The purpose of this paper is to outline, define, and convince my reader that there are powerful institutions governing the views of students educated in the United States. To give background on myself I have to divulge that I am a white female in my mid twenties and graduated from a 95% white high school with a 100% graduation rate. Why I offer up this information will be clear as I educate you, the reader, as to what inspired this piece of writing. I have found discrepancies between the education I received from elementary level all the way up through the end of high school, and the higher education I have obtained, leading me to believe that these institutions are programming students in order to support their own selfish purpose. I am convinced that the sole purpose of these institutions is to keep rich, white men in power and to oppress other races. I cannot persuade belief into this conclusion until defining who and what is the culprit of these horrendous actions. To know how this act is accomplished one needs to know what an institution is, have a clear definition of power, prejudice, racism, white privilege, powerlessness and how conditioning has affected people over time. This will assist in the learning of how these agents play a role in the oppression of people today. I can’t assume that my reader knows what I know. I know that I don’t have this luxury because before my studies I was not privilege to this information either. To introduce this issue to someone like myself, one may find it to be confusing and in a way a little embarrassing as well. I must state that there is a difference between Puerto Ricans, Mexicans, Hispanics, and Guatemalans, etc. If a person speaks Spanish, it does not make them a Mexican, Spanish, Hispanic or Latino. Latino refers to anyone from Latin America despite there differences in the actual Spanish that they speak, the history of their land, their culture, etc. This is sadly, new information for a lot of people I know because they were never taught to understand or see that there is any difference. I don’t even want to be generalized by my surrounding states. I’m from Minnesota, not from Fargo in North Dakota or Iowa despite how my accent sounds to others. I am a Midwestern girl, but I prefer to be just Minnesotan. I know it sounds silly but it is my hope that you will understand after reading this paper. I am not southern, or rich, or just white, I have my heritage and identity and I don’t want it generalized or ignored or labeled anymore than I would expect anyone else to.
The institutions I am referring to begin with parents of students, the school board, the institution, in general, known as the education system, and those who determine what is taught and learned in public school classrooms in the United States. First, I can say with disappointment that students blindly believe what they are being taught in their classrooms and I am not an exception to this. Students are never told to question their educators. The last thing students of privilege are going to do is question what they are learning when all you have to care about is after school sports, prom committee, and where to go to college, not whether or not to go to college. It is not my intention to criticize privileged students for participating in extra curricular activities as opposed to fighting for equal education rights; I am simply attempting to give a visual that would display the differences and/or their lack of struggle in these matters. Students of color that are struggling with a second language don’t have time to question or debate it because they are fighting to get through it in order to graduate. What does this say about our education system and who is at fault? If we don’t learn to question what we learn, what we know, what books we are learning from and who wrote them then in public high schools we are at the mercy of a higher power. The fact is that this important lesson is never a part of building our leaders of tomorrow because the leaders of today like the system just the way it is. “Education is a primary route to rewarding employment and economic security. It is particularly significant for the future prospects of children who are ethnic minorities, born into disadvantaged economic circumstances and/or dealing with language barriers” (Fact Sheet on Latino Youth: Education, 2002). I didn’t understand the importance of my education because I was able to take it for granted. Unfortunately, we are not all privileged enough to be that ignorant despite the fact that it has an effect on the future of youth in education. Before I address the effects of this ignorance it is vital that I introduce a concept that may be an uneasy phrase to swallow for some.
White privilege is something I never knew existed. In addition, I didn’t have a name for it, but in my experiences I have seen that male privilege exists as well, so, how ignorant of me to not recognize that, in addition, white privilege also exists. I bring this up only to acknowledge that I am aware of what privilege is despite my unawareness to my own. In my research, Peggy McIntosh describes it best as “…an invisible package of unearned assets that I can count on cashing in each day, but about which I was “meant” to remain oblivious.” This is true, now whether one decides to acknowledge it or not is his or her own decision. White people in the United States want to believe, despite where they truly rank in a class, economically or otherwise, that they are average. The tendency is to want to be impartial, middle-of-the-road and un-bias. To a degree it is common for people to also believe that they are culturally competent, aware, accepting, and accommodating. Although in reality this is hardly factual. Howard, in Chapter 1 of his book, We Can’t Teach What We Don’t Know, describes this as “encapsulation” or his unsighted White status. He also describes the driving forces of it to be the assumption of rightness, the luxury of ignorance, and the legacy of privilege, referring to the power white people have that enables them to be unaware of the historical development and existence of it. Without a shred of acceptance to the presence of this white privilege, one cannot completely be open to the idea of inequality, racism, discrimination or any of the other scary words that are avoided in our language. I use the word, “scary” because for the same reason the stories are altered in “our” text books “we” want to remain oblivious to actions that may incriminate “us.” As a result, change can not occur. If the problem doesn’t exist because there is no acknowledgement of our own dominance then how can there ever truly be equal rights among the people of this country?
