Self Assessment #2

1.My peer review was helpful in that it showed me where I needed to tie my claims together for what he referred to as a "late game" claim. I think this was vital to bring my essay together and connecting Kohl's essay and Pratt's essay. The two ideas are important to each other because they bring together the groups who are unwilling to learn and the groups trying to teach them and putting then in the context of a contact zone. It almost made me see the Contact zone as a kind of problem solver. Also thanks for the punctuation tips =)

2. I will be writing an entire new essay and I think i have found a direction that is more focused. I will be discussing the group, Anonymous and their effect on the internet legislation and foundation of certain bills moving their way through congress. I will be discussing how and why Anonymous is creating a viral contact zone between internet users and the government. I have not yet decided what the third essay i will be using is but i hope to figure that out over the weekend. I would also like to make note that i will be using a few outside news article in  relation to my topic and the essay ideas as a whole.

Plan of Action for Portfolio

1.     1.How has the development of internet sub cultures and the creation of groups like anonymous effects the internet? What have been the major implications of their actions?

2.   2.  Throughout history minority groups have developed some good and some bad, some of these groups even go as far as causing others trouble. In todays information age a subculture of Internet users have created a collective effort to cause mayhem and even some times become Internet freedom activists.

3.     3.In this new essay I want to use Pratt’s idea of contact zones and how the literal arts of the contact zone create a working environment where people can communicate and develop working relationships with one another. The idea of the contact zones is that the subculture of Internet users, anonymous has created a social and political contact zone because of their actions on the Internet. I am also planning on using Kohl’s idea in against school to show how the both sides of this Internet debate are refusing to learn. I think I will also use ideas from Gatto’s against school. To discuss the differences between a working system and system that does not function they way it was intended to function.

4.    4. I think my question is a strong one that has many areas of exploration. I will look at the behaviors and patterns of the group Anonymous and analyze their behavior. What I really want to figure out is are they doing the opposite of what they set out to do? I want to know whether their actions on the Internet have a negative effect on the Internet freedom acts and I want to analyze whether or not they are handling their problems effectively in today’s day and age. Some might even say that this group of people is putting themselves at risk of capital punishment but is what they are doing really bad?

5.   5.  I am interested in this topic because I have seen first hand the damage and good that Anonymous can do as a group. I think the hardest part for me is being un biased as I myself have partaken in some of the Anonymous online raids. I think that this is an important issue right now especially with bills like SOPA and PIPA, yes they were shelved but HR 1998 should be the revised bill that will be the center of debate between the government and the online community. I think this topic also strikes me as important because I want to know what motivates the Anonymous group members to be so malicious in their attacks. Is it right that they destroy people’s lives yet also seemingly protecting the Internet. Something that has also always made me curious that I might mention in my essay is how anonymous is Anonymous?

6.   6.  This paper will essentially be a new paper, yes the central focus and ideas are similar however it is on a completely different yet related topic. I think that this will extend analytically to the group Anonymous’ psyche and why they are motivated to damage intellectual property or why they are willing to protect other internet freedoms. I think that this will also provide deep insight into the SOPA and PIPA debates, deeper than anything just written about SOPA and PIPA simply because we can trace much of the negative conflict back to this group. I think I will end up asking myself, is anonymous hurting or helping these online feuds.

Essay Project 3

Please post comments about essay project 3 here!

Reading Journal 6

1. Shorris' project is simply to provide any "student" with a background education that makes them successful in their other pursuits. A sort of school that teaches higher thinking and logic and reasoning over preciseness and correctness. The new liberal school was embracing the ambiguity of its new education style. Shorris does a good job at picking out what he thinks are the most important things to teach. He discovers a sort of foundation for a sturdily taught education. However I believe his argument is limited to a certain domain because i believe this education would not work for someone out side of the lower class. Precisely because the background education is different, the life style choices are different, It was best said in the beginning to the essay people needed to be taught "a moral alternative to the street".  He did just that with the types of literature and knowledge he introduced those students too, however what if an alternative to the street isn't needed or you have had other outlets in your life because of your economic status. Well, I don't believe those people are looking for that same sort of liberal education. Yet i do believe that the curriculum of his school is sound for teaching basics to people and offering them "a moral alternative to the street".

2. Much like Plato's "Allegory of the Cave" the alternative education presented by Shorris is by all means the light to witch people find their way out of the cave, Identifying for themselves the world in front of them.

