For centuries, teenagers have fought with their parents over the amount of freedom they should have. Parents always fight to reel in their child’s freedom, while teens argue that they need more privileges. While parents certainly have an argument in protecting their kids from the big, scary world, ultimately teenagers need to be exposed to the dangers of everyday life in order to prepare them for entering it on their own. If they have no real-life experience, they cannot be expected to handle it well when they leave their parents’ houses. In order to teach kids responsibility and life skills, kids should be allowed freedom to work and be out on their own, but have certain restrictions on a case-to-case basis in terms of curfews and household obligations. …show more content…
Columnist Lenore Skenazy of the New York Sun decided to provide her child with freedom and responsibility. Her son asked to be left somewhere and find his way home. She provided him with little more than some cash and a subway map and decided to see if he could find his way home. She writes, “I trusted him to figure out that he should take the Lexington Avenue subway down, and the 34th Street crosstown bus home. If he couldn’t do that, I trusted him to ask a stranger. And then I even trusted that stranger not to think, ‘Gee, I was about to catch my train home, but now I think I’ll abduct this adorable child instead’ Long story short: My son got home, ecstatic with independence” (The New York). This quote proves how important an independent experience can be to a child. If they can see that they can handle a dangerous, real world situation, they will be far better prepared to face those situations every day than a teen who does not have those
Is anything in life really free? If college is free, what is the point of trying to work hard and to try to go above beyond? “Free tuition colleges could make college seem less important” (Lobosco). It would make it seem less important because if a student fail one year the student will not have to pay for the next year or the year after that. The students could just keep failing. The reasons behind why college tuition should not be free is because of how taxes would be raised, how it would still not be completely free, and how scholarships can help make it free.
Should college be free? A current universal problem poses this question. In today’s world, full of public education standards that hold students maybe too high and in a generation bogged down by student debt, this issue qualifies as a problem more than many are maybe even willing to admit. While the prospect of free college proposes excellent ideals such as a stronger and smarter generation, no student loan problems, and a higher educated society, the truth may actually lie in the reality that making college free would do more hindrance than good and is not the answer to these problems. Free college would increase economic problems, according to Andrew P. Kelly, who says it would only shifts the cost to someone else. As well, it would also hinder our education system. Michael J. Petrilli writes that making college free would “probably shift billions of dollars a year from programs that help talented poor kids access higher education and improve our schools”. Although the concept of free higher education is becoming appealing to the general population, it ultimately would create more problems than it solved and do virtually nothing of huge significance to increase the level of intelligence in modern society.
I, therefore, a student at Anaheim High School in Anaheim , California , present these facts to the rest of the country and the world. We now declare that every teen in the United States are to be free and independent as well as having the same freedom and power as adults do. We are now to be treated equal , not anything less. By this we mean , we can no longer be told what to do or when to do it. For the moral support of our declaration , we pledge our lives , and all that we
Do curfews keep teenagers out of trouble? This topic has always been on the cover page of today's newspaper headlines and a hot topic that has been discussed by every family. What are curfews like? A curfew is a time frame given by an authority like a parent or the government to teenagers below 18 to be home before a certain period of time. So, ask yourself, do you think that by implementing curfews into a teenager’s life, he or she would keep out of trouble. Our group has discussed and came to an agreement that curfews really do help teenagers keep out of trouble. Firstly, curfews help teenagers to stay
One of the greatest and more fundamental gifts of life is the autonomy that comes with being a sentiment human being. This hasn’t always been considered a human right, however, and many eastern hemispheres are struggling to catch on to the concept that people should be allowed to make the decisions they choose without the external pressure to do otherwise. Thus, the question that should be asked is whether or not every human being on this planet is free, whether they should be free and what does free really mean. For many, freedom is all about that ability to to choose what they want, make their own decision and be able to move around as they please. Freedom is about equity, free speech and the guarantee of life, no matter how good or bad.
Each year, college tuition increases more and more, which makes getting a higher education almost impossible for some people. According to Pay it forward written by Catherine Morris tuitions and fees at public four-year institutions has been increasing an average of 3.4 percent each year between 2005 and 2015.
