Archive for month: September, 2014

As you reflect on the assumptions of Theory X and Y, how would you describe your own philosophy of leadership?

My own philosophy of leadership is a mainly that of theory Y. I like to work together with people, discuss with them and be democratic about things. I try to work with individuals who are self-motivated and are intrinsically being rewarded so this style tends to suite me best.

Of the three styles of leadership, what style comes easiest for you? Describe how people respond to you when you use the style.

The style that comes easiest to me is the Laissez-faire style. Though that only works best in particular and ideal situations. So then the more common yet still easy style for me is the democratic leadership style. People respond well to the democratic style as they feel included and thus feel invested in the work. This then motivates them to produce good results.

One of the aspects of democratic leadership is to help subordinates take responsibility for themselves. How do you assess your own ability to help others help themselves?

I believe I am at least decent at this. That is because I try to get them to see the benefits of taking responsibility for themselves and by persuading them to do this they then respond well.

List three specific activities you could use to improve your leadership style.

1. It would help me to become more knowledgeable in whatever it is that I am leading thus allowing me to understand what is required more clearly which then allows me to direct the group more effectively.
2. I could express a greater concern for production.
3. I need to continue to learn about leadership and stay on the cutting edge of research so I can always be doing my best.

Lat week’s class consisted of many interesting things, for the first part Julian provided us with reading techniques that we can use for this and any of our other classes. I found many of those techniques very useful, I actually used a couple of them for this weeks readings.  The rest part of the class focused on the reading topics that mainly had to do with white privilege. I really enjoyed the activity that Jaimie had us do, the privilege walk. This activity really opened my eyes to how fortunate and lucky I am to be where I am today. Although some of my classmates have been in a sense more privileged than me, we are all in the same position today. It was also kinda of nice to see that although many classmates have experienced being unprivileged in some time in their lives, we all continue striving for that success that we want so bad. After the activity we moved on to talking about the chapters in the book and the articles , we talked about chapter two and how the K-12 pipeline for Black and Latino students. We saw how race was a major aspect in regards on how children get treated in the K-12 system. Although we have come far from segregation and discrimination in schools, children of African American or Latino descent tend to get shut down or don’t get enough resources they really need. So from the beginning they are at a disadvantage and that later leads to failure or carelessness in higher education.

This weeks readings were Chapter 6 and 8 in the textbook and an article which was connected with the context in chapter 6. Chapter 6 mainly focused on the Diversity Rationale, which allowed the use of race as a selective factor in higher education admissions as long as racial quotas were not promoted. It was stated that the rationale was designed to serve as a legal purpose and not necessarily a educational one, since it was seen as a result of University of California vs Bakke. This chapter contained a lot of information and lead to me re-reading a lot of sections in order to sort of get the concept of the text. Chapter 8 in my opinion was a lot more easier to grasp, it focused on trends in the education of underrepresented racial minority students. It provided statistics that focused on the years of 1940-2007 of how successful Whites, Blacks and Latinos have been with earning college degrees and going on to earn advanced degrees. Whites were, without a surprise the race who had the highest and continues having the highest success race when it comes to earning degrees and although Blacks and Latinos’ numbers have varied for the most part they are at the bottom. I was in a way surprised to see this, since I live in a a community where Latinos make up most of the population and where community colleges have a larger number of Latino students. I in a way have a different perspective since I started CSUCI I noticed most of the population here in campus is White. This makes it easier to understand why Whites and Asians dominate the highly sought-after occupations in the U.S. It was a very interesting reading, and I sincerely hope that the percentage of Latinos that seek those college and advanced degrees continue to rise.