By not seeing the problem we are able to look the other way to the effects of that problem. It enables us to not make the connection of cause and affect. One additional problem that in my interpretation was left out of Howard’s book is the importance of being submerged into an issue. Without this, a person will struggle to take an un-biased look at it. You cannot simply state that an issue exists, it needs to be seen. Working at La Escuelita, an after school program for middle school and high school students at El Colegio Charter School in south Minneapolis has given me the opportunity to witness the struggles of students attending public schools whose primary language is Spanish with having limited to no access to assistance in their learning. The level of available bilingual teachers and English Language Learning programs is dependent upon money. The people that have the strongest influence on how much money is spent on what programs are the white parents of white children that attend the school board meetings. They are ultimately fighting for the future of their children while ignoring the needs of desperate students. This is an unfortunate fact that began long ago.
Segregated schools began in 1919 when the first Mexican school was established. A fact, I must mention, that was not one I was taught about in high school. I question the reason behind why it was acknowledged in my history lessons that African Americans were segregated from white schools but there was no mention of that occurring to other students of color. I hate to speculate in this manner, but my only conclusion is that African Americans have been conditioned and assimilated to the point that they are in an acceptable place in the eyes of rich, white men that hold the powerful positions in this government. In the book, Barrios Norteños, by Dionicio Nodín Valdés, Sra. Dionisia Cárdenas Coates describes her experience in her St. Paul, Minnesota high school in the 1940’s saying that “even when one tried to imitate the manners of Anglo youth and spoke English like them, ‘you are going to know that you are different. You aren’t going to understand what makes you different… the schools never taught us what the Mexican American contributed to the society… We were ashamed to be different,’” and in my experience while working with the students of La Escuelita I found that they experience some of the same feelings. Now, I ask myself, why, since 1940, have we not changed the learning environment so that it is one that accommodates students of color in order to eliminate these debilitating feelings. After the Second World War, “leaders began to emerge and organize to challenge segregation” (The Elusive Quest for Equality, page 72). Now, even as we see and acknowledge that the schools aren’t segregated, the problem still remains that students are not treated as equals, because we are not addressing all students’ needs in their learning environment.
A wonderful example of how to see this issue was given to me by Luis Ortega, the Executive Director of the Multicultural/Multilingual Department and also one of the founders of La Escuelita. His example described how if a student is required to jump three feet into the air by the third grade and the student is disabled and cannot do it, then the question arises, do you modify it to help the student or do you just let them fail? In the 1999 case of Cedar Rapids Community School District v. Garret F., the school district did not want to provide Garret with the one-on-one nursing care he needed and the Supreme Court’s interpretation of the law found that they had to. If this were applied to education, then we could truly not leave a child behind because it would include all students of all abilities, not just the 20% or more in a single classroom. In the case of Garret a fight was put forth in his defense.
One can say that the parents of these children should attend those meetings and fight for their cause but the reason they aren’t present at those meetings is not because they don’t care or because they are not intelligent people. It is because they are not aware of how the system works or where to start. Additionally, it is important to taken into consideration that they may only have one vehicle and are working jobs that do not allow time to get involved. In that position there is little room to advocate the issue, and therefore little hope for change. Before a parent makes the decision to support or oppose an issue, all students should be taken into consideration. Once the struggle through a general education is over a new battle begins.
The Minnesota Immigrant Freedom Network describes The Dream Act as defining the problem by beginning in 1996 when “changes were made to a federal immigration law that prevent many of Minnesota’s brightest high school graduates from pursuing dreams of a college education and a better future every year. These changes required students who don’t have U.S. citizenship to pay out-of-state tuition rates when attending public post-secondary institutions.” These are tuition rates that not even I can afford. It goes on to describe further estimating “…that approximately 65,000 undocumented students in the U.S. graduate from high school each year (MN Dream Act/ National Immigration Law Center). Most immigrant students were brought to this country as young children and have lived here almost their entire lives. They have no control over their immigration status.” These barriers combined with so many others suffer our country. The language used by our media to define these aspiring students makes it all too easy to not speak up on the issue. The word “illegal,” meaning without visa or documentation dehumanizes people, giving the impression that they are criminals when they are simply in violation of laws. The wall the government wants to build is fueling hatred and giving people the right to say, “Go home!” It allows people to see brown skin, not human beings. Continuing to use this language and take these views keeps power in the hands of narrow minds and selfish bodies.
