Woolman Blog

While Woolman has been a great adventure so far, no other activity has come close to the food intensive. Throughout the six days, the amount of experience and perspective I gained about the food system is unprecedented. One stop on our packed trip was to Full Belly Farm in Guinda. In class while reading The Omnivore’s Dilemma by Michael Pollan, we learned about small-scale, mostly organic farms that operate with the assistance of the animals that live on the farm, illustrated by Pollan using the model used by Joel Salatin at Polyface Farms. In the book, Pollan describes how Salatin uses his animals to help fertilize and replenish the fields. At Full Belly Farm, we saw exactly this in action. After a field has been farmed, the farmers at Full Belly plant a cover crop. Once this grows, they set their sheep onto the field, which will eat all the grass and help fertilize the soil and provide their animals with food. In addition, after corn has been harvested they let the cows eat the remaining plants. Both of these are concepts described by Pollan.

Another one of my favorite places that we visited on our trip was the Wolfskill USDA germplasm repository. I was completely enthralled by the concept that they essentially had almost every single variety of grapes and figs. The scale of this place hit me as I was roaming the grape vineyards sampling all the different varieties and pondering the fact that there are so many different types of grapes that I had never tasted before, let alone heard of. While many students were disturbed by the fact that nobody was eating the food, I wasn’t. I don’t feel that it is somehow wrong that that food is going to “waste” because in my opinion, what the scientists at Wolfskill are doing with those plants is more important in the long term and will keep more people from going hungry further down the line, in addition to the fact that they give away clippings of the plants per request. Over all the food intensive was a great experience which really helped me shape my opinion about how I think I should eat and where to get my food. I now feel confident in my decisions pertaining to food and way of life after hearing many conflicting views and ideas throughout this trip.

Agriculture and food have always been something that I've really liked learning about. This past week I have learned so much! I went on a trip that took me through the Bay Area of California, and really exposed me to some amazing places. The first place I landed was the Eco Fair in Marin County. The main attraction at the fair was a man named Van Jones, who is an environmental advocate, and briefly worked for Obama. Although he was an important part, there were also really ground breaking companies, who all attended the fair with hopes of helping Marin. Another thing I really liked while I was in Santa Rosa was the Summerfield Waldorf School. I loved how the school has a farm on their campus where many of the students could get involved. Another stop we made was Swanton Berry Farm, close to Santa Cruz. I really thought our guide, Bear, was honest about his job. He talked about how his farm was one of the only unionized berry farms and gave the workers an opportunity to own part of the company. He described that even though farming is really hard work and doesn't always make the most money, he still liked it. 

Many days were spent driving along the coast. It was my first time seeing the Pacific Ocean, and California! The Golden Gate Bridge was also really big for me. It was really awesome that we stopped at one end and got out to look around. I love seeing new places, so I really enjoyed driving through the cities. 

Full Belly Farm was probably my favorite place that we visited. Fully Belly was founded by two families twenty eight years ago, and has evolved into quite a successful organic farm! Most of their employees are Spanish speaking immigrants who get full health benefits and fair pay. Their jobs are also guaranteed through out the whole year, even during the slower winter season. One of my fellow students, who speaks Spanish, asked a man how long he had been working there and he said fourteen years. The system they had established seemed very solid, and I really liked how they ran the farm. 

Throughout the whole trip, my thoughts about agriculture changed a lot, and now I've been thinking a lot more about studying it in college. There are so many different aspects about it including; sustainable farming, GMO's, and solutions for feeding more people in the future. I'm really looking forward to learning more, and seeing where else it will take me!

I learned a lot on the our food intensive field trip.  There were a lot of things that were complicated, interesting, cool, mind-blowing. I gained a lot of knowledge about food, life and sustainability. There were a lot of things that I agreed with and disagreed with. I especially like how we started with politics and ended it at an organic farm.

I agreed with what Van Jones said about how to make changes in the U.S. I also like how he gave everyone the sad information about the country first and then he ended the speech by giving people hope for change. Moreover I feel that it is a fact when he said “if you want to make a change you have to make a move towards that to make it change”. Another place that we visited that I liked was Veritable Vegetable. I liked it because I learned a lot about labor. It was pretty shocking to me when I learned that the majority of the physical labor in their company is done by women, as I had previously believed that only men do that type of work. From my perspective I think it is unfair that people who do physical labor traditionally get paid less than people who work in an office. I think that this system should change.

