“Che cosa vuoi con vita?” Imagine that you are a fourteen year old boy or girl growing up in Italy. You have just finished your middle school education and are in the process of transitioning to high school. However, this question that was just asked to you has nothing to do with high school at all. This Italian phrase is the equivalent of this English question: “What do you want to do with your life?” For many young Italians, high school is the starting point of their future careers unlike many high schools in the United States where you just complete a college preparatory program of study. As terrifying as this question might seem to a fourteen year old, many people would argue that these teenagers have not had enough time to make this very important life decision and the quality of students’ knowledge after receiving educations demonstrate this flaw. Even though the Italian Education system is very proactive in having its young pupil’s choose their future career paths, there is a lack …show more content…
This was especially true for Italy when the worldwide recession took place. In 2008, expenditures for public education in Italy only composed of around 6.8 percent of Italy’s total yearly budget (Salerno). As if this wasn’t bad enough, soon after, a cut of eight million euros from public educational funding was established from 2009 until 2012 in Italy. Even though this may not appear to be a huge budget cut for a country, the size of Italy’s public budget is much smaller than the United States federal budget. So, this particular budget cut will have much greater affects in Italy than the United States would have experienced if a similar cut was put into place (Salerno). During the course of 2009 to 2012, over 120,000 teachers were laid off and 750 schools had to be merged with other schools. In addition, 450 high schools also had to be closed due to these financial setbacks
The amount of funding for education was the most difficult to determine. This education system seems to be very inefficient and the huge backlog of teacher pensions restricted the more favorable budget. Well educated students leads to a more productive economy but there are many who do not take ad...
California is one of the largest states in the country and has one of the biggest state budgets, but in the past several years, its school system has become one of the worst in the nation because of enormous budget cuts in efforts to balance the state’s enormous deficit. The economic downturn at the end of the 2000s resulted in even more cuts to education. It is in environments like this one in which students from poor backgrounds become most vulnerable because of their lack of access to support in their homes as well as other programs outside of schools. Their already financially restricted school districts have no choice but to cut supplementary programs and increase class sizes among other negative changes to public schools. The lack of financial support from the state level as well as demands for schools to meet certain testing benchmarks by the state results in a system in which the schools are no longer able to focus on students as individuals; they are forced to treat students as numbers rather than on an individual case by case basis. An article from the Los Angeles Times showed that majority of Californians give California schools “a grade of C or below” and half think that the quality of schools will continue to decline (Watanabe).While the economic downturn affected the public school system in a negative way, it was not the sole root of its problems. It just simply exacerbated already existing issues.
We live in a society where we are surrounded by people telling us that school/education and being educated is the only way to succeed. However, the school system is not up to the standards we want it to uphold. There are three issues we discuss the most which are the government, the student, and the teacher. In John Taylor Gatto 's essay “Against School”, we see the inside perspective of the educational system from the view of a teacher. In “I Just Wanna Be Average”, an essay written by Mike Rose, we hear a student 's experience of being in a vocational class in the lower level class in the educational system when he was supposed to be in the higher class. Both Gatto and Rose give their opinions on how the educational system is falling apart. Today the government is only trying to get students to pass, making it hard for teachers to teach what they want. Students are affected everyday by the school system. They sit there - bored - and do not think that the teachers care, making the
(Bruenig). This is because students from well-off families already enjoy a disproportionately successful future than students from poor families, State budgets could become strained, which might lead to cuts and decreased access to programs that students want to take. Budget cuts may also need to take place, or pulling from other departments to make up for the loss of tuition. These could come from high schools, middle schools, and elementary schools. This could result in many teachers, administrators, and other school district employees losing their jobs due to schools needing to save money.
If economists took one thing away from the Great Depression, it should be that losing billions of dollars in a short amount of time causes colossal problems. Everyday in America that is precisely what continues to happen. One day the country will pay for it, but until then, America continues to limp along. The statistics of how much America actually spends could cause even Bill Gates to take a step back. In an article in The Atlanta Journal and Constitution, the situation is summed up quite horrifyingly: “The U.S. Census Bureau just released 2008 figures showing the national average total per-pupil funding from all revenue sources was $12,028” (Izumi). The article goes on to calculate that “if one multiplies $12,028 by the roughly 3.7 million students [almost all living in Texas and California] with illegal-immigrant parents, then one gets a national total funding cost of $44.5...
