4 Questions About the Poor and Minorities and Access to Education

A student had an assignment from her Public Policy class about the Poor and Minorities and Educational Access.  She picked me because she knew she wasn't going to get Public School Teacher Boilerplate.

She was right.

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1. In your opinion, do you think that low income students have the same access to a higher education as students with a higher socioeconomic status?

They do now. In the old days, the top schools had access to better libraries, documents and primary sources. Those days are over. You, today, can read the entire Harvard 5-foot shelf (check it out) for free. Back in the Real America, the president of Harvard told the world that if you spent 15 minutes a day reading those works and you'd get a Harvard education. And this was the Harvard way back 125 years ago - not the obscene buffoonery that passes for "Harvard" today. That is only the easiest example to produce. Now, a student can access materials in all types of media - the only cost is time.

2. Did you come from a low-income family? If so, did you ever find it hard to access better opportunities for a higher education?

Not really - I came from a lower middle class family. My father died when I was very young so we struggled. We didn't find it hard to access better opportunities because back then the NYC public education system was much better. They carried out practices and policies and curricula that worked. Now they have replaced them with things that sound good. Also, good habits breed opportunities. We were taught to focus and delay gratification. When you do that you are ready when opportunity arrives. A higher education was therefore accessible because of the years of preparation.

3. What steps could be taken to make sure low income and minority students have all the resources they need?

Part of the problem here is the question itself. Why aren't 'low income and minority students' able to get the resources they need on their own? They don't need others to do it for them. They're people, not hamsters. I know 'low income and minority students' can access resources and succeed because I've been seeing it happen since September 1996.

4. In your opinion, what would be a “lack of academic preparation”?
The most insidious, dangerous and disastrous "lack of academic preparation" is the victim mentality. Much of the public-school systems, in areas that can least afford it, and university Liberal Arts departments, are fixated on the Victim Mentality. Most of them obsess with it in terms of race. I am unable to think of a bigger waste of time. It not only vaporizes years of study within young and eager minds, it sets up the idea that you must agitate against people in power that you should be given something because of past racial wrongs. It has created a mob of angry young people who know nothing, yet feel aggrieved and that they're owed something. I can't think of any group of people less prepared for the world than recent university graduates in the Liberal Arts. They not only "lack academic preparation", they lack the academic bedrock that prepares a person for the future. They are angry, ignorant, entitled empty vessels who lack all the academic and intellectual skill for dealing with things as simple as 'bad news'. You can thank the Progressives, the political Left, and the Cultural Marxists for this. They have left a small army of human wreckage and disaster in their wake.