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Garretts First Post

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Survivor China

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Welcome to the page dedicated to the development of the newest location for the game of Survivor to be played.  Contestants will have to dig deep to overcome the vast differences of the terrain and climate spread throughout the 3rd biggest country on this planet.

Hello world!

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Welcome to WordPress. This is your first post. Edit or delete it, then start blogging!

Hello world!

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Welcome to WordPress. This is your first post. Edit or delete it, then start blogging!

Blog Post #3

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Who did you interview?  What did you learn from your interviews? Be sure to share two or three recurring themes from the interviews.

The three people that I interviewed were an old coworker from a high school job, a coworker from a college job, and a good friend. I really enjoyed getting feedback from all of them, as I had never really done so before. I learned from my co-worker from high school that although I was often shy and timid, she saw leadership qualities in me from a young age. I really appreciated her insight as she has known me since I was 14 years old. I feel as though my leadership abilities did not come to surface until I came to college, so the fact that she recognized them years prior to that really shocked me. One of my co-workers from college talked about how no matter the situation that I am in, I always tend to check on how others are doing throughout any moments of leadership, as many of my leadership opportunities have taken place as an event planner. Another interviewee said that I know not only when to step down and give someone else the reins, but I also give them the proper guidance that they may need. One of the most prominent recurring themes from my interviews was that everyone seemed to agree that I stay calm no matter how hectic any situations may be. Thinking back to situations that I have worked with each one of these individuals, rather it be executing a Thanksgiving dinner for 200 people or managing a staff of 20 people in a busy kitchen, I enjoyed the fact that each interviewee found that I stay calm, and after their feedback, I definitely see it as one of my strengths that I had never considered before.

 

Which self assessment did you take?  What were your results?  What did you learn?  Do you agree or disagree with your results?  Please explain.

I decided to take the Values in Action Inventory of Strengths. My five highest strengths were fairness, teamwork,honesty, judgement and kindness. My five lowest strengths were love of learning, spirituality, self-regulation, appreciation of beauty and excellence, and love. I learned that and came to a realization that there are many adjectives to describe ones strengths. Some happen to be used more often than others, but this specific test had a ride range of options that I may have never considered to use before while describing ones strengths (ie zest or prudence). It’s not that I disagree with the end results that I was given, however I do not think that this was a valuable test to truly find my strengths. What bothered me the most were the multiple questions regarding religion, and as a non-religious person, I found it troubling that this is now considered one of my “weaknesses”, if you will, just because I do not find religion a necessity in my life. I also truly do not believe that the questions were balanced or fair in their wording. As a future educator, having “love of learning” as the last description on my results was kind of troubling. I quickly realized that most of the questions regarding education or learning were always based on treading, and because reading and comprehension have been difficult for my since a young age, it is not a task I enjoy, but I don’t think that that fact alone can determine whether or not I have the love of learning.

 

Blog1

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Unfortunately I was not able to attend class last friday due to a personal matter. However, I would have liked to hear those personal stories that we all have to share in regards to the struggles and barriers that we have all overcome. I would now like to  share a little part of my persona and my identity that I talked about in my paper. I wrote about the fact that I am Mexican and how I, my family, and society view me in many different ways. I mainly focused on the way I was treated throughout my education career. But one thing that I have learned is that all those people  have tried to make me feel guilty and ashamed of who I am as a person. They do not accept the fact that I have the same rights as they do to better my life. And I am achieving this dream by putting my greatest effort into my education. One person that I really owe it to is my mother. She brought me into this country at the age of 6 and raised me and my other five siblings all by herself. I thank God for putting such a wonderful woman in my life.  We all have different identities, but under God we are all brothers and sisters. And sometimes we forget that….

