Good early morning,
It is shortly after 5:00 a.m. and as is typically the case, or so it seems, I am awake and my brain is racing along with possibilities than what seems reasonably conceivable to me. What is reasonable might be the first question to ponder. As I get up most mornings, or more accurately awaken, I read three to five different news sources, from ones referred to by “my” President as “fake news” to the one that should be called “the President’s friends.” Why might you ask? Because I think I need to listen to a variety of voices and then decide where I stand. One does not think critically unless challenged to do so. As I work with more than 70 freshmen writing students this semester, it becomes more and more apparent to me (and this is my own opinion) that our public school system is in dire straits. We are not teaching students to think critically; we are not teaching them to think beyond the obvious and analyze the learning situation; and finally we are not teaching them how to connect their learning to something else they are learning or to make connections across disciplines and situations. We seem content to teach them to memorize or to learn to jump hoops to manage the standardized test that somehow demonstrates they are capable. The consequence is students who are very nice and want to do well, but the tool box they have from which to draw their tools or skills is pretty sparse.
Yet, I find myself conflicted. Certainly we have a requirement as their professors. We are to take what comes to us and prepare them academically, socially, and critically to enter a world that is in a most precarious position (again, my opinion). The current fight between the reality of globalism and the somewhat knee-jerk reaction of nationalism (or nativism as it was called this past week) has two incredibly powerful philosophical ideas of what we how we are to proceed to manage this complex world that is interdependent, whether we like it or not. I have witnessed this not merely here in the United States, but when I was in Ireland last year the Brexit vote was in process. When I have been in Hungary or Poland, or read about some of the neighboring countries, the struggle to become an accepting world of the other versus keeping to ourselves is dramatically apparent around the globe. Just today in Egypt there is news of difficulties; Turkey has had its own issues and some of my former colleagues from Wisconsin have been affected by that. Students in our universities are unsure of their status because of issues in their own countries or the third iteration of a travel ban, which has been challenged again by Hawaii. What is the world we are preparing our students to enter? How do we understand it? What does our obsession with technology and how it is being used as evidenced on an almost daily basis done to how we understand ourselves, our world, or what we can believe to be real or truthful. The irony of the revelation that the Trump family themselves posted information from the Russian infiltrators, which was genuine fake news, did not go unnoticed by me or many others. The overwhelming propensity to jump on anything posted and use it within our own context or for our own partisan viewpoint has made anything posted suspect. What are the consequences?
The consequence is there is no trust. There is no decorum. There is little possibility for a national conversation, or forget national, even interpersonal one-on-one conversation with someone with whom you might have some fundamental difference in opinion (please note I merely said opinion). We cannot seem to have any opportunity to discuss most anything because we have to win; we have to prove we are right. The consequence is a fragmentation beyond anything I have witnessed in my life. And yet, I am that American child. What does that mean to me? It does mean I had opportunities that many in the world did not, and still do not, have. Even though I was on a third family by the time I was less than 5; even though my biological parents were probably not the most suited to be parents; even though I struggled as an adopted child for many reasons I have laid out in earlier blogs, I had opportunities many others did not have. What I know now, as I am older and as I noted there is more of my life behind me than ahead of me, is there have always been people who were kind enough to lend me a helping hand, people caring and generous enough to offer me opportunities that would not have been available without their help. I di grow up in a time that even blue-collar, poorer kids on the Westside of Sioux City, Iowa believed in possibilities. We believed in that American dream, and I am quite sure that most of our parents hoped we might have opportunities for success that went beyond what they had experienced. I have often said that I innately understood that my parents wanted me to go to college, but they did not know how to help that occur. They thought it mean merely get good grades, but even then they were not sure what constituted good grades. I think more they saw good grades as scholarships because they did not have the money to help me get to college. In fact, they had no idea what the cost was. I remember many years later (almost 10) when I was a senior in college finally and my mother could not understand why I had to work or seemed to be broke all of the time. When I told her how much it cost me per credit hour to take classes, she told me I was lying. When I showed her the costs, her response in utter disbelief was, “How can you afford to do that?” My response was, “How can I afford not to do that?” Costs back then are a mere fraction of what students are paying now. The investment in education is astronomical, and the competition for a position after college is certainly more extreme.