Long before these laws and programs hinder the ability of these students to succeed they are set up for failure by this country through the very education they struggle to obtain. To see the true culprits one must look far beyond the obvious. The culprits are the very books provided to our children in their classrooms. I feel that I have been robbed of a color blind, unbiased United States history lesson. By robbed, I mean that important parts of the making of our history were carelessly left out which causes students to grow up ignorant of how “American” history came to be and what really built our country. There are holes in the text books stories which I believe are strategically left out so that “America” can continue to oppress certain races. There is an abundance of examples that support my assertion.
The importance of teaching history is underestimated. Recently there has been discussion of dropping World History as a subject all together at the high school that I attended. “The legacy of these voiceless and nameless Spanish-speaking peoples is a long one, and their experiences in North America before 1900 are important and worthy of separate discussion… rather than offering a smattering of ideas across five hundred years, we have chosen to write from our vantage point as twentieth-century United States historians” (Joseph A. Rodríguez and Vicki L. Ruiz, At Loose Ends: Twentieth-Century Latinos in Current United States History Textbooks). One argument that would be presented in the defense of not teaching these stories tends to be the available time in school to teach them. I must then argue that without teaching these stories we are conditioning not only students of color but white students to be culturally incompetent. That is a repercussion of not finding the time, but still the argument would be, where would the time come from? How many study halls, jewelry classes, fluffy career exploration classes, team sports (which is an elective at the high school I attended), and wild life courses need to be available to students when all they tend to allow is “easy A’s” for students to waste time and unjustly increase their grade point averages? In addition to these, work-study credit is given to students without a thorough examination of how they will actually be spending their time in these work environments. The value of a proper history lesson is being disregarded although it would strongly be a more justifiable course. There is more value in expanding their minds with other course work. Not to mention, by losing fluffy courses, a school district will have more funds available for English Language Learning classes, seeing as they represent a larger and more rewarding demand in our education system in regards to this nation’s future, much more than jewelry design. Whether additional time is allowed for the education of the historical significance of Spanish-speaking people in relation to the United States, the un-bias stories need to be told in order to create a multicultural awareness in students attending public institutions of education. The struggle for students of color I am certain will continue to be a greater one than finding the time in a school day to tell the stories without bias and inaccuracies.
Before the stories can even be discussed it is important that I address the segregation that took place and the injustices that have been done by the educators throughout time. Now, it has occurred throughout time although what I am writing about did not occur so long ago that it did, and is not currently affecting students of today’s parents, grandparents, and aunts and uncles. A fact that really hit home for me was that “more than 80 percent of the school districts in southern California enrolled Mexicans and Mexican Americans in segregated schools,” during the time of the Great Depression according to historian, Francisco Balderrama. Another story by Vicki Olivo is of a career counselor, “He was telling Latino kids that they weren’t going to college anyway, so they didn’t need information about certain career options,” she said. This was a very common tale around the Great Depression era although this story took place about 80 miles south of the Twin Cities, in Minnesota in 1995. I remember in my service learning course which is a part of the Chicano Studies Department at the University of Minnesota, when my classmates and I shared good and bad experiences of our time spent as tutors in Minneapolis schools. I will never forget a female classmate of mine and how angry she was when one of the teachers that she worked with told her that the students didn’t belong in school because they were illegal. I shouldn’t have to, but will mention that not every student of color is without documents. I wonder if it helped him feel more comfortable being a teacher and not being capable of helping because the students were Latino. I imagine that the type of person that becomes a teacher does so because he or she wishes to inspire their students, and give them hope for a bright future. I imagine that that person knows the value of an education and how it is a significant determining factor in the success of one’s life, also effecting how much they contribute to society, how much they provide for their family, therefore determining the level of respect they may end up having for themselves. So how it is that this teacher doesn’t feel the need to help these “illegal” students? My only possible answer is that he read the same books I did in school, and never acquired any kind of cultural competence in all of his schooling that said he has enough knowledge and the kind of demeanor that is appropriate and beneficial for students today. Or, does he believe that they simply do not deserve the same education opportunities as the other students who just happen to be born in this country. We cannot honestly say that a child has a choice to where he or she is born. Also, since we cannot, how can we say that it is suitable and lawful to deprive these children of