My favorite of the trip, though, was James who gave a speech about American lifestyle and simple life. He talked about how we are consuming and wasting a lot of our resources. James believes that we should reclaim some of the ways we used to live back in the day and combine them with some of our best modern technology, which I strongly agree with. While it might not be possible or desirable to go back to how things were 100 years ago. I think we would all be happier living much simpler lives, which although difficult is not impossible. In order to live a simple life, one must surround oneself with people who live simple lives, which will in turn make it easier to live one's own life simply. I can relate to this because when I was in India I lived a very simple life and I was a very happy person. However, when I came to U.S. I always bought/consumed to keep myself happy which only gave me the fake happiness.

Hey everyone---I thought I would share this letter that I sent out to the parents last week, in case you are interested in how things have been going around here!

 

 

It has been an absolute whirlwind of a month, with wilderness and then two weeks in the classroom, and then taking our learning out into the world again with the Food Intensive. Now, we are in our second week of class post-Food Intensive, which means we are getting ready for yet another experiential learning adventure: The Service Week.

 

The Service Week is specifically part of the Peace Studies class. So far in that program, we have examined the multiple meanings of peace and what it means to be working towards a culture of peace. We are just now getting into different perspectives of violence and the root causes of violence. Part of that unit is studying the idea of poverty as a form of structural violence. Our service work is an opportunity to volunteer to help lessen the negative effects of poverty and also to compare and contrast the ideas of volunteerism and activism. We will be working at the local Food Bank warehouse and also a Food Bank Farm that puts fresh produce directly into the bags that they distribute to people in need. They are both wonderful projects and it should be a lot of fun!

 

In Global Issues we are finishing our first unit, which is an overview of the major challenges facing the world today with an emphasis on the idea that we are at a crossroads in human history. The concept is that we can choose to continue on with “business as usual” and allow for these crises to worsen or we can see the work of turning it around as our “calling” and find a way to use what we love to do to create better, stronger, more just and sustainable systems. There have been some heavy global conflicts presented to the class and so part of the curriculum is also about paying careful attention to what we are feeling when we learn about such sad topics. We are talking a lot about using those "negative" feelings such as grief, outrage, and guilt as indicators of interconnectedness, empathy, and power to make a change. It is a tricky line to walk, but we are in it together.

 

Final projects for my two classes are coming along with students in the research phase for both. They have come up with some intriguing and inspiring ideas for their Peace Documentaries, including the following topics:

 

• ·       Sierra Roots: A local initiative with the goal to create an eco-village for homeless vets
• ·       Issues facing homeless youth
• ·       The negative consequences of drug abuse for family relationships
• ·       Obama’s new immigration act offering temporary visas for undocumented youth

In Global Issues project class, the students are researching different types of nonviolent activism that they will be presenting upon in two weeks.

 

Did I mention that we are busy?! And these are just MY classes!

 

As always, there are ups and downs, challenges and successes and everything in between. The group is forming well outside of the classroom, too. It is clear that some life-long friendships are getting a great start!

 

I wanted to remind everyone that on the front page of the Woolman site (http://semester.woolman.org), you can also check out upcoming events! For example, right now you can see that we have some fantastic guest speakers coming in to share their experiences and lead workshops on issues like power and oppression, Palestinian rights, and art activism.

 

Finally, if any of you are on Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/woolmansemester , we submit little stories as updates nearly every day and post a lot of pictures there, too.

If you aren’t into the Facebook (I can’t blame you!), I have attached some of my favorite photos from the Peace Rally that our class hosted for the International Day of Peace, the Harvest Work Day, and one of the artistic responses to learning about Modern Day Slavery.

 

Thanks so much for all of your support! 

 

Hope you are enjoying a lovely start to Fall! 

 

En paz,

Emily

 

To begin with, I wholeheartedly agree with the sentiment that the youth of America have a much greater capacity to bring about change than is generally attributed to them. Speaking as a youth, it took me a very long time to move beyond the idea that there is nothing I can do to bring about change until I “grow up”. For me it was a very liberating experience to realize that, with enough dedication, I can accomplish very nearly anything I like. This was something I realized bit by bit, over a fairly extended series of time, but I’d say my personal empowerment was set in motion by a program at my school in which students would run various environmental monitoring projects, the purpose being to teach students about science and also about how to manage a project. What I like the most about this program is that in an often rigid and uncompromising education system this program allowed me the freedom to do things as I like, and to develop my initiative. I believe that if there were more such programs in public schools you would see much more in the way of activism and initiative from the Youth of America.

