December Your Turn runners up

By Hemen Muleta of South Senior High, Micayla Dodd of Humboldt Senior High and Cortney Stevens of Rosemount High School

Motivation is Key
By Hemen Muleta of South Senior High

The issue of students of color under-performing is not a new one. For many years, we’ve heard about it, seen it, and watched as many attempts to resolve the issue failed. I think that like anything else in life, the poor performances of color students comes from the lack of both motivation and an apparent goal. If these two are gained, there is nothing that can stop any kind of person from achieving.

I believe that in order to help students of color score higher on standardized tests and such, they must be provided with a support system that can expose them to the incredible heights they could reach in the future.

Without a person to look up to, we don’t really know what can be accomplished. Many times, I hear the phrase “Well no one in the family went to college, so why should I?” This to me shows a need for a figure in one’s life to encourage, motivate, and direct the person toward a bright future.

From personal experience, I know that a support system or a mentor in your life makes all the difference. Without reinforcement and stimulus from my parents, I don’t think I’d be as concerned about my future as I am. When there is someone in your life that has “made it,” it opens your mind to what you can do.

I think the problem with many students of color is the fact that they don’t know just how much they can accomplish. If we could create a system which would pair up low scoring students with professionals of different fields, it would help them care and study in order to pass tests and graduate on time. Having a mentor also means having a person that believes in you, someone to give you support when you need it. I think this is essential for not only African-American students, but teenagers in general.

As times get tough, it is important to have a person that you can talk to and plan your next move with. Just the same, a supportive figure that praises your good deeds is necessary. In my opinion, motivation combined with passion is the key to life. It is essential to have an individual in your life that has been through tough times, conquered them, and came out successfully. After all, life is about learning; if there is no one to look up to, how will we know what to look for?

The teacher’s guide to understanding teens
By Micayla Dodd of Humboldt Senior High

“What’s going on with our schools?” is a question that is being asked more and more often now by parents, teachers, people in communities, and even students.

As a student, when I hear that Minnesota has one of the biggest achievement gaps between white teens and teens of color in terms of test scores and graduation rates, it makes me afraid for my generation and the generations after us.

I think that the ideas that school districts are experimenting with aren’t carefully thought out. One of the ideas was to hire more teachers of color. The way I see it, the race of the teacher doesn’t matter as much as the connection the teachers develop with students. There are many times when I have seen a teacher of color not getting attention from teens because they don’t know how, and I have seen many white teachers do just that. It isn’t about race with teens, it’s about how well teachers understand us and get the information through to us in a way that we understand.

If you taught those teens in a way that connects with them – such as in an analogy to what they understand, like sports, it would be easier for them to comprehend. Everyone should know by now that we all process information differently. I have many friends who participate in sports, especially basketball. Some of those friends have a difficult time understanding the work that teachers give to us. So in our math class, the teacher explained it to them in terms of basketball. There was even a unit when we worked on the NCAA basketball tournament. We all picked a team and followed their stats. Our math teacher found a way to get us to understand and it worked great.

Another idea was magnet programs and homework help. The most reasonable way that a magnet program will work is if you make it academic, which is only pushing grades on the student more instead of working with them. Homework help is there, but you can’t force the student to go. Teens have to want to learn and want help with school.

Secondly, adults have to realize that, just like children, we are easily influenced by the media and what we see – what our friends have and do, what we see our favorite musicians, actors, athletes, and even our parents do. My mother says she doesn’t understand math either, but when she shops, she is amazing with budgeting, percents, multiplication and division, and addition and subtraction. Everyone sees things a different way, we just have to find how those students see it.

Third, there should be a way to get students thinking more about what they want to do in life. And though they all will say it in different ways, they all want the same thing: success. So to get them to care, which is probably to them the most basic problem, we have to show them how to get that success. Getting more college access programs in school does, in fact, play a role in this. My school has the most college access programs in St. Paul. They give us as much information as possible.

Just show us the way and it will prove that the ones who didn’t follow it before will.

Closing the achievement gap
By Cortney Stevens of Rosemount High School

Statistics show Minnesota as having one of the largest achievement gaps between white teens and teens of color in the nation. This problem has caused many to develop ideas on ways schools can decrease this gap. A major contributor to this problem is the lack of motivation in students. Some students are raised in homes with divorced parents or broken families, and others have parents who did not complete high school themselves and do not encourage their children to either. This creates the wrong impression on students, and prevents them from seeing the value of a high school diploma.

Educating students in school about the benefits of staying in school and receiving a high school diploma will increase the graduation rate. People who do not have high school diplomas make only 65 percent of what people with high school diplomas make, and people with college degrees earn 72 percent more than someone with a high school degree. If students were informed of these statistics, they would be more motivated to change their future by graduating from high school, and maybe even going to college.

I think, in my school, signs should be posted in classrooms and throughout the hallways with statistics such as the ones just mentioned, for I truly believe they would motivate people to stay in school. Also, I think the schools should hire more teachers to lower the student-to-teacher ratio. With smaller classes, students would be able to have more attention, which would improve learning.

This trimester at my school, I have a friend who is in a class with only seven people, when only last trimester they had 18 people. The significantly smaller class has allowed for her to learn more, as a result of the teacher spending more one on one time with her and explaining things directly to her that she did not understand. Smaller class sizes would help to increase standardized test scores for teens of color and would also help lower the drop out rate, because students would view their classes as more valuable if they are receiving more attention.

Lastly, if schools are unable to hire more teachers, I think they should create a program where the top 20 percent of students in their class or grade is given the option to take a class where they can tutor other struggling students. The class should have the same amount of “peer tutors” as “students.” For example, if there are fifteen students who are struggling and need help, there should be fifteen people who are in the top twenty percent of the class so each student can have their own tutor. This way, students will be able to receive one on one attention. The students who are doing the teaching will also benefit, for they could receive credit for the class. Students would be taught by their friends or other students, so it would be enjoyable along with being educational. Also, the class would be during the school day so students would not have to stay after school, which most students dislike doing. Overall, the program would help to boost standardized test scores and raise the graduation rate.