3. Would this sort of education work on people not impoverished or depressed. Or would this sort of education be just another history class about the grey men of the days way back when? Would the effect of the alternative education be the same for students from different economic classes?

Given the chance, would you participate in an alternate style of learning or would you question your peers' questioning?

Readin Journal 5

Mcintosh's "White Privilege and Male Privilege" discusses the racsim and disenfranchisement of people other than white males. She begins by letting us know that the world works a certain way. No matter what there is a world of people who are segregated into groups and despite our best efforts to remain unbiased in our judgment of others that is just how society pushes us to be. Examples are given and the best example I read was that going to a bookstore you can find authors of your particular race grouped into what a supermarket would look like. I think of the example of aferican american literature. There is always a section for aferican american literature or there is always a section for women's literature. isn't it all just literature. Society has pushed us into certain societal "norms" and this has created a sense of privilege in many groups and in reverse has also made many people feel as though they are not properly represented.

Discussion questions

Do people stick to their" Water Cooler Group'? and why do they tend to be this way.

How often do we find our selves associating with people that are only like us and when we are with people like us how do we see the other groups?

Are people misrepresented in situations where there groups/culture/race/sex should be the one leading the conversation. And is there one group making all of the decisions for every other group?

Reading Journal #4

1. In Kohl's "I Won't Learn From You" he raises many points about how fear of failure and willed not learning go hand in hand, "Conscious, willed refusal of schooling for political or cultural reasons is a response to oppressive education." Kohl is saying that willed learning is someones response to the way they were raised and that just because people are choosing to not learn doesn't mean that they can't. Take the story of Barry for example. Barry was a student that refused to learn because he had been given free reign in the classroom. He chose not to read with the rest of the class, yet we knew he was capable of something because he was a natural leader and someone whom all of the kids knew. What was his problem? He was afraid of failure, however when he was given to tools to succeed, he passed with flying colors, eventually even developing reading skills. Kohl also states "Until we learn to distinguish not-learning from failure and respect the truth behind this massive rejection of schooling by students from poor oppressed communities, it will not be possible to solve the major problems of the education system of the United States today." This is a great claim! its juicy and to the point and what i think Kohl is getting at is similar to my essay, he believes there is an alternative out there that can help students learn in different ways. Not learning and failure have their differences and when we fail to recognize this we let students past that may have willfully not learned the material, not because they are dumb but because they didn't want to. The question then arises, how do we make ALL people want to learn?

2. Kohl argues that we cannot solve the problems with America's Education System until we have distinguished not-learning form failure. An all to common problem in harder areas of the united states. for whatever reason the students and teachers seem to be reaching what Pratt would refer to as a contact zone. In this contact zone students meet teachers, students are armed to the teeth, with "NO", "I DON'T WANT TO" and "SHUTUP". What weapons does that leave the teacher with? The primary issue is that these kids are not being taught they way they should be. The children in classes choosing to not learn are not being catered to instead they are being treated as failures which in some cases, like Barry's, is exactly what they need in order to learn. This brings to question in my mind, what are the alternatives? Yes, we have seem remedial classes and other sorts of alternative schooling, but these classes i feel do more harm than good when it comes to helping students learn in different ways. These classes are used for students who teachers sometimes have given up on. How is the education system in America supposed to change if the students are not learning. Is it not the teachers job to find ways around these barriers and adjust to the students that they are teaching. There are many questions as to why we have the problems within the education system that we do and it is a curious thing that students would choose to willfully not learn instead of participate. Yet to each his own and if thats what it takes is a teacher going the extra mile to teach a student I think thats when the teacher is doing their job correctly. Now I'm not saying give one teacher a whole group of these kids but what i am saying is that the teachers need to be more accommodating to these students because in the end they are just the students of a compulsory education system. They are not the ones making the lesson plans. I think more of the weight of this problem lies with the teachers and less with the students.

