Scott

Jacob Scott
EDTE 302
Dr. Colmenares
10 / 17 / 18

I- SEARCH PAPER

Throughout my academic life I have experienced nothing but the best from

public schools, and I feel incredibly blessed to be able to say that. Since elementary

level I had noticed that I had it “easy” compared to some students and families, even

though I have never attended a private school and have only been exposed to public

schooling. However, it wasn’t really until community that I noticed and learned

about the systematic racism that is absolutely right there in front of everyone’s face.

I had never had a teacher of a different race other than white until I went to college.

It took me until this class to actually realize that and think about it from a much

more education standpoint. It is honestly sickening that as of 2011, 84% of US

public school teachers are female, and 83% of US public school teachers are white.

Ever since I could remember I have been experiencing tracking within all the

schools I have attended, but I wasn’t aware of it until now, due to the fact that I had

no idea what tracking even was until this class. To attend the elementary school that

I went to as a child you needed to enter a raffle that was quite expensive to pay for,

and then after that you had to actually win in order to be accepted into the school.

Fortunately for me, my parents were able to afford to enter me into the raffle at

least, and I was lucky enough to get picked. I think about that quite frequently now

that I have taken a few classes about education in the US. I feel as if this is a terrible

system for public schooling. I could see this system maybe working in a private
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school where they already make privileged white people pay 20,000 – 50,000

dollars a year, but as far as public schools go, this is just wrong. Anyone child should

be aloud to attend a school in their own neighborhood if they wish to, but

unfortunately that is not the case. The system is flawed if there are public schools

running giant “random raffles” to see who gets into their schools or not. They could

be in fact lying to the public and saying they pick their students randomly through a

raffle, when in reality they could be picking students based on gender, race, or

income. This creates another problem due to the fact that they are literally taking

innocent peoples money and then deciding if they are “good enough” for their

school. This is just one of the forms of tracking that I have experienced through my

academic life.

Another example of tracking that I have encountered was in high school. It

was extremely evident that the set up and system of my high school favored the

white community in some way or form. I say this simply because I was in both “low-

tracking” classes and “high-tracking” classes in high school, even though I was

unaware that such thing even existed at the time. Since high school I have always

been gifted and extremely interested in the subject of English because I found it fun.

I was good at it. This caused me to be eager to sign up for the advanced “AP” English

classes with the “best teachers” we had on campus. Once I finally had gotten

accepted into an advanced English class, I think junior or senior year, it was rather

obvious and clear that these types of special classes were meant for white people.

Now, it is true that there was an Asian, and a Latino, and a Middle-Eastern student in

the class and maybe even some other races, but it is safe to say that my advanced
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English classes were at least 75 – 85 percent white. This statistic is frightening

because it is not as if 75 – 85 percent of my high school were white, this was only the

case in advanced classes. Sophomore year I received a D in Geometry after trying

very hard week in and week out. This resulted in me being placed into a “low-

tracking” math class were some of the students were even younger than me and

some were even two years older than me. This class was like nothing I ever

experienced before. It was truly like entering a new world, or at least a new school. I

would estimate that there was about only 5-10 white students in the class out of

about 30-32 students. In my “high-tracking” English class it was mostly white

people, but then in my low-tracking Mathematics class there was most definitely

mostly Latino’s and different races other than white. This relates to Jeannie Oakes

article “Keeping Track – How Schools Structure Inequality” when Oakes states on

page 67, “From the information about these six schools, then, it is clear that in our

multiracial schools minority students were found in disproportionately small

percentages in high-track classes and in disproportionately large percentages in

low-track classes (Oakes 67).” Not only was this the case, the students were treated

differently even though it was the same exact class I took the semester prior to that

one. Perhaps this was partially due to the fact that it was a different teacher running

the class, but nevertheless the students should be treated just as fair as white

students and should receive just as much expectation and respect that the white

students receive.

