The most important insight that James Tierney shared with the class is that Maine is in “big trouble”. In the first two minutes of Tierney’s speech he reiterated that point multiple times. I would agree with Tierney, Maine is in troubled times. The states average age keeps getting higher and higher. Maine is also one of the whitest states in the country. Tierney's insight on how to fix this problem was something that I agree with. To fix the demographic issue, we need to have an open sign, but as Tierney said, Mainer's hate change. The big issue I see is that diversity is not taught in schools. I came from Lee Academy so I had a different experience than most high school students in Maine. Lee Academy is private school that boards students …show more content…
As Tierney said, he went on to teach at Harvard and Yale, so you know that he has to be truly gifted at what he does. The University of Maine law school missed a great professor and possibly one that could have changed the schools low ranking. The final thing that I found interesting in Tierney’s presentation was his fact on Minneapolis. Minneapolis has the largest Somali population in the United States. I associate Somalia with being warm, so it is interesting that Minneapolis is where the greatest population of Somalis is. As Tierney said though, Minneapolis had a come on in sign and let the Somali people come in with no hassle. It is to bad that Maine did not try to push harder to get more Somali immigrants, it certainly could have done good. Maine people just do not seem welcoming though. I can remember from my high school basketball days, we would always have a couple players from around the world and that created great tension. Many of the opposing teams fans would begin chanting U.S.A. and bring in American flags to wave. There also were a lot of racial slurs that were just utterly disgraceful. It is a shame that many of the people in Maine hate change. I consider myself a conservative and personally I say come on in, we could use the help. So as long as you work or at least try to find a job then there should be a place in this state for you. I believe that Tierney’s
Shankman discusses the view of the war, and the sinking of the Maine, from the perspective of the Methodist church. Throughout the church there was varying opinions of the explosion and the war itself. Some people believed that the war would be necessary, while others believed there was no need for a war. IN an editorial from a New York Methodist newspaper in April 1898: "Should we now go to war," insisted the Syracuse Northern Christian Advocate, "our cause will be just, and Methodism will be ready to do its full duty. Every Methodist preacher will be a recruiting officer” (Shankman, 1973). However, in the south, the Southern Christian Advocate pushed for people to help send aid to the Cubans that are refugees and on the island; some groups even set up soup kitchens and churches donated some money as charity. These opinions helped spread the divide after the attack on the Maine:
Sean Reardon of the Center for Education Policy Analysis wrote, “If we do not find ways to reduce the growing inequality in education outcomes – between the rich and the poor – schools will no longer be the great equalizer we want them to be.” President Obama’s “Race to the Top” policy will perpetuate race and class inequality in America’s education system. Low-income students as a group already have poorer academic performance, grade point averages and standardized test scores, than higher-income students. In “Ain’t No Makin It,” author Jay Macleod depicts the Adjustment Class taught by Jimmy Sullivan as an example of how “culturally responsive pedagogy” can motivate students academically while helping them maintain their street identities. The Obama Administration’s 2009, "Race to the Top" competition has been greatly damaging to lower income schools around the country, by enforcing policies that making it much less likely that students will have minority teachers with shared backgrounds like Jimmy Sullivan.
