High School Failure

In Seven Ways High School Prepares You for Failure, Kelsey Diaz explains why high school English is a “lie.” She had to learn a different way of writing, because the structure taught, 5- paragraph essay, was not very helpful when writing in college. Diaz blames the “standardized test” system for the way teachers teach and what materials need to be covered. There are a lot of “rules” college students will break when writing in college. It all goes back to writers being unique and having different perspectives of writing out their own thoughts. In the university professors expect the student to prove their point independently and not to rely entirely on the sources. Diaz states that high school teachers want each source to prove the students
Learning to figure out the texts meaning of the source is important if one does not know how. These are questions Kelsey Diaz has listed to ask oneself when analyzing a text: Who wrote it? Why? What are they trying to accomplish? What are their intentions for the reader? Is the writer biased? Do two different sources disagree? Why? (pg. 709) Diaz strongly believes that the student needs to take control when writing their paper, because they have the most to lose, not their sources. Interviewing sources rarely happen in high school or not at all, but in college it is possible to happen at least one time. She explains that the student does not have to write down every word the interviewee says and only focus on important questions that relate to the research. Lastly, most teachers in high school like to scare students into thinking their all alone in college, but Diaz explains that it is very untrue. University classes are much bigger in capacity than high school classes, but there will most likely be someone as confused as another; that is where teamwork comes in or just simply ask the professor for help or