This week we are studying the effects of poverty in schools. Many of the generational poor students that were interviewed in Beegle in See Poverty...Be the Difference! expressed that they never even considered the idea of going to college or even graduating high school. People born into generational poverty most often never escape. When it comes to education, they often lack family support, community support or even systematic support. They internalize their struggles and, like most of society, blame themselves for not being able to pull themselves and their family out of poverty. They see their deficiencies, not their competencies. Education can be liberating and empowering. But those born into poverty too often get stuck in a vicious cycle where education is sacrificed for poor wage jobs which perpetuates poverty.
Maxine Greene asked us as future teachers to imagine a classroom, a school and a system that supports us and all our children, to dream the dream. She writes, "it may be the recovery of imagination that lessens the social paralysis we see around us and restores the sense that something can be done in the name of what is decent and humane" (35). How, as educators, can we help these students to imagine a life outside of poverty? How can they imagine themselves in college when they're too busy worrying about their next meal? Somehow, we must not only see and acknowledge these students' competencies, but we must get them to see it too. We must always push them to never give up on themselves and we must not give up on them either. We must help shine a light on a path that they never even imagined existed. In this respect, it is also our duty to strive to remove the systematic barriers these children and their parents face when it comes to accessing education.
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