I remember very vividly this one experience that I had in my “low-tracking”

math class and I will never forget it either. One day two Latino students and one
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white student entered the classroom together and they were loud and obnoxious. It

was right after our 15 min break before 4th period and they smelled of weed, so I

was guessing that they were just high and being annoying and not caring about the

material we were about to learn that day for whatever reason. This was not very

surprising to me at all because a fair amount of students smoked weed at lunch or

break at my school. However, what was utterly surprising to me was the fact that all

of a sudden I started to smell vodka. It was so strong that I looked back at the loud

students, and there it was. There was a big water bottle of vodka that had been spilt

all over the back of the classroom floor. After about only two minutes everyone

started to smell it and everyone was giving them stares, some students were even

laughing hysterically, which I found rather annoying and immature. After all the

students stopped paying attention, that was when our teacher started to smell the

alcohol as well. She immediately knew who brought it into the classroom and so she

went up to them with such a strong look of disappointment in her face. She was

genuinely confused, worried, and sad because her students who she tried to get

through to so much were drinking at 10:30 a.m. in the morning. Our teacher called

the office on the classroom phone, notified them of what had just happened, and

then escorted them all the way down to the front office to see the principle and vice

principle. It was honestly painful to watch my teacher re-enter the classroom in

tears. That was one of the few times I have ever seen students make a teacher cry.

They made her cry to the point where she could barely teach for the rest of the

period. What is very disturbing is the fact that was not the only time I saw our

teacher cry or get emotional that year. This was probably the first time I became
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aware that some classes compared to other classes, even at the same school, varied

drastically depending on who was in the class and how it was tracked.

However, I cannot even begin to imagine what it would be like if I attended a

very low-funded school, such as those in New York and Chicago that Jonathan Kozol

talks about in his insightful book called, Savage Inequalities. When I was attending

my high school I was obviously blessed and spoiled with privilege because I felt as if

my school could have used a lot more money for art classes, elective classes, school

trips, rally’s, and so on and so forth. But after reading Savage Inequalities I realized

how spoiled my school was compared to inner city schools and such. For example,

my Geography or Economics class, I can’t remember, were given ipads for each

student of the class. In my eyes this was an absolute waste of money because it was

something that was indeed unneeded, and there were schools about half an hour

away that probably didn’t even have enough textbooks for all the students in each

classroom. We had an amazing library that was rather large where students could

go to feel safe, to learn, and even have fun. We had dozens and dozens of computers

in our library and that isn’t counting all the ones we had in the classrooms, so it is

difficult for me to even imagine that some classes don’t even have dictionaries or

encyclopedias. This idea relates directly to Kozol’s book when he writes about a

comment that a teacher in New York said. This teacher actually said, “We don’t have

encyclopedias in classrooms. That is for the suburbs (Kozol 105).” And then directly

after this line Kozol states, “The school, I am told, has 26 computers for its 1,3000

children and recess, however, is not possible because there is no playground (Kozol

105-106).” These lines resonate with me strongly because I have always been
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someone who loves to play and be active with my peers. It is heartbreaking to now

have this knowledge stored in my brain because I honestly think about it very often.

Although being educated on the education system is a rather depressing

affair, it has helped me solidify my goal of wanting, of having to help those who are

less fortunate and not as privileged as me. I have been born into a position where I

am able to make a difference in the school system, and that is exactly what I plan on

doing. I want to show public school students that it is possible for us to get rid of

tracking, to get rid of vouchers, and to especially get rid of systematic racism, due to

the fact that that is the number one problem in the school-system. I want to make

students of all ethnicities aware of the systematic racism that is happening every

single day throughout the school industry, so they can rise above it and defeat it

with pride.
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Work Cited

Kozol, Jonathan. Savage Inequalities. New York: Broadway Books, 1991. Print

Oakes, Jeannie. Keeping Track How Schools Structure Inequality .

Jacob Scott
EDTE 302
Dr. Colmenares
12 / 12 / 18

Personal Investigation Paper

Going into this class I had a certain mindset that I would try to learn as much

as I possibly could about emergent bilinguals and focus mainly on those type of

students, due to the fact that I want to be a high school English teacher, but that all

changed when I started becoming aware of how many other issues I had to

anticipate. Fortunately today we now live in a society where individuals are not

living in constant fear about their sexual orientation to the extreme extent in which

they have for the last hundreds of years. However, this does not mean that the

LGBTQ and the Transgender community are treated equally to cisgender

community, and in fact they still suffer from being bullied, when in reality schools

should be the number one place where these individuals feel safer than anywhere

else. I want to make it one of my duties to myself to create an environment inside

my classroom where any student can come to me as almost a parent figure for

advice if they don’t feel safe or comfortable in their own skin. I want to be the staff

member of the school forcing equality, kindness, and as much help as possible for

the LGBTQ and Transgender community. This is so vital to be aware of, especially

for me because I want to become a high school English teacher and that is exactly

the time where most youth feels as if they are ready to start being identified by the

sex they feel they really are and what sex they are actually attracted to. This idea is

proven when you know that “the average age for a student to come out about their
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sexual orientation is 15.9 years of age (Greytak 23),” and that is just about the age of

a sophomore in high school.