Essay #2

Brendan Young

English 101: Feller

Essay #2 2/1/12

Education: Selective or Elective

            Children are often afraid to raise there hand in class and in many cases the chirping of crickets ensues as a teacher stares back at the students, which are supposed to be learning. This is an all to common sight in today’s day and age. Students afraid to learn from the wrong because they are taught at such a young age to always be correct. When did being correct become the only way to succeed? In John Gatto’s “Against School” he argues that, “Children learn things not because they are doing something wrong but because they are doing something correct” (Gatto 2). Does our current compulsory school system teach students that you cannot learn if you are wrong? From a young age every child has heard that you learn from your mistakes, is it true? We are putting out children through a school system that does not allow children to learn from their mistakes but instead punishes them. Gatto also argues that there are many people who have been successful that have not participated in what we would consider a “traditional” schooling (Gatto 2). In fact some of the greatest minds in history have been people who don’t seem to fit into the traditional system of school. This raises the question, are there other ways to learn that would be more effective than the compulsory education we have in place today? The tools to educate in other ways is out there, it is possible for people to learn through, homeschooling, private school, alternative and vocational schools, even a self-paced learning environment where the tools and materials are provided and you teach yourself.  A stretch? Maybe but we will see that people have been successful with independent study many times before. There is no way around it, the current education system is compromised, inadvertently we have stunted the growth of knowledge in our students by teaching them dependency and uncertainty and to curb this there should be alternatives in place for people who wish to learn effectively in different ways.

            Many people have seen there way through America’s education system and pushed on to receive their degrees from universities across the country but are they educated? John Gatto gives an example of people who have been wildly successful without a complete education, Ben Franklin, Thomas Edison, Abraham Lincoln, John Rockefeller and Andrew Carnegie (Gatto 2). These men by all standards have been successful but they did not receive the education that we are forced to put ourselves through. Had any of us opted out of school at a young age to pursue other ventures, we would be faced with constant opposition. Family and friends would only be disappointed and employers would say that we are undereducated and unable to perform daily tasks. There was no strict education system in America until the early 1900’s, how were people successful before then? It would be ignorant to say that the people of America’s history, who did not have a chance to receive the education of today, are uneducated. The argument that if you don’t go to school for 12 years you will never amount to anything doesn’t hold any water. It has no validity because we have seen “non-traditional” styles of learning work in the past. Is there any reason we should not consider accepting a different style of learning like some of histories greats? Benjamin Franklin, was not only a founding father of our country but he was also a skilled printer, author, political theorist, postmaster, scientist and inventor. Today he would be considered a dropout.  However the self-paced study that Benjamin Franklin put himself through would challenge most students with a heavier than average load at Yale. Yet self-paced instruction is not an option. It is not wrong to take education into your own hands and learn things on your own.

Clearly the only way to learn cannot be the rote style of learning we receive in our classrooms today. Is the Traditional system of learning working? In the sense that it is turning out individuals to the next level of education, yes it is working. But are the individuals that make it through the schooling system educated? Plain and simple, students in school systems are not actively learning. In Gatto’s Essay, “Against School” he states that, “Boredom is a common condition among school teachers” (Gatto 1). Not only is it a plague that affects the teachers but also it easily spreads into the minds of the students. Active learning is apart from boredom; if a student is actively learning and engaged then there should be no mention of boredom. Where our system fails is that it promotes repetition of material and the rote style of learning that seems to bore students to death by battering them over the head with the same material over and over. Tasks in school have become so tedious that students are no longer learning for themselves; instead they are going through the motions to “make the grade”. Ken Macrorie’s “The Poison Fish” gives us insight into the dilemma above:

Most English teachers have been trained to correct students’ writing, not to read it; so they put down those bloody correction marks in the margins. When the students see them, they think they mean the teacher doesn’t care what students write, only how they punctuate and spell. So they give him Engfish (Macrorie 1).

The idea of Engfish, presents the essential problem with the education system today. Students are not learning for themselves instead they are learning for the teacher, learning how to do everything correctly so they receive high marks. Schools, over the years, have become less and less effective at accomplishing their goal of educating children because students have fallen away from learning actively and more independently. Thus creating a dependency on instruction to function later in their careers.

America’s education system is compromised. It is riddled with boredom and disinterest. It is almost as though America’s school system is an environment in which active learning is rare. This isn’t the first time that we have seen a compulsory system of education have its road bumps, Prussia had one and this raises concern for the future of our “educated” people.  The goal of the Old Prussian system was to, “deny students appreciable leadership skills and to ensure docile and incomplete citizens- all in order to render the population manageable” (Gatto 3) By not allowing students to learn independently as well as actively we are inadvertently depriving them of the skills necessary for them to be complete citizens. While our schooling system may not be exactly the same as the Prussian system of the past our school system definitely has similar flaws. This brings to mind the phrase, “The world needs ditch diggers too.” This is no way for us to teach our children, instead we should be teaching our children to achieve, it is the job of the older generation to give the children and students the tools and motivation to be great. The world doesn’t need ditch diggers, the world needs free thinking individuals who can create and dream individually to advance and enhance the lives of all people. Gatto may be against school but not education, he finds a simple solution; we need to teach the future generations to be leaders and adventurers, teach them how to think critically and independently and most importantly it is out job to challenge and always continue questioning.

