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Jeanette Juachi, a high school senior, who has been granted admission at Cal State Dominguez Hills; however, with her mother unemployed and her deceased father, she has been left with the burden to meet her annual student obligation. She tirelessly works as a cashier at a supermarket, after her long day at school. The price of tuition has been rapidly increasing over the past few years; therefore, many families are questioning whether college is worth the cost and hassle for those 4 years. While a college degree can lead to a more lucrative and fulfilling career, it can also engender a huge financial burden that can encumber graduates for many years to come.…
Larry Cuban, a former social studies high school teacher, superintendent, manages to compress the mantra that has been repeated for several of years with his article entitled, “Why Everyone Shouldn’t Go To College”. He accomplishes this by giving us countless of interesting facts about the reality of college and life. He argues that the annual college tuition seems to be extremely expensive, that may not worth the amount of money you’re paying.In addition, he makes note that college graduates working at manufacturing places that don’t need college diplomas, in order to complete their job. Furthermore, he makes clear that one might be a high school dropout or graduate of high school and can still be highly…
Many people believe that college is what closes the gap between an educated individual and an uneducated individual. People also have the tendency to agree with the social norms that a college diploma is ultimately the final step towards a successful future and a lavish lifestyle. In Freeman Hrabowski’s article, “Colleges Prepare People for Life,” the author agrees with his statement that “yes, colleges prepare people for jobs, but more critically, they prepare people for life” (260). However, what people do not realize is that college is not for every individual and the value of education should not be based on…
In recent discussions of “The College Dropout Boom,” David Leonhardt made some interesting points on the works of society and it’s modern day views on education. Many of the ideas he presented were controversial to me, considering my previous perspective of social status’ having nothing to do with someone’s chances at graduating college. However, there are many ideas in which he presented that I agree with, such as the belief that obtaining a college degree doesn’t necessarily promise a well-paying job. Growing up in a household where nobody has ever earned a college degree, I can say personally that it is extremely important to have one, regardless of the immediate outcome. It’s better to be safe than sorry.…
Unlike the idea of the essentialist perspective of believing in the innate essence of everything visible and tangible, the constructionalist perspective adopts the idea regarding the origin of reality as being shaped by society including time. Commonly, the concept of time is hardly discussed, much less thought of as something more than always present or as a way of organization. Yet time had to undergo a beginning and a process to reach its current state. The idea of time highlights the progression needed in order to become a reality. It was not something that simply was nor originated naturally. Time is ingrained into the mind of societies after a progression of social construction. Slowly, but steadily, the concept of time came to be what…
Social constructionism accepts that there is an objective reality. It is concerned with how knowledge is constructed and understood. It has therefore an epistemological not an ontological perspective. Criticisms and misunderstanding arise when this central fact is misinterpreted. This is most evident in debates and criticisms surrounding realism and relativism. The words of Kirk and Miller (1986) are relevant when they suggest that the search for a final, absolute truth be left to philosophers and theologians. Social constructionism places great emphasis on everyday interactions between people and how they use language to construct their reality. It regards the social practices people engage in as the focus of enquiry. This is very similar…
Today, many students like myself all over the America have walked down the hectic aisles of high school and have sat in some of the largest lecture halls in college. As kids, we were somewhat taught that going to school and getting an education would be the key to our success and thought that if we didn’t fulfill these expectations, we would end up homeless and live a terrible life. For so many years during my educational career this was the mentality that I believed in. Although this may be over exaggerated, I believe that this may hold some truth to the many college students all over the world. It is almost like we volunteer to go into debt and deal with all the stress that a college education brings us because we feel like it will get us…
A major focus of social constructionism is to uncover the ways in which individuals and groups participate in the creation of their perceived social reality. It involves looking at the ways social phenome are created, institutionalized, and made into traditions by humans. Socially constructed reality is seen as an ongoing, dynamic process in which reality is reproduced by people acting on their own interpretation and their own knowledge of it. By putting the value on culturally and personal renditions of reality, a therapist could easily apply this approach for culturally diverse clients. A challenge of culturally diverse clients is they often experience an expectation that they should conform their lives to the truths and realities of a more…
