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Class In America By Gregory Mantsios Summary

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All Americans want their future generations to be well educated—at least, all Americans should. When it comes to the topic of education, critics attack it by claiming that there are issues with how our American students are being taught. Some believe that education is too focused in an argumentative culture and that environment narrows our perspective, while some argue that the issue is in the commercialization of our educational system. Collectively, educational value is destroyed. Authors Benjamin Barber, Deborah Tannen, and Gregory Mantsios all agree that our educational system is flawed. In spite of this, they do not necessarily agree on what the most important issue is with education. Nonetheless, it all boils down to this: our educational system is flawed and it must be examined and re-evaluated by teachers and administration in order to best serve our democratic arrangement; it is necessary that the argumentative culture be disbanded and that we focus on creating opportunities for students to flourish through a civic education.
In Deborah Tannen’s article “The Roots of Debate in Education and the Hope of Dialogue,” she touches on a few key issues in our educational system. Since …show more content…

However, the most thought provoking concept introduced by Mantsios is his fifth reality. Mantsios asserts, “Class standing has a significant impact on chances for educational achievement.” (Mantsios, p 483). Throughout this portion of his article, Mantsios continues to reference studies that prove lower class citizens achieve significantly less (Mantsios, p 482). Although the media is filled with stories of how different celebrities, such as Oprah, went from rags to riches, these are a merely a select few that escape their predetermined end. Mantsios confronts the issues with our educational system by asserting the

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