While this week’s topic does center around the inequity of the American school system, I do want to shed light on what has been happening in my home country of Nigeria. In 2017, the founder of #ENDSARS, Segun Awosanya, started this movement to speak on the harm civilians have faced at the hands of SARS. SARS (Special Anti-Robbery Squad) is a unit of the Nigerian police allotted with the tasks of combating both robbery and kidnapping. Instead of focusing on the objective at hand, SARS has targeted Nigerians, especially the youth of Nigeria. Having dreaded hair, nice clothes, a luxury car, or even an iPhone are associated with criminality and prompts SARS to attack anyone that may fall into these categories. Unfortunately, many have been victim to extortion, sexual abuse, physical abuse, and homicide.
Recently, the movement became more serious when a young man by the name of Jimoh Isiaq was fatally shot while on the sidelines of the protest. He played no parts in the peaceful protest, but a SARS member deemed it reasonable to shoot him. Many Nigerians and Africans around the world have raised their voices to speak against this senseless brutality; I hope you speak on it too. #ENDSARS is not only a movement, but it is a REVOLUTION. Nigerians in Nigeria have been living in unsuitable conditions and it is our goal to fix this. It is time that we make the leaders of Nigeria hear our voices. We want to rid this country of its rampant impunity and that starts with ending SARS for good. Please speak up and let your voice be heard through the application of social media or even at a physical protest. Donate if you can and please help Nigeria become a better Nigeria. Thank you.
Making education more equitable is essential for the progression of the United States and its people. If we were to establish a baseline for all students’ economic standing, every person would either land far ahead of that baseline, around that baseline or far behind it. We are not the same. Not everyone’s pocket enables them to have opportunities. According to the Washington post-2014, “students from families earning more than $200,000 a year average a combined score of 1,714, while students from families earning under $20,000 a year average a combined score of 1,326.” (Abigail Hess, 2019) I don’t understand how and why we utilize exams such as the SAT as indicators of intelligence when there are so many factors that play into how a student may perform on the exam. A parent’s income should not determine the education their student receives.
If we desire the best out of our students, then we must implement a “fair” education system. Of course, the term fair is subjective. What is fair to me may not be fair to the next person and so on. However, if one student is allowed to code computer languages in a school, that opportunity should be present in as many schools as possible. When we give particular students the possibility to get ahead because of high property taxes, we also put students in communities with low property taxes at a disadvantage by disregarding the history of redlining. We must acknowledge how the U.S.’s racist history still impacts a student’s ability to learn and get ahead. Upcoming students will be a part of the next generation; to show how far this nation has come, we have to start by fixing education.
https://www.cnbc.com/2019/10/03/rich-students-get-better-sat-scores-heres-why.html
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