This weeks reading, Explaining White Privilege to a Broke White Person,  was  interesting because without knowing it the “White” individual possesses rights that are seen on a daily basis in our society.  The author states that the fact that were are born into things such as citizenship, class, gender, and not earned puts some people at an advantage. White individuals can roam the streets without being targeted by police officers since they know that they will cause no harm simply because they were born into a wealthy family. On the other hand if a Bald Latino or an African- American is walking out on the streets that is a sign of danger. And those are the kind of people that a police officer will focus their attention on more often. But I ask myself. What about the school shootings? Most of them where white folks were they not? What happened to having this stereotype that they were born in a healthy and wealthy home? They should not be having mental disorders right? They have all the money and happiness in the world don’t they? The police officers were sure surprised to see that it was not a Latino or African-American that was carrying a gun to school. Also I can relate this to the shooter Elliot Roger that went on shooting sprees in Isla Vista, California next to the UCSB campus. I once again bring up my point, the shooter was White. I read in the newspaper that this individual did not have his apartment searched by police  due to the fact that he looked harmless and a good citizen. However, the Police officers did not know that this young man possessed guns and would go on a rampage on the evening of May 2014. I think police officers should attend matters like this more seriously, and not just come across different cases and take different actions on a “suspect” simply by their skin color.

Welcome bloggers and readers! Here’s Blog #1: The K-12 Pipeline and Funding of American Schools and White Privilege

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In the last meeting each person spoke about on of their identities that they thought described who they were. Sadly I was unable to attend class and was not able to hear anyone’s presentation. From what I heard they were all great and I wish I could have been there.

Reading Chapters 2 and 3 was not very surprising for me because I want to be a teacher when I am older and in class we have talked about these situations. I also remember hearing that standardized tests did nothing to help us learn because students are just bombarded with information. Teachers have to dedicate so much time on these tests and I think that the students feel so much pressure knowing that they have to do their best because if not the school will not get as much funding. I had a bad experience when I was in fifth grade with my white teacher I do not know if she thought I was incapable of understanding the directions she gave us but when I “disobeyed” she started screaming at me about listening to directions. This was not the first time she screamed at a Latino student, she would also scream at one boy in my class when he would do something she deemed “wrong”. She would also isolate him from the entire class that way he would not forget what he did wrong. The class broken up into four groups advanced, average, below average, and far below average. Most of her time was spent with the advanced children because she thought the far below children did not have a chance in improving. This example here alone shows how some teachers just give up on students because of their race and capabilities.

The articles on White privilege really opened my eyes on the various ways white people see themselves. Some people know their privileged and want to educate their children to understand that they are privileged but not to abuse it. I think that it is very important for parents to educate their children and teach them about their roots and how others do not have the same opportunities or life that they have. On the other hand there are people who are white and do not feel privileged because they live in low income homes that it does not matter what your race is you still have to be on your guard if you want to survive. I am Hispanic and I do not feel very privileged my parents are struggling financially with trying to pay bills and the mortgage. Now that I am going to college it is even harder I because I only received three small scholarships and I had to take out a loan but this is still not enough to pay all of tuition and housing. However, I am glad that these articles made me look at the different aspects of being white privileged I realize that not just because someone is white it means they are privileged.

Week 4 readings

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Last week we were asked to make a presentation about the introductory paper we wrote about our identities. They were all awesome! I liked how everyone was able to share a little about our lives to each other. I realized that even if we all have our own identities, we still share the essence of being college students. These presentations made me feel better about being here at CI, because everyone has their on story to share which sometimes can help motivate another to keep pressing on. I really do appreciate that I as given a chance to share a little about myself to you all. What stood out to me about the presentations was that for the first time since I’ve been on campus, I did not feel alone. I was able to relate with many of my classmates. Although we came from different places and experienced different things, we are all in school for a better future. I feel like this presentation was the perfect opportunity for me to get out of my shell because I am a bit shy. Although we were all expected to present on the overhead projector, I really enjoyed the presentations given by the classmates who did not have a slide show. I’m sure they must have felt more nervous than those who did have one. Even if most of us did not really refer our identities back to the articles, I think we did a good job in explaining who we are and where we want to get to in life.

