Rethinking Information Technology And Its Effects On The World Wide Web

Brittany LamberthProfessor Wells English 102June 15, 2018Paul Krugman, agrees that the country is becoming economically diverse bit by bit. The middle ground amongthe richest and poorest is vanishing, and inequality is`widespread. His essay, “Confronting inequality” revealsonly how inequalityaffects us, but, as McClelland opposes, how recurringinequality can be. He references a study performed by the National Center for Education informationfrom the 1988 to 2003, in which eighth grade students were arrangedboth by academic skilland the socioeconomic rankof their parents, and the college graduation percentage. If our educational system truly gave all students equivalentopportunities, then we would expect the graduation rates to depend onlyon

The inequality of education in the United States is a pressing societal issue that has been the main catalyst for the division between the social classes. Education is a public good, and thus if it used by one consumer then it will not reduce the availability to another consumer. Education can also be considered the largest single factor in determining a person’s success and quality of life in society today.

Recently there has been a lot of debate about the importance of college education. Students are asking if it’s worth the debt to attend a four year university or community college. Some are thinking what are the benefits of a degree is in the workforce. With college tuition increasing and state fundings lowering, low income students are struggling to attain a higher education. College institutions should have a role to provide students higher education and equal opportunity to students to increase social mobility yet intergenerational reproduction of privilege has produced inequality in education.

College is the next stepping stone to better or advance ones social standing in life, whether it is moving from a blue collar lifestyle to white collar, or to continue to further their career path. However, it comes with an “unavoidable result.” Alfred Lubrano discusses this “unavoidable result” in his text “The Shock of Education: How College Corrupts.” Lubrano discusses the topic of how furthering ones education opens more possibilities but at the same time distances those held most dearly. He explains that the more knowledge gained, the bigger the gap caused between friends and family due to differences in levels of knowledge. That distance is greatly increase if one comes from a poorer region where blue collar workers are the social

is through socioeconomic status. According to Sean Reardon, a main outcome of the widening income gap for families has been a widening gap in achievement among children, which he refers to as the income achievement gap (Reardon, 2011). Therefore, the children of the poor remain at an educational disadvantage when their parents’ income becomes as much of a predictor of their educational achievements, as their parents’ educational obtainment. To emphasize the results of the income achievement gap, Reardon states, “As the children of the rich do better in school, and those who do better in school are more likely to become rich, we risk producing an even more unequal and economically polarized society” (Reardon, 2011, p. 111). For example, as standardized testing shifted towards standardized achievement testing to determine a student’s academic achievement, parental investment in their children’s cognitive development began to increase. Educational disparities occur when affluent families can very easily afford tutoring outside of the classroom for their children to perform highly, while children being raised in impoverished homes are at a disadvantage, and at a lower chance of doing well on these exams. This becomes problematic when SAT reading, math, and writing scores increase with income as exemplified by the disproportionately small amount of minority students in higher education (Brand lecture,

With the growing importance of higher education, more people than ever are attending college. According to a middle-class parent, “[Higher education] seen as a means of developing a career and getting secure employment.” (30, Higher Education, social class and social mobility) Moreover, “parents believe that their children need a university education to get on in life… over the past decades (parents) fearful that without a degree their children will be in danger of downward social mobility. (32, Higher

In “The Dangers of Telling Poor Kids That College Is the Key to Social Mobility”, Andrew Simmons, a high school teacher who teaches in a poor area of Los Angeles, argues that higher education’s educational opportunities should be the main promotion for students to attend college. The author’s purpose is to inform and persuade his readers to accept his view on what he sees as a problem of the education system. According to Simmons, teachers focus on the economic advantages that higher education could bring instead of the actual education these institutions offer. Because of this promotion, students in poorer areas focus on their potential wealth instead of their future education while students in wealthier areas focus on their future careers

Throughout the world, social classes tend to separate people into groups. Everything depends on a person’s experience with wealth and power. Therefore, the levels of education determine the value of a person. In the articles, “Blue-Collar Brilliance” and “Why Colleges Shower Their Students with A’s” by Rose and Staples, they go in depth about how education and wealth plays a significant role in today’s society.

