Wanna Be Average in I Essay

Total Length: 909 words ( 3 double-spaced pages)

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Rose found a teacher who served as educational mentor at the time when he was unsure he was academically worthy and who served as a life mentor right after his father dies. Jack MacFarland was able to forge his own identity with students as an English teacher. By being giving his all and clearly being prepared and motivated, his students, including the vocational education students, gave him their respect. One of the reasons this happened was because MacFarland was giving the students life tools they did not possess, specifically the art of communicating in the English language and a general knowledge of Western philosophy taught in a way that students could at least understand it as it was being taught to them (190).

This represents a striking contrast to the math lessons that Rose describes he and his classmates went through. The math lessons were a series of lectures in a 'foreign language' that always built upon previous lectures the students did not grasp. As a result, the students never opened their ears or minds during the math lectures. As Rose relays the 'Math' experience:

This is what a number of students go through, especially those in so-called remedial classes. They open their textbooks and see once again the Familiar and impenetrable formulas and diagrams and terms that have stumped them for years. (188)

Rose discusses a certain paradox regarding grades: they are at once a symbol of an educational system that obsesses over evaluation and assessment and a barometer by which underachieving and lower level students can gain an academic measure of self-esteem and enthusiasm for ongoing educational effort (191).
Grades were also an important part of getting into college. Rose learned that his past academic malaise would severely hamper his ability to get into college. MacFarland, seeing both the potential and the effort, went to bat for Rose, who was accepted to a four-year college on a probationary basis.

Soon, Rose embarked on a natural course of intellectualism, where he willingly sought out and associated with beatniks in the Art district of West Hollywood (192). Rose had completely transformed his life in the span of one year- not by winning the lottery or becoming a great athlete, but because he was exposed to a different lifestyle by a mentor who wanted to mentor young people, not merely rubber stamp report cards. Rose's senior year of high school could not have been more different than his first three. As a senior, Rose opted to forego the all too comfortable mantra of 'wanna be average' for the much more frightening and rewarding experience of growing in to himself.

Rose, Mike. "I Just Wanna Be Average." 1989. University of Houston. 26 June, 2010.

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