their rights? It is not determined by the child’s free will or personal human desire to live in this country, so with that how is it justified that these rights will be stripped from aspiring students, or are we simply saying that they do not have rights at all? Then, what seems to happen is, even when we acknowledge that it is not their fault we as a nation fail to do, at least out of selfishness for our country, is teach them and allow them what we take for granted, an educated mind, the ability to move foreword in life, the option to attend college, to one day have a career and provide for their family, to have a choice of obtaining citizenship or finally choose where they want to live. In all of this narrow-minded discrimination, we have to realize that there is no real profit in this behavior. This attitude is harmful to the society we live in. To be truly fulfilled by our own identity and history is to embrace our differences and how they built each other. What is right or wrong mistakenly gets separated into good and evil. This is where evil extracts its power. It appears to be good because years of conditioning throughout history have told us the same stories over and over that were written by racist, white historians. The media has a talented hand in this as well. Book writers seem so worthy and knowledgeable, but since we are not reading for pleasure in classrooms we don’t decide whether we, the students like the stories; we simply believe them and live out our lives believing them to be true. What an easy target, high school students, for them to serve up pages and pages that hold underlying deceitful messages that all the while serve their egotistical purposes.
In the teaching of the story of the Alamo the battle is described as a valiant struggle for independence from Mexico although it neglects to emphasize that Texas belonged to Mexico in the first place. The stories I remember make it sound like white people were struggling for independence when in reality the rightful struggle began after the 1848 Guadalupe-Hidalgo Treaty that marked the end of the war between the United States and Mexico which had only began after Mexico refused to sell the states of California, Colorado, Arizona, New Mexico and Texas to the United States. When the treaty was signed, Mexican land owners were promised that the United States would respect their land ownership by honoring their land grants. In the end many were denied ownership to their land and were forced to retreat to Mexico. It is also common for these land owners to be criticized for their lack of care for which nation they belonged to as opposed to the land titles they possessed. If you worked hard to build a home, develop your land, and raise your family and were promised that your rights would not change, that they would be respected, honored and you would be granted citizenship, would you be inclined to move because the border of a nation moved? If where I live in Minnesota became Wisconsin and I had the option of moving my entire existence and leaving behind the life I had built and an asset such as land I would not be inclined to pick up and leave no matter the desires of Wisconsinites. It is not practical to snub ones nose at another for choosing to stay put versus starting their life all over again. It is the presence of these misrepresentations and biases that oppresses students of color and injures the minds of tomorrow’s leaders.
By examining the truth in the occurrence of these misrepresentations, it can be deducted that slavery in a manner of speaking still exists. “One of the ugliest beauties, if I can use that word, about slavery was this: If you steal a human being’s past then you can recreate for that person what you want him to be” (Lewis Diuduid, The Kansas City Star). Once you take a good look at it, you can see how this can be true, but my challenge to you is to see that it is done in present day and the harm it is causing. “History textbooks often mirror social and political contexts of the time” (Takashi Yoshida, Columbia University). Takashi, a student at Columbia University, is, in stating this, preparing to describe how powerful forces exist in her country of Japan that are presently contending over the type of information that textbooks will present the legacy of World War II to their youth. She describes her concern in her a paper she wrote entitled, “History Textbooks: For whom and for What Purpose?” as a battle towards a more open discussion of the past. She is aware of the harmful affects of not examining ones past and how the lack of examination of it is detrimental to the future. It is detrimental in that it makes people invisible in its pages, and discredits them in its history, making it possible to discount these people today.
What if your identity were erased from the history books, your people removed, how would you feel while reading “history” when you cannot see yourself in those books? Howard, author of We Can’t Teach What We Don’t Know, describes education throughout history as using education to rob the Natives of their dignity and identity resulting in psychological alienation. In not writing about how Mexico and people of that decent helped to build what this country is today and by ignoring their presence now we continue to ignore our short comings as a nation. This fuels the ignorance that dominates public school classrooms. White people with all of their middle ground desired attitudes do not want to hear that they did wrong in their past, they don’t want to know that “Americans” lynched thousands of people and pirated the land, stealing property from the rightful land owners. Who wants to hear that their ancestors and the men that built for them the life that they know were lying murders. It does not define you when you act like it never happened, right? So, erase it from the books and hold your head up high, you’re white. To look at this further we must now define power, prejudice, racism, and look at what oppression is in its sneakiest form.
