family. It is someone who is socially fit, who does not have to worry about financial troubles. A person who is a friend of many and disliked by few has come across this dream. Finally, the most significant factor to meeting this goal is that a person is pleased with the way life is.

In 1931 the phrase "American Dream" swept the world and continues to bring hope to many Americans today. James Truslow Adams book, The Epic of America, defines the term as a “dream of a land in which life should be better and richer and fuller for everyone, with opportunity for each according to ability or achievement.” This phrase continues to aspire hope Americans of a better life with endless possibilities. As time moves past the 1930s the pure reality of achieving the American Dream dwindles. Harsh realities quickly set in; people just are not making enough money to support themselves. Everyday costs such as health insurance, mortgages, transportation, and costs of pursing higher education depletes any chances of upward mobility on the social ladder. America creates establishes college to be a necessity by increasing tuition prices; this drastically affects the everyday American’s ability to afford it. The rising costs of achieving higher public education in the United Stated schooling system reflects the increasing enrollment rates correlating with the increasing amount of student loans creating a higher dropout rate than in previous generations.

When the children walked into the classroom, they all seemed excited and eager to start their day. Miss Suzy greeted each student with respect and a smile on her face. Every child seemed to know where

Phillip doesn’t like being in English Class. His teacher is Margaret Narwin. She is trying to come up with new ideas for the class. He would rather be running in track, then being in her class. Allison has a bit of a crush on Phillip Malloy. (Pages 1-19)

For the purpose of this paper, the American Dream will be defined as the idea that you can achieve financial stability through hard work, which often means going to college. The term “college” refers to any undergraduate or graduate program at a secondary institution. This paper aims to examine the relationship between

“Hello,” the teacher said. The class echoed her monotonously. “I’m Mrs. McEversons. First we’re going to get to know each other.”

When the bell rang, Hector and another student, Jose Cortez, walked with Riverside’s principal to Mrs. Robinson’s third grade classroom.

The students work on assigned classwork on the IPad. Bobby begins singing. Ms. Fizzle approaches Bobby to help him with the assignment. Ms. Frizzle walks away. Bobby stands up, and the teacher aide approaches and asks Bobby to have a seat he sits down and starts mumbling under his breath. Bobby begins staring around the classroom. Bobby looks at the IPad (class assignment) puts it away and walks to the back of the classroom and stands behind one of his classmate seats mumbling and singing to himself. Teacher Aide addresses Bobby behavior and asks him to return to the front of the class. His classmates begin snickering.

A new principal was hired at Kristina's elementary school, he was also her 4th grade teacher. He respected Kristina's opinion and listened to her pitch,

The first student was named Serena, grade 8 in Katie’s class, teachers pet, straight A student. She was asked to explain what happened and where she was during this incident. “ Well I was

Everything was the same, well except for Finn and Jessica. Finn was Charlie’s best friend since before he could remember, and Jessica was the love of Charlie’s life. “Hey Charlie boy!” Finn shouted. “Hi Charlie.” Jessica murmured timdly. “Hey guys. Man this place stinks, and I’ll just never get used to waking up every morning for something I hate.” Charlie grunted. “I hate it too man, but my Pops would kill me if I didn't get good marks, and I mean kill me.” Finn explained. “Same here Charlie, I don’t think anyone really likes school, but I do well anyways. You know maybe we could all study together sometime.” Jessica said. Charlie jumped on this opportunity to hang with Jessica outside of school. “Yes! I mean um...sure I will see if I can.” Charlie eagerly said. Charlie glanced around and noticed a guy standing against a locker down the hall. “Hey guys, I should probably get to class.” Charlie said skeptically. “What do you mean Charlie? There is still 10 minutes until class starts.” Finn questioned. “ I just got to go man!” Charlie said. As Charlie approached the boy against the locker, he reached into his bag for the money he

Gruwell would not be able to teach them during their Junior year. After strong bonding together after experiencing the different “luxuries” and growing with each other in many ways and become a family, finding out this news hit them really hard and they wanted to find a way to fight it, at first with some more violent and/or illegal options. But even this experience of being told they were going to be separated helped bring them closer. In the end after proving that the students tests scores and grades were going up and the competence of their journals being turned into a book like format, Ms. Gruwell won the battle with the Board of Education and would be able to teach her students for their Junior and Senior years which filled the students with much happiness due to discovering that they would be together and experience more that would help them grow, most likely involving more