My whole perspective about this very important and prevalent topic was

flipped upside down when I was first taught by a transgender man named Connor.

He lectured us and educated us for over an hour without me even knowing he was

transgender until he told the room right before he left. He made me think and

wonder to myself if I had ever encountered a transgender person that I was

unaware of, and then I thought to myself…yeah I must have at least a few times.

Connor told me and my fellow peers that even in elementary school, that 25% of

classes feel like they are non-gender conformity, meaning 25% of all classes feel like

they are “tomboys” and so on and so forth. This was a shocking statistic to me

personally because I always felt like it was more like one out of every twenty kids,

not one out of every four kids. This statistic makes me feel as if I have been oblivious

to certain individuals my entire life, and to me that seems like I have been living a

lie. I should have been informed about this a while ago so I could have watched my

use of language and use of pronouns better. I have many plans for how I am going to

teach my class about the proper use of pronouns, and how to never assume

anything. I am never going to split the class up into boys and girls, I am never going

to use the words mom and dad, and I am especially going to never ever address my

class as “guys” because that may possibly offend a handful of students in my class,

maybe even more. You don’t know who has two moms or two dads, so you cant use

words like ‘mom and dad,” and not everyone wants to be called a guy… it’s simple.
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These people are innocent, yet we treat them like they are the biggest threat

to society, or humanity even for that matter. We need to make the world a safer

place for these mistreated individuals, and the first place to start with are the

schools. It is simply not right that “69% of transgender students feel unsafe in

school and 90% of transgender students hear derogatory and negative remarks

about someone’s gender expression.” (Greytak 12-13). What is even more sickening

is that “over half of all transgender students have been physically harassed in school

of the past few years simply because of their sexual orientation and 28% and

actually been physically assaulted.” (Greytak 13). What makes it even more tragic is

that more than half of those students don’t even report anything to authorities,

probably because they don’t want to be harassed, insulted, or assaulted any more

than they already have been.

One main reason why I want to make schools the safest place for these

students is the fact that they are students with tremendous amounts of potential,

but we often see them not succeed in their academics or just drop out all together

because of their own safety. Even saying that out loud sounds utterly absurd and

disgusting. These students can become anything they want and are usually really

gifted and talented students that could very well achieve greatness, but bullies and

students who weren’t raised properly are hindering their chances at a good life, and

it’s not fair. This idea is very much real when you know that almost half of all

transgender students, 47%, report that they skip at least one day of school per

month just because they feel unsafe or uncomfortable to go that day.” (Greytak 14).

Why are we letting these kids go through life feeling this unsafe and this
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uncomfortable? Is it because half of the staff is being just as judgmental as the

terrible students that bully these kids? I don’t know if I can make that claim quite

yet, but I sure do believe that not all teachers are innocent.

When I become a teacher, I want to make notes to myself about everything I

see, including the mistreating of students by other students and by staff. Staff can be

a teacher or it can just be a yard duty perhaps, but either way I know there are some

guilty ones out there with some outdated, hateful political views. In the words of a

transgender man named Connor, “One positive interaction decreases suicide rate by

