Jose Ortiz
Today I will be talking about the so called importance of our education and our country's incarceration system.Many say that the American dream is basically to sum it up and make it long story short is to be successful and have an equal opportunity at at a somewhat perfect life like everyone else but they is far from what the reality is. The system is designed to keep the rich rich, and the poor poor. Which brings me to my upcoming concern about this self contradicting situation of how it is explained to us how important ones education mainly because of the inflation of the cost of everyday living. First, what is education? Education is a formal process of learning in which some people consciously teach while others adopt the social role of a learner. Even though education happens to be one of the major industries of the United States, it also coincidently is the social institution that socializes members today of our society. With that in mind if you didnt at least graduate from high school to make the least. But, again since cost of living has inflated dramatically but not the minimum wage which I personally think should have risen up a bit more with the cost of living obtaining a high school diploma is not enough if you want to so called live the great american dream. Here is a graph explaining the yearly earning depending on a individuals educational level. Here is a link to get a better view of the picture of the Annual Median Earnings by Educational Level ->Annual Median Earnings by Education Level
As you can see from the graph above that the better education a person receives the more anticipated of making a year. However, if the United States is so called "obsessed" with making sure everybody especially particular the youth of today has an equal shot at education so they can be successful then why is our government spending much more money on incarcerating our youth then spending it on schools that actually need the money.Hundreds of millions of dollars are being invested in locking up hundreds to thousands of young blacks and latinos these days in many cities or areas that are predominantly minorities. Sixty six percent of the lowest performing high schools are put together very near the neighborhoods that also happens to have the highest rates of incarceration, where some of the biggest taxpayers investment in imprisonments is being made up until this day. From reading a couple pages from the book entitled "The New Jim Crow" by Michelle Alexander it has opened my eyes and taught me much more on how the government so calls cares about today's american citizens. All the government cares about is money and thats one of the main reasons why taxes were created. Our government goes and spends BILLIONS of dollars like its pocket change and taxes all of us for everything we got in order to gain some money back that it spent. I am personally surprised we aren't even taxed or charged for breathing everyday smh. Quoting from a text from the book "What we learn from Los Angeles, Houston, and Philadelphia is that our national priorities are misplaced, and with devastating consequences." What she was referring to was that not just those specific places but many other cities filled with many different neighborhoods send more teens to jail than to college which is reflecting how much money is invested into prisons. In a number of neighborhoods the large investment into the penile system that overthrows or overshadows the investment on education correlates with the lowest performing schools. Quoting from Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger noting in his 2010 State of the State address: "Spending 45 percent more on prisons than universities is no way to proceed into the future. I also like how Michelle Alexander labels her book the "The New Jim Crow" simply because today's penile system is seen as a legal way to keep non white races or ethnicities at or at least below the poverty line. People do have to remember that back in the early to mid 20th century there was the Jim Crow laws which segregated every other race from whites especially African Americans. Any school outside of a white school was horrible, with few teachers, and very old and if any textbooks, and also a very poor possibly worn down school buildings. Blacks were capable of voting but were forced to first answer questions that were back in those days nearly impossible to answer in order to be capable of voting. So to make it long story short non-whites have had a chance at obtaining a good education but were given the short end of the stick which made it truly difficult to become successful and live the made up american dream. Now they have the penile system which legally makes ex cons and people with criminal to not being able to vote and its not that whites don't ever get incarcerated but the majority of the races that do are blacks and latinos. So in my opinion even though many blacks and latinos do become successful there is still a bigger percentage that don't and those that don't are either in the poverty line or below it working very low paying jobs or are in prison. I see it as somewhat like a system that is set up to now legally keep blacks and latinos or any other non whites on the bottom and the whites who they see as their selves as the superior race, on the top.