Another claim I agree with is that in America we have an unhealthy tendency to glorify and to some degree worship heroes. In fact, just last year I wrote a speech about just that. My main argument was although heroes can be an inspiration to us, by turning men and women into heroes we create a gap between them and us. Many will see such an unbridgeable gap between them and the heroes we look up to that they will not believe that they have it within themselves to be heroic in their own way. The celebration of heroes can also create a sense that the efforts of the average citizen are in some way unnecessary - another dangerously untrue idea.

Lastly, I connected with the assertion that standardized testing is not always the best tool to assess a student’s merits. As I see it, the main shortcoming of standardized testing is not that such tests fail to measure a student’s knowledge of the subject matter - although that argument can also be made - it is that that is not necessarily the most important thing. More important, I believe, than a students encyclopedic knowledge of history is a students ability to relate current events to historical anecdotes and apply their knowledge to the decisions he or she faces in life. While I believe that it may be possible to assess this skill, standardized tests have thus far, in my opinion, entirely failed to do so.

The experience I most value from the food intensive came during our tour of the experimental orchard and germplasm repository. There were many aspects of the orchard that I found inspiring, such as the incredible amount of biodiversity being preserved for the use of future generations. However, there were also parts of the tour which left a bitter taste in my mouth, such as the acres of fruit left to rot on the ground, or the researchers’ complicity with the demands of the food industry to breed for shelf life and processing potential rather than flavor or hardiness. Still, the woman in charge of our tour was an intelligent and kind person, so I asked her, “do you feel that by working with the industry you are able to help more people?”

“yes, exactly”, she replied.

“But what if the interests of the industry are not the same as those of the people?”, I asked.

“That’s a sociological problem, not an agricultural one. While I do think the two are in some ways related, what I do here is feed people”

“But don’t you worry that you’re playing into that by working toward the interests of the industry?”

“Nope”, she said, matter of factly, “I’m just a cog in the machine. In life, you can have your ideals, but you have to keep them separate from your work.”

I thought it was fascinating to hear views so different from my own, and from the Woolman motto: live what you believe.

Someone before my semester stuck a star on the light over my bed. I don’t know what color the star sticker is because the light, along with the walls, is painted an off white. My room has been painted many times over; so many times there is a thick coating over the star, making its presence pretty prominent. In a place like Woolman, sometimes it is hard to find evidence of prior students. No doubt at the end of our semester here, we will have to paint the walls as well, deep clean the buildings, and move out.

The star reminds me that this place is more than just ours; I think about those who came before us, and who will come after, and respect that it is theirs as much as it is ours.  Woolman is a place where 50 years of passionate young people like my semester have slept, worked, and socialized.  They probably felt similarly to our semester, they probably had struggles like ours, and lived like us. After Hiwot, Anna, and I leave Cabin H will continue to host such folk, and the cycle of Woolman will continue. The star will remain, and maybe the next person who will sleep in this bed will think about the preceding students, like I do.

Realizing this is the most beautiful thing I have learned from Woolman.  This place is a building and thriving community of people who come and go, and create and maintain a space where students like us can come and change the atmosphere relative to our wants and needs, then leave and create the space for another group all over again. I feel sad about leaving this great school, but I am relieved to know that there will be more students feeling the same as I do right now next semester and the one after and so on. The legacy of the students lives on the stories that we will create, and maybe the stars we leave on the lights. 

Dear Readers,

Three years ago, I earned a Masters in Peace Education from The United Nations University for Peace. I sometimes joke that I'm pretty lucky to have found THE job, as in, the only job. I don't think that is true, but not a day goes by that I am not full of gratitude for my curricular freedom at Woolman. The ability to teach for peace, justice, and sustainability in ways that are creative, experiential, and sometimes out of the box---WHILE building crucial college-level academic skills is what makes this program so successful. Unfortunately, it is also what makes this program so unique. Education in public schools has been increasingly focused on test-taking in a very limited amount of traditional subjects and what is being sacrificed is, in my opinion, devastating. 

When the Chicago Teachers Union decided to go on strike on Monday morning, there were a myriad of reasons that they put themselves out on the picket line. Reasons that made it worthwhile to leave their youth with nowhere to be and be put under intense national criticism. Despite what the mainstream media tells you, you better believe that they took those concerns into account. But too many schools are being shut down and too many others that are open are infested with rats and falling apart. Too many teachers are being unfairly punished for low test scores and the privatization and corporate management of the public system is getting out of hand. 

