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Summary Of I Just Wanna Be Average By Mike Rose

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In the article “I Just Wanna Be Average”, Mike Rose describes about the changes that occurred in his life by undertaking challenges in achieving an education. Mike Rose was a smart kid who was accidentally placed in lower division classes due to mixing of placement test results between two students with similar names. Instead of complaining about it, he deals with whatever he was offered with. Mike Rose describes his school as a "a place for those who are just not making it, a dumping ground for the disaffected." There were times when he had to drop his level down just to be on the same level as other kids were. But he realized that people saw him in a different manner as compared to other kids above his section. The teachers were unqualified, …show more content…

Rose states that some of the kids were dedicated and hardworking, whereas the rest slacked off. Once Rose asked one of his classmate Ken Harvey is regarding his views about achievement in life. He ended up saying “ just wanna be an average”. The word Average got stuck in Rose’s mind and it made Rose admire Ken. For Rose being average is what a few of the kids want to be, unfortunately they are not able to reach that level. The reason behind it was lack of faith and inspiration, that ultimately led up being failures. Later in his sophomore year, he was deviated on a different route, not willing to give attention to his studies yet ended up acing the tests in Biology class. His teacher tried verifying the placement results if something was wrong or not and finally realized him being put in a wrong section. Suddenly, he was asked to get started with the college prep. Then he met Prof Mac Farland, his English teacher. He motivated Rose, and pushed hard to get him back into the studies. Mr. Farland became his role model and the ultimate reason behind his

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This is a story about a young intelligent kid whose test scores were switched by accident with another kid whose last name is coincidently the same as his. Rose attended two years of Italian Schooling and now is set down a dead end path through the vocational education track. Throughout the story you can see Rose change his mindset about school. From school being an importance to not caring about school anymore. In the story “I just want to be average” a young kid is by the name of Mike Rose and shows that a simple mix-up in test scores almost ruined his future and set him down a dead end path.

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What this essay is saying about students and education is there is no student who doesn’t want to learn or what’s to get an education. Everybody is capable of learning, but the problem is sometimes the education are given by people who don’t care if you are learning or not. In this essay, we learned that the author was put in classes where the teachers didn’t care too much about their students and because of this he become a mediocre student. Not because he didn’t like school or he was lazy, but because there was no inspiration in learning. Luckily, Mike Rose the author of I Just Wanna Be Average found someone that wants him to start learning someone that make him change his mind.

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Mike Rose said he loved getting good grades because he now knows show subjective grades can be. Rose quotes the following; “While its certainly true that we’ve created an educational system that encourages our best and brightest to become cynical grade collectors and, in general, have developed an obsession with evaluation, I must tell you that venal though it may have been, I loved getting good grades from MacFarland”(185). As Rose continues writing about MacFarland you start to notice how he admires him because he actually cares for all of his students and pushes them to work hard, which makes Rose very interested in school. It’s like having a teacher who cares gives him hope. Which is why the grades he got from MacFarland were different

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Mike Rose shares his personal story to the public in “I just wanna be average”, as he reveals the many flaws within the educational system of a high school in an economically depressed neighborhood in Los Angeles. He effectively directs his arguments towards both educators and parents by utilizing emotional and logical appeals. By convincing the audience to fear that children placed on remedial tracks are being hindered rather than assisted, the author causes both awareness and a feeling of duty to change the way we handle teaching children. Rose presents his argument by aiding the reader through the eyes of his younger self as he retells the story of his years in high school.

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