Yet, most of my students believe in that dream . . . I believe the dream is a bit more difficult to imagine for students today. I believe the dream is a bit more illusive, but is that a good thing or a bad thing? That, I believe, depends on the person. When the dream is more illusive because of one’s social economic class it saddens me; when the dream is more illusive because of someone’s birthplace or status, the color of their skin or their gender, their sexual identity, it causes me pause because then the dream is limited to the few and in contrary to whom I was raised to believe we are as a country of opportunity. Again, before you want to jump on a particular bandwagon, I am not trying to stand in opposition to our laws or points that seem to be touch-points for argument. I could certainly argue that I am one of those who had to work much more intentionally to make my way out of a blue collar neighborhood. Again, before you think I do not respect the trades or unions, you have not read much of what I have written about my journey electrician father or older brother, or two nephews. You are not aware of my summer jobs working in packing plants, co-op fertilizer elevators, harvesting wheat, waiting tables or bartending for 2o years. As I write this I am sitting in a Starbuck now, in Chantilly, VA, guests of yet another culture of people who have blessed me. Egyptian/Sudanese and as I have watched the people coming in an out I have seen Indian, Chinese, Japanese, Arabic, Black, and I am probably the minority. Those things actually do not frighten me, they give me hope.
What I believe being an American child gave me was hope. It allowed me to dream of possibilities and options. It allowed me to be proud of a country that seemed to be a beacon of hope not just for an adopted middle class small boy from NW Iowa, but for the rest of the world. My first trip to Europe as a student, as I have noted before, allowed me to see the world as a place to learn, a place to explore and realize how the centuries of history in the Vatican, in Aachen, Lubeck, or Copenhagen had a connection to what I was learning in Blair, Nebraska. What I realized in that trip, which was the consequence of the generosity of Harold and Dorothy Wright, was the world was a walking history book that need to be absorbed and learned. As I have been blessed to be on the other side now and take students to Poland, the Czech Republic, Hungary, Germany, Austria, and Slovakia this time is to realize how much Central and Eastern Europe has to offer to my understanding of our changing world. I have mentioned more than once, I am not sure I had any idea what the future would hold for me, and even at this advanced age, I am not sure. What I do know is it has been quite a journey and one that I do believe being the American child offered me a sense of perspective and opportunity I might not have had. Because of the generosity of a little tornado, I am able to now help others. I am able to offer opportunities that go beyond what I knew at that age. It is ironic that it was not an American native, but one who came to America to continues to bless me so I can bless others. Amazing how life works . . . but it continues to do so. With that, I offer this video.
As always thanks for reading.
Dr. Martin (that Riverside child)
thewritingprofessor55 
Dr. Martin,
Being an American is often synonymous with the “American Dream,” as you mentioned. I think back to the early twentieth century with the boom in immigrants into the United States. I think of when my dad told me about his grandparents coming to America to start a better life, the same thing my mother’s father told me about his parents. How both families came with nothing and tried to better both themselves and their future generations. American families today can enjoy those benefits that their ancestors dreamed of while other families are just starting their “American Journey.” I believe it’s important to remember all the good that we have in this ever-hostile world we still live in. As you mentioned in a previous blog post, I believe that children with hope and curiosity in their eyes give me hope. I’m still young, not even twenty years old not, but there’s still so much that needs to change. Hopefully, the “American Dream” isn’t gone yet, and everybody can use their unique opportunities to improve the lives of everyone.
