• What roles do families and society play in the pressures facing youth? Describe.

            A child’s family is his/her first experience with people. Unlike some animals with innate behaviors, most human behaviors are learned from watching or listening to their surroundings. Especially in youth, children can be very impressionable, so their families and society play a huge role in how the child discovers, deals with, and conquers the pressures upon them.  One of the main pressures a youth faces is school; It is where they spend eight hours a day. Although our educational system has been altered countless times to give students an equal chance at success, there are still some students who “get a running start”.  A student’s family and social surroundings often determine if they will be successful or not.  Something like the family’s Social Economic Status can affect how a child sees school. This can go many ways. A child in a lower SES family can either see school as a way to build their way up financially by getting good grades as a way to college and eventually getting a degree, resulting in a higher paying job or it is seen as waste of time because they never had someone to help with homework, so now they are just “getting by” with grades and have no plans to attend college because their parents did not. Student’s with families of higher SES are the ones with the “running start”. Being that this status can also come with parental guidance, tutors, or time spent on homework and not at an extra job, it is easier for them to stay and be successful. These students can either see school as only “stop one” on their educational journey because of the help from their parents or school can be seen as an annoyance because they know their parents can help support them financially while they “goof off”.

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What can school and teachers do about these external forces? Describe.

            The best way a school or teacher can handle the external forces of a student’s life is to treat everyone equally. A teacher should make it very clear that despite students’ differences, anyone can succeed through hard work. All students should have the same rules and consequences for breaking those rules. Also, teachers should connect with their students. This sense of connection to school is most important for those children who struggle with lack of support on the home front, serious academic deficiencies, language barriers, and other challenges. This connection makes the student feel they belong, and when a student feels they belong, it is more likely they will be more confident in class and succed. This way, both teachers and students have a sense of involvement. The staff cares about not just a program or strategy, but a way of relating to students, their families, and one another that conveys compassion, understanding, respect, and interest.

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Why is it important to graduate from high school and go on to obtain a degree? Describe.

            As Georgia moves out of the devastation of the 2007 recession, the low-skill, Blue-collar jobs are not expected to return to their high levels of employment. During this time, if Georgia schools are not producing graduates and prepping them for college, unemployment rates will skyrocket. Compared to graduates, non-graduates are less likely to be employed full-time, will be unemployed more often, and will experience longer periods of being out of work. Non-graduates also put stress on our economy. The impact can be felt directly as the loss of their personal incomes which lowers the region’s lower per capita income. Non-graduates can also impact the economy indirectly with higher crime rates, higher welfare expenses, increased rates of unemployment, and greater costs of healthcare for the poor. It has also been proven that the more educated people a community has, the more likely a business will locate there which would strengthen the economy. And with more people working in degree-driven jobs, the more tax revenue the community has to strengthen itself.

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What are some barriers to educational success in high school? Describe a few.

            One of the first barriers can be student engagement. Students often complain that school is boring. Mainly, they feel that teachers do not do enough to involve them in their lessons; frequently delivering their teachings in boring fashions which can be described as monotone. Due to the delivery of the lessons, it is hard for the students to pay attention and stay interested. Keeping students engaged is also hard because it is not made clear to them the connection between what they are learning in high school and what they will do as a career in real life. Because students cannot make this connection, they often think most of the work is pointless and “busy work.” Second, parent involvement and basic needs can be restrictions on student success. Lack of parental ability to help with school work is one of the reasons that students depended so much on teachers to go the extra mile to help them with their school work and keep them engaged. Family instability or hardships impacted many students lives; these are things like: stable housing, transportation, financial stability, etc. When worrying about “which parent am I staying with this weekend?”, “how I am going to get to school tomorrow?”, or “What am I going to eat today?”, it can be hard to focus on any school work.

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Why do some high school students drop out of school before they graduate?

            Academic performance is one key factor in determining if a student will stay in school. The road to academic success starts early in the education system, which can also put a lot stress on a young child. The deciding factor for dropping out can be anything as small as getting one bad grade, as big as being held back a grade, or consistently not meeting the grade requirements. It does not take much to discourage a student to a place where they deem school “not worth it”. Success in middle school is usually a key indicator of whether a student will drop out of high school. In middle school, a student goes through so many social and physical changes that can affect school work. As their bodies are changing, the structure of how they learn is too. Elementary school classes usually only have one teacher who the students stay with all day, but in middle school, the classes, teachers, and sometimes students, rotate. This transition can be difficult. Students are now less likely to have any one-on-one with their teachers, making it difficult to get the attention they need. Second, SES, or Social Economic Status, plays a huge roll in a students’ attendance in school. More than likely, families with a higher SES have children who are more inclined to stay in school. Being that this status can also come with parental guidance, tutors, or time spent on homework and not at an extra job, it is easier for them to stay and be successful. Families with a lower SES are at risk of having children who drop out because they do not have the time to do their homework, and it just seems more practical to turn their part time job into a full time job feeling that’s where they are going to end up anyway since they are less likely to go to college. Third, Parent Engagement is most often a necessary factor for a child to be successful in school. Educational support (both financial and emotional) from parents is key to a child to stay in school. If parents do not hold high goals for their child’s educational accomplishments, their child will not see the purpose of staying in or doing well in school. If parents are engaged early in the child’s educational career the child is more likely to be successful in school. The parent’s interest and investment in their child’s education shows the child that education is important.

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Describe what you, as a teacher, can do to help reduce or eliminate these barriers?

            Being that the main problem is student engagement, I would take many measures to keep students interested. First, I would make sure to connect with my students outside of class. It is important for them to know that you care and want them to succeed. Second, teacher’s ways of instructing need to match the age group. I plan to teach lower elementary, and I know that it would be nearly impossible just to lecture for an hour about addition and expect the students to retain the information like seniors. At that age, many activities have to be included for the students to get the full effect of the lesson. Third, at any age group, discussion can be used and actually may even be a good thing. The more a student talks in class, the more confident they will be about their knowledge. Once a student realizes their ability of intelligence, they will fall in love with learning despite the challenges they face at home or any other barriers they have in life.

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Summary:

            This lesson really had me thinking about how even though teachers and our educational system try to give an equal chance to all students, it is still possible for many students to fall behind because of their home life or other barriers of education. But despite all students’ differences, anything can happen. Even the families with higher SES status can have children who do not stay in school, even though they have all the help they could possibly need. Also, Families with a lower SES status may include parents who are never around to help their children with homework or participate in the motivation can have children who are exceptionally bright and are beyond succeeding in school. These children may also understand why it is so important to do well in school. In order to provide for a family, the parents must be making a decent amount of money, which can come from finishing high school and going on to get a degree from a college. I learned, through this lesson, that it is possible for all students to have some kind of barrier to learning and school success, but these can be conquered with hard work and caring teachers.

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