Tuesday, November 16, 2010

Bargains and Outliers

The “Marita’s Bargain” chapter focuses on a leading college-prep school, the KIPP (Knowledge is Power Program) in a struggling community in New York City. Gladwell gives special attention to one of the students, Marita, and the considerable effort and sacrifices she must make in order to do well at the school. She must rise early and study late into the night

Gladwell argues that KIPP “has succeeded by taking the idea of cultural legacies seriously.” That means that a tradition like summer vacation is replaced with year-round schooling, and the times that the school day begins and ends changes as well as how students are instructed to pay attention in class. And, a student like Marita is given more of a “chance” when someone brings “a little bit of the rice paddy to the South Bronx” and explains “the miracle of meaningful work.”

KIPP Academies seem to have tremendous success assisting young people from poor, neglected environments make it to college. But, what might a KIPP Academy at the collegiate level look like? Perhaps that’s what our activities with the Haley Scholars Academy are all about. So what KIPP-like strategies do you think would be most important for a large group of us to adopt in order to ensure that larger numbers of students at the university attain academic and professional success?

Or, what kinds of “bargains” should the university or specific programs like the Haley Scholars Academy create to make opportunities for collegiate success available to more and more students here?

29 comments:

Ke'Asha Jones said...

I think for people who are struggling in certain subjects for a particular year, they should have to take mandatory refresher courses for those classes that last about a week to a week in a half. The courses should be taken right before the next semester starts so that way they will be up to par with the new material they are about to learn just in case they my have forgotten something vital to them moving on to the next level or understanding the new concept.

Alexis Cortes said...

I think SIUE is already creating "bargains" for the students. For example, some scholarships require a student to have a tutor, or a mentor to meet with periodically. Students can also make "bargains" similar to Marita's, like attending classes until late at night. They give up some of their freetime, and in return make their way closer and closer to a degree. Summer classes are also an option for students. The more classes a student signs up for, the more time they must spend studying and give up things like going out with friends everynight. Students are given so many opportunities to succeed with the amount of scholarships available, and with environments such as the writing center to have access to help at all times. I feel that SIUE is place where I have many advantages, and I believe every student can achieve academic success.

Bryan M said...

I think fundraising to get enough money for a couple of scholarships would be nice. Grants would also be really helpful. If the government would be willing to fund some sort of grant program to help under-priveledged persons that would be a great way to bring in potetionally exceptional students that may not be able to afford college.

Zack Leija said...

Students' success at college depends mostly on the amount of time and effort they put into a class and into learning new things. Programs and other campus groups that help students in a similar academic fashion to KIPP should try to attract more students to their organizations. Whatever they decide to do in order to attract those students can be determined by the group, but the main goal should be to keep students active in class and maintain higher grades and keep learning. Also, more groups should be created in order to allow more students the opportunity to get involved.

Joe Brown said...

First of all, I found the Marita's Bargain story to be quite touching. It is touching because it shows the idea that an opportunity and drive, a person can succeed.

I believe a way to get students to learn more over the summer vacation, because it will be a long road to travel for the summer vacation to be revoked, is to make summer school an option rather than a punishment. By making summer school a punishment it subconsiously says to students, "Summer is not a time to learn, and those who take summer school are either failures or miscreants." This is the wrong kind of message to send.

Jerraco Johnson said...

I completely agree with Joe Brown! For as long as I can remember summer school was definitely not a good thing. That was until college came around, now I would love to have more opportunities to pay for summer school. It is a way to get ahead of the process of getting your degree. It takes a real diligent student to give up their summer, so I think some kind of incentive should be given in order to attract more students to summer school.

Gabriel C. said...

I believe that at the collegiate level slowing classes down in a way that there is continued progress would greatly benefit the students. College is difficult at times, students are expected to take in the information and then immediately use it within the next couple classes. Taking time to insure that the students grasp the concepts given to them would allow for higher test scores and greatly increase the amount of graduating students, as can already been seen in the KIPP Academy students.

Ronald Banks said...