Dr. Martin,
First, I would like to say that I really enjoyed reading your post. I resonated with a lot of what you have discussed in this blog post as I am also adopted living in a blue-collared area. However, I think our situations differ a little as I am originally from China. I will always be first to admit that my life with my adopted family is one-hundred times better than what I would have had back in China. I’m not going to lie and say that I didn’t have a pretty good childhood, and I never had to wonder if I would go hungry. However, my family is also a strong believer in you either go to higher education or you immediately find a decent paying job.
Obviously, I choose the latter as I am typing this for an assignment, but I have come to a lot of realizations as I am finishing my junior year. First, my parents truly believe in the American dream, but they still think that it is a simple process as long as you work hard for what you want. When I was in high school, they always pushed me to get good grades because, just like in your experience, they associated grades with scholarships and work ethic. For the longest time, I also associated grades as a part of my identity. I was always in honors and AP classes, and I guess I was considered what people call a “high achieving student.” However, for the life of me, I can’t remember a lot of what I have learned in high school or even in my college classes. Which negates the point of education as you are supposed to retain the information that you receive. Second, I am also paying for college completely on my own. I think most of today’s generation understand that certain aspects of the “American dream” do not really exist as much as we would like to believe it does. We know that college is expensive and that most of us are going to have to hold a job in order to support ourselves even with our parents paying some portion of our tuition bill. I often see TikTok’s of people interviewing college students asking if they are receiving help from their parents. Then, I look all the comments and a lot of people are often mad that other people are getting support when they are not. I think it is just sad that we, as a society, are mad that others have supportive parents and are belittling them because they have it. Finally, I believe the reason why we still strongly believe in the American dream is because of professors, like you, who push us into believing that we are capable of achieving great feats. I remember every time I think about quitting, Dr. Lint, Dr. Guignard, or another professor would always keep telling me that I am capable of reaching and going beyond my goals. I think in this sense the “American dream” is still a vital part of society. I agree my parents to an extent that you do have to work hard to achieve what you want and it is not going to be easy especially if you come from a middle to low class family or a minority. I would, however, argue that it is not impossible since we are in American, but you will definitely meet a lot of hardships a long the way.
I also think all what I have said above ties into the idea that higher education is now not really about becoming a critical thinker and making connections across disciplines or situations. I just had a conversation with my friend, yesterday, claiming that I am at the point where I am just in it for the diploma. Which made me start to think, wasn’t I always in it just for the diploma? I think modern America almost requires you to go for high education to become “educated” in an academic sense. However, I find that I still focus more on survival and getting good grades than on the content that I am learning or paying attention to the world around me. I always get so focused on trying to do well in my classes that I fail to notice what is happening in the word. However, even when I do try and make my own opinions, it is hard to trust what the news is saying even though those who say they are unbiased. I just don’t know who to believe anymore, and I think that it deters me away from politics. Which, nowadays, you are considered “uneducated” or “you don’t care” if you don’t pay attention or associate with a certain side of the argument. I truly believe that college should be the place where you can start to make your own opinions that can either agree or disagree with what you were raised with. However, within America’s current climate, I don’t know if it is possible to have a discussion about really controversial topics without getting into a brawl. I actually posed this question to a ninth grade honors English class while I was teaching the other day. A lot of them said that it is possible if you respect each other which is quite refreshing that the younger generation believes that this still can occur. However, there was a couple where they said yes but not for “certain” topics. I think that it is really important that we instill these “American” values in the younger generation because we are such a diverse country where you will met people that don’t agree with you. However, you still need to treat them with curtesy and respect because they are still people who can always change their opinion.
Overall, as I said before, I really enjoyed reading this blog post. The “American dream” has been altered since the founding of our country, however, I believe that we still hold some of the values that we had before. Education has become prominent in our society, which is not a bad thing. I just think that the reasoning behind why we are choosing to seek higher education is not what it should be. Along with this notion, funding for higher education has gotten more expensive each year, and I think that also deterrers people from wanting to learn and experience different disciplines. I am hopeful that, in the future, the values of the “American dream” are still present in society, and that our view of higher education is also altered to allow more people to experience the joys of learning. Thank you for your post!
Anna Lewis