"If I Were A Poor Black Kid" Article Response

I do not agree with this article. Black students living in an area have limited resources, and they are not the best resources at that. I'm sure many black students are motivated to succeed, but it takes so much more motivation to achieve this. I'm going to compare Deerfield High School, which is one of the top schools in Illinois to an inner city school. A student from Deerfield High School has things much easier than a student from an inner city school. Deerfield is an extremely wealthy community, and its schools, citizens, and libraries have access to state of the art technology (smart boards, laptops, projectors, databases, college career and resource center, science materials, etc.), which makes learning, studying, and succeeding much easier. The teachers are paid extremely well, and the student body and staff is kept safe. Students in Deerfield do not have to work nearly as hard as students in an inner city school, because they have all of this working towards giving them the best possible education. In an inner city school students most likely live in dangerous neighborhoods where the commute to school is dangerous, and even the school isn't always safe. Inner city schools do not have the technology that is readily available at Deerfield, and neither do their libraries or homes. The staff isn't nearly as well paid in an inner city school, as the staff at Deerfield.

Gene Marks said that if he was a poor black student he would go to the library and study every day, he would constantly study and work his hardest to get out of that situation, but I don't think he realizes the severity of that situation. I don't know what growing up in the city is truly like, but I have an idea, and Marks made it seem much easier than what I believe growing up in the city would be like. These students have so much working against them, that I think it isn't a lack of motivation among them that is keeping them from succeeding, because I'm sure they want to succeed. But they must be mentally broken. Going to the library and school can be a dangerous commute, and they are constantly surrounded by drugs and gang violence. They must spend so much time worrying about their own lives and the lives of their loved ones that have no time for studying. These students also don't have the resources available to them, which students from Deerfield have.

I agree with this response to Marks' article. (http://ideas.time.com/2011/12/15/if-i-was-a-middle-class-white-guy-writing-about-being-a-poor-black-kid/) Marks truly doesn't know what it is like growing up as an African American in an impoverished community, and neither do I, but I realize that only a person who has grown up in that situation can truly know what it is like.