This experience of addressing the needs of the fourth largest public school system in the country has provided me unique insights into the challenges faced by schools at the K-12 level, including those of English learners” 9, Energy and Environment – “Florida’s 26th Congressional District is home to some of our country’s greatest natural treasures, including the Everglades and Biscayne National Parks and the Florida Keys National Marine Sanctuary” 10, Foreign Affairs – “I have the utmost respect for the men and women who wear our nation’s uniform and work every day to secure the freedoms and liberties we as Americans are privileged to enjoy. Our Congressional District is honored to be home to both the U.S. Coast Guard Sector Key West and Naval Air Station Key West, along with hundreds of service members who reside in South Florida” 11, Health Care – “I believe that all Americans strive for and deserve a healthcare system that is both affordable and efficient. The dramatically increasing cost of healthcare, troubling classification standards for employer provided plans, and importance of medical research are a few of my top priorities. Ultimately, affordable healthcare must be accessible to every hard-working American family. I will continue to work to ensure that our nation’s healthcare system is serving the best interests of the American people” 12, Transportation – “The need for dedicated, long-term funding for transportation and infrastructure projects is vital to alleviating the congestion problems that plague South Florida” 13, Veterans –“Our nation owes its military veterans a debt of gratitude for their service and sacrifices. Each took an oath, lived by a code, and stood ready to offer themselves in defense of their country. The lives we live today, and the freedoms we enjoy, have been preserved by their protection. Too many of these noble service
“Originally published in 2006, Mississippi Politics quickly became the definitive work on the state’s political history, campaigns, legislative battles, and litigation, as well as how Mississippi shaped and was shaped by national and regional trends.” While the second edition of the book still shows Mississippi’s gradual change from a blue state to a red state, it also examines the aftermath of Haley Barbour’s re-election campaign in 2007 along with the 2008 presidential elections. The one thing that I found most interesting about this book has nothing to do with its contents but everything to do with the two authors Jere Nash and Andy Taggart. Jere Nash is a well known Democrat who has held many political positions including chief of
For centuries, the citizens of many European nations were under the firm ruling of a monarch, where any kind of individualism was nearly impossible to acquire. Looking for an escape from the corrupt tyrannies, seeking religious freedom and economic gains, immigrants from different nations fled to the New World to seize the upcoming opportunities of a new life. Once a profuse amount of settlers had arrived and with adequate time, leaders within various colonies created several documents and early attempts of autonomous government, such as the Virginia House of Burgesses (1619), the Mayflower Compact (1620), and the Fundamental Orders of Connecticut (1639). Also, two large events; the Enlightenment, a philosophical movement, and the ruling of
We the people whom live in thee New England Colonies who were originally from Great Britain called Puritans and Pilgrims are more of the peaceful type of people whom worship God. We are people whom want to change the Church of England but saw no change, so we went to the The New England Colonies to get away from their religious persecution. We are not brutal people such as the people living in Georgia in the Southern Colonies and are not yet prepared to fight in a war. The people here came over to worship the way that pleased them. We the people surrounding the busy port cities of the Boston harbor lived in small towns or villages and church was the center of our daily life. We settled in the Massachusetts
“Education in our country is the social service equivalent of Katrina. Part of the challenge that we face in this nation is that we have to confront the fact that we have systems that are designed essentially to fail kids,” states Geoffrey Canada in his address at the Social Justice Leadership Conference (Newport, 2011). Canada has an innate ability to blatantly state the problems facing communities in this country. However he is not just talking; he is doing something about it.
I participate in a tutoring program for elementary students in Dorchester, an underserved community in Boston. Working with the children has helped me eliminate preconceived ideas that led me to believe schools were bad because the parents did not pay enough attention to their children's educations. I now realize that the problems in education have more to do with the amount of funding that goes into certain schools. Ignorance and distance from reality caused me to believe that struggling neighborhoods inherently produce bad students. I now understand that the problems within the school do not reflect the students’ abilities.
