It's evident that we lack great public education here in Puerto Rico. Don't get me wrong the UPR is great. But, I can testify to knowing how it feels to compare education from PR to that of a decent public school in the US. When I studied at Emory University I could see how my peers were, so eloquent (some, not all), but most of these came from Public schools. And this isn't to say that I couldn't match up, but to know that people could express themselves and be this competitive and attend public school sound surreal to the average puerto rican.
When we read Jim Cooper's chapter on teaching, I can genuinely feel his frustration on how it seems like an impossible task to teach under a lack of education structure. They had to implement systems throughout the year to try and educate in language (which is not his field; he studied literature), but we see that he tries and solve a problem that is deeply rooted in our way of learning and viewing english.
English is seen as a privilege as snarky or foreign (high class or as weird; it has a social stigma to speak in english). For example, when people see you speaking in spanish and you switch to english they judge you because they believe you should only speak in spanish (when it's our second language!), and they create a stigma out of it. People who know it hide it, and aren't able to practice because of this stigma and does who don't know it are afraid to ask for the help because they believe they will be made fun of. Nonetheless, there specialized public schools that excel in english and regular public schools that may have better programs, but the typical norm is that if you want to learn english you have to learn it by your own means or attend a private school (and private school is not cheap, by any means). In the end, here we are approximately 60 years after the stories from this chapter are told and we still face an uphill battle, we've made progress, but we still have a long way to go.
I agree that the education in Puerto Rico, especially in English, is lacking. The only way you get a halfway decent English education, or education in general, is when your in a private school. I learned English because I spent every summer since I was kid with my aunt in Miami, because the little English I learned in private school was third grade English; I do agree we have made progress but not as much as is needed. Speaking in English has become a social stigma as we saw in the Tourist for a Day for some of our fellow classmates.
ReplyDeleteEducation here and in the USA is very different indeed and they are extremely competitive, which is something we lack. For better or worse since I'm kinda non-competitive. Still it must have been eye opening to see that in Emory University. We still have a lot of work to do concerning education especially English here on the island. I agree, you can definitely see the authors frustration when he writes this, nonetheless he tried his best to give his students the best learning experience.
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