Reflection on Education in the United States

Simon Stasko

Education for Liberation: Section 009

Dr. Susmita Sil

December 6, 2016

Reflection on education in the United States

Education is the keystone to the formation of beliefs and behaviors in a society. Society’s goals can only be achieved through an effective educational process that articulates to people what they need to do in order to achieve these goals. It is important to take a step back and understand what the goals are and whether they are being targeted with the educational system in place because the concepts and behaviors taught in schools, shape students’ beliefs and stay with them for the rest of their lives. The teachings of freedom of thought, equality, and creativity should be a priority, but history has shown us that’s not always the case. An educational system that favors one culture or belief over another, weakens the people that are not in charge and serves as a disadvantage rather than advantage.

Education can be a dangerous tool that alienates cultures and sometimes goes as far as to create systematic poverty. Minorities in the United States have been disadvantaged by the educational system for years. Public schools populated by minorities tend be unequally funded than those that have mostly white students. Without quality education and a decent competitive environment, children’s economic mobility suffers greatly. Even if students, through hard work and determination, find a way to succeed, they forget about the community that they belonged to, move into the suburbs and further perpetuate the poverty cycle. Because children are taught that their culture is inferior, in order to make a better life for their children they want to become more like the oppressor. The spread of globalization has pushed the concept of western culture being superior even further into the world. The Euro-centric mode of education inherently describes itself as the superior way to teach children. Under the impression that they are educating the world, westerners are actually creating systemic poverty that was previously non-existent. Children around the world, in places like India, are taught that an educated person is someone who speaks English or lives a fabulous western life. As a result, the children view their parents as uneducated and begin to reject their own culture. While the prospects of making a use out of the education is small, millions of people unsuccessfully join the work force believing in western education’s greatness. Similarly, as minorities in the United States want to move into the suburbs, talented people in third world countries want to move to the United States for reasons ingrained in them through western education.    

Our teach-back project analyzed the aspects of the Aztec educational system that could be implemented into the United States system in order to fix its inherent problems. Main goal of education is to prepare people to be fully-fledged members of their society.  An educated person is someone who follows the norms and rules of the society and uses his/her skills to fulfill a meaningful role within that society. By analyzing education from this perspective, statistics, such as unemployment rates or poverty rates, become a much more relevant way to measure the quality of education than standardized tests scores. If students score high on standardized tests, but are unable to find a job after graduation or feed themselves, ultimately their educational system has failed them.