            If you want authenticity you have to initiate it. This is the true way to learn and we can see that from the successful people in our past. There are many styles of learning and there should be more than one option.  Ken Robinson of “Ted Talks” says we are killing the creativity of students in schools and he could not be more correct. We need to inspire the youth to make the changes to their own education, no longer should we as students be able to say this is boring, if its boring then you aren’t pushing yourself because no one can cure boredom but you and our current schooling system is not pushing us to be involved because there is one right answer. We know that we can learn from wrong, and that independent self-paced study has been successful in the past but are there more options? Could we let students pursue their own course of study and direct themselves into a profession with which they feel naturally inclined to. Would it be a viable option to give students a building full of the educational material and their peers and learn from each other, with just support from “teachers” rather than direction? Would students still be motivated to learn on their own? There are other options to consider as well, such as keeping the current system and changing our children are evaluated and divided.

            Going about changing the current schooling system would not be easy and of course face opposition. No one other than the students themselves should dictate how they educate themselves. The compulsory education system in place now has no doubt turned out many individuals who have gone on to great things but is that a result of the education they received or a result of their personal conviction and work ethic? And If that is the case then what is to say that the individuals would not have been as successful in another learning atmosphere. As students, what we can do is strive to be better, this means go beyond the minimum, don’t be afraid to challenge ideas or question. It is our job to have ideas and our job to continue learning at all times and most of all; we all have to start being wrong. That is when the learning will really occur.

Self Assessment #1

So far in this English 101 class I have been doing decently. The one thing that i have been struggling with in this class is the due dates and definitely the time that the class starts. Lately I have been struggling with getting to class 2 minutes sooner than I have been. I have learned to be on top of my dates and get things posted on time. I realize that this might not be a good example of that. I have also learned that making a claim and having a thesis are two different things, formulating claims is a lot harder than i originally thought. I have definitely become better at reading and analyzing. My ability to think critically has increased and I have become much better at analyzing literature. In the next half of the course i hope to continue learning about Engfish. I think that the idea that people write for a grade instead of writing to analyze and think critically is very important because I myself was once a victim of Engfish. This course has given me the ability to stray away from Engfish and be more comfortable about it. I couldn't say that there is anything that I am looking forward to learning in this course. But i am excited to keep reading about the school and education subject matter that we have been into recently. I hope that i see more ted talks in the future because they are very informative and i love listening to lectures.

Overall I have  had a great time in this course. I hope to continue having a good time and hope i can make it at 10:00 and not 10:02

IWA #2 (Presentation Week)

IWA #2
Due at 5pm


In Mary Pratt's essay, "Art of the Contact Zone" she makes the claim that, "Autoethnography, transculturation, critique, collaboration, bilingualism, mediation, parody, denunciation, imaginary dialogue, vernacular expression--these are some of the literate arts of the contact zone" (4). While the contact zone is a place where all of these are present, it brings to question, do all contact zones have the same things happening in them or are these just the characteristics of a "working" contact zone? Would there be distinct differences between a working contact zone and a contact zone full of chaos? If a contact zone is referred to as, "Social spaces where cultures meet, clash, and grapple with each other, often in contexts of highly asymmetrical relations of power, such as colonialism, slavery, or their aftermaths as they are lived out in many parts of the world today" (1). I do not think that the literal arts are present in certain situations because if a contact zone is a place where people are grappling and clashing then it doesn't seem as though mediation, dialogue, and collaboration. These seem as though they are important to the cohesiveness of a contact zone but if it directly contradicts what a contact zone is then how is it that we are supposed to believe that any contact zone is seem development. A better definition of contact zone is needed, a definition that leaves out the physical and verbal confrontational feel that it currently has. It needs to be clear that the people are not Physically grappling because that seems to be a  contact zone that lacks any literate arts whatsoever. A working contact zone is one where the collaboration and dialogue leads to an end to a contact zone and somewhere along those lines there is a change from contact zone to cohesive zone. Whether the Cohesive zone was created because of assimilation, acculturation, or agreement it is no longer a zone that grapples its a zone that grasps. The zone grasps for the dialogue, collaboration and mediation that it needs to make itself better but it is definitely no longer a contact zone.
 

