Pop Culture VS Real Life Education

     Dead Poets Society is about privileged kids who are driven to always be the best at all cost, being told what to do with not much choice.  These kids are being groomed to be future leaders and are expected to comply with what society expects from them.  That is until one teacher decided to show them how to dance to a different beat.  After seeing things from a different perspective, their own, they challenge the norm in their school and in their life.  When Mr. Keating encouraged them to find something that inspires them, they discovered there is more to life than other people’s expectations.

Until we learn to reach deep inside ourselves, how can we understand our full potential and what we have to offer?  Our schools need teachers who will challenge the students and teach them how to use their imaginations, how to think outside of the box.  We need teachers who will help students get past all the barriers that they set for themselves.  Getting students out of their comfort zone would help them to maximize their own potential.  Being a great teacher is sometimes about putting students in the direction of that potential and sometimes it's teaching them that it exists in the first place.

As a society, we often think it’s the underprivileged kids that lose out on the best education available.  The truth is, schools can stand for improvement in every neighborhood.  No matter how much clout your family's status holds in the community or what type of financial circumstance you were born into, you should be entitled to the same quality of education as anyone else.

 



My Education

I was very fortunate when it comes to my education.  I am the third of four children, raised by an uneducated, single mother who only ever held blue collar jobs.  In spite of coming from a working class family, I believe I got at least a middle class education.

Looking back, one of the first people to make an impact on my life was my fourth grade teacher at Shull-David Elementary School.  Most of the kids I went to school with grew up in homes very different from mine and boy, did they know it.  I didn't fit in.  I didn't have many friends.  I was one of the few ‘less fortunate’ kids in our school.  Mrs. P. is what we called her and honestly, it's all I can remember today.  With a smile, she sat me down one day encouraged me to focus on schoolwork and not get caught up with what the other kids thought.  I realize now that she recognized potential that I didn't know existed until many years later.  But I stuck my head in my books and I concentrated on my work from that day forward.

Up until high school, I studied, worked hard and applied myself because I thought that’s what I was supposed to do.  It wasn’t until I reached high school at Lehighton Area High School that the teachers’ goals were more apparent.  I realized that it was almost expected that most of us would be going to college.  That's what we were being prepared for.

My school career was challenging, but easier than it appeared to be.  What the teachers were offering was only limited by what I was open to receiving from them.  The exceptional education I received was not only a result of my efforts.  It was the teachers and the tools and recourses offered by my school district that allowed me to reach my full potential.

 

 

Getting to know Rahmah

Rahmah Jan, a 25 year old Saudi Arabian woman, moved with her husband, Abdulaziz Alshehri of seven years to California.  After spending a year on the west coast, the couple packed up their things and moved to Allentown, PA, where they have been building a life for the last two years.  They have been studying English and are enrolled in this writing course together.  They are the proud parents of 15 month old twin boys.



The homemaker, student, wife and mother has very little time for herself.  Outside of school,

where she is taking four classes a semester to earn a Business Administration degree, she fulfills her household and family obligations with devotion.  She boasted of her cooking ability to prepare four to five meals at one time.  Her favorite things to cook are pasta, lasagna, rice and all types of meat.  Baking cakes and cookies is something she would like to do more, but as her husband does not eat sweets, she rarely bakes these types of things.  Interestingly, she makes banana and watermelon juice, which she says are very easy to make and delicious!

 

In Saudi Arabia, woman's rights are limited (Women's rights in Saudi Arabia).  Driving and advanced schooling are just a few things she, as a woman, was not allowed to do in her home country.  Although she has no extended family here to support her, she intends to stay here and eventually find a job in her field.  Her husband is currently teaching her to drive.  She is very excited about this new adventure, although she admits, she is a little nervous. 

 

At a glance, Rahmah is a reserved, but happy, always having a smile on her face.  You can’t let her shyness fool you.  She has more courage than most people I know.  In spite of moving what probably seems like a million miles away from her family, her culture, her life and starting over in a strange and different place, she remains positive and determined.