Power is defined as the “ability or capacity to perform or act effectively,” it is the “ability or official capacity to exercise control or authority” and takes the form of “a person, group, or nation having great influence or control over others,” described as having “the might of a nation, political organization, or similar group” according to the online free dictionary. Looking at society today, power is everywhere, its not only visible in the lost pages of our books but it takes control through the images our books project similar to the way that our media controls the images they project in order to influence their viewers so that they may side with their opinions and attitudes. “If our stories are discounted, if we are not seen as valuable contributors to the country that we have helped to build then we will be discounted in everyday situations, too” (Lewis Diuguid, The Kansas City Star). By first acknowledging these indiscretions and then acting on them we may in time take a step in the direction of a nation that can call itself a melting pot. The analogy of the melting pot makes me think of a stew. A stew has several ingredients and they do not satisfy a pallet without complimenting each other with their diverse flavors, if the flavor assimilates itself into one bland taste, then how good is it really? What I am arguing is that this pot will not simmer forever without scorching the flavor of the soup and this country will not thrive without taking pride in its every ingredient, giving each one equal attention.
Discrimination is only possible with power and with discrimination and power, racism is created. To truly oppress a race or culture in today’s day sounds radical. An indigenous woman by the name of Suzanna de León who I had the honor of hearing speak on “Crossing Borders and Border Crossing,” said that racism is not prejudice. It is with power that enables us to segregate. I believe her although before that speech I had never felt that I had a good definition for it. By reading someone else’s history books we become agents of oppression. You don’t need to hold a person down or put them in chains because after so much conditioning over time they will stop resisting. In truth, people will never completely stop resisting and that brings me peace in putting this all down on paper. What affects me so strongly is that I have been told that no one is truly powerless although by examining only small pieces of what people of other races are encountering and experience in their every day struggles I see that lack of hope is the cause of loss of power. If you add it all up the outcome is more than discouraging, it is crippling. Powerlessness may not exist because one always has power over their decisions and actions, but they cannot wake up tomorrow, white, privileged and with equal opportunity to receive a fair and unbiased education. A “Palabrista” or Latina Poet, named Teresa Ortiz recited that “our history is long and it is living…we are here, the future is now.” I see that as so optimistic since she is talking about the exact history that is chosen to be excluded and banished from the very books that teach us about “Americans” since not all “Americans” are white. Teresa is an American, a Minnesotan and she is from Mexico. I hope students in this country can find the inspiration that Teresa has, to write of her pride and history, since it is a part of “ours.” We share so many pages of history, even though we don’t share enough pages in our books. I asked myself why when sitting in my first Chicano Studies classes, why I was never privileged to this information. Not until further researching other sources of oppression and realizing that I have been bread to have a white mind did I really become infuriated. A white mind is one that is educated to continue the oppression that has deprived our country of multicultural competent individuals.
I have concern in concluding this paper that white readers will feel as if I am playing the blame game, but I do not mean to force guilt onto people like myself for not knowing, I point the finger at the institutions that began in our past and exist with ill intentions today. No more than I want a white reader to feel guilt do I want a person of color to hate me because of my ignorance to this. I have begun to take off my blindfold and exert my personal power to choose to question those in power who determine my education. I ask that instead of holding this knowledge inside that students of color educate me to my history, and its relationship to your history and how it has given me the privilege while it oppresses you. I am white and with knowledge I have the power to see a history full of color. Time has not changed the colors of our skin, but we are not powerless if we acknowledge the effects of the discrepancies in our books, and act in a conscious effort towards stopping the institutions from dominating our views of each other. Without increasing cultural competence, starting with the textbooks, “American” children of all races, cultures, and backgrounds first open we can not turn the page to a future that is truly capable of proudly stating that, “all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness” (Declaration of Independence). We will not create leaders for tomorrow without acknowledging our shortcomings because we will have fallen short of the truth in our history and in our pasts. The real history, that tells us that injustices have been done, racism exists, and that the power surrounding white privilege makes us incapable of developing our own identity and in turn hinders the development of other’s identities including one that truly would depict us as a “free” nation of equal opportunities.
Works Cited
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