I believe that SIUE is offering there students academics opportunities for example the Soar program. They provide with addititional help with your studies and Scholarship like the Haley Scholarship. With opportunities like summer school you have that choice to make. I do think that there should be more scholarships that helps pay for your education. More programs should have Alumi come back and talk to the students about their careers and be mentors to students.

Jennifer Johnson said...

I FEEL THAT SIUE ALREADY HAS KIPP LIKE STRATEGIES IF YOU CONSIDER ALL OF THE OPPORTUNITIES THAT ARE GIVEN TO US IN ORDER TO HELP US SUCCEED. THESE ARE THINGS SUCH AS TUTORING AND PLACES OF STUDY. IF A STUDENT IS STRUGGLING AT ALL THEN THEY HAVE THE MEANS OF GETTING HELP RIGHT HERE ON CAMPUS

Bradley Golsby said...

I agree with most of what has been stated here. SIUE offers many good "bargains" as is, and an incentive for summer school would help greatly in attracting struggling students. Maybe if students started to fall below a certain grade, it could become mandatory to take a tutoring session, or as ke'asha jones has already stated, provide mandatory refresher courses before the next semester/year.

Renee Johns-Goodenough said...

I believe that in order for collegiate success be available to students here at SIUE, we must be willing to work as hard as it takes to get that degree that would lead to professional success. Like what Alexis said, there are so many options that SIUE has already implemented for us to use to become better students such as the writing lab or providing tutors for athlete's/other scholarship holders. I believe that if we raise a little bit more money so that we will be able to give more scholarships to those deserving them, we would see more success as a university.

Jim Engracia said...

I feel that SIUE is doing a pretty good job with the work that they are doing to help college students succeed. For example, SOAR requires many mandatory studying sessions for many hard classes like science, math and business.
I feel that SIUE can offer more classes over the summer and year round to help similarly to the year round schooling of high school. This could help everyone, not just those who are struggling.
For me, I feel like Marita sometimes. I study and do homework till all hours of the night because of extracurricular activities and my classes throughout the day.

Moriah Lupardus said...

I believe that SIUE does a good job of providing "bargains" to students. To improve student performance I think that each class should have a coordinating study group that meets at least once a week for students who need extra help. Problems that arise in the study group could be further discussed or answered by the teacher in the next class session.

Jewel M. said...

I feel the university has already given bargains and demonstrated characteristics like the KIPP. The SOAR program offers tutoring in a wide variety of subjects; The Student Success Center is open all night long for those that need a quiet place to study besides the library. Also, like another blogger mentioned, some scholarships require a tutor and or mentor. There are ample resources for students to take advantage to ensure their success. These resources are not just for Haley Scholars. Thus there is not a reason others cannot take advantage of these resources.

Alex Heppner said...

I think that SIUE already provides "bargains" and KIPP like strategies. The issue really is that some of those helpful services and opportunities are hard to find. Either students need to dig deeper to get the help they need or those service need to be brought to the public. I think that opportunities are everywhere, they may just be hard to find, but true success takes hard work and dedication.

Natalie B. said...

I believe that SIUE has already created bargains. There are plentiful opportunities for students to do well. They just must be motivated enough to take those opportunities and run with them. The help is out there. People just need to reach out and take it.

Brian Cooper said...

I think SIUE already has KIPP strategies, like certain majors, scholarships, and greeks have required study hours at the library. But it would also be beneficial if SIUE adapted the longer school hours like KIPP. So students should be required to take friday classes, instead of having the option of having friday off. The friday classes would give students a smaller chance of forgetting info that was just learned over the weekend since they had one extra day of class.

Maame A said...

I believe that it would be very difficult to adopt the KIPP-like strategies at a collegiate level. For example, I do not think that many college students would be willing to give up their summer for school work. I also think there is a lot that goes on in a college students life other than school work, such as a job, possibly a boyfriend or girlfriend, or maybe a child. Many college students would simply not have the time to go through a KIPP schedule. I do think that SIUe could use some of the strategies that KIPP offers. How students are instructed to pay attention in class may be very beneficial to many if not all college students.