She then introduces Donald Trump and talk about how he isn’t exceptional and follows the same ideology as his Republican counterparts. Briggs further emphasizes that 53% of white women voted for Trump. The women supported his anti-feminist agenda that targeted planned parenthood and maternity care. Additionally, they supported conversion therapy for gay people and bathroom bills aimed at transgender people. Briggs also talks about how Evangelical Christian right is more powerful in Trump’s administration than ever before which include Jeff Sessions, Betsy Devos and dozens of judicial appointees. So, in defense of reproductive labor, k-12 teaching has been seen increasingly as like care work. So, Parkland student movement and teachers’ strikes are about refusing to see schools as a “private” responsibility and they demand for political accountability for funding and safety. Briggs believes that no political party has a solution for our problems. An outsider is the solution to these reforms and the rise of new social movements in the last 5 years such #MeToo and #BlackLivesMatter will bring significant change in society. After attending the lecture, I could relate some of
These platforms dehumanize immigrants, abandoning their needs and contributing to the “ghetto-ization” of their communities. This means that they are continuously left with the “worst housing in the worst neighborhoods” as local policymakers fail to facilitate their economic and political integration (Sandercock 18). Somalis original came to Lewiston because they benefited from what the community had to offer, but an increasingly hostile environment has left them feeling unwelcome. Maine is coping with a rapidly dwindling population, meaning that the state will be unable to sustain it’s workforce as young people leave the state for opportunities elsewhere (Gibney). But here is where refugees could be saviors, as statistics show that Somali’s are eager to get jobs and enter the workforce in Maine. Evidently, the Somali community has a higher graduation rate then native students, with the majority attending Maine’s colleges to get degrees to become teachers, doctors, engineers (Galofaro). But as Maine’s politicians continuously fail to address racial tensions, our state faces the “worst of both worlds: expending resources to house and educate refugee newcomers, only to see the next generation leave in search of a more welcoming environment”
Many said racism will cease after the 1960s, but we are living in the 21st century and yes people are still racist to all the ones that are not their "same kind". He mentions the opportunity of more diverse schools, for me that was just like, " Are you Kidding Me?" I attend a very diverse college where I have had Asian, White, African Americans, Jewish, Hispanics, and Arab classmates, and he comes to that bullet point when we have that already in society and we still have discrimination and racism. If a school isn't diverse enough we should the parents why their children don’t attend a school that has a lot of African Americans and Latinos, but private schools tend to be a better choice. Sometimes even teachers have discriminatory comments towards their students and you don’t need to be Einstein to read that between lines. Then he goes on mentioning an example that it would improve public transportation by connecting the "creative class" with working class. That sentence was like humm….
Minnesota has a long history of welcoming immigrants. The motive why earlier European immigrants immigrated to Minnesota was primarily economic in nature. For example, “The opening of Minnesota to white settlement coincided with peak immigration years for Germans seeking farms and jobs in America.” Norwegians also came to Minnesota due to “wrenching economic changes.” Another motivation that Germans and Scandinavians forced to settle in Minnesota was the lure of free land. Unlike, those earlier immigrants, the Somalis are quite different. For example, the first wave of immigrants came here legally under the aegis of refugee resettlement of agencies. Somalis did not immigrate to Minnesota to seek free land, but they came to this
He also talked about the increasing secondary school dropout rate of the Blacks. He said that this high dropout rate is what stopping the Black community to progress. In addition to that, he mentioned what happened during the “Brown Vs. Board of Education”. Before, there were
Listening to the video jogged my memory at the conception of the clip. Hearing the testimonial, “There was no place for us in school,” is a heartbreaking, interesting statement and it is a factual statement. I understand a fact is a piece of information used as evidence. Simply considering the account that the young man makes and reflecting upon the curriculum in schools, stereotypes set through display by the media vividly illustrates his statement as a fact throughout American history. As a young girl, my grandmother would tell me stories about her childhood. She was born December 22, 1905, as a sweet girl with blonde hair and blue eyes in Kauffman, Texas. Within the community she was raised White people frowned upon her and Black people treated her as if she was a offspring from a villain. She would tell me she was called ‘nigger girl’ by the White kids and ‘white girl’ by the Black kids in the neighborhood. My grandmother would tell me her features reminded the White family what they did to her grandmother and the Black families were disgraced to know in her blood was a mixture of the White family. I recall being told how the Black kids would pull on her hair saying, “You ain’t Black, look at yo’ hair. You ain’t Black look at yo’ skin.” While tears would roll down from her face, I’d say, “I am happy you are not around those mean people anymore.” My emotions included a sense of feeling completely lost, entrapped internally until the day I was greeted at school by
As stated above, State Schools Chief Jack O’Connell believes that student’s education should be protected and invested in the future. Our government had a critical mission which is preparing students for productive futures. What he means by this is that we should have an educated, highly skilled workforce that can compete in the global economy for our state’s long term success, but since our resources are excessively depleted, we cannot succeed in achieving this necessary. He felt that the governor and legislature was not fair or responsible approach to closing this budget gap, especially the vital state services such as education. He argued that we can talk about courage, but it is just a word and it will not be useful until it is supporting by the right kind of action. By the way, the right kind of