Home | How It Works | Stats Login | Register         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 the educational effects of the poem has ties in both history and English. I mean she is reading a piece of literature based off of history. That's very educational. I don't think it should have a negative effect on her legitimacy as a teacher. Yes, it was perhaps a racial and emotionally charged poem, but it's not like shewrote it. She read it to give her students knowledge. It wasn;t personal, nor did it depict her feelings. I think she needs positive encouragement. She considered her students' culture with this poem. SHe exposed them to what used to be.