Reading Journal 3

In Pratt’s “Art of the Contact Zone”  a lecture given to the Modern Language Association . it pushed teachers to find a more meaningful way to teach children by introducing everyone to the contact zone. The contact zone is a place where cultures collide and grapple with each other in asymmetrical power struggles. Prat uses the example of “The New Chronicle” and constructs a new picture of the world with Andean people and Not European peoples at the center of it. This shows how cultures coexist and shows exactly what is meant by “The Contact Zone”.

The thing that stood out to me the most or became my main flash point was her first example or anecdote about the child collecting baseball cards. I did not ever think that all of those things could be learned from baseball but clearly they can be. This reminded me of how I learned in elementary school I loved learning hands on things so I always loved blocks. Yet I collected cards to and I never felt like I learned any of the things that Pratt describes. However this brings to question my Idea of learning in different ways, it makes me question further whether or not there is a set way to learn or do we as students learn more creatively and effectively if we relate to the material?

The second flash point was related to Teacher and Pupil language and how most of the time we only see the side from the teachers point of view and not the pupils’. I Think more and more of student choice and the idea of independent study, I also continue to think that what might be wrong with our schooling today is that teachers are making all of the decisions for us and that students aren’t taking the initiative to learn, they are just arriving to absorb the information and pass tests. This is no way to learn. Both of these flashpoints relate to my essay #1 topic and I plan on incorporating them as soon as I edit. 

Essay Number 1

Are there other ways to learn that might be more effective than compulsory education?

            Children afraid to raise there hand in class and the chirping of crickets as a teacher stares at the students, which are supposed to be learning from them. This is an all to common sight in today’s day and age. Students afraid to learn from the wrong because they are taught at such a young age to be correct, and being correct is the only way to succeed. In John Gatto’s “Against School” he argues that, “Children learn things not because they are doing something wrong but because they are doing something correct.” Does our current compulsory school system teach students that you cannot learn if you are wrong? Are we doing things correct by teaching out children that being wrong is bad? From a young age every child has heard that you learn from your mistakes, is it true? In school it seems as though we are punished for our mistakes with bad grades and there is no opportunity to redeem yourself even if you are learning from your mistakes.  Gatto also argues that there are many people who have been successful that have not participated in what we would consider a “traditional” schooling. In fact some of the greatest minds in history have been people who don’t seem to fit into the traditional system of school. This raises the question, are there other ways to learn that would be more effective than the compulsory education we have in place today? There has to be other ways for people to learn, homeschooling, private school, alternative and vocational schools, consider even a self-paced learning environment where the tools and materials are provided and you teach yourself.  A stretch maybe but we will see that people have been successful with independent study many times before.  Whatever it is there should be alternatives in place for people who wish to learn different ways.

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            Many people have seen there way through America’s education system and pushed on to receive their degrees from universities across the country but are they educated? Gatto gives an example of people who have been wildly successful without a compulsory education, Ben Franklin, Thomas Edison, Abraham Lincoln, John Rockefeller and Andrew Carnegie. These men by all standards have been successful but they did not receive the education that we are forced to put ourselves through. Had any of us opted out of school at a young age, we would be faced with constant opposition, family and friends would only be disappointed and employers would say that we are undereducated and unable to perform daily tasks. Where did this shift occur? There was no strict education system in America until the early 1900’s, how were people successful before then? It would be ignorant to say that the people of America’s history, who did not have a chance to receive the education of today, are uneducated. It is possible that they learned in just different ways and we have moved away from that style of learning but clearly something besides our 12 years of primary and secondary school works. Is there any reason we should not consider a different style of learning like the greats of the past had? Benjamin Franklin, was not only a founding father of our country but he was also a skilled printer, author, political theorist, postmaster, scientist and inventor. However he would be what considers today a dropout.  The self-paced study that Benjamin Franklin put himself through would challenge most students with a heavier than average load at Yale. But self-paced instruction is not an option. Is it wrong to learn things on your own, clearly the only way to learn cannot be the rote style of learning we receive in our classrooms today.

