There’s something scary happening in Connecticut. There are fourth graders in Connecticut taking standardized tests. Their test scores will be used to determine how many new jail cells need to be built in the state. In Texas, this same judgment is made based on third grade test scores; whether a state is blue or red, politicians have discovered the same correlation between academic performance and criminal behavior. There are children in my eighth grade classroom, on the Navajo Reservation in New Mexico, who, on average, are reading at a fifth grade reading level. Fifth grade. They’re only fourteen years old, and already are three grade levels behind their wealthier peers. I have students who tell me that they are going to Wesleyan, mostly because their favorite teacher went there, and I smile sadly at them, knowing they have no chance in the world of getting in if they stay on the educational track our public school system has destined them to.
This is why I chose, upon my graduation last year, to tackle what I believe to be one of the greatest injustices affecting our country today. I learned in the halls of PAC that with education comes civic and social responsibility, that adequate education of a society is essential to a true democracy. Right now, in this country, we’re selling our children short of the chance to live in such a democracy. It’s not entirely the fault of No Child Left Behind, nor is it the fault of parents, teachers, money, or any other single factor. Yet research has shown time and time again that informed, trained, and passionate teachers lead to the empowering education of a child, even if that child lives in a non-traditional family situation in a low-income community.
That’s why I packed up my car last June in Middletown and drove out to the desert, to prove to children I had never met, and to myself, that they weren’t destined to end up in a jail cell, whatever their test scores may have been. I’ve been teaching for five months, and so far some of my students have made twice as much growth in their reading level than they had made on average in an entire school year previously. Did I major in education? No, I went to Wesleyan and studied the development of the EU’s economic policy and read a whole lot of postmodern literary theory. Yet I’m doing something for my kids, for the community in which I teach, and I love it.
I invite you to join me, as well as several other professionals involved in education who reside in Connecticut, to explore the issue of recent college graduates teaching in low-income communities in a panel discussion this Thursday, February 8th, at 7:30 p.m. in Woodhead Lounge. This is a serious issue affecting every aspect of our country’s welfare, and it’s essential that our generation explore how we can best help solve America’s daunting achievement gap. Please contact me at hg**@******an.edu should you have any questions. Otherwise I’ll see you Thursday!
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