Culpepper 1

Eric Culpepper
Lindsay Drumm
English 111
17 June 2014
CC Final
Different Ways to Change Education
The battle on education will continue. Different people from different walks of life have
different opinions of how the education system should change. Some people believe that the
education system is perfect the way it is, but most people have at least a little idea on what they
would like to see change. Maybe change the way the information is taught or change the way the
class is set up. However one sees it, the education system will continue to change as educators
become aware of the changing needs of the students. The articles used here are just two
examples. While hooks and Crook share some similarities, their views on the education system
very in many ways.
bell hooks (a teacher, writer, and scholar) writes her article Engaged Pedagogy about
getting students to be Active Participants in her classroom. What she means by this is that she
wants her students to get involved with the lesson being taught. Not to just sit idle in class but to
add something to the conversation at hand, and, in return, she hopes to give her students a better
working knowledge that they may apply towards things in their personal lives. hooks take on the
education system is simply that there arent enough teachers/educators who care enough to get
involved with the students. hooks says, More than anything they seemed enthralled by the
exercise of power and authority within their mini-kingdom, the classroom (256). She is using
this phrase to help the reader understand the teaching style in which she would like to see
change.
Culpepper 2

Clive Crook is currently a senior editor for The Atlantic Monthly, and his article A
Matter of Degrees: Why College Is Not an Economic Cure-All talks about college as not being
for everyone and was published in 2006. Instead of changing how students and professors
interact with each other and learn, some, such as Crook, believe that some people should just not
go to college in the first place. In this article, Crook uses the analogy: giving an extra year of
school to everybody would raise nobodys income, because nobodys position in the ordering
would change. The private benefit of more education would remain, but the social benefit would
be zero (366). The article is believed to be in response to an article that was written about how
everyone should go to college. The standpoint that Crook is taking is that having everyone go to
college and get a degree will no longer help anyone to get a better paying job because even the
low-income jobs will require a degree, and if those jobs require degrees, why should any other
job earn a bigger income when they are all essentially on the same playing field? Crook is not
saying that people shouldnt go to college; he is just simply suggesting that college isnt for
everyone.
Crook says illiteracy is a more important issue to focus on. He states, The most recent
National Assessment of Adult Literacy found that 30million adult Americans have less than
basic literacy (meaning, for instance, that they find it difficult to read mail, or address an
envelope) (Crook 368). Why would Crook use this statistic at the end of his article about
college not being for everyone? Maybe, he is trying to draw the attention of the reader to the
bigger issue of illiteracy. He talks about how two-thirds of the population struggle with every
day tasks, such as simply reading the mail or addressing an envelope to go out. As the reader, it
is obvious that Crook is saying that literacy is an important part of education, even back to the
high school years and states, Three out of ten seniors in public high schools still fail to reach the
Culpepper 3

basic literacy standard (Crook 368). He goes on to say this: Progress on literacy would bring
great material benefits, of course, for the people concerned and some benefits for a wider
economy but those benefits are not the main reason to make confronting illiteracy the countrys
highest educational priority (Crook 368). Crook is saying that illiteracy is a big problem for the
education system; however, there are other things that need to be addressed as well.
All of the authors in the book Exploring Relationships: Globalization and Learning in
the 21
st
Century have something to say about how education should change. Not one of them,
that I have read thus far, have said anything about motivation and helping students to actually
want to do the work. Most students concentrate on one of three things: 1) not disappointing their
parents, 2) having a good time and just going to class, or 3) the real reason that most make it
through college; the better paying job at the end of college. Students focus on the end job as if it
were a guarantee. What happens when there is no motivation to find a job after working so hard
to get through college? What about the students who lose motivation before they even finish
college? The real problem here is motivation and how to keep students motivated. bell hooks
shares an example within her article about a student who felt the decision he had made to join a
fraternity was not constructive, that I had taught him openness where the fraternity had
encouraged one-dimensional allegiance (257). hooks used this example to show that her idea of
engaged pedagogy is not only effecting how her students learn, but she is also helping them to
make positive choices outside of the classroom. This shows that not only is bell hooks teaching
her students, but she is helping them to stay motivated and engaged in their own learning.
Trade schools have it all figured out, and, perhaps that is why they charge so much for
tuition. A high percentage of the students who attend trade schools are simply motivated by their
personal lives. Maybe the students have families to provide for, or are just tired of their current
Culpepper 4

job, or maybe they just want a specific job that they know they want to do for the rest of their
life. Trade school students generally consist of people who have been out of school for a while
and are just trying to change their present life style. They show it all the time on TV. A father of
two with a beautiful wife: he goes back to school (trade school) to get a better degree so that his
beautiful wife can afford to stay at home with the kids all day and they can still afford a nice
house. bell hooks says this, Professors who embrace the challenge of self-actualization will be
better able to create pedagogical practices that engage students, providing them with way of
knowing that enhance their capacity to live full and deeply (258). Trade schools, and even most
Community Colleges, have it all figured out because not only do the students get an education,
but most of the professors and staff are willing to talk the time and help the students when they
seem to be struggling. I am not saying that a Universitys staff/professors wont take the time to
talk with an individual student and help them to correct a problem, however, I believe the setting
of the classroom makes it hard for those that do wish to help the students. Another thing Trade
Schools are doing right; most of them help their students to find jobs in their field of study while
most degrees at big universities dont even provide students with the fundamentals of job-
searching, resume-building, or even self-presentation and interviewing techniques.
bell hooks and Clive Crook have very different opinions on how to change the education
system. Some ideas are small, some ideas are big, while some could have a big effect. Although
Crook does not give us a way to address illiteracy in America, he does point out that it is a big
issue and needs to be addressed. hooks, on the other hand, does what she can to affect the lives of
her students so that they may be more well-equipped to make the right choices in life outside of
the classroom. Regardless of the different ideas, change in the education system is needed.

Culpepper 5

Works Cited

hooks, bell. Engaged Pedagogy. Exploring Relationships: Globalization and Learning in the
21
st
Century. Boston: Pearson Learning Solutions, 2013. 253-259. Print.
Crook, Clive. A Matter of Degrees: Why College Is Not an Economic Cure-All. Exploring
Relationships: Globalization and Learning in the 21
st
Century. Boston: Pearson Learning
Solutions, 2013. 366-368. Print.