Advanced Essay #3:The Hide and Seek of Race

Intro: My central question in my essay is How does society and the way they teach race and culture affect the knowledge of a person's racial identity ?,In my essay I tried to incorporate  experiences of not just me but students and youth as a whole and how they are affected by my essential question because I believe youth are definitely affected by it. I also tried to incorporate a lot of the quotes I found as evidence to prove my thesis to be true. I think that I did pretty well explaining such a complex topic and getting  the reader to understand the importance of the issue.

Essay:

 In every grade from kindergarten to 12th we have history as one of our main subjects. School systems have the mindset that  the curriculum they teach for this subject is suitable for all of their students. They know  that they are instilling false knowledge about American History  and neglecting their duties to help each and every child  find their own racial identity.School systems are letting the stereotypes and  misconceptions the media portrays about race teach their children and in return students are amplifying their ignorance in schools,work,at home if they don’t have the proper support  in their household  to correct their wrong information, social situations, and even more. Students who  are not taught correctly about their racial identity and aware  and informed about  other racial identities are the ones who usually end up becoming the stereotype or using their incorrect information to be little other races. If school systems cut common misconceptions and stereotypes about racial identity at the roots they’ll be no room for ignorance to grow.

The way school systems teach students about their  racial identity has gotten so out of control that it is starting to  affect the way students perceive themselves and how much effort they put into their school work .In school now a days  how well you study or how much attention you pay in class is no longer the measure of how successful you’ll be in a subject but  the color of your skin.  In an article  recently written by Heidi W.Durrow  she explained how even though she was Dominican the results she had in math decided she didn’t fit in with being Dominican but another race. “I learned that because of the peculiar way that math and race work together in America, I was black.”. The quote is a perfect example how the school system is helping to categorize races in a stereotypical way which is taking away from the  actual learning experience of the students. It is also striping them away and confusing them about their  real racial identity and leading students to believe false information about a race.

Students should  be trying to learn about their racial identity and history  without the fear of being already categorized  before they even get to show off their skills in the classroom. Without the students even getting to the point of being aware of their own racial identity, the school system does a good job of indirectly applying definitions to the social,economical, and political meanings of race. Angela Willing states ““Unlike race and racial identity, the social, political and economic meanings of race, or rather belonging to particular racial groups, have not been fluid.”  Students especially in the  12th grade and under are trying  find out their self identity and how that ties in with their racial identity but how can they, when society is already crafting the definition for them. This makes it much more confusing for students trying to find the truth about their racial identity and even makes them more vulnerable to believing stereotypes and misconceptions the media feeds them.

 It is not practical to ask the school system to teach about every single race in the world, it just isn’t possible especially in one school year. It is way too  much information and history to investigate and research but it is practical to want the school system to teach about  a wide range of different races that don’t all come from the same region. It is essential that the school system dives deeper into racial identity and eliminates misconceptions about different races. This will lower the rates of ignorance that has already spread so vastly across our country. Also  helping students find their racial identities early in life might make finding their self identity a lot easier.Students shouldn’t have to be unfortable in their own skin. Students should not have to be afraid to be who they are. The  students race should not determine  how well they do in school.The student should not be limited in their education because of their complexion. Skin color does not define the student, the student defines her or himself.