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  Case: White Intern in a Black inner-city school
My sister, Gina, who is a young White girl, started her student teaching in a predominantly Black school in inner-city America. She initially approached her job with optimism and purpose. However, she began to experience her first doubts with the presentation of an emotionally charged poetry reading at an all-school assembly. The poem painted a picture of the oppression of the African Americans by the European American majority. My sister was moved by the poem and accepted the historical truth of its message. At the same, she said she wondered what educational effects of the poem were and whether it would affect her legitimacy as a White teacher in a Black school. She talked to me about her experience. I am an experienced teacher, but I could not answer whether poems like that have any educational value, and whether or not my sister should worry about her legitimacy as a White teacher. I don't what she should do in this specific situation.
Solution: (Rates are posted for this solution!)
I think that those poems do have some educational value because that is unfortunately the way a lot of our society works and has worked in the past. I don't think she needs to worry about her legitimacy as a White teacher. She needs to be open about the situation in her classroom. I think it would do more damage to deny the truth of the poem and ignore it than to just face the problem head-on. A classroom needs to be a community of learners. If your sister can make her classroom a community and learn about her students and their lives then she will be fine. If she shows that she really cares about her students then there will be no reason for her students to think that she is trying to be oppressive. Overall, I am sure she will be fine. If the problem arises then she needs to address it for the sake of the classroom and for the sake of her students' views on whites as they get older.
 
     
     
  Rating
The suggested solution is respectful of the individual (student) Yes
The suggested solution is relevant to the case Yes
The suggested solution is reasonable (easy) for the teacher to implement Yes
The suggested solution is likely to solve the problem/issue Yes
The suggested solution is original Yes
Comments: Good
Rated On: October 3, 2017 6:11 pm
Rated By: NuXepy