I stand with Chicago Teachers on strike, not just because my sister is one of them, but for all of those reasons and more. Although it is not customary to have long blog entries, I thought that some might be interested in this segment on standardized testing from my Peace Education thesis on practices that empower/disempower youth to be activists. The following two entries from students are responses. Feel free to comment or question below.

Finally, I highly recommend that you tune in to Democracy Now!, Amy Goodman's report on the strike. It reveals a perspective that I am only finding in correspondence from the Chicago teachers themselves in my Teachers for Social Justice listserv. 

http://www.democracynow.org/2012/9/11/thousands_rally_in_chicago_teachers_strike

In peace,

Emily

A Look at Standardized Testing

            In American public schools, the pressures of meeting the goals of high stakes testing has left little room for learning about civic responsibility, social action, environmental sustainability, cultivating inner harmony, or thinking critically about how mainstream lifestyles affect lives in other countries. While activists are trying hard to reform education on a national level, school funding is eternally strained and the changes are slow to come.      

In order to transform the current pervading violent culture into that of the Culture of Peace there is a need to examine the morals that youth are being taught (in school settings, in after school type programs and/or in their daily lives). The ethics that sustain the cycle of violence come from a myriad of sources that are crucial to identify, but are not in the purview of this paper. Among such influences as the family environment and the media, formal education is unique in its specified role of forming our citizens.

The overall outcomes of schooling have varied dramatically through the centuries. The emphasis has successively evolved and transformed. There were times when the curriculum was the focus point and then others when a student-centered approach was the goal and back and forth again (Spring, 2007). Today, public education is widely believed to be an objective transference of knowledge and skills. The idea of specifically teaching morals and values is very controversial, as it is believed that there are far too many incompatible agendas to reconcile. While some see the goals of education to be preparing our youth for the workforce, others want schools to develop human potential to the fullest.  Interesting questions to ask include: Are these two goals able to co-exist? Are the capacities that create a politically active citizen, a critical thinker, or an environmentalist incompatible with the skills that create a better employee? Can one achieve a high paying “American Dream” job with holistic, cooperative beliefs and attitudes? In light of the unique dilemmas that the world is facing today, these questions are imperative to ask. Perhaps, by not asserting the explicit aims of education, Americans have unquestioningly accepted other goals (Jenkins, 2008). 

Whether it is the agenda of the state and national governments who funds the schools (and determine policies such as standards for the tests) or the worldview of each individual teacher; we need to consider the ethical outcomes that are inherent in the choice of curriculum and methodology of our schools today.  The numerous ways in which this is manifested could be demonstrated through a complete analysis of the system. However, the focus of this section is the practice of standardized testing and the way in which the system indoctrinates competitiveness, as well as dominates the teaching agenda at the expense of other subjects and activities. Those subjects that suffer most widely from cutbacks are those that are intended to help develop well-rounded, healthy, critical thinking, creative, and responsible students. The overarching suggestion from the literature is that the excessive practice of standardized testing is one of many that contribute to The Culture of Violence. This may seem like an exaggeration as the links are not explicit. However, the system that surrounds the American use of testing steers the goals of education away from promoting the values of a Culture of Peace, that are necessary for coping with the global problems that we face today.

Support for Standardized Testing

Standardized testing is justified by the concept that parents and community members need to know with some sort of reliability, whether or not students are learning. Currently, the consensus is that the optimum method for doing this is to take standards that have been developed by each state and create tests that measure the degree to which these standards have or have not been met. Schools have been said to use standardized tests to determine if children are ready for school, separate them by level into instructional groups, to diagnose for learning disabilities, college acceptance, and to decide whether to promote a student to the next grade or hold them back (Fairtest, 2008). The results of the tests also determine how whether a school is successful or not and in some cases, the salaries of teachers. Parents and real estate agents will often use the evaluations to locate neighborhoods with the highest achieving schools (Fairtest, 2008). The most substantial benefit is that schools which are shown to be scoring very low are identified for improvements.