30%.” When he said this line so casually my mouth dropped and I blurted out loud

“really” and he just looked and me and smiled and nodded yes. It hit me pretty hard

because right then and there I felt as if he knew that statistic for a reason. He knew

that statistic from experience, he knew that statistic because he had lived it, I

thought to myself. We need to stop assuming things. We need to stop assuming

every student and every person’s identify with whatever you may think they look

like because it is just rude at this point. It is simply wrong to assume someone’s

sexual identity, especially when you are aware that you are assuming and you just

do it anyways. When I am finally a high school teacher I am truly considering taking

just maybe one or two days from the semesters schedule to introduce the gender

unicorn to my class, and actually make them educated on every little thing about it. I

had no idea what the gender unicorn was until this year, 2018, so it makes me really

look back on my childhood experience and how much different it would have been if

all these individuals who were living in fear knew about the gender unicorn and

how common it is, and how they are not alone whatsoever. College is too late to be
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introduced to such a concept. Yeah sure there are plenty of clubs and programs in

college where students in the LGBTQ and Transgender community can join and feel

safe and at home, but I feel as if there are far too little if any in the high schools

around our nation. Perhaps there are some progressive schools out there in certain

states that are doing a great job of treating these communities fairly and giving them

a strong voice, but for the most part I think there is a big absence of pride for these

communities in most public high schools. This idea is somewhat shown when you

see the statistic that “only 24% of transgender students said that their schools

policy included specific protections based on sexual orientation, gender identity, or

gender expression. (Greytak 15). It is safe to say that sexual orientation and gender

expression is the number one leading percentage of students who feel unsafe at

school, considering religion is only 25%, disability is 9%, race/ethnicity is 15%,

where as gender expression and sexual orientation 69% of those surveyed felt

unsafe at school. (Greytak 31). This statistic shines light on the truth about

harassment in school. Everyone always assumes most of the bulling going on at

school has to do about race and ethnicity when in reality sexual orientation and

gender expression amount for far more than half of the bulling that takes place in

public schools.

I am going to act on an amazing idea that I got from an English teacher at

Pleasant Valley High School in Chico when I was working as a student teacher there

last semester. She told me that you can’t just love the subject that you are teaching,

you have to love your students/kids as well or else you wont last in this career field

for more than a year or two. I felt her powerful sense of passion through her eyes
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when she was saying this to me, so I asked her to give me some tips on how to make

them feel at home and comfortable enough with me so they can ask and talk to me

about anything and everything. I will never forget one of the things that she told me.

She told me to open my classroom up at lunchtime every day as a safe place for all

students to come in and do classwork, eat their lunch, hang out asking questions,

and anything else to make them feel comfortable. She told me this makes all the

difference in the world to some students, and that it was some students favorite part

of their day because they felt more safe there than at home or at work or anywhere

else. This made me sad but it also warmed my heart immensely because at that

moment I knew I would be able to help kids no matter how small of an act it was.

When I am a teacher, my classroom will have the doors open at lunchtime so all

students, students who aren’t even in any of my classes are welcome to come in and

just relax in safety. I want students to come to me to talk about their issues and fears

if they don’t feel comfortable going to a counselor because as said before “most girls

(guys too) thought there was no point in telling the counselors because they

wouldn’t do anything.”(Orenstein 9). I believe that teachers play a stronger role than

therapist, counselors, or even parents sometimes. This idea is proven when you look

at the statistic that “transgender students were more likely to have actually spoken

with a teacher (66%) than a school mental health professional (51%) even though

their comfort level with counselors/social workers/psychologists was somewhat

higher.” (Greytak 49). This shows that even when students don’t think they are most

comfortable with their teachers, they really are; therefore, we must be there for all

of them. Teachers are the true hero’s of the world, and that’s why I am a future one.
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Work Cited

Greytak, Emily, A. Harsh Realities: The Experience of Transgender Youth in Our

Nation’s Schools. GLSEN: 2009.

Orenstein, Peggy. Anita Hill Is A Boy: Tales From A Gender-Fair Classroom. Jossey-

Bass Reader on Gender in Education: 2002.

Jacob Scott
EDTE 534
Mr. Anderson
4 / 22 / 19
Observation Paper

Mr. Anderson, the Pleasant Valley High School Special Education teacher,

taught me how to deal with a wide range of high school students. These students

were students with learning disabilities, and some of them had IEP’s and 504’s. I

noticed that some of the students that I observed had successfully worked their way

out of their IEP’S or their 504’s, which was very promising and reassuring to see and

experience. He taught me how to deal with students who have poor hygiene and

how to address the situation properly. He also taught me how to deal with late work

and how to make accommodations for certain students for various reasons. Through

my observation I learned that you must build a rapport with students with learning

disabilities, along with all students, and let them know you are coming from a place

of compassion.

