College Pressures Analysis

Often, we find that education is suppressed, forcing people to go extreme measures in order to get even a resemblance of a basic education. The people who do receive education are often victims of peer/self-pressures as well as lack of parental support. In Indian Education by Sherman Alexie and College Pressures by William Zinsser, both author’s share their views on the starvation of education and the pressures students may face once in college.
In the article, Indian Education, the author observes many things throughout his schooling including the section entitled “Eighth Grade” when he presents the readers with the claim “There is more than one way to starve”(Alexie, 139). Starvation is manifested in more than one way throughout this story. One form of starvation that ties to my experiences are those on the reservation who are starving for a real education. Alexie grew up in a society which lacked education. As a child, my grandparents encouraged me to do my absolute best because they knew what was expected of me by my teachers. However, as I got older and now that I’m in high school, there is a lack of support. My
He says his “students think that every student is working harder and doing better, so the only solution is to study harder still” (CITATION). Students now have so many priorities and obligations. This makes overexerting themselves with unnecessary homework a huge problem. I constantly worry about whether another student has done more work than I do. This is all due to my incontrollable obsession of class rank. As soon as I found out my rank, I have constantly tried to succeed and do better than my peers. While I am number five in my class, I still stress and try to go above and beyond to raise my grades. With such a spiral of competitive disillusionment, my true learning process, along with my peers, is