Thursday, February 23, 2012

Inequality in Schools and Quality of Education

The United States is a political and economic system which is defined by inequalities. Our country thrives off of creating competition between people from different socioeconomic status'. A major issue in education is that we are seeing these same inequalities in our schools. Schools in suburban areas differ greatly from those in urbanized, low-income, poverty stricken areas.


Why are there so many differences between two schools located in different areas? First of all, urban schools receive less funding from our government. School funds mainly come from a state's government. Poorer areas of our country receive less state funds for education due to their inability to pay higher taxes. These lack of funds that the urban schools have to work with limit there attainable resources. School districts that are in poverty stricken areas can't hire the most qualified teachers. They are forced to hire teachers who are new to the field or those who have lower qualifications. These are the only type of teachers that they are capable of affording to have on salary. Along with less qualified teachers, school districts cannot afford to purchase reliable and effective school materials. Students' who live in poverty are forced to read and learn from inadequate textbooks. This effects the level of knowledge that they are obtaining. One final difference is that these students, who live in poverty and need guidance, have limited availability to qualified counselors. Without these counselors and others to guide them, they are likely to fall off track.

There are consequences of these poor school standards and conditions in poverty stricken districts. The drop out rates of poverty level students are much higher than those of the middle or rich class. Students in the poverty level are less likely to succeed in life and stay out of trouble. Many of the students who drop out of school end up in prison at some point in their lives.

These are the reasons that I would love to work in a poverty stricken school system. My goal is to be one of the good teachers in these types of areas who really help their students. Just because our politically and economic system is divided, doesn't mean that education opportunities should be as well. Every person deserves an equal chance to succeed and by providing lower level of service to those who are more unfortunate is going against our nation's ideals of providing equal opportunities to everyone.

For more information and articles covering this issue of inequalities in our schools, visit Poverty and Equality.

2 comments:

  1. As a future educator I think it is a hard spot to be put in. I want to be in a school that I can influence the students the best. I want to be in a school that needs and wants good teachers. Unfortunatly the schools that need the good teachers, like you said, usually dont get them due to salary. So do you go where the pay check is or where the kids that need you are? I hope more and more current and future educators choose the latter! Nice blog post Katie!

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  2. Thank you! If I was in that type of situation, there is no doubt that I would choose the latter. I know that teaching is a job and you have to live off of it, but I want to be a teacher for more than a paycheck; I'm in this to influence and help students. I think if there were more educators who looked at their job as more than a paycheck, our students would be better off!

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