I watched Mr. Anderson have conversations with four students that were in

his classroom during lunch and it was amazing to watch. It was truly like watching a

group of friends just chill out and laugh and hangout, yet he still knew how to keep

that distance between friend and teacher and was really able to meet at a middle

ground in between the two, which I found extremely impressive and motivating. He

taught me how to deal with a variety of different students being tardy, and how to

not blame it on the student if their parents are responsible for them being late to
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class. He told me to get the parents involved as much as you possibly can when a

student is struggling so the student is on the same page at home as he is in school.

While observing Mr. Anderson I realized that I am going to let students

hangout in my classroom during lunch if they wish to do so. Some students only

place to feel safe and confortable and somewhat happy is school, and so I want my

classroom to represent that feeling of comfort and acceptance. I am going to make

my classroom the most inviting place on campus. Mr. Anderson had four rows of

desks with four desks in each row. There were about fifteen computers, and 49er’s

and Giant’s decoration. I watched a very nice student show Mr. Anderson a video

that she took the night before. She showed him a video of a chicken she saw in

person at her grandmother’s house and she thought it had rabies. She was talking

about how much she hated chicken wings and any food with bones in it for that

matter. It’s one of her phobias and she apparently has a phobia of a lot of things such

as lakes, oceans, and she is allergic to chlorine. She can’t even swim for very long

unless it is a saltwater pool. This not only made me laugh, it also made me excited to

be in his shoes and to have such a strong connection and bond with students. I feel

as if moments like these are going to make my day when I am finally a teacher.

I noticed that the only class rule is respect. I thought this was just awesome

because if there is respect for everyone in a classroom then there really won’t be

many problems. Respect is going to be my only classroom rule as well after this

observation at Pleasant Valley High School. Mr. Anderson looked me in the eyes and

told me, “Treat students as humans and it will be amazing what you will see.” This

advice is going to stick with me throughout my entire career. I know that for a fact.
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In my interview with the special education teacher at Pleasant Valley High

School, Mr. Anderson, I asked how I could afford to be able to do what I want to do

with my classes. I stressed to him that I don’t want money being a deciding factor of

how I teach my classroom. He told me about DonorsChoose.org, which is an

app/website that you can request money from donors on. It is a nationwide website

where random people will fund you to add books, pay for projects, go to plays,

fieldtrips, supplies, materials, and many other things. It is so good to know that I

don’t have to let money get in the way of what I want to do with my classes.

I asked Mr. Anderson to give me as many tips as he could. He told me that I

must know what exactly is going on at home with my students so that I am able to

treat them appropriately and not to judge them. He told me don’t teach certain

books or plays just because you love them. It doesn’t matter what I like anymore

because it is up to the kids. The students must like what they are reading or else

they won’t be motivated to participate and grow as readers and writers.

He also told me something that I have been hearing all my life, which is that

“It’s all about who you know, not what you know” and I believe this is very true. He

was really letting me know that I have to become close with all the staff on campus,

from English teachers to the custodians. This is how you make changes happen. I

asked him how I should treat the fact that the students might not respect me

because I am so close to their age, and he said that is exactly why they might respect

me even more. He was telling me that I am young so I have to be fast, hip, and I have

to be relatable. I can connect with them on all types of levels. I can connect with

them through sports, music, clothing, nature, social media, memes, and many other
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topics. He told me that kids will respond to me well because I don’t look like an

ordinary English teacher.

I asked Mr. Anderson what is one thing that I should always be asking myself

as a teacher and he that you must constantly ask yourself, “What more can I bring to

the school?” He told me that there is always something that you can bring to your

school whether it be running and staring a club(s), being head of the yearbook

committee, starting a poetry group/club, or even being a coach for one of the high

school’s sports team if needed. Mr. Anderson told me that soon as you do something

like offer to become a coach or club leader or yearbook leader you are automatically

one level higher than the next person. I want to let my students adventure. I want to

take them to Golden Gate Park to go see Shakespeare live. I am going to talk to the

principle of my school about adding courses and funding trips for those courses. I

want to get involved because Mr. Anderson made it very clear that simply getting

involved, truly getting involved, is by far the most beneficial thing you can do for

yourself as a teacher.