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Richard Rodriguez's The Achievement of Desire

&

Mike Rose's I Just Want to Be Average

Questions and Assignments by Andrew Gottlieb

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Conversation Questions for The Achievement of Desire by Richard Rodriquez

1. A primary reason for my success in the classroom was that I couldn't forget that schooling was changing me and separating me from the life I enjoyed before becoming a student (1).

To what does Rodriquez attribute his academic success?

2. What he (Hogart) grasps very well is that the scholarship boy must move between environments, his home and the classroom, which are at cultural extremes, opposed. With his

family, the boy has the intense pleasure of intimacy, the family's consolation in feeling public

alienation. Lavish emotions texture home life. Then, at school, the instruction bids him to

trust lonely reason primarily. Immediate needs set the pace of his parents' lives. From his

mother and father the boy learns to trust spontaneity and nonrational ways of knowing.

Then, at school, there is mental calm. Teachers emphasize the value of a reflectiveness that

opens a space between thinking and immediate action(2).

How does Rodriquez characterize the difference between the home and the classroom?

Can you relate to what he says?

3. He (the working-class child) has to be more and more alone, if he is going to "get on (in school)." He will have, probably unconsciously, to oppose the ethos of the hearth, the intense

gregariousness of the working-class family group (2).

Why would the working-class child have to oppose the ethos of the hearth to do well in school?

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4. And there is time enough, and silence, to think about ideas (big ideas) never considered at home by his parents. Not for the working-class child alone is adjustment to the classroom

difficult. Good schooling requires that any student alter early childhood habits. But the

working-class child is usually least prepared for the change. And, unlike many middle-class

children, he goes home and sees in his parents a way of life not only different but starkly

opposed to that of the classroom. (He enters the house and hears his parents talking in ways

his teachers discourage (2) .)

a) What, according to Rodriquez is one of the challenges facing working-class children?

b) Why might a middle class child find it easier to go to school than a working class child?

5. Somehow they (the scholarship students among the working-class children) learn to live in the two very different worlds of their day... Here is a child who cannot forget that his

academic success distances him from a life he loved, even from his own memory of himself

. Initially, he wavers, balances allegiance. ("The boy is himself [until he reaches, say, the upper forms] very much of both the worlds of home and school. He is enormously

obedient to the dictates of the world of school, but emotionally still strongly wants to

continue as part of the family circle.") Gradually, necessarily, the balance is lost. The boy

needs to spend more and more time studying, each night enclosing himself in the silence

permitted and required by intense concentration. He takes his first step toward academic

success, away from his family (3).

According to Rodriquez, what price do working-class children who do well

in school pay?

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6. He (the scholarship boy) cannot afford to admire his parents (3).

Why, according to Rodriquez can the scholarship boy not afford to admire his parents?

7. But withheld from my mother and father was any mention of what most mattered to me: the extraordinary experience of first-learning. Late afternoon: in the midst of preparing

dinner, my mother would come up behind me while I was trying to read. Her head just

over mine, her breath warmly scented with food. "What are you reading?" Or, "Tell me

all about your new courses." I would barely respond, "Just the usual things, nothing

special." (A half smile, then silence. Her head moving back in the silence. Silence!

Instead of the flood of intimate sounds that had once flowed smoothly between us, there

was this silence (4).)

How did Rodriquezs relationship with his parents change as a result of his having become a successful student?

8. More acute was her (Rodriquezs mother) complaint that the family wasn't close anymore, like some others she knew.

What effect did Rodriquezs education seem to have on his mother and her perception of family life?

4

Conversation Questions for "I Just Wanna Be Average

1. Vocational education has aimed at increasing the economic opportunities of students who

do not do well in our schools. Some serious programs succeed in doing that, and through

exceptional teachers like Mr. Gross in Horace's Compromise5 students learn to develop hypotheses and troubleshoot, reason through a problem, and communicate

effectively the true job skills. The vocational track, however, is most often a place for those who are just not making it, a dumping ground for the disaffected. There were a few

teachers who worked hard at education; young Brother Slattery, for example, combined a

stern voice with weekly quizzes to try to pass along to us a skeletal outline of world history.

But mostly the teachers had no idea of how to engage the imaginations of us kids who were

scuttling along at the bottom of the pond (1).

