Education Failure Of The Great Depression

Public education in America began in the early to mid-19th century with the simple goal of “uniting the American population by instilling common moral and political values” (Spring, 2012, p. 5). Our country was founded by men who designed the constitution so that it could be amended to accommodate changing political and social climates. They believed in the ideology of the American dream which “holds out a vision of both individual success and the collective good of all” (Hochschild & Scovronick, 2004, p. 1). It is with this same ideology that our public schools were

The Great Depression was a dark time in American history that lasted from1929-1939. It began after the Stock Market crashed on October 19, 1929. According to A Biography of America: FDR- The Great Depression, “It was the deepest and longest lasting economic downturn in American History” (A Biography of America). As a result of the Great Depression one out of every four Americans was out of work. The Great Depression resulted in a life for Americans that was plagued by overproduction and under-consumption of products, starving families were forced into bread and soup lines, and thousands of agricultural workers became migratory workers in order to survive.

Public education has faced many extreme challenges and obstacles historically. Based on the films I’ve viewed I think the top issues were segregation and poverty. Segregation in schools started in the 1800s and continued until the 1960s. I learned mostly about the problems with segregation in the film A Struggle for Education Equality. In the film, it explains facts and statistics about children and how their lives were like. From around the time period of 1950-1980 schools were very much segregated and only ⅗ of students graduated and 50% of them went to college. The fight for equality in schools began in Topeka Kansas where high schools became integrated. Elementary schools, however, were not integrated and still segregated. The NAACP tried to have 13 parents try to enroll their kids into white school but of course, it failed because of segregation. Linda Brown was one of the children in the experiment and that’s when the Brown v Board of Education of Topeka of 1954 was created which banned the inequality in schools. The southern states still had segregation problems, unfortunately, but the Elementary and Secondary Education Act gave 4 billion dollars of aid to disadvantaged children and around 9 years after that, 91% of southern black children attended integrated schools. Segregation had clearly gotten so much better but was a major problem for a long time in terms of public education. Poverty, in my opinion, is another major problem facing public education today. In

The American Education System is not meeting the needs of current students. If anything, the system is not building a sturdy foundation for the future working class. Schools have existed for many years and every period they have worked differently. However, every school’s main purpose was to educate students to be efficacious later in life. Modern day schools are corrupting students with added pressure, standardized tests, making less accommodations for special education students, not following laws, and take away individualism from the students’. The students of modern times are the people of our future and the future does not look too bright with the current American Education System.

The greatest country in the world still has problems evenly distributing education to its youth. The articles I have read for this unit have a common theme regarding our education system. The authors illustrate to the reader about the struggles in America concerning how we obtain and education. Oppression, politics, racism, and socioeconomic status are a few examples of what is wrong with our country and its means of delivering a fair education to all Americans.

"In other periods of depression, it has always been possible to see some things which were solid and upon which you could base hope... but as I look around about, I now see nothing to give ground to hope.” This great quote was made by former president, Coolidge. In the great depression people in cities and towns already lost too many jobs. Farmers struggles have already been happening since the 1920s, and farmers tried to do anything to save their farms. However, farmers may have been better off than city folk. The government tried to pitch in multiple times, but did not succeed as people hoped. After the great depression, people were all shaken up and scared. Also Hoover, was not very much liked during this time

The 1960s to many Americans at the time, was, and continues to be referred to as the

Nations like the U.S and Germany choose to combat the Great Depression through their respective political ideologies and nations like U.S and Britain countered the Great Depression through the creation of public works. Unlike other nations that found internal solutions to the Great Depression, Japan combated the Great Depression externally by expansion. Japan and Britain both counter the Great Depression by placing an emphasis on the development of resources. Unlike other nations, U.S funded governmental organizations and used banking reforms. Both U.S and Germany are combating the Great Depression through their own respective political ideology.

Do you want to live in a dictatorship? During the Great Depression President Franklin D. Roosevelt said “True individual freedom cannot exist without economic security and independence. People who are hungry and out of a job are the stuff of which dictatorships are made of”. The Great Depression in the United States began after the stock market crash of October 1929 because Americans gambled on the stock market with money they didn’t really have and when the prices of stocks started to drop panicked investors tried to bail out. Investors dumped shares. A record 12.9 million shares was traded on October 24, 1929, “Black Thursday”, then five days later on October 29, 1929, “Black Tuesday”, 16 million

Since 1983 public education has been an issue in America. The system has been constantly changing every year with reforms. This constant change has been driven by the American people’s perception that education has declined and something should be done about it. First there was an increased emphasis on basic skills, making school years longer and more graduation requirements. Second, many began focusing on increasing teachers professionalism. Third, they began restructuring many things such as how the schools were organized and how the school day was structured etc. Now today the most of the American people believe that not enough money is given to public schooling. They associate academic improvement with the money the school is funded.

"In other periods of depression, it has always been possible to see some things which were solid and upon which you could base hope, but as I look about, I now see nothing to give ground to hope-nothing of man" stated Former President Calvin Coolidge during the Great Depression. The Great Depression affected almost everyone in the United States. People had to learn to live on less, and still enjoy life when they could. When the stock market crashed, people were forced to payback their loans that they used to buy stocks. Most people had to sell their belongings in order to get money for their debts. Some people even had to sell their cars and

“Failure is only the opportunity to begin again, only this time more wisely”. Seeing the light at the end of the tunnel was the only hope the people had during the Great Depression. It was the worst economic crisis in U.S. History. It was a time that could only be described as something horrible. Something that impacted many American lives. A time when all that people wanted was for it to end. A time that came all of a sudden and left a mark on many people.

The Great Depression was an economic failure pretty much everything crashed and for the economy to be down for ten years that was a long time. The Great Depression started when the stock market crashed panicking millions of investors. When the Great Depression reached the top point there were millions of Americans with out jobs. The Civil War improved the economy up North but the South was a different story. Since the Civil War freed slaves the number of people unemployed and able to work double or even tripled. The North experienced a railroad boom as railroads were built with the government support behind it. The westward expansion and better transportation also was benefited. There were a lot of reason why the north was better after the

“personal assertion of existential meaning in a universe of potential cosmic meaninglessness” (Mast, 246). In the adventure films and Westerns, heroes are willing to challenge authority for their personal beliefs and feelings. They take actions based on individual beliefs, definitions of right and wrong, and the urge to complete their personal goals and dreams. The helpless antiheroes in screwball comedies present the situation during the Great Depression from another aspect. They cannot make choices themselves because of others’ intervention, and unfortunate things just happen to them. The denial of humanness is one feature of antiheroes. Powerlessness of antiheroes in the ridiculous world definitely reflects the desperate situation faced by the Americans during the Great Depression.

Public schools are in crisis, and not because of any shortages of public funds (more money is spent on public education than ever before, but with declining results). Many people like to think the problem with our schools is precisely that they are public: "Government schools" are run like the rest of