"The Browser"

The other day, I heard "The Browser" on the radio. It's an interesting program dedicated to letting us know what people are talking about online. Weird that it's a radio show, but interesting. So, they talked about living the American Dream, and how certain demographics are more likely to feel they were living the American Dream, which prompted the question, "What is the American Dream?" One of the "browsers" said it really well, and I can't remember it all, but I think she said something like this: the American Dream is the ability and freedom to live the life you choose. The other one said he thought it had a lot to do with having the ability to own your own home and car, among other things. I agree with both of those statements, but feel they were both missing just a little something -- maybe the magic feeling of the 50s (Dad in a suit, Mom always coifed, and kids neatly pressed, you know what I mean!) or something? They segwayed into a discussion about how much the "Leave It to Beaver" family would have to pay TODAY for the house they lived in and activities they did, computed to include inflation, etc., so maybe they felt that was the era of the American Dream, too.

But it prompted me to ask some of my family if they felt they were living the American Dream. My sister, Rachel, is teaching inner city kids in Memphis, Tenn. right now with Teach for America -- a super-hard job, and one she's not getting a lot of positive reinforcement for, but one she feels is important to do. Her response to me was that she was fixing the American Dream. That felt so different than the American Dream I was talking about that I asked her to clarify. This is what she said:


Nat,

You asked about the American Dream. I think of images when I think of the American Dream. Those images are associated with family, leisure time, hard work, and a good life. To try and describe it, I see it as the chance to pursue happiness, really as opportunity.

Maybe it's because I'm at school, maybe I just watched "Waiting for Superman", or maybe this is just how I feel, but many of my students don't have the chance to pursue happiness. Some of them are literally just trying to survive. Some of them don't know that there are opportunities for them within the school or community that will give them opportunities. It's a rare student that understands the key to doing more than surviving is learning how to stop reacting and start planning. Education does that for a person. Education teaches a student the idea of delayed-gratification. It gives them the opportunities most of them wouldn't have seen without it.

When I said I'm trying to fix the American Dream I meant that for whatever reason, a large number of children are being brought up without the intellectual and emotional resources to give themselves opportunities. I don't think it's just low socio-economic status that defines this, but poorer children don't have the money to buy opportunities, so they have to make them. I'm trying to teach in a way that if my students want to stop just surviving (emotionally, physically, intellectually) they have a way out in my class. I'm trying to give my students a chance to earn their American Dream.

I think these students have been offered this chance before, but they've had (and many still have) blinders on to it.

I went to a meeting today and heard something I really liked, and think sums up what I'm trying to say. "A diploma doesn't guarantee my students anything. But not earning that diploma almost certainly damns my students to a life of ignorance and squalor, where even mediocrity is next to impossible."

I don't normally talk about what I'm doing quite like this, maybe I need to write a paper? But I guess that's what I meant.

I'm satisfied with my life, yes, I do think I'm living the American Dream, but I see a lot of folks that I don't think are and that's what I'm trying to fix. It could be that I'm putting myself where I don't belong, butting into other folks' business, but I'm trying to do right, and will stop when I don't think it is anymore.

Rachel