Teach for America was founded in 1989 by Wendy Kopp, a Princeton student who for her senior year of college wrote a thesis about the educational achievement gap between high and low income students. She was searching for a way to take on a significant responsibility that would make a real difference in the world. Kopp wanted to build a prominent teach corps, whose standards and reputation would be enough to persuade Ivy League college, high-achieving graduates to choose teaching over more lucrative opportunities. Kopp envisioned an organization that would focus on creating teaching recruitment programs that would increase the quality of applicants the profession deserved.
As she wrote in one of her first published books, “One day, all children in our nation will have the opportunity to attain an excellent education" (Kopp 2001, 174). Kopp decided to take her thesis a step further, and so she decided to put her idea of a national teacher corps into action and Teach For America was formed. After estimating she would need approximately 2.5 million for project's start-up costs. And, at the suggestion of a professor, she contacted executives from several major corporations and asked for them to fund a seed grant. Shot down by almost all the people she had approached, she finally received an offer for a $26,000 grant from Mobil Corporation. With those limited funds she went on to and launched a grass-roots recruitment campaign to raise even more funds and open her company.
During Teach For America's first year of operation, the organization received applications from 2,500 candidates and chose 500 of them to become teachers for the program who began their two-year teaching commitment in low-income communities all across the cou...
... middle of paper ...
...ated by one of their executives at a recent alumni event: “We are not the enemy,” said co-CEO Elisa Villanueva at a July 18 alumni event, in response to the summit. “People like me and you ... will teach in places many would dismiss as lost or forgotten, or worse yet, invisible.” Maybe they need to do a greater effort on behalf of Teach For America needs to be put in place to go against these “misconceptions.
As Teach For America continues to grow from an outside force for change into an army of soldiers of change to make systemic transformation possible, a closer look needs to be taken on how the organization puts itself forward to the general public. I strongly believe that the current public relations model is outdated and is in need of a refresh in order to truly reflect the diverse membership and to effectively counter biased misconceptions of the brand.
To Kill a Mockingbird is a novel written by Harper lee in 1960. The novel tells the story of Atticus Finch, a white lawyer, and Tom Robinson, a black servant, accused of raping a white female. Finch defends Robinson in court arguing lack of evidence as his main point. However, the judge and jury still believe the woman’s testimony and orders Robinson to be killed. The novel has been praised for its outstanding literature since its publication. However, it remains a banned book by the American Library Association for its use of racial slurs and profanity. Due to it being banned, many high schools have reconsidered the notion of teaching it to their students. Two prominent authors wrote articles pertaining to this piece of literature: Angela Shaw-Thornburg wrote an article on her re-reading of the novel and her opinions on it; while Malcom Gladwell wrote an article comparing Atticus Finch to a state governor liberalist, James Folsom, and the restraints of liberalism in the south. In addition, Rebecca Best contributes her thought on how the novel should be taught by introducing the idea of “the other.” Regardless of the modern day political arguments surrounding this piece of literature, this novel contains a large insight into the time period of the 1960s which is an influential topic that should be taught to young high school students.
Data proves that America does not have enough African American males teaching in today’s schools. As a matter of fact, only 2% of America’s nearly five million teachers are black men (Bryan 1). In our American society, more and more African American females are fiercely taking over both public and private classrooms. Although this might be a great accomplishment, school officials believes that if more black males teach, it would reduce the numbers of minority achievement gaps and dropout rates. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, about 44% of students nationwide are minorities, but nearly 90% of teachers are white. Polls and surveys further read that if there were more African American male teachers, the dropout rate would decrease while the graduation rate increases. In urban societies most African American teens would be more likely to succeed if there were more black males instructing secondary classrooms.
Countless programs currently exist to help provide all pupils a quality education. To be specific, Louisiana also has the Child Care Assistance Program, which provides parents with affordable child care; so that the child can obtain an education; or so that the parents can further their education while the child is in the hands of a provider (Louisiana Believes Child Care Assistance Program. 2016). In addition, there is also the Save the Children project to help Louisiana’s children succeed; which was started in two thousand and five. This project was used to help students from all ethnic and financial background get back in school after hurricane Katrina; and better themselves academically in the areas of literacy and health (Save the Children U.S. Programs.
