When the Light Goes On by Mike Rose

Author:Mike Rose [Rose, Mike]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Beacon Press
Published: 2022-03-15T00:00:00+00:00

One tragic fact about the path to academic achievement in the United States is that it is littered with barriers that have nothing to do with individual ability and effort or with the dynamics within one’s family. As is the case with all our major institutions, the school absorbs the larger society’s biases and inequities. Remember Tomás Herrera, the fellow I met in a university’s student lounge reading Hegel who is pursuing a doctorate in political science? His account of high school contains both incidents of bias and person-to-person racism (such as his teachers ridiculing the clothing and hairstyles of the Mexican kids) as well as racist and classist structural norms and practices—for example, providing college counseling to students on the academic track while sending military recruiters to the homes of the other primarily working-class students. Other people of color I interviewed had similar stories to tell. Several spoke about not being guided to take honors or Advanced Placement classes, even though they had good academic records. One Latina explains that she succeeded by sticking close to her White girlfriend and taking the same courses she did. Assumptions were made by teachers and counselors about who would go on to college. “How do you give a kid an A in math,” another woman asks rhetorically, “and not talk to him about college?” And sometimes bigotry is direct and nasty. A young Black man describes being ridiculed by his AP teacher for enrolling in the advanced class. “Man,” he says in exasperation, “it was all over by tenth grade.”

A widely held belief in our country is that once evident barriers to opportunity are removed—from segregationist restrictions to discriminatory hiring practices—then the playing field is leveled, and merit can triumph. To be sure, as social and state-sanctioned barriers are cleared—by social movements, by law, by evolving attitudes—opportunity widens. But bias and inequity die hard, are so embedded in our daily lives and institutions that they persist in many guises. Two further stories illustrate the shape-shifting persistence of social class and racial inequality—and possible ways counselors and teachers can respond.

Kateri Allen was a model student. Her father was in the construction trades and her mother was a homemaker and volunteered at Kateri’s school. Of the five children in their family, Kateri was the scholar. “I wanted to make my parents happy,” and her achievement did just that. By the time she began her senior year in high school, she was an athlete and a member of the National Honor Society. She took Advanced Placement classes and was a straight-A student. Kateri was compiling exactly the kind of record that would open doors to college, to lots of colleges, and she was Native American, a group notably underrepresented in higher education.

The high school’s college counselor, Mr. Torres, was also Kateri’s Advanced Placement Government teacher, so fortunately, he knew her as a standout student. They meet at the beginning of the year in his small, cramped office for a mandatory check-in. What are your plans

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