I really enjoyed reading the article, “Poverty and the ideological imperative: a call to unhook from deficit and grit ideology and to strive for structural ideology in teacher education” by Paul Gorski. Before this semester, I had never heard of the term “deficit” views/ideology in the field of education. I am ashamed to admit that I was one of the people Gorski criticizes for their ideological view of those living in poverty. Obviously, this was never my conscious intention, but I realized after reading this article, that I need to change my perceptions as I prepare to be an educator. I feel that many future teachers, including myself, operate under the false assumption that their job is to make poor students and their parents care about school and education. In this view, the teacher is essentially saying that socioeconomically disadvantaged parents don’t value education and don’t see the importance in being present for their child at school events. However, Gorski really put it into perspective for me when he said that there are structural barriers that exist in our society, and as teachers we need to learn how to change our ideology to respond to them. I really enjoyed how Gorski broke down both the deficit and grit views, which I think are unfortunately still dominant amongst educators.
I also found the Thomas article, “Failing Still to Address Poverty Directly: Growth Mindset as Deficit Ideology” which seemed to be in conversation with the Gorski article, very interesting. I particularly like his example about how our assignments typically start at 100 and we lose points for what we’re lacking rather than everyone starting at 0 and earning points for what we did well. It was a great example that illustrated his point about deficit mindsets. This article again made me realize that I had some false ideological beliefs about people in poverty. I never directly said anything such as “if poor people worked harder they wouldn’t be poor,” but when reading, I still felt guilty because I believe that has been a part of my mindset. In my own experience, I feel that I’ve worked hard to get where I am, but at the same time, I have middle class parents who I can fall back on at a moment’s notice if I need to, and I have in the past. For those in poverty, there isn’t the same ability to “work hard” because they do not always have the basic privileges of food security, housing security, etc.
The last
reading from the NCTE website was very helpful to me. I liked the “What does this mean for teaching”
sections, because they gave great ideas for teaching writing. I think it is important to recognize that 5
paragraph academic essays are not the only relationship students should have to
writing, and that varying your teaching to include writing for other purposes
will be a very practical and beneficial skillset to give to your students. All three of these readings really challenged
my professional identity and have caused me to rethink my educational beliefs.
I definitely had some of the same feelings that you had while reading these articles. Although I personally never bought into the idea that people in poverty can work hard and lift themselves out of a horribly biased system, I have held onto the idea that any student who applies themselves full-tilt can succeed in life through the power of their own resolve. I think these articles do a good job of pointing out that many students who are called on to succeed despite adversity are at an immense disadvantage because every other aspect of their life is subject to the various threats that living in poverty poses. Even if a student is applying themselves 100%, they might not be able to provide that same kind of 100% that this deficit ideology ask of them.
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