Jean Anyon's Four Different Schools

In this reading Jean Anyon describes four different types of schools for social status: working-class schools, middle class school, affluent professional school, and executive elite school. These schools were defined by how much income the fathers were making and thus organizing these schools into the four categories.

Working-class schools:
This type of school is a school where teachers are not thrilled to work there and are not exactly thrilled about teaching the students that they have to work with. The teachers do not put in a great amount of effort and follow a standard curriculum with no enthusiasm, this type of teaching is lazy and demanding on the students. Teachers who do try to teach "out of the box" methods are laughed at and embarrassed, there is a certain feeling to these schools and to me seems very depressing. Knowledge is described as coming from the teachers, they are the ones who have the answers and their answer is the only answer- learning is not taken seriously and the idea of "thinking" or having "original thoughts" is slim to none. Most teachers described knowledge as basic skills. Learning in this type of environment is through a system of steps and simple skills, no broadened ideas of education and certainly no creativity, it is a method of completing tasks in a specific way and this is used in all subject areas. facts are what matters in the working-class school and college is not a definite or even a maybe for most students. Teachers and students have a tumultuous relationship, they aren't caring for their students and many see them as a burden or lazy or not even intelligent which is wrong, they just don;t take their jobs seriously enough to care or take the time to connect.

link to working-class schools:
http://ees.d300.org/school/eastview
 I think this schools qualifies as working-class because it holds a lot of similarities to what Anyon talked about, the neighborhood is small and slightly unsafe and the school is old and has had no updates, it is very diverse in its student body but has a high Hispanic population. Eatsview is an elementary school that one of my students attended, he was forced to repeat second grade because he had no sufficiently learned any material the previous year. Not because this student has a learning disability or because he is 'lazy' but because the teacher didn't do her job properly. This schools website is even bare, offering very little information to parents or to anyone for that matter. This school is set in a neighborhood across the road from a very nice middle-class neighborhood with a new elementary school less than a mile away.

Middle Class School:
This type of school is generally set in a nice neighborhood where parents have average jobs and do alright for themselves, students go to school because it is what is expected of them but not because they are thrilled to learn. A lot of the education and learning in these schools is based on what comes from the textbooks that the teachers use. There is some creativity and some opportunities for different answers, not always just one answer but definitely answers that the textbooks have provided. Teachers view knowledge as skills and things they need to know for daily life and that knowledge is understanding, if you do not understand what you are reading or learning it is useless. To these students and teachers knowledge has already been put down in books and they rely heavily on looking answers up and gaining knowledge from others but not creating it themselves. The relationship between teachers and students is that they are there to help and give the tools to gain knowledge and interpret curriculum that has been given to them.

Link to Middle class school:
http://ww2.d155.org/clc/default.aspx
I know this is a middle class school because I went here and I know what the teachers and the education were like. This high school is about as down home and middle class as you can get and people in this area are proud of that. They offer a lot of programs and they do their best to make them fun and appropriate but they do not offer as many things as perhaps say an affluent professional school. The school is old and it takes it traditions and history rather seriously. A lot of the teachers graduated from this high school or surrounding high schools and came back to teach.

Affluent Professional School:
This type of school is somewhere I would have definitely loved to go, this is a school where knowledge is highly valued and you are given the tools to learn from your own experiences and think for yourself. You have the ability to create and be yourself within this type of learning environment. The type of work students are given is different and presented in different methods and types of ways to find the answer. Children are encouraged to have an opinion and think of the answers themselves or at least try to. Teachers engage their students and get them to think deeply on different topics, but some teachers find themselves walking on egg shells and making sure to not get too free with their opinions or lesson plans. The idea of individualism is heavy in this type on environment everyone is encouraged to be an individual and independent and this can cause children to think too highly of themselves. Knowledge can be gained for yourself in an affluent professional school, knowledge is something that you gain through experience and individualism and is something that can be found in several different ways.

Link to Affluent Professional School:
http://www.nscollegeprep.cps.k12.il.us/
This school is what they call a college preparatory school and you usually have to have money to attend schools of this nature. This high school is tanked #33 in the nation for college prep, meaning to all of them are expected to go to college and not just state schools but elite top 10 schools. On the website it has a laundry list of the ideal graduate from this school and the expectations they have for students who attend Northside College Prep. This is a type of school where you have to be admitted you do not just attend a school such as this you must be admitted based on your status as a student.

Executive Elite School:
A school such as this is filled with students and teachers that come from upper to middle class backgrounds and the students often having higher social and class status than some of the teachers. It is sad to say but the diversity within this school is very little, a majority of rich white kids attend executive elite schools and they come from families that have small fortunes if not large ones. I would describe this schools curriculum as demanding and rigorous not only for the students but the teachers the expectation is excellence. These are expected to be the minds of the future and the application and tuition to these schools can be more difficult than getting into college. Knowledge is something they define not something created, they think deeply and cognitively beyond their years for the correct and most intellectual answer.  The relationship between student and teacher is that the teacher is thee to instill knowledge and give you the ideas and the tools to succeed without failure, because failure is never an option. Going to a school like this is about being the best and trying harder, you are an elite member of society so you are expected to act and think as such.

Link to Executive Elite School:
http://www.taftschool.org/
This is a boarding school for executive elite members of society, getting in here is similar to getting into Harvard. The Taft school strives for excellence and has a very low admittance rate, they are coming from very secure financial backgrounds and are academically talented individuals. Students who graduate from here often go on to executive elite Universities and Colleges- it eve says so in the description for the institution. I had a very good friend go here, she lived in my neighborhood growing up and she was slightly younger than me she attended private elementary and middle schools. Her mother paid a hefty donation to get her into this school and after she went away I never talked to her again, rather she stopped talking to me.