This week’s readings focused on dominant group privilege, inequalities at school and discrimination amongst minorities. When I was at Santa Monica College, I took a couple of classes that opened my eyes to the oppression that people of color still experience today. Like I have lived through some of the examples I have read about and I have also seen them happen to people I know and it makes me a bit upset. Because I feel as long as someone keeps acknowledging stereotypes the separation won’t end. The reading that stood out the most to me was called “White privilege and male privilege” by Peggy McIntosh because it gives couple of examples of how people of color experience a situation with such stigma and shame that someone from the white privileged group wouldn’t. An example of this can be having a group of young brown men walking down the block as the police rolls through. The guys might be seen as suspects and maybe stopped and be tagged with label of being gang affiliated or even for selling drugs. If a group of white men were walking down the same situation they would have been disturbed of even handcuffed because they are civilized citizens. This often happens back in my hometown. And lately prejudice, racism, and stereotypes have been ending many lives because of the ignorance that lives within the community of people who believe in justice but still decide to turn the other check when the person being victimized for their color is pleading for their defense. I really do hope that this inequality amongst all humanity stops one day.

Blog #1 (:

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Last week’s class focused on the presentations that went along with our “Who are you?” papers. I like the fact that this class is smaller than all of my other classes, it makes it easier to get to know all of the people in a class in depth, it makes us sort of a small community that is set up to help one another. I enjoyed getting to know each and every one of my classmates, its great to see that there are some that I have so many similarities with. Although many of us talked about some of the topics which included family, ethnicity, and education; it is great to see how it all was different for each of us in our own special way. I also enjoyed the fact that although we may all have different backgrounds and our journeys might vary from one another we all for the most part have the same goals which is to be the best type of individual we can be and succeed in whatever we put our mind to. Although  it may be a long journey with obstacles we cannot predict it is quite satisfying to know we will have each other throughout this course and hopefully beyond it.

This week’s readings consisted of chapters 2 and 3 in the book and some articles online. The chapter in the book that I found more interesting and in various ways I myself experienced or saw as I was growing up was the chapter that focused on the K-12 pipeline for Blacks and Latinos. The reading talked about how racism has indeed improved since the segregation years,but it hasn’t really completely gone away. The way that white children are treated in regards to their education compared to black and Latino is very different even to this day. The fact that the readings focus on this is very much more than enough proof that racism still occurs in schools and that the way we are taught and treated throughout or early educational years really affects our future outcome. The future outcome to many of the students that get that special treatment is for the most part getting into nicer schools with better reputations and resources. The fact that I experienced this first hand is more than enough proof that something is being done that shouldn’t be whether it special treatment, segregation or even racism. When I became a senior in High School and realized I had no real set plan for myself hit me that I was likely to become a bum of some-sort. I went for help to my counselor but was shocked to see they were only focused on the students who were on the right track since about freshman year. I wasn’t shocked to see that most were AP students and mostly all were either White or Asian. The counselor sort of pushed other students like myself who were never given the opportunity like those that the AP students had. For the most part most of the misinformed students consisted of Hispanics or other types of minorities. Although I think this wasn’t done on purpose by any specific individual, it just goes to show how much of a privilege it is to be a certain type of ethnicity.

The second article that also stood out to me, not because of any personal experience, but because it had so much truth interpreted in it was the article ” A Mother’s White Privilege”. It tells how much of a privilege it is for this mother to have three white blond haired, blue eyed boys compared to having o be a mother to boys of Black ethnicity. It explains how she won’t have to worry about her boys being shot, killed or mistreated by officers just because of their ethnicity.  All the points she makes are very true and have been strongly supported by many recent events that have happened in the U.S. including the case of Trayvon Martin and events that recently occurred in Ferguson. It is great to see that a White mother recognizes all of her privileges and will indeed take advantage of them. I think it can also open the eyes of the U.S. and see that action needs to be taken so not only one type of ethnicity is seen with these types of privileges.