Today I will be talking about the so called importance of our education and our country's incarceration system.Many say that the American dream is basically to sum it up and make it long story short is to be successful and have an equal opportunity at at a somewhat perfect life like everyone else but they is far from what the reality is. The system is designed to keep the rich rich, and the poor poor. Which brings me to my upcoming concern about this self contradicting situation of how it is explained to us how important ones education mainly because of the inflation of the cost of everyday living. First, what is education? Education is a formal process of learning in which some people consciously teach while others adopt the social role of a learner. Even though education happens to be one of the major industries of the United States, it also coincidently is the social institution that socializes members today of our society. With that in mind if you didnt at least graduate from high school to make the least. But, again since cost of living has inflated dramatically but not the minimum wage which I personally think should have risen up a bit more with the cost of living obtaining a high school diploma is not enough if you want to so called live the great american dream. Here is a graph explaining the yearly earning depending on a individuals educational level. Here is a link to get a better view of the picture of the Annual Median Earnings by Educational Level ->Annual Median Earnings by Education Level
As you can see from the graph above that the better education a person receives the more anticipated of making a year. However, if the United States is so called "obsessed" with making sure everybody especially particular the youth of today has an equal shot at education so they can be successful then why is our government spending much more money on incarcerating our youth then spending it on schools that actually need the money.Hundreds of millions of dollars are being invested in locking up hundreds to thousands of young blacks and latinos these days in many cities or areas that are predominantly minorities. Sixty six percent of the lowest performing high schools are put together very near the neighborhoods that also happens to have the highest rates of incarceration, where some of the biggest taxpayers investment in imprisonments is being made up until this day. From reading a couple pages from the book entitled "The New Jim Crow" by Michelle Alexander it has opened my eyes and taught me much more on how the government so calls cares about today's american citizens. All the government cares about is money and thats one of the main reasons why taxes were created. Our government goes and spends BILLIONS of dollars like its pocket change and taxes all of us for everything we got in order to gain some money back that it spent. I am personally surprised we aren't even taxed or charged for breathing everyday smh. Quoting from a text from the book "What we learn from Los Angeles, Houston, and Philadelphia is that our national priorities are misplaced, and with devastating consequences." What she was referring to was that not just those specific places but many other cities filled with many different neighborhoods send more teens to jail than to college which is reflecting how much money is invested into prisons. In a number of neighborhoods the large investment into the penile system that overthrows or overshadows the investment on education correlates with the lowest performing schools. Quoting from Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger noting in his 2010 State of the State address: "Spending 45 percent more on prisons than universities is no way to proceed into the future. I also like how Michelle Alexander labels her book the "The New Jim Crow" simply because today's penile system is seen as a legal way to keep non white races or ethnicities at or at least below the poverty line. People do have to remember that back in the early to mid 20th century there was the Jim Crow laws which segregated every other race from whites especially African Americans. Any school outside of a white school was horrible, with few teachers, and very old and if any textbooks, and also a very poor possibly worn down school buildings. Blacks were capable of voting but were forced to first answer questions that were back in those days nearly impossible to answer in order to be capable of voting. So to make it long story short non-whites have had a chance at obtaining a good education but were given the short end of the stick which made it truly difficult to become successful and live the made up american dream. Now they have the penile system which legally makes ex cons and people with criminal to not being able to vote and its not that whites don't ever get incarcerated but the majority of the races that do are blacks and latinos. So in my opinion even though many blacks and latinos do become successful there is still a bigger percentage that don't and those that don't are either in the poverty line or below it working very low paying jobs or are in prison. I see it as somewhat like a system that is set up to now legally keep blacks and latinos or any other non whites on the bottom and the whites who they see as their selves as the superior race, on the top.
Name: Dekontee Wah
ReplyDeleteI like your post and i think you did a good job explaining it. It was clear and easy to follow. The mode and language that were used clearly state your point. However, i think you should have talk a little more and give more details on education. I think you should have include urban and suburban schools and describe how they are different or alike in terms of education, and how the governmnet spend more money into suburban schools.
Your post was really interesting. I kinda already knew that we spent more money on incarceration rather than education, but this post really brings it into perspective. I think the main source of this problem is drugs. A couple countries and areas have recently done things like legalize softer drugs like marijuana. I think legalization of at least marijuana for a start, would get rid of tons of minority arrests, an taxation on it would bring in a lot of money to the government, that could hopefully be used for education, hopefully. The possession of any other drug I think should be penalized by being sent to rehab, who ocassionally uses cocaine, crack or heroin anyway? Seriously? Why is government putting people behind bars for having a disease (drug addiction).
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