Addressing education inequality in America

The issue she faces is finding the right school for her daughter to attend. Her husband wants to send their daughter to a public school, since he attended public schools and had a good experience. Unfortunately in certain cities the public school system isn’t that great, so most parents need to try and send their children to an expensive private school. A close example of this is San Francisco high schools. The private schools are very nice and great, but the public schools are falling behind and lack funding. Unfortunately the public school system in certain cities or districts don’t provide a great option. “ One family, or even a few families, cannot transform a segregated school, but if none of us were willing to go into them, nothing would change. Putting our child into a segregated school would not integrate it racially, but we are middle-class and would, at least, help to integrate it economically.” I picked this quote because a lot of big public school funding is from parents. The state does provide money and has a way of deciding how much each school gets, but even then it would not be enough. I went to Redwood High and was able to enjoy a great public school experience. A lot of parents donated and would raise money for certain things in the school. Our baseball team raised enough money for a turf infield and new dugouts, and this is a baseball program that had 40 kids from Varsity to the Freshman teams. Not every public school is located in Larkspur and doesn’t have affluent parents that Redwood had. Although I went to Redwood I wasn’t the typical Redwood kid. Growing up my mom worked two jobs and attended Dominican. We lived in a one bedroom apartment in Kentfield so that I could attend Bacich Elementary. My mom knew that Ross Valley School District was much better than San Rafael and that no matter what I had to be in it. She made sacrifices so that I would have the best opportunities and wouldn’t have to make sacrifices like her.

I think people fight against the status quo because they see the flaws in the current system. There is a reason that American school system is ranked poorly compared to other nations. We have systematic flaws that aren’t addressed. We spent 597 billion on our military in 2015 compared to just 70 billion for education. We spend so much on military but aren’t in a war. Year after year the education budget is cut. I like the picture in WWFWW, it was a simple message but a strong one. The balloons in the back represented that change that they wanted to happen, and the slogan on the bottom showed the overall theme. Everyone should want an equal education system because it helps America out.

I read the report called “Five Bleak Facts on Black Opportunity” the facts in the report gave a lot of information and showed the structural issues we have discussed. The facts showed different things that I never knew. One of the facts that was alarming to me was that Black Americans born into middle class families are more likely to move down in social class. I think that I have always seen the structural issues in education that we have discussed. It was as simple as playing basketball in the Marin middle school basketball league and seeing other gyms and then seeing the one at Kent. My mom also made sure that I appreciated all of the great facilities I had and great teachers. She would point out that not every school has a computer lab and a great library and two gyms. I think my years at these schools made me enjoy learning more. It may be naive to think every public school can have the facilities that Redwood or the one in suburb Chicago that we saw in the Opera video, but we should strive to make it so that they all have libraries and the tools to inspire kids and motivate kids to be something great. Not just a place they go from 8–3 everyday.