IDS 250: Poverty, Education, and the American Dream in Contemporary Rural America

Spring 2010
MWF 11:00-11:50

5 digit class number: 20771

Wide-ranging course explores the relationship between economic and social stability and educational success in contemporary rural America. Through fiction, non-fiction, films, and documentaries, this course tracks educational opportunities for children in poverty, with special attention to immigration history, reality, law, and issues of assimilation. Developed in consultation with a local rural school district and the Center for Public Service, this course complements academic work with service-learning experience, including training for tutoring and a regular tutoring assignment.

The course focuses on how socioeconomic and ethnic diversity within rural American schools may be correlated directly with educational opportunity and achievement, and thus with long-term individual, family, and demographic group economic stability and advancement. In addition, since farm labor in the United States is often migratory and involves many workers from Central America, examination of migrant and Latino cultures will provide areas of particular emphasis of the course.

Topics covered in this class will include: Literacy issues and practices, with some special emphasis on English as a Second Language; educational policies, including No Child Left Behind, disparities in US school-funding and testing institutions, the problems and potential benefits associated with bilingual education, etc.; immigration history, reality, and law, as well as issues of assimilation concerning non-English speaking immigrants; economic opportunity, the decline of agriculture and industry as avenues for individual financial success, and issues of Middle-class assimilation concerning the Anglo rural underclass, etc.; labor law and practices; other topics as they come to light. The readings will be a blend of pertinent policies and critical examinations thereof, non-fiction memoirs and case studies, as well as relevant fiction & film.

A main goal of the class is for students to recognize the great diversity of socioeconomic and cultural realities which populate the landscape of rural America, and thus to perceive social and economic barriers to educational opportunity that many students may not have realized were prevalent. The readings, assignments, movies, and class discussions will provide the scholarly context for such discoveries, while critical reflection upon the service-learning component may force students to examine assumptions that they might not otherwise even have realized foregrounded their understandings of educational and economic opportunity in the United States.

In addition to the academic coursework, the experiences of the students in the service placements in this course will give them in-depth and hands-on knowledge of some of key components of peace studies, including how various cultures, constituencies, and communities attempt to negotiate harmonious confluence in a context of limited resources and sometimes wildly divergent needs, expectations, and world views. The justice issues inherent in any study of the disparity of quality and opportunity in the educational system of the United States are manifested in how our schools are funded, how resources are allocated, and how readily factors such as socioeconomic status and ethnicity can be correlated to educational success.

This course has been approved to fulfill the Domestic/Conceptual Diversity Requirement and counts towards the Peace and Justice Minor; in addition, it is possible that the tutoring service-learning hours may be applicable towards some of the mandates from the Pennsylvania Department of Education.