Affirmative action plan as stated in the readings is not only challenging but controversial. According to the readings Affirmative action plan was design to help less represented minorities, “Affirmative action is more of a process than just an admissions policy. Colleges and universities reach out to groups that are underrepresented and urge students to apply. Institutions often offer financial aid to underrepresented students and provide on-campus support programs to improve their academic success.” In the article The Supreme Court and Affirmative Action, adds on to say that the policy permitted schools to use two forms of admissions. One, regular admission, which compared all scores and grades among White students. Second, special admission, students were allowed to apply as “economically and or educationally disadvantaged” and were not ranked against White students but instead with others of similar disadvantaged students. Unfortunately after the 1978 Bakke case that ruled out the affirmative action policy a decrease in admissions at Universities was seen by African American students and Latinos. It’s very hard to add comment to such controversial topic but I instead can agree with President Lyndon Johnson who acknowledges that, “You do not take a person who, for years, has been hobbled by chains and liberate him, bring him up to the starting line of a race and then say you are free to compete with all the others, and still just believe that you have been completely fair.” In making this comment, President Lyndon Johnson argues that it’s not fair to conclude that les disadvantaged students are able to compete with students who have exposure to more knowledge and better education. I agree that minorities do face many educational disadvantages because of my participation as a minority I faced many struggles that prevented me from taking classes with regular students that were native English speakers. I struggled with English classes simply because I had never been exposed to vocabulary that was necessary to successfully accomplish Standard English classes. If I were a student that was looking for an opportunity at a respect Medical Universities, I would hope to be ranked with other minorities instead of highly educated students. Not because I’m less intelligent but simply because my struggles and my exposure to lower educated environments.

testing

I had my first DIG meeting last Thursday and was able to express concerns I had in class, one of which was taking in all of the assigned reading each week. As a result of the group’s concern’s Julian designed an activity around writing tips. It was important to be able to hear other student’s ideas for what works for them and what doesn’t, as well as gaining tips to better my own reading. Before we engaged in our class discussion we went outside and participated in activity to better prepare us. I was skeptical at first but I honestly enjoyed linking fingers with classmates and seeing the ways each of us have been privileged or not. I discovered many ways of being privileged that I wasn’t previously aware, such as my family owning a house, having a house full of books, and a parent who graduated college. I ended up being one of the only few close to the front and it made me feel uneasy, however, with proper respect for others I know that doesn’t make me any better.

 

After we took part in the activity we discussed K-12 Pipeline and its impacts on educational equity. Although I read chapter 2 and 3 it was still eye opening to see the statistics presented on the slides. I was shocked my how many more whites score higher on the SAT than African Americans or Latinos. It became apparent to me that our K-12 school system is not equal for everyone and each student and school is not given a fair chance. What is sad is that those who start in the lowest quartile almost never have the ability to catch up. Teachers are not as prepared and schools are not given enough resources to effectively teach students. It was hard to accept the glaring inequities because I wish they didn’t exist, but through class discussion and experience I am aware that they do. We then discussed the other various articles on white privilege and I was again saddened by the covert discrimination that still exists today. People of similar backgrounds and socioeconomic status’ tend in the same neighborhoods, therefore, those living in low income areas don’t receive as much funding. Less expectation and praise may be given to those students, as demonstrated through the quick in-class activity. Mostly, I was stunned and troubled by the statistics.

 

This week we read Chapter 6 and 8 in Diversity in American Higher Education. Chapter 6 on the Diversity Rationale contained a lot information, most of which I hadn’t previously been aware of. The Diversity Rational is an interpretation that stemmed from a Supreme Court decision and says that race may be used as a selective factor in college admissions as long as racial quotas are not being endorsed. I found chapter 6 somewhat hard to follow. It contained a lot of information and terms that I wasn’t familiar with until I looked up the terms. I felt that chapter 8 complimented the statistics that were in class last Friday. Due to the socioeconomic status of many African Americans in the 1940s, many received poor education compared to that of White’s. I felt as though chapter 8 was easier to understand and presented ways, such as affirmative action, to help solve the problem of underrepresentation of minorities in college. The third assigned reading was an article that related to chapter 6 and included various Supreme Court decisions regarding race and education throughout history. It contained facts on specific cases and how it still impacts educational equity to this day. Overall, the reading was difficult to digest upon first glance but became easier to understand as I researched terms and read over things more than once.