Since 2001, standardized testing has taken a much higher priority than ever before as the result of the passing of the No Child Left Behind (NCLB) Act. George W. Bush’s highly controversial education-reform bill sought to raise education standards through increased testing and tougher accountability in schools. Proponents of NCLB say that it, “benefits children, empowers parents, supports teachers and strengthens schools” (U.S. Department of Education, 2006). The ideal is that there is accountability for all children and that schools are more responsible than ever to make sure that each child is meeting the agreed upon standards. Parents are said to be given more specific information on the true standing of their child’s learning and also new choices for improving that level.  Teachers can use these data to improve their methodology and schools that do not meet the standards are given additional assistance and resources. No Child Left Behind advocates cite unprecedented student achievement in reading and math, with all-time highs in improvements for minority children (U.S. Department of Education, 2006).  

Opposition to Standardized Testing

“Intellectuals, who memorize everything, reading for hours on end, slaves to the text, fearful or taking a risk, speaking as if they were reciting from memory, fail to make any concrete connections between what they have read and what is happening in the world, the country or the local community.”

-Noam Chomsky (2003, p. 28)

Not many people disagree with the grand goals of No Child Left Behind which are equality in schools, school accountability, basic literacy and math skills for all, and extra help for those in need. However, there is a strong movement of people who believe that in actuality NCLB is doing more harm than good. A divergence in opinion exists amongst those in opposition to the system of standardized testing. While some are completely against it, many recognize the value that tests have in combination with other tools for assessment. Yet, a search of anecdotes on internet forums revealed that many of those who are in opposition feel that overuse and misuse of testing is having grave affects on teaching and learning. In the following section, I will illustrate ways in which this system (NCLB and overuse of testing in general) takes away from learning values that promote the Culture of Peace.

The school ratings and annual tests create a system that relies far too heavily on the scores to understand the achievements of students. This raises many questions that our communities need to address: Are high test scores the only way to understand success? Is proficiency solely in the areas of reading, writing, and arithmetic the key to successful employment or does today’s global economy need both literacy and creative, critical thinkers? Are we measuring intelligence, ability, or test-taking skills? Not to mention, what are the effects of the pressure to succeed that is put upon children starting at age 5.

Another very important question to ask is: what is being sacrificed in order to raise the test scores? Standardized testing in its current form is said to pressure teachers into spending excessive amounts of valuable class time preparing children to take the tests. Students are not the only members of the learning community who are overwhelmed with the pressure. Teachers today cite feeling very stressed in being unable to provide a developmentally sound program that is relevant and inspiring to a child (Fairtest, 2008).

More and more, teachers are found to be “teaching to the test,” meaning that they are using the test to decide their class program and focus instruction. The danger in this is that it “limits educational possibilities for children, resulting in distortion of curriculum, teaching and learning, as well as lowered expectations” (Association of for Childhood Education International, 1991). Methods of teaching often conform to the multiple-choice format of the tests which most commonly reflect skills in short-term memory more than reasoning ability (Chomsky, 2003, p.32). Experiential learning has considerable evidence with regard to its efficacy (and will be discussed in greater detail in the next chapter). Yet, teaching is more and more resembling testing. This is extremely problematic if we want to raise children to become adults who can make sound decisions with strong problem solving skills.

“The desperate response of the schools to test pressure has been to excise history, science, and the arts, and replace them with still more such exercises in reading,” writes Hirsch, founder of the Core Knowledge Foundation. “This is a futile strategy, since reading achievement depends on broad knowledge of [these subjects].” (Manzo, 2005, p. 2)

As the emphasis of the testing lies solely on reading and math, classes in science, social studies, music, art, and the languages have suffered. While many schools are seeing higher scores in those tested disciplines, a recent study of the legislation’s impact by the Council on Education Policy showed that 71% of the schools surveyed reported having reduced instructional time in at least one other subject to make more time for reading and math. Also, schools reported a 22% decline in their art and music instruction (Lynch, 2007). The benefits of exposure to the arts are vast and innumerable, ranging from self-expression to self-esteem. The question that needs to be answered: is teaching art and music actually incompatible with creating students prepared for the global economy? The United States is making $134 billion in economic activity off of the nonprofit arts industry per year and yet these skills are not seen as valuable (Lynch, 2007).

Other areas that have taken a hard hit in the same manner are social studies, government, economics, history, and geography. These are the very subjects that encourage citizen participation, empowerment in our students and enhance higher level critical thinking skills. The following quotebythe American Youth Policy Forum and the Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development illustrates this point:

 “[There is] a disturbing imbalance in the mission of public education. The recent preoccupation of the nation with reshaping academics and raising academic performance,” it says, “has all but overpowered a task of equally vital importance—educating our young people to become engaged members of their communities as citizens” (Manzo, 2005, p.46 ).