KIPP’s School District still focuses on enforcing a different teaching concept as compared to public schools. They implement bright colors, singing, and hand motions into everyday learning. This keeps the students attention and helps with their involvement. KIPP’s business level strategy would still be focused differentiation. They focus on kids that live in poverty and are failing in a normal public school. Most of the children that live in these areas are minorities. “There is 58,000 students, more than 88 percent qualify for free or reduced-price meals at school, and 95 percent are black or Latino” (Monahan). With most of the students living in poverty, the teachers need to pay special attention to them and have commitment plan with the student’s parent. This means the teachers need to put in more hours than most teachers in public schools. This has caused a low retention rate for KIPP teachers. There are also major issues with funding and management. These are some of the major issues shown in the 2012/13 case
To teach is to choose a challenging life. It requires passion in the profession, genuine love and interest in children, especially when one opts to teach young children. One must have a heart and needs to be ethical, reflective, caring and hopeful. It requires faith in yourself and respect for individual children, willing to work against the odds in order to contribute to an evolving environment. Ayers’s book, To Teach: The Journey of a Teacher is a book, I consider a work that strives for educational reform. Ayers write from his personal experience and then draws his educational philosophy around those experiences. William Ayers writes, as teacher, parent, student and observer, of the children he has known, and of the things that actually
Teach for America is an important program for today's and future education because it establishes contemporary thoughts and teachings. Like Kuhn states, “society is changing so fast” (Kuhn). Due to this belief, education is transforming and it is the teacher's priority to keep up with this pace. Teachers from Teach for America, or even great teachers within current education, are constantly reinventing their teaching styles and les...
With Rupert Murdoch’s arrival in the business of education have been celebrated because of the ideal of the parent companies of News of the World and Fox about getting into business dealing with school but has not meet the requirements of an establishment of education. When New Jersey had lost over millions in the federal education funding, due a summon on its grant applications the company was in the center of a huge devastation. With the entrance of education into the sector of broader education policies and with multinational corporations that oversee assessing kid’s in reading skills. University of Arizona Education Professor Kenneth Goodman said “decision making in education is so far removed from people who have anything to do with kids.”
The ability for all children from varying walks of life to receive a well-rounded education in America has become nothing more than a myth. In excerpt “The Essentials of a Good Education”, Diane Ravitch argues the government’s fanatical obsession with data based on test scores has ruined the education system across the country (107). In their eyes, students have faded from their eyes as individual hopefully, creative and full of spirit, and have become statistics on a data sheet, percentages on a pie chart, and numbers calculated to show the intelligence they have from filling out bubbles in a booklet. In order for schools to be able to provide a liberal education, they need the proper funding, which comes from the testing.
Long, Cindy. "How Do We Increase Teacher Quality in Low-Income Schools?" NEA Today RSS. N.p., 24 May 2011. Web. 28 Apr. 2014.
As children, we look to our parents to teach us skills that we need in everyday life, whether it be social skills or how to. Yet for a variety of reasons, some children do not have this personal role model for them to follow and learn from. For these children, their teachers may be the first adult to give them any sort of attention or care. As a result, a teacher can play a huge impact in a young child’s life. The Allentown School District’s high schools are both considered Title I schools, meaning that over 40% of the school’s students come from families that are legally considered low-income (www2.ed.gov). In the ASD, this number is nearly doubled at 88.7% (www.allentownsd.org). Most likely, these students come from homes in which the adults they live with are working most of the day and
...the tools to significantly close the achievement gap, but they won’t likely be responsible for a radical upward mobility of low-income students of color. So, what role can KIPP play in the larger picture? Diane Ravitch offered sage advice in a recent speech at Rice University when she challenged KIPP co-founder Mike Fienberg in saying, “Don’t compete. Collaborate with public schools. Share whatever you know that works. Work with public schools. Help them get better. We all share the same goal and that is to ensure that every child in America gets a great education” (Ravitch, 2010). Perhaps KIPP schools are best utilized as “laboratories” where methods are tested, refined and readied for export to the public school system at large and utilized by all students. This collaboration could contribute to real public school reform and be the lasting legacy of KIPP.
The discipline of public relations is a modern profession which has been in existence for only close to a century; however, it has already taken an important role in the fields of business, government, entertainment and non-profit organizations including educational institutions and healthcare organizations. Public relations professionals are required to have excellent organizational, interpersonal and communication skills and have the ability to persuade the public. It is imperative for PR professionals to effectively communicate with its public in order to establish and maintain a positive relationship. Furthermore, public relations professionals must have the ability to work under pressure and effectively manage crisis which may have detrimental effect on the company and the public it serves. State purpose of paper and an overview of what will be covered in the introduction
...al initiatives and my goal is to establish an educational center that will focus on disadvantaged youth and their parents. I was the first in my family to attend college and I believe through helping others, they too can become “firsts.”
Weiner mentions Teachers Unions such as The National Union of Teachers (NUT) which promotes “embedding in its vision for public education and developing on-the-ground alliances with parents and students.” (Weiner, 1) reveling teachers efforts to find a solution to this topic.
When I interviewed the Kindergarten teacher she was very eager to share all of the partnerships that her school is participating in. She stated that the biggest challenge facing schools today is the increasing class size, poverty, and cuts in funding. As a result, “sage funding” was put into place to help with smaller classes, but is now being cut from the La Crosse School District. In regards to poverty, she says that schools can help get families in touch with community organizations that can provide them with some of their needs.