My Experience:
I went to middle class schools throughout my life although I come from a more middle to upper class family. I have always loved school and I can not remember every disliking my teachers or what I was learning. I have a strong love for education and what it stands for and I know that they did something right along the way. I can remember having these awesome experiences in school with loving and caring teachers that wanted us to "shoot for the stars" and "be successful". My middle school was filled with teachers who taught from books and gave us knowledge based on what someone else had written, but the ideology of possibility was strong during those years and I can remember that success was the theme, that as students we were really pushed into believing that we were the future and what we did with our lives was going to make an impact. I loved my high school and it was a middle class school with what id like to think of as affluent professional teachers. They expanded our minds as much as they could, although not as much as if we had attended an affluent professional school. I had great teachers in high school and they cared a hell of a lot about us and what we did with ourselves and how we performed academically. I was lucky now that I think about it because the way that middle class schools are described mine was a part of the exception although living up to some of the stereotypes along the way. I was expected to go to college and mostly everyone I know did go away to state schools or to community college and those who didn't enlisted in the military. People I know that have graduated from school now have middle-class jobs and are living in the suburbs not far away from their parents or with their parents for now. A lot of teachers, nurses, pharmacists, marketing majors, physical therapists etc. Id like to say we were more or less molded into these expectations.

Stratified Monoploy

Overall I had a pretty pleasant experience with stratified monopoly, I was places in working class and I found that I was denied a lot of opportunities but not as many as the lower class. We did not have a very aggressive upper class person so it made the game a little more tolerable. I can see how this game applies to class status in today's society especially since when you have a lot of opportunity or privilege to begin with it seems to be  easier for you to make strides in life. I also can see how when you have a low income status or are unemployed/homeless you would feel the cards are stacked against you because that way of loving is obviously not glorified like the upperclass. I got extremely angry that I couldn't complain about the game I just had to shut up and take it, and I mostly wasn't even upset for myself but my partners having to  pay  to the upperclass or that their luck wasn't very good. I felt super irritated that  there was a rule to enforce the lack of freedom of speech. I definitely see how that pertains to how people feel maybe even in particular women or minorities because they often are not as valued.  Similarly in the end of the game I ran out of money and the lower class had gone bankrupt and selling their property, while the upperclass  kept buying every property for $10 because we couldn't afford them or even buy them period.

Blog Post #2 Wealth Inequality

I have learned about the wealth inequality before, but more in terms of inequality among races. My initial reaction to the video, "Wealth Inequality in America" was shock and disgust. I knew that the top 1% makes significantly more than the rest of the country but when it's put in terms of work ethic and stock holding it BLOWS MY MIND! They account for 50% of stocks and bonds owned and the average CEO makes 378% more than the average worker in his own company. What even qualifies someone to make that much more than the average worker, when I guarantee that "average joe" works just as hard if not harder, like a worker bee working for the queen. I was surprised to see what people thought the wealth distribution was, while I knew it was extremely skewed I was definitely unaware that it was that much of a difference and it makes me wonder, how did we let this happen? What justifies this distribution?  It is shocking and disturbing to me even more than it sort of remains a topic that is more or less unspoken of.

Social status and class are not a topic I generally think about, I would have always considered myself and my family to be in the middle to upper middle class, but when looking at the wealth distribution I may as well consider myself as a student WAY off the charts. I'd have to wholly agree that the video, " People like us" makes some very valid points. In this country we don't like to think that social class exists yet it obviously does, and the judgments of what class you belong to is made simply by appearance or what social functions you attend. I also love the term that in America we belong to "tribes" and we that we do often times separate ourselves from people who don't "fit into our social group or class", mostly because I think it makes us uncomfortable and people hate to have the feeling of uncomfortability. Social class determines a lot, it creates prejudices and divides people who don't know each other from Adam but because they don't shop at the same stores or live in the same neighborhoods they don't come together. I think that says a lot about society today, that we have these ideals about what makes a person 'fit in' or 'belong'.

Blog Post #1

Hi everybody,

My name is Jeanine Geraci, no relation to the lawyer on television ,but it is funny to be asked occasionally. I am a psychology major with a minor in sociology and going for a certification in family and child studies. Some fun facts about me are that I love to work with children and I currently work with special needs children. I already have a blog, although not a writing/ reading or academic blog. It pertains to fashion and specifically a "woman's guide to dressing.a curvy body", I felt like women with curves needed to be represented more and it's a good outlet for me. I have over 1000 followers and I think that is pretty neat that people like me enough to read what I have to say!
 
I think this class is an excellent requirement for students and introducing them on how to properly write a research paper and become more comfortable with reading and writing. I would consider myself a "good" writer, at least I would hope so considering it is something I really enjoy and am a Senior in college that I would have quite a bit of experience in writing thus far. I have always liked writing and I really do love to read, I wasn't always a good reader and I had to have services in 2nd and 3rd grade  to improve my reading skills. I consider myself an excellent reader and pretty well read, but that being said I don't have time to leisurely read with school taking over most of that time.

In the field of psychology writing is very important, many psychologists end up publishing their own books and writing extensively on their particular fields of study. I can see myself doing research and  publishing in the future. I will also hopefully be going for a Masters and a Psy-D in clinical psychology which would  require quite a bit of writing. Some things I would like to change about my reading habits is to read more for myself and books I'm interested in aside from school. I would like to work on my procrastination in writing although that seems to be more of a time management issue than anything else, and be more confident in my writing skills. I hope that with this class I can better my writing and reading skills and acquire the patience to read more thoughtfully. I am always open to criticism and the ability to learn more and of course better myself, I hope that I can take away a lot from this course and wish I wouldn't have waited until my last semester to take it.