Kathleen Blanco, the 54th governor of the U.S. state of Louisiana, once pointed out that “ Every educated person is not rich, but almost every education person has a job and a way out of poverty. So education is a fundamental solution to poverty.” It is almost gratuitous to say that everyone desires a higher education. And why not? It is perhaps the best way to avoid a life of poverty; a life in which one must struggle to meet the basic necessities of life. Unfortunately, not everyone has the opportunity to receive a higher education, especially students living in poverty, who are often forced to live on a day-to-day basis, let alone even think about school. Poverty deprives these students the quality education they are entitled to, thus inhibiting their potential for future success. This predicament has contributed to a widening racial wealth gap that is not only a threat to the individual’s themselves and the economy, but also a significant threat to upward mobility, which is defined as the ability of an individual to climb up the socioeconomic ladder. One particular factor that has and continues to contribute to this widening racial wealth gap is the lack of a college education among these low-income students. More importantly, this lack of college education is the direct result of a poor-quality K-12 education, especially in poverty-stricken neighborhoods. To mitigate the prevalent racial wealth gap, each

I article “ educating for Privilege” the author states that more wealthier children, whose economic status higher, are receiving better opportunities for better education. He states that “tuition increases have dramatically”, “ Only about 10 percent of the cohort comes from the bottom 50 percent”, “no one even thinks of expanding our student bodies or reducing the costs of instruction”, “the academy itself has to remember that professional education is a public good, not merely a private one.” A lot of powerful evidences were provided. And this leads me to the question of why this is acceptable. Why poverty and social status are still the main obstacles on the way to a scientific career. The difficulties faced by students from low-income

In “Inequality by Design”, the argument is made that social environment affects where individuals end up, not individual talent or market capitalism (Fischer et al 1996). This social environment includes advantages and disadvantages we get from our parents, the resources our friends share can share with us, quantity and quality of schooling, and the historical era we are born in (Fischer et al 1996). The argument made in “Inequality by Design”, is closely related what shapes one’s trajectory into college. Though college may not be the final destination in “where we end up” as stated in the argument, college is a large contributing factor to where we end up and the social environment affects has a large effect on one’s trajectory into college. When looking back on my trajectory into college, I can see that my social environment had a large part in shaping my path to college, however some factors of the social environment had a larger role than others. In Gregor Aisch and his colleges article “You Draw It: How Family Income Predicts Children’s College Chances” (2015), it is shown that this is true not only for myself but also for children who were born around 1980. The income percentile of children’s parents, which is a factor of the child’s social environment, is closely related to whether or not the children attend college. Within this paper we will discuss the advantages and disadvantages that my social environment gave me on my trajectory to college and how parent’s income

America suffers from a lack of economic equality; the population is divided into social classes. Per Mantsios, the upper fifteen percent control eighty-five percent of the nations’ wealth. This attributes the other eighty-five percent of the population the remaining fifteen percent of the nations’ wealth. The people born into a high economic standing can afford better education which prepares them for better jobs. And those who are born into a lower economic standing are more expected to enter low income schools and conditioned for labor jobs. Higher income families, those of the fifteen percent, are more likely to have children that will obtain a better education. This leaves the other eighty-five percent of the population that make up the lower and middle class to seemingly reduced education and public schooling which is only available for free up until the twelfth grade. The population consisting of the lower class, who can’t afford higher education, are less likely to continue to go to college; this only narrows their options for jobs. Those in the upper class will have a better education and obtain higher positions in companies than those in the lower class.

Each one of us has specific talents, that when cultivated correctly, have the potential to advance society as a whole. This is self evident. Why then, even though education is compulsory and supposedly equal in America's public school system, is there a conspicuous education gap between certain communities; especially in the STEM fields? My hypothesis is that the basis of this issue lies in the teaching method of most urban public schools, and I am ready to start my own research to find an answer.

In Samuel Bowel’s and Herbert Gintis’ Education and Inequality, Bowels and Gintis investigate how education in the United States is unequal, especially to those indivduals who are financially unstable. In today’s extremely judgmental society, many are at a disadvantage based solely on their class, race, sex, etc. The quality of one’s education is compromised for a number of unfair reasons having to do with artificial inequalities.

America is often enamored of itself as the champion of equality in every aspect of its society; however, this is often not the case. This is true in every aspect of life, but is very evident specifically in the American education system. Although America claims to give an equal education to all, regardless of any external factors, economic class often plays a role in what type and how good of an education a student may receive. Since education is the basis for future success, this inequity resulting from socioeconomic status implies that this is where inequality in everyday life starts, and that the system generates this inequality. If this is true, then one might ask, what then is the purpose of education? If economic class predetermines