A 12th-grader wrote a college admissions essay about wanting to pursue a career in oceanography. Let’s call her Isabella. A few months ago, we edited it in my classroom during lunch. The writing was good, but plenty of 17-year-olds fantasize about swimming with whales. Her essay was distinctive for another reason: Her career goals were not the highlight of the essay. They were just a means of framing her statement of purpose, something surprisingly few personal statements actually get around to making.

The essay’s core concerned the rhetoric that educators had used to motivate her and her peers—other minority students from low-income communities. She’d been encouraged to think of college foremost as a path to socioeconomic mobility. Since elementary school, teachers had rhapsodized about the opportunities that four years of higher education could unlock. Administrators had rattled off statistics about the gulf in earnings between college graduates and those with only high-school diplomas. She’d been told to think about her family, their hopes for her, what they hadn’t had and what she could have if she remained diligent. She’d been promised that good grades and a ticket to a good college would lead to a good job, one that would guarantee her financial independence and enable her to give back to those hard-working people who had placed their faith in her.

Thankfully, Isabella decried this characterization as shortsighted and simplistic. My guess is that only students like her ever have to hear it.

【危险，别再跟穷孩子说“书中自有黄金屋”】相关文章：

★ BEC商务英语初级写作必备黄金句(4)

★ 双语笑话:研究生班和本科生的区别

★ 一起学做菜之川菜：麻婆豆腐

★ 读书好还是听书好?这是个问题

★ 吃饭的时候刷手机?你就等着变胖吧

★ 加拿大夫妇隐瞒孩子性别 称让其自由选择

★ 不管世事如何,生命都在继续

★ 名师点评网友BEC初级作文(2)

★ 如果一直对孩子说“Yes”效果会怎样?

★ 新研究发现：肚子越大，脑子越小