When reflecting upon the values and attitudes that define a Culture of Peace or Violence, the issue militarization of public schools one of grave concern. The No Child Left Behind Act actually requires that schools distribute the name, home phone number and address of every student enrolled to military recruiters and institutions of higher education, unless the student (or the student’s parent) specifically objects (Education U. S., 2002). There is also an interesting program initiative that is a feature of NCLB found on the websites for the U.S. Department of Education. This is the “Troops to Teachers” program that gives financial support to former military personnel in order for them to train to become classroom teachers (U.S. Department of Education, n.d.). The connections between militarism and education today come in both subtle and not so discreet forms.

Learning languages, art, music and social studies are all equally important subjects that help our children understand their place in the world; as each subject reveals a new perspective of the complicated and diverse place we live in. As an educator and concerned citizen, it is my belief that it is very important to question the connection between the decreasing amounts of time that is spent in these subjects in order to make room for test preparation with the type of citizen that this education will produce. For example, it has been said that "encounters with the arts nurture and sometimes provoke the growth of individuals who reach out to one another” (Greene, 2007, p. 37). Additional benefits of art classes have been documented to show "gains in math, reading, cognitive ability, critical thinking, and verbal skill. Arts learning can also improve motivation, concentration, confidence, and teamwork" (Smith, 2009). What are we losing by decreasing time spent exploring these areas with our youth?

The ranking of students that occurs through standardized testing is not productive given all of the variables that affect test results. There are many alternatives to testing that can more holistically capture the level of not only student growth, but also give indications for how learning should proceed. Successful models of these methods include the act of reflection through journaling, small to large group discussions and the use of student-created portfolios (Peterson, 1999). The point that is being stressed here is that our public schools are encouraging competition over cooperation and collaboration in a way that will inevitably lead to global conflict.

“One of the most important tasks of critical education practice is to make possible the conditions in which the learners, in their interaction with one another and with their teachers, engage in the experience of assuming themselves as social, historical, thinking, communicating, transformative, creative persons; dreamers of possible utopias" (Freire,1998, p. 112).

As Freire (1998) suggested, now that we understand the global proportions of today's crises, it seems as though it is past the time for us to move beyond our competitive and individualistic modes of living.

While I am not convinced that the country-wide obsession with standardized testing was created intentionally to promote a Culture of Violence, it seems that by critically analyzing the content and pedagogy of our current system we can argue that this is a consequence. 

The following piece is another response to the Peace Studies teacher, Emily Zionts' chapter on education practices that do/don't support youth:

When I first read this paper, I found it personally, completely relate-able! The first thing that I found really interesting is when Emily mentioned on page one in the second paragraph that much of Public Education is teaching to the test and not to the student. In my school back at home, we have to take a test called TCAP. It’s a standard test that everyone has to take up until ninth grade. Because my school is a lot smaller and has different philosophies other than teaching to the test, we were facing a really big pressure to raise our test scores or be shut down. Jeffco Open (my school at home) feels like a safe place to me, and if it didn't exist I wouldn't have the resources that I have now.

We felt so much pressure in the past year to take classes that weren't exactly fun for the student or the teacher, just so we could prepare for the test. There is more to education than this! My school at home teaches us how to prepare ourselves for the real world outside of high school, and how to make a change in what we’re doing. I found a line in this article that said, “the pressure of meeting goals of high stakes testing has left little room for learning about civic responsibility, social action, environmental sustainability...” which I feel like my school has always been about… until the past few years. We have started to give up our specialized teaching just to prove that the students are learning the things that the government feels necessary. 

The next thing I found interesting was that on page 6, in the first paragraph was that “for youth…boredom can be a major factor leading to bad behaviors...” I grew up in a very small town just outside of Denver. Because it was so small, it didn't offer many opportunities for teens to have jobs, hang out somewhere safe, or be heard. As a lot of the kids started to reach high school, they turned to doing drugs and having parties to have fun. If you were not academically focused in high school, you most likely were doing drugs. I feel that a lot of small towns also feel this pressure of how to positively use teens and youths voices.  I think it should really be important to have more opportunities for the youth to step forward in the community, and be active. If there was a place where youth thought they were important, fewer would fall into peer pressure and cause negative actions.

I think that education is a really important aspect of life and it can help you do wonderful things, but if it is not being taught the right way, it will not be able to.