In recent years racial and socioeconomic differences have grown more prevalent in our society, and many wonder why. Growing up in Ethiopia, the concept of race was never popular or significant, as there was little to no racial diversity. Coming from a country where I did not even look at the color of my skin to a place where the only thing people saw was my color, astonished me. Living in the United States and learning about slavery in middle school, I thought of it as something that was long gone, something I would never have to worry about, but as I grew older I began to see the lingering shadows that remained. A petrified twelve-year-old me once asked my mother why we were moving to America and to that question she replied “America is the land of the free; the land of opportunities”. America did feel like an embodiment of her statement my first few years here but as time passed I began to see some clear differences in how society viewed me. I wondered, if this really was the so called “land of the free”, why are minorities incarcerated at a higher rate? And why are there such significant socioeconomic and educational gaps?
As we age, our lives are divided into stages with inescapable hardships. The most difficult of these stages has proven to be adolescence and young adulthood, the years in which our personalities are defined. This juncture is the pinnacle of maturation, however, it is gradually becoming a plateau wherein inactivity is most prevalent. It is indisputable that American children and young adults alike are lingering in their youth for far too long. Many in their teens and twenties are holding tight to the freedom of childhood by depending on their parents, refusing to settle down, and avoiding responsibility. Through their lack of independence, inability to commit and their indolence, certain action must be taken against adolescents
Teenagers have proven themselves mature and able to handle responsibilities at an early age in the views of some people, but what is ignored is all the consequences of handling over these privileges earlier than necessary.
Lacking in such skills as a student, or adult for that matter, can cause serious issues, “the number of students in crisis coming in for help has increased sharply—from 647 in the 2014–2015 academic year to 906 [in the 2015-2016 school year]. And the number of students needing medical transports for psychiatric evaluation has also risen, from 120 in the 2014–2015 academic year to 134 last year” (Brown). These incidents are most likely caused by none other than over-parenting. With a student’s parent unable to assist the now incapable problem solver, the child, unfit for such stress and analytical processing, simply cannot handle what is expected of them and essentially breaks down. Similarly, “teens [with hovering parents] might be more likely to participate in sexual activities, drinking or drug abuse. Teens often test the boundaries of their overprotective parents because these children have likely not developed a sense of responsibility for their actions” (Hewitt). Almost on the other end of the spectrum, these are people who have never done anything individual and feel the need to test the waters. However, these teens, unlike the college students, do not break down when not in the presence of their parents, they go wild. With their newly found freedom they are expected to do irresponsible things, and due to their parents taking the liability for everything previously, be bewildered at the overwhelming penalties they have to uphold. These teens may not have crumpled without their parents, but without any knowledge of punishment, they would crumble under the justice system. In both of these cases over-parenting has proved to be the factor that causes the downfall of the child. The parents’ overactivity, the thing they saw as protecting their child, is now destroying
As a child, I had a degree of autonomy to an extent, meaning that everything that I did was not overly controlled by my parents. I was able to sleep in during the weekends and chill inside my house without having to worry about strenuous chores. Whenever I wanted to hang out with friends from school, I was not allowed unless my parents knew my friend and their parents; I could not go out with just anyone. As I matured, I was permitted by my parents to participate in outside activities such as going to the movies with my friends. I really did not have a curfew because
Many teenagers have a set time they have to be home by their parents. Usually teenagers must be home from dates and nights out with friends by anywhere from 10 o’clock at night to 2 o’clock in the morning. Each parent has extremely different curfews set for their children, based on the individual level of responsibility and trust levels. Some local government decides to set their own curfews, to keep teens off the streets at night and out of trouble. Many people argue whether this actually solves anything, or is even legal to do, since it is taking away a piece of teenager’s freedom. Although there are many good and bad points to enforcing curfews, they should be less enforced because they do not necessarily keep teens out of trouble,
Working with teenagers every day at school reminds me of the quest for freedom that is so urgent at this time of their lives. How many times have I heard, “But, Mrs. Smith, I’m 18 years old. Why can’t I leave school? Why can’t I come in late? Why can’t I go home for lunch? Why can’t I do what I want? At 18 years old I’m supposed to be free to do exactly what I want to do.”
Teens in todays society are often at risk of abusing substances, getting into trouble, and causing violent scenes. They also are still trying to discover who they are, what interests them, who to hang around with, and just discover themselves. But an issue people debate about is the actions that teens choose to do. Many teens often hangout in groups at a variety of locations such as houses, parks, the mall, and other places such as a recreational center. Although teens may not see harm in being out and about with friends, adults may think otherwise. Some parents may be worried where there kids are or what they're doing, other parents may just say, "Let them be kids", and others
I’ve always felt that that I’m at a constant battle against myself. If I must say, from my personal experience, I’m struggling to keep myself together. I keep calm outside but on the inside, I just feel a rush and craziness.