Jasmine said...

The KIPP like strategies that the Hayley Scholarship Program should use are the strategies that hard work will equal success. This strategy is actually already used. The scholarship program pushes students to have at least a 2.9.

This program encourages us to study on a very regular basis. It also involves community service which means that we have to learn time management because we not only have to worry about keeping our grades up in order to keep our scholarships but we have to fit community service in. Being in this program helps teach us the skills of hard working cultures.

robert dammer said...

I think that at a college level, the bargains or programs that students should be entered into are mostly limited to voluntary help groups. Things like tutoring, summer classes, or additional classes are really the only way to provide extra to higher-level education that isn't mandatory itself.

Austin Banks said...

I agree with Ke'Asha. Collegiate level courses can be very difficult and despite efforts, not everyone graduates from high school with the tools and skills necessary to do well. If you are struggling or are not adequately prepared for classes, then I think that mandatory refresher courses should be taken over the summer. This will help them to understand the new concepts, but not let them be left behind when the traditional fall/spring semesters start.

As for student bargains, more grants would be very helpful. Although SIUE provides many loan options, these options can be a cause of stress for students since they'll have a proverbial cloud of financial woes waiting for them upon graduation. Grants and scholarships with a wider range of pre-requisites would be the best option since the money would not have to be payed back.

Eric Horin said...

I think SIUE already has a good system of helping students who need it. There is the writing center that helps students with their papers and there are free tutors that come to most of the residence halls. I think the main reason that students struggle in college is because they are not motivated enough. I really benefited from attending a few sessions at the career development center about the different types of careers I would be best suited for. I think if more people would find out exactly what they wanted to with their life than they would be more motivated to go after it and more people would succeed.

Clarissa B. said...

I think that it would be a good idea if SIUE required tutoring if a student is getting a C- or lower, or even just let students know more about the tutoring services offered at the school. I know if a student actually cares about getting a good grade in class he or she would gladly go to tutoring until they are succeeding academically.

Quiandez m said...

A friend once told me it matters how much you care and how passionate you are about something to determine how well you do in things. Better grades means people will have to inspire us to want to better ourselves. If we feel that this is a class that we have to take just because will we truly better ourselves? I doubt it. Summer School is feared because people see their friends out and about frolicking while they are in class. Why not get every student like a big brother/ big sister, a upperclassmen within their major to help them overcome obstacles. They then will have a support group and a friend to work with.

Derreck said...

I'm moved by the deeds that KIPP are ding for students of poor and/or neglected backgrounds because I was once in that situation. The community in which I lived held fundraisers and benefits for students just like me which gave us the opportunity to attend schools like my high school.
I agree with Alex when he says that SIUE already has bargains for students in that situations. SIUE creates scholarships, grants, tutoring, and other offered services that can help students achieve their dreams when they have little to nothing encouraging them to achieve.

Terrence H. said...

I believe that SIUE alreasy has KIPP like strategies because there are so many resources available to succeed. There are many courses that can refresh our memories of concepts we need for higher level classes. There are many tutoring services that we can use for free. It is up to the students to use these resources in order for them to succeed.

Ricky Mahajan said...

Soome KIPP like strategies that SIUE could offer are, a 24/7 tutoring service. How many times have you needed a tutot, for that big test tommorow, and then realized tutoring wasnt available at that time/day? Too many times.So I think that would be a nice KIPP ish program.

Unknown said...

I am a fan of classes lasting longer than just a semester, especially when students start taking classes in a specialized field. I feel as if some students just do enough to pass a class without really grasping the information they learn. Longer periods of time really analyzing and "learning" the information could be really helpful.

Gwen G said...

I agree with almost everyone's post. Success brings in scholarships, and careers. But what about the people who don't obtain success? Not all of us have hours and hours of free time to focus on a particular class everyday. Some of us have children, a stressful home life, and a full time job. I think a great bargain would to be accepting and understanding. I'm not saying its okay for a student to slack off, because everyone should take college seriously.