The assignment for this
blog was to write a response to an Edu(cation) Blog. I chose one written on the
NY Times website called Beyond the Tree Line.
It’s about a alternative high school in Tennessee and specifically focuses on
several girls that attended the school. It brings up several interesting and
important points (among so many) in education today.
First, the
topic of teen pregnancy is brought to the forefront of the blog because that’s
the first picture we see. Of an 18 year-old, Miranda, who is pregnant getting
her nursery ready. She discusses the problems she has encountered in the town
she lives in because the father of her baby is African American and how in the
2010 census indicated that there weren’t any African American’s in the down she
lives in. You get the feeling that the town is quite racist but at the same
time the girl says that she doesn’t have a problem with black people but that they
just don’t live there. In terms of
pregnancy- Miranda seems to have many resources available to her unlike most
teen mothers you see on TV. She has mentors from her high school that help her
and give her advice. I am not sure about her mother. I don’t want to assume
anything but her mother is not discussed a lot in the blog. It is more of a
passing remark.
Second, the
main point of the blog is to discuss what happens when you’re not in school
anymore. Or as a person in the story describes it as “Behind the Tree Line.” Many of the girls in
the this article were given people to rely on and a structured school setting
at the Carroll Academy and after they left the school they were out of resources
and people to go to. Many of them slipped back into the not-so-good actions
they were partaking in before they started going to the Carroll Academy.
So my
question is: why do the resources to the students who need them the most stop
when they graduate high school? A time when they probably need those resources
the most.
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