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Is the Traditional system of learning working? In the sense that it is turning out individuals to the next level of education, yes it is working. But are the individuals that make it through the schooling system educated? This isn’t the first time that we have seen a compulsory system of education, Prussia had one and this raises concern for the future of our “educated” people.  The goal of the Old Prussian system was to, “deny students appreciable leadership skills and to ensure docile and incomplete citizens- all in order to render the population manageable.” If this really is the aim of our public schools, it would be no question as to why we have not realized it, simply because we are being taught not to recognize the pending social problems associated with the constant turn out of individuals form a school system like this. If the population is being rendered manageable, what are we be made manageable for? Are the people of our nation being made manageable, Gatto makes mention of schools raising a horde of consumers and isn’t that we are taught to do? We consume from the same industry we are trained to work in. The reason we are made manageable is so that our work force is constant and that there is no change, because as manageable people we have no drive to become better. While our schooling system may not be exactly the same as the Prussian system of the past our school system definitely has similar flaws, an added flaw may be that the students are divided at young ages and separated into certain groups. What groups are we divided into? I’m sure that we have all seem it through gifted class in elementary school and honors classes in the upper divisions of our schooling.  This brings to mind the phrase, “The world needs ditch diggers too.” This is no way for us to teach our children, instead we should be teaching our children to achieve,  it is the job of the older generation to give the children and students the tools and motivation to be great. The world doesn’t need ditch diggers, the world needs free thinking individuals who can create and dream individually to advance and enhance the lives of all people

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            If you want authenticity you have to initiate it. Its our job to lead and adventure, according to Gatto we should also think critically and independently, we should also push ourselves toward the “grown up” material to really learn. This is the true way to learn and we can see that from the successful people in our past. There are many styles of learning and there should be more than one option.  Ken of “Ted Talks” says we are killing the creativity of students in schools and he could not be more correct. We need to inspire the youth to make the changes to their own education, no longer should we as students be able to say this is boring, if its boring then you aren’t pushing yourself because no one can cure boredom but you and our current schooling system is not pushing us to be involved because there is one right answer. We know that we can learn from wrong and that independent self paced study has been successful in the past but are there more options? Could we let students pursue their own course of study and direct themselves into a profession with which they feel naturally inclined to. Would it be a viable option to let students run free in a building full of the educational material and their peers and learn from each other, with just support from “teachers” rather than direction. Would students still be motivated to learn on their own? There are other options to consider as well, such as keeping the current system and changing our children are evaluated and divided.

*********

            Going about changing the current schooling system would not be easy and of course face opposition. No one other than the students themselves should dictate how people educate themselves. The compulsory education system in place now has no doubt turned out many individuals who have gone on to great things but is that a result of the education they received or a result of their personal conviction and work ethic? And If that is the case then what is to say that the individuals would not have been as successful in another learning atmosphere. As students, what we can do is strive to be better, this means go beyond the minimum, don’t be afraid to challenge ideas or question. It is our job to have ideas and our job to continue learning at all times and most of all; we all have to start being wrong. That is when the learning will really occur.

Against School

Reading Journal #1

Gatto makes large claims but terrific points in his argument against the "Compulsory" education of America's forever children. He raises many questions, the first being:

Are there different ways to learn?
Well yes in fact, Gatto dives deep into examples of successful people whom have received little to no education and been successful. Men like Carnegie and Rockefeller, industrial titans and by todays standards, highly undereducated. What about Ben Franklin? Was he undereducated because he did not go to a compulsory twelve years of school. Maybe, but what if his self schooling had been more sucessful than  any other schooling that we ourselves have received. Does twelve years of education push children to learn and develop or does it push them through being okay with mediocre and only finding the right answer and not learning from the wrong.

Are our public schools keeping us from growing?
In todays society, all educated people are consumers. But are all educated people adults? The school system tends to teach people to "Get" the right answer and not search for it. Technology has given society great things but also a disability, we can't think for ourselves. Isn't that where the most learning occurs? The six functions of public schools seem to assimilate all children into a population of people who are not free thinking and are born and bred to be workers in a society controlled by industry.

With all of the negativity towards compulsory education that Gatto shares, it is hard to believe that words within his essay Against School would inspire me more to learn. Yet he says that boredom is no ones  fault but your own and that we must all push ourselves to lead and adventure. Not only that, but think critically and independently and don't avoid the grown up material, strive to be better and you will never get bored. Words of wisdom.

Looking back on it, reading this essay was more inspiring than anything i feel i ever "Learned" in elementary school.