The number of undergraduates enrolled in higher education in the United States has risen to new heights (NCES, 2012). Between 1999 and 2009 alone, US college matriculation increased by 38 percent, three times the rate of the preceding decade (Rosenbaum, Deil-Amen, & Person, 2006). This stunning growth is driven in large part by record enrollments of “nontraditional” students: defined as older, minority, of lower income, and often the first generation in their family to attend college (NCES, 2011). Their numbers have been increasing since the 1970s, while the “traditional” definition of a college student as young, financially dependent, and living on campus now describes only about 14% of current undergraduates in the U.S. (Attewell & Lavin, 2012). While the bulk of undergraduates engage in higher education as commuters, however, most research on higher education (with the exceptions of Chang, 2005; Pascarella, Duby & Iverson, 1983) continues to focus on traditional, residential institutions. Urban commuter colleges, such as community colleges and the new, for-profit career colleges, have attracted the most challenged segments of the non-traditional population (Baum, Little, & Payea, 2011; NCES, 2012). Compared to other four year colleges, urban commuter and career colleges have a significantly larger percentage of students below the poverty line, a larger percentage of single parents, African American and Latino students, and first generation college students (Deming, Goldin & Katz, 2010; Rosenbaum, Deil-Amen, & Person, 2006) that, taken together, raise the specter of growing segregation in higher education. About 72% of two year and 54% of four year community colleges are minority students, while minorities constitute about 80% of career college enrollments (NCES, 2012). This concentrated environment of minority, disadvantaged students at commuter schools presents a challenge to social models of…
Measuring the effectiveness of social constructivism in the classroom will take place in two different ways. When working on group projects or when engaging in class discussion, students will be expected to demonstrate the five essential elements that are unique to a cooperative learning classroom: positive interdependence, individual accountability, face-to-face interaction, and social skills (Moreno, 2010). This is very abstract and therefore, will be measured through direct evaluation because it allows the teacher to receive quality information on individual participation and give each student specific feedback. The second measurement will be a criterion-referenced assessment using either an exam or paper…
Not many are lucky to have paid all their debt by the time they graduate. Colleges and universities have given students the ability to work around the campus in order to pay for their education. Although this seems like a positive effect to help students pay and try to minimize debt, work is bound to get in the way of education. As students worry about having money in their pockets and scavenge any type of job they can find in or around the campus, they put aside their studies and their capability to perform in class is diminished. In his article, Hoover is able to capture a statement made by Ashley Dawson, an English professor at the College of Staten Island, regarding how work affects students ability to work in class and colleges maintaining…
“It’s just extremely disappointing and aggravating to have paid all that money and have nothing to show for it other than debt.” proclaimed Michelle Polyakov, an English graduate from Drake University. Polyakov obviously feels that college is not worth the cost and that all someone has to show for the education is debt. College has been deemed, by some, that it is not worth the cost because of the financial loss, the future job security, and the need for “blue collar” jobs. Finances, job security, and the need for manual laborers are all major factors in the debate of college and its cost. The reason being is because not all people are meant to go to college, or their situation just isn’t ideal. College is a privilege, and not every job requires you to have a higher form of learning, but most do. By viewing the debt of a student after graduation, the job security of graduates, and the need for manual laborers, one can infer that college is not worth the cost.…
Social constructionism is a core concept in sociology, so strongly integrated in every society globally, that it has affected the way we all think. Social constructionism displays the fact that the social world is not natural, it is not revealed, and it's not even fully determined. It is completely made up by people, who also continue to transmit and cultivate such views. Everything that we have learned, that has not originated from our own senses, intuition, or reasoning we have learned from other people. 95% of what we know, we have accepted from others, which is why some say that even our own reasoning is influenced by those around us. Essentially, social constructionism explains how and why we give everything reason, from feminine…
When an average high schooler walks into senior year, the students are quickly bombarded by school counselors discussing which four year college they should apply too. At my high school, it was never second guessed whether the student would be attending college but was assumed. Most people have misconceptions that if they do not get a degree, they will unable to obtain a job and have an overall unsuccessful life. In Charles Murray’s, “Are Too Many People Going to College” and Freeman Hrabowski’s “College Prepares People for Life”, the two author both discuss the education system we have in place, however, Charles Murray provides a more convincing argument that college, contrary to popular belief, is just not for everyone.…
Imagine if every student made it to college. Jobs would be plentiful, homeless folks would become less in numbers, and the acceptance rates for jobs would be much higher. Now, consider this. From ages twenty-five to thirty-two, twenty-two percent with a diploma from high school are living in poverty, in comparison to six percent of college-educated adults, today (“The Rising Cost of Not Going to College”). This is a real problem in today’s nation, but can be prevented. Students not only have better chances of getting a job from receiving a college education, rather than just a high school diploma, but their average yearly pay is also much higher. A college education is a necessity to students in our nation, because of increased chances of being accepted to jobs of your choice and background, and receiving a much higher annual pay.…