In this higher class area, we have seen that our schools are just as dysfunctional as those in poverty. I, just like many others, believe there are a lot of things that could be better with our education system, like better preparation for the situations we will face as adults as well as less homework. But if we feel that the school system is so flawed, why do we still participate in it? It goes along with the truth that we have been taught - by our parents, peers, teachers, etc - that there is only one path to be successful in life, and this is the most important step of that process. And while it's true that school does not have to be insanely stressful and overwhelming due to choosing your classes, students are extremely pressured to "challenge themselves" which can be a good thing, but not to the extent that we in our high-expectations society expect a challenge to be. Students find it nearly impossible to balance school with all of the aspects of their life, like their social life, family, their hobbies/passions, and the extracurriculars they have signed up for just for the sake of "success." So, I believe it is not actually the school system itself that causes stress, but the pressure to follow the supposed single path to success that causes students to turn school and other things into stressors by overwhelming themselves.
What do you think?
People likely go along with the school system and don't do anything to try to get out of it because of normative influence. No one else is, so why should they? Also, just because it stresses them out that much doesn't mean that their goals have changed. Many students still want to go to good schools and get good jobs, and they feel that staying in their current situation is the only way to do this. There could also be a little learned helplessness in this situation. They have been stressed out so many times by the school system that it is just their automatic response to complain but do nothing about it. Carolyn Walworth addresses the amount of stress in her letter, but we don't see her suggesting drastic changes that she or other students could make; she only suggests ones that the school and teachers could make. This seems fair since the school seems to be causing the stress, but there could be other factors for the stress. For example, a student could have poor time management, choose not to try hard, or something else affecting their performance. They could change these things through their own means. Do others agree?
ReplyDeleteI agree. I think the school system itself offers choices that allow for a student to decide how intense and how time consuming they want school to be. I think where everything falls apart is at the mindsets of adults and students regarding college. We hold ourselves to unrealistically high standards, for example, as was brought up in class: there are "crappy" UC schools.
ReplyDeleteI agree with what's already been said, that the current US schools system gives students lots of stress and keeps them from engaging in other interesting activities. While one could say that students could simply take fewer hard classes or cut back from extracurricular activities, we do these things to get into college, just like Leena said. Many of us have this goal, but perhaps we work too hard for it, with too little payoff.
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