The essay of "Teach yourself Italian" was written by Jhumpa Lahiri and published in the New Yorker. Lahiri talks about her interest and devotion to the Italian language she gained. In 1994, she visited Italy for the first time and realizes that she wants to learn the Italian language, she becomes fascinated by it. She says it herself, "for a writer, a foreign language becomes a new adventure." Her mom knew Bengali and Lahiri tried to speak, write, and read it herself but she wasn't as good as her mom. She had an accent and she wasn't able to pick up the language. However, when she went to Italy she knew this was the language she wanted to learn because she had all these questions to ask but little knowledge of how to even say it. She wanted
The cost for education is a lot more than it used to be. Everyone would think getting an education is easy so you wouldn’t need a minimum wage job, but it isn’t College tuition has gone up and so have private schools and catholic schools. Some private schools are at
Defense receives the most support and money. Politicians support military spending, mainly because it is “the only form of large-scale public investment that can consistently win political support” (Pollin). However, the heavy support for military spending is counterproductive for our nation’s economy. Since military spending increased in 2001, several industries and programs have had to “bite the bullet.” The Department of Education often gets fewer funds each fiscal year to cover the military budget. Then again, the United States leads all countries in money spent on education. The U.S. education system is well funded, but that statistic is very misleading. If the high cost of college is excluded, the United States ranks slightly above average in education spending (OECD). Per the OECD, U.S. spending is decreasing at a 1% average (OECD). This doesn’t seem like much, but it is still a step in the wrong direction. Only Mexico, Iceland, and Ireland have cut more (OECD). Coincidentally, the percentage of teachers that quit within five years is extremely high at 46% (OECD)! This isn’t surprising considering all teachers in the U.S. work so many hours and are still underpaid. U.S. primary school teachers spend the most time in the classroom amongst all PISA countries
Dante Alighieri's Influence on Italian Culture. Dante Alighieri was a very well known and influential poet in early literature. He was not only a poet, he was also a philosophical thinker, an active politician, and a religious visionary'; (Holmes 1). Dante was born in Florence in 1265, into the Guelph political party, one of the two main parties in Florence. The Guelphs were aristocrats and nobles.
Visiting Europe has been a long dream for me, especially visiting Italy. Italy has fascinated for as long as I can remember. Italian history and culture has always been intriguing to me ever since I learned about the Roman Empire in elementary school. I’ve always had Rome as my number one place I want to visit in the world. However, due to my financial status, I never had the chance to go to outside any country except the United States and my native country, Peru. Being in college has given me the opportunity to study abroad in a place I’ve always dreamed of. My university, Loyola University Chicago, have their own campus abroad in Rome, Vietnam and Beijing. Being already enrolled in the university, choosing to study abroad is facilitated as all my financial aid, including the university’s, and credits will transfer. I actually never planned on studying but the opportunity my university gave me to study in a place I’ve always wanted to go was too good for me to pass on. I
According to the California Department of Education’s Statistics overall spending for education over the last five years have shown an upward trend in spending for schools. Over the last five years spending for education has gone up by 28% (California Department of Education). It went from an average expenditure per student of $4570.00 to $6360.00 (California Department of Education). Though over the last five years spending has headed in the right direction it has not done so in a fast enough manner. The average rate of growth for the educational budget has been 8.6% (California Department of Education) a year over the last five years. This is barely above the rate of growth of enrollment of 6%(California Department of Education). We are not moving forward in fact it would seem like we are treading water. With the upcoming cuts in educational spending for the 2003-2004 school year we will actually be losing ground.
In the early years of the twentieth century, Italy has created a new system of government, however suffered social and economic conditions. Improvements were made however, poverty and literacy were still problems that have not been solved well. While entering World War I, the nation was neutral up until joining the British and French in exchange for certain advantages. However, it was unsuccessful as Italy failed to take control of the territories that it claimed at the Versailles Peace Conference,and suffered significant losses. The ideology of fascism occurred when the power of Italy was shrinking and the idea of being a pacifist became weak. Benito Mussolini created a group of fascists to represent a means to stop the socialists and the communists coming into his nation.
... sums of money that could be spent on education to debt repayment. Structural adjustment makes the problem worse, as the IMF demand government spending cuts and privatization measures in education. What money remains for education goes to primary schools, with education beyond elementary levels shifting to a fee-for-service basis. In Mexico, the Bank advised the government to abolish constitutionally guaranteed free education at the national university, provoking a lengthy student strike. The rich get an education. The poor get sweatshop jobs.
Learning occurs when each child is developmentally ready, and this happens at a different pace for each individual child. I experience this daily in my Kindergarten classroom. Although a lot has changed in education over the course of my career, I try to focus on the constant that each of my students can learn on any given day and that I must challenge all of my students to reach his or her potential. This is my school’s motto, and we recite it daily. Education has faced many challenges over the years with politics, the economy, students’ culture, and legal issues. Politics does play a crucial role in education. Different school systems and population areas receive more or less government funding. Educational dollars can play a key role in a school system receiving the latest technology, updated facilities, educational funds for teachers, and curriculum needs. I have been able to experience this for myself by transferring schools from the city to the county school district. The social aspect of learning affects children in different ways also. Different cultures of schools are negatively and positively affected as well. Having taught in an inner-city school for 9 years, I was able to witness firsthand the downfalls and negative effects that come into play for students who come
The capital city of Italy is a very extraordinary place to visit. The population of Rome is well over two-million. The people there are very friendly and are extremely proud of their country. Rome is a beautiful bustling city that has a moderate cli mate. The temperature usually stays around eighty degrees. The main way of transportation is by bus.