In Lima, Peru you can see poor people all around. As you drive your car through the gray pavement and look outside the window you see a woman that walks with difficulty because she can't pertain her weight anymore and you can barely hear her soft voice through the window asking for money. And sometimes society can be oblivious, because as the woman walks away, you tell to yourself, why doesn´t just this woman get a job, it´s easy for her to just ask for money, but we have to work hard to sustain ourselves. But though have you though that most of the people in the streets wanted to get a job but weren´t qualified, perhaps because they didn't have the appropriate education when they were younger, or because they didn't have a exemplary role model. When this happens I call it the “cycle of education and poverty”. As I read through the topics that my peers had chosen for the “deep dive” project, I noticed a peculiar pattern. While analyzing the causes and effects of each topic and while listening to all the pitches that my classmates presented, I realized that every single problem went back to education. Education is vital to the life of all human beings, not only because you gain knowledge but also because it helps you to survive. When you take a look to all the issues Lima faces there is a common factor in the cause again education. Politics is a huge problem here, most of politicians tend to be corrupted or don´t know how to manage the country, in this case either they weren't taught the right morals or the right way to manage things. Then you analyze a problem such as teenage pregnancy, here again the predator could have had a abusive role model and the victim didn't know how to defend herself or that she shouldn´t be sexually active at such young age. And as I reach the end of the list of issues in Lima I conclude that this is a never ending process. A person in a low level class is born with the right amount resources to live. Her family puts him in a school, where there is a low quality of infrastructure and a low level education, which most schools in Lima have. When she gets out of school she can´t find a good job due to the insufficient knowledge gained in school, or because the school didn't allow her to be there because she was about to become a mother because she didn't learn that being sexually active could be dangerous at that age. When she can´find any job she conforms herself with any open position maybe a teacher position, which she later can´t handle and doesn´t teach the necessary attributes and information and the kids in her classroom become just like her. Perhaps she settle for begging money on the streets or selling candy in the streets, perhaps she is the same woman that you just denied to gave money to just because she didn't have the right education she couldn´t get out of the cycle and stayed poor. Next time someone asks for your support in the street think about this.
2 Comments
Tomás Arrarte
9/17/2015 08:14:56 am
Barc, I enjoyed reading your post, especially because you not only talked about but as well explained in detail and in your perspective the cycle that exists between education and poverty. Having taken a look at your post, I have one main recomendation, to reflect more. Don't get me wrong, I feel that your post is very real as well as true, still I don't really understand why you actually wrote about the experience, I don't really understand what is the anecdote. Overall, though, really solid post and very in depth. Keep up the good work.
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Bon
9/18/2015 09:57:56 am
Cristina, we take poverty way too for granted at times. We judge people without knowing their stories and it mars our understanding of the problem. Poverty can overwhelm us because it's complex. It takes time to implement measures and people don't have the patience to wait for the long-term results. That's partly the root cause of the problem with education in Peru and elsewhere.
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Cristina BarclayCurrent eleventh grader at Colegio Franklin Delano Roosevelt, taking the IB diploma program. Archives
May 2016
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