Today people tend to identify themselves through institutions and communities. When looking specifically at the education system, identity plays a major role in shaping a student’s expectations. A larger school that receives more funding and tends to be located in more ideal and wealthy areas attracts students of the same traits. A school that receives less money and is located in less ideal settings also attracts students with similar traits. So the inequity begins before the student is even able to review classroom material. By enrolling in a school that has limited resources and knowing that it doesn’t have the best reputation, the student is already at a disadvantage compared to students in more well funded schools. They enrolled in the school because it’s what was available to them, therefore they identify with its quality, and therefore they expect their time there to have the same poor quality along with what the future will hold. The same holds true for students enrolled in higher quality education institutions except that a positive identity is created and so the students live with an identity that tells them they are to be successful. The identity that the institution has created, wether it be poor or high quality, has caused educational inequity.
Tag Archives: Identity
Roots and Education
From our discussions in class over Electronic Monuments we have begun to cover the topic of root cause and in turn we have begun focusing more on the individual and not groups such as society. An easy topic that can be seen as the cause of a lot of societal issues is educational inequity. Looking at the United State’s education standpoint in the world, this country is lacking. Our society has become focused on the fact that as one of the most influential countries in the world, we are no where near the top in terms of the level of education most of our citizens have. This in turn can be seen as a root cause of other societal issues, such as poverty and crime. We can see a correlation between the level of education in general the American public has and the level of crime and poverty seen. On the individual level, an individual who has received less education becomes more prone to criminal and negative activities. This distribution can be seen by narrowing in on individuals in communities where the educational level tends to be less than say a community where the education level is high and therefore crime rates are lower. A culmination of these communities weakens the entire society.
Exercise #2
Literacy
Literacy for me is experienced through school. I depend on it for many things besides the “purpose” that school is supposed to fulfill. Many things also affect my outlook of my connection with literacy, mostly family as they are the ones who I connect my schooling with the most. The meaning to me changes from school year to school year as future goals change and the situations in which I’m getting my education changes.
Another class, another 50 minutes of battling the desire to switch on standby mode. The material comes and goes, I’ll look at it later because today is not the day. But it’s so much harder to get it later. I’ve done this time and time again, I need to focus. The grades must get better, it will mean so much to them. It’s the least I can do.
How many classes do I have today? There’s too many, too much to do, too little time. How can I do well in everything? There is no such thing as a throw away class. I wonder if they think I’m doing well. I won’t disappoint, I have to listen. What’s going on on Friday again? 45 more minutes to go.
I can do this, I study and I work hard. Why is this not making any sense? It’s okay, there’s so much time. I’ll be fine, I’ll be fine. 40 minutes to go.
Orality
I believe orality has significant differences when experienced through different mediums. Conversations through technology fell different than face to face encounters. Even a phone call creates a noticeable screen between individuals where the conversation is warped and different meanings are interpreted from what originally was intended. Unfortunately, the convenience of technology makes it hard to communicate in other ways.
I need to talk to you, can you Skype me? I know it’s late but I’d rather not do this over a text. Yes everything is okay. Stop everything is fine, don’t worry! Then just pick up the phone.
I’m sorry about last week, I didn’t mean for anything to sound like that. Of course, I just want to talk real quick while we’re here. You’re not busy are you? Oh, okay. Yeah, call me tonight.
I’m sorry I missed your calls, something came up at work! Can we talk now? I didn’t mean to leave you hanging…. Alright, I guess I’ll call you tomorrow.
Electracy
Sometimes I’m glad I don’t play professional sports.
It’s like I’m actually there!! Wait…
The online social sphere is one of the greatest achievements of mankind. Experiences from all over the world of virtually anything you can imagine is accessible via the internet. You can experience all of these via the online community, but always remember you are only truly understanding these in very basic forms. The connections that the online social sphere makes are only surface level connections that we must understand do not give us the full experience of what we find online that meant something to those who posted the original material.
Networks and Algorithms
Being a computer science major, I deal with algorithms more than most. We rely on these to predict behavior and outcomes of hardware and software alike. Algorithms are the true step towards developing a more complexly connected and therefore smarter and powerful computer system. The system of online social networking seems much closer to this than I believe most people think when specifically looking at human interaction. Connectivity and the ways we connect to other people is a key characteristic of human life. Ideas are generated and constantly being changed due to the instant access to our peer’s ideas due to tools such as the internet. In creating mass media sharing platforms such as Facebook, we have in fact created a sort of algorithm for the sharing of ideas and the connection of human communities. And what is a computer but a combination of complex and simple algorithms designed to connect different systems? What these network platforms actually are doing is taking the complex characteristics of the human mind and developing these thoughts through a simpler system that is designed to connect to other humans and share data. Of course this is still far from saying we have begun turning ourselves and society into hardware, but as we rely more on online social connections we see more and more similarities between us and the machines we use to network.
