Popcycle Linking

The connection between “career” and “family” that Ulmer makes is interesting.  According to him the family institution reflects “a set of norms…within the idealogical identity categories” while the career shows  one is an expert within a specialized field of knowledge.  There are fundamental differences here and yet there are common links between the two once you have the opportunity to look towards the bigger picture. These connections are imperative in defining the identities of individuals since this connection can be made across fundamentally different aspects of that person’s life.  Thus this connection is an ingrained part of the individuals identity since it never changes.

The connections people can make are infinite since they depend solely on the individual in question.  For me when I think about my job and my family the term “time” comes quickly to mind.  “Time” for my job means a deadline, or a restraint on the work I can put in or also the restraint on me from doing other things.  Mostly this is different from what I consider “time” to be when I think about family.  It’s precious and means a selected period where I am free to be me and to really relax and enjoy myself.  The difference in stress between “career” and “family” makes the difference for me but underneath it all I can make out a connection, a similarity.  “Time” in both institutions means constraint.  My time at my job restrains me from perhaps doing a better job or making more money.  Time for family restrains me from seeing my friends or doing work like schoolwork since it’s a time that I should be around my family members and participating in social activities.

This connection shows that “time” is an important aspect of my life.  I find myself thinking about it no matter what situation I’m in.  I’m always weighing the other possibilities I could be using my time for and most of the time I’m worried about those things and wishing there was a way for me to just have more time.  Despite it seeming like a negative part of who I am, my concern with time also shows me that the I have other connections that reach across these institutions and show more positive aspects of myself.  “Satisfaction” is big one since through always being concerned with time, what I’m also concerned with is that I can satisfy people’s expectations of me.  I want to be able to do a good job for my superiors and to let my family know I’m happy and that I care about them.

These popsicle linkings show important characteristics about an individual that makes up their identities.  This in turn leads to other common characteristics of individuals that also cross institutions and become defining characteristics of that individual’s identity.  They aren’t always positive characteristics but they are nonetheless important and truly define the differences between people.  For me “time” is an important term and shows characteristics about myself that are not necessarily positive but lead to other strengths of mine that are important parts of myself and define who I am.

Prompt 4

When talking about education inequity, the issue that comes up is that education inequity leads to a lack of success for kids later in life.  The term means different things to different people but what can be agreed upon is that success means a stronger standing in life and a good education is an important foundation for any attempt at being successful.  Education in another way can be considered the starting point of a map leading to success.  However, education inequity causes this starting point to be skewed and blurred.  Students who would have normally had a good sense of what comes next in life to be successful have the added challenge of an unequal education system that does nothing but make that path to the future much harder to see.

As I discussed in my last post, the public school system in Hawaii has suffered for many years due to lack of funding, political pressure, and culture differences.  However, the Department of Education in Hawaii has made leaps and bounds since my residency there 10 years ago.  Aware that the students of local families were trapped in a cycle of education inequity, the department has since brought college credit courses to public schools and increased Advanced Placement subject material for students.  Since this has begun a decade ago, Hawaii has seen an increase in 8% in high school graduates who attended college the following year.

I look back on my public school education experience in Hawaii and I am amazed that the public school system has made such progress.  The map to success that I had begun to follow was already blurred for me when I was still in elementary school.  The system was so bad my parents were wondering how to transition me to private schools and how to pay for it and how to prepare me for the entrance exams.  As the schooling seemed to get worse, the situation became more stressful as we looked for ways for me to learn outside the public school system that would still keep me on the map to success.

If the education inequity in Hawaii hadn’t caused a rift between locals using the public school system and the private school system, the map to success for Hawaii locals wouldn’t be so difficult to follow and the percentage of “successful” adults in Hawaiian society would dramatically increase.  What is another obstacle to overcome is that in most families minds in Hawaii the map to success is an altogether different map from what it should be.  After generations of this education inequity and relative struggle to find success, most family’s idea of success is to just make it through high school and use family and local connections on the island to find stable jobs.  These jobs are stable, but they aren’t what most would call “successful”.  “Success” is a very subjective term but if it is being restricted by limitations such as those brought on by education inequity then the term is not fully being used.  The situation in Hawaii has been improved but the map to success is still far too blurred due to education inequity on the islands.