Exercise 1
An app I’ve found myself using on my phone a lot when I’m bored is a computer mediated communication platform called Ifunny. Basically to an outside user, the app is a watered down version of the popular site Reddit. It’s an app where, using the tools the creator of the site provides, one can created and upload posts about virtually anything. The app’s purpose is to provide a space where people can post original humorous posts but there is no monitoring of the subject material so people really can post about whatever they want. As an incentive to post for the original purpose of the app, the creator searches the submitted posts and places a chosen few on a part of the app called “featured” where they are given special exposure.
The ideas that I can apply to this app are electracy and participatory culture. The posts that people put on the app are scrolled through by other users and can also be “liked” and commented on. Gathering more likes and comments makes the post more noticeable to the creator and therefore their chances of being on “featured” increases. This satisfies Jenkin’s definition of participatory culture since there is nothing stopping other users from viewing the material and interacting with it. A post on Ifunny is subject to viewing, “liking”, and commenting from anyone. Also since the status of content of certain posts can be “elevated” by reaching the “featured” category, this puts a new spin on the role of participatory culture. Now people who create the content somewhat rely on the participation of strangers to elevate the status of their content. This doesn’t change the fact that the purpose of the app is to promote creativity and not the social politics of trying to squeeze out more “likes”. The lack of an actual prize for being in “featured” other than the exposure is small enough of an award to preserve that.
The idea of Electracy applies to Ifunny as well. In order to post anything on Ifunny, one needs to be familiar with the tools the creator provides so that posts will actually make it on the app. And because the app is a form of social networking, the need to recognize online acronyms is required. The commenting section has no organization to it, so the posts are just listed from newest to oldest so being able to navigate and keep track of conversations within the comments section is on the user. The navigating of posts is not difficult, scrolling over to the right gets the user to the next post but this also presents a problem. Because new content comes in on the general space at random intervals and quantities, it’s easy to lose track of your spot and therefore it’s possible to miss posts and never know you missed them. Being able to manually search for them by providing information on the content you wish to view is another necessary skill. This does not provide much of a problem in the “featured” category since there is a set number who make it there every day.
Electronic Monuments Intro
Our community today has grown to what is now seen as a global community. Natural boundaries and state and nation lines are no longer substantial barriers keeping people from one another. This mostly has to do with the existence of the internet. The internet certainly can be a cause of travesty and hardship for the global community, but most today would agree that the internet is a necessity in modern society. The major source of this success is the internet’s ability to connect individuals with the overall collective that is the modern global community. Ideas, beliefs, and thoughts are now able to be shared globally, making the individual aware, and sometimes painfully, of the many other individuals of the global community. This can also be a negative thing as smaller communities within the global community have disputes over disagreeing ideas. I have seen the negative effects that the sharing of information has on a community, specifically a school community. Adolescents that have yet to fully understand that communicating ideas over the internet can be even more destructive than saying them in person are an example of how easily it is to misinterpret the purpose and power the internet has, and only shows a situation with minor consequence compared to that of a an issue within the global community. EmerAgency does attempt to increase awareness and concern over the issue of expression over the internet but we must be aware that internet is always changing and advancing with new technology. It will take far more supervision if we are to truly see a “safer” internet.
Who am I
I’m a third year and I’m currently majoring in Computer Science. Besides a freshman level writing seminar, this is the only writing course I’ve taken. As I said in class, I don’t leave the engineering center very often. To be honest in the beginning I didn’t expect much from this class other than a few core requirements satisfied. But after the first couple of days of class I’m definitely excited to see how the projects are going to go and how this blog is going to turn out. I’ve never written a blog before, I’ve never looked at blogs before, and I’m not even a big Facebook person which is what I think I can relate this to. I don’t even know if how I’m writing right now is the right way to do this! Either way I’m excited to figure it out. An interesting social issue I know about is the killing of Michael Brown on August 9th which apparently led to a couple weeks of intense civil rights protesting and riots. The boy was unarmed and reported to have raised his hands in the air before he was shot, although the chief of the St. Louis County police department stated Brown went for the officer’s gun before he was shot. I plan to continue to follow this until it’s decided whether the officer will be charged with a crime or not. My idea of network engagement would be the participation of an individual in a community that relies on the participation of many individuals. I have no idea if that’s close to the actual definition.
A Word To the Wise 