According to Rose, how effective is vocational education?

2. I developed further into a mediocre student and a somnambulant problem solver, and that affected the subjects I did have the wherewithal to handle. I detested Shakespeare; I got

bored with history. My attention flitted here and there. I fooled around in class and read my

books indifferentlythe intellectual equivalent of playing with your food. I did what I had to do to get by, and I did it with half a mind (2).

What kind of a student was Rose?

5

3. We were talking about the parable of the talents, about achievement, working hard, doing the best you can do, blab-blab-blab, when the teacher called on the restive Ken Harvey for an

opinion. Ken thought about it, but just for a second, and said (with studied, minimal affect),

"I just wanna be average." That woke me up. Average? Who wants to be average? Then

the athletes chimed in with the clichs that make you want to laryngectomize them, and the

exchange became a platitudinous melee. At the time, I thought Ken's assertion was stupid,

and I wrote him off. But his sentence has stayed with me all these years, and I think I am

finally coming to understand it. Ken Harvey was gasping for air. School can be a

tremendously disorienting place. No matter how bad the school, you're going to encounter

notions that don't fit with the assumptions and beliefs that you grew up with maybe you'll hear these dissonant notions from teachers, maybe from the other students, and maybe you'll

read them. You'll also be thrown in with all kinds of kids from all kinds of backgrounds, and

that can be unsettling this is especially true in places of rich ethnic and linguistic mix, like the L.A. basin. You'll see a handful of students far excel you in courses that sound exotic and

that are only in the curriculum of the elite: French, physics, trigonometry. And all this is

happening while you're trying to shape an identity, your body is changing, and your emotions

are running wild. If you're a working-class kid in the vocational track, the options you'll have

to deal with this will be constrained in certain ways: you're defined by your school as "slow";

you're placed in a curriculum that isn't designed to liberate you but to occupy you, or, if

you're lucky, train you, though the training is for work the society does not esteem; other

students are picking up the cues from your school and your curriculum and interacting with

you in particular ways. If you're a kid like Ted Richard, you turn your back on all this and let

your mind roam where it may. But youngsters like Ted are rare. What Ken and so many

others do is protect themselves from such suffocating madness by taking on with a vengeance

the identity implied in the vocational track. Reject the confusion and frustration by openly

defining yourself as the Common Joe. Champion the average. Rely on your own good sense.

Fuck this bullshit. Bullshit, of course, is everything you and the others fear is beyond you: books, essays, tests, academic scrambling, complexity, scientific reasoning,

philosophical inquiry. The tragedy is that you have to twist the knife in your own gray matter

to make this defense work. You'll have to shut down, have to reject intellectual stimuli or

diffuse them with sarcasm, have to cultivate stupidity, have to convert boredom from a

malady into a way of confronting the world. Keep your vocabulary simple, act stoned when

you're not or act more stoned than you are, flaunt ignorance, materialize your dreams. It is a

powerful and effective defense it neutralizes the insult and the frustration of being a vocational kid and, when perfected, it drives teachers up the wall, a delightful secondary

effect. But like all strong magic, it exacts a price (3).

a) What for a student like Ken and Rose might be the advantage of being just average?

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b) According to the passage, what might be the disadvantage of trying to be a good student?

4. I lived in one world during spring semester, and when I came back to school in the fall, I was living in another (4).

What do you think the difference was between the two worlds Rose lived in?

5. Knowledge was becoming a bonding agent. Within a year or two, the persona of the disaffected hipster would prove too cynical, too alienated to last. But for a time it was new

and exciting: it provided a critical perspective on society, and it allowed me to act as though I

were living beyond the limiting boundaries of South Vermont (8).

What effect did Roses education appear to have on him?

6. In the end, did Rose turn out to be just average?

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Key Points in Rodriquezs Essay 1. Rodriquez attributes his success in school to his ability to recognize that education was

changing him and separating him from he enjoyed before becoming a student. This

signifies a shift in perspective and values. Once exposed to academia, Rodriquez became

a different person with a different way of thinking. As such, he could not relate to the

people in the environment in which he was raised as he had before. Consequently, the

gains he made through education entailed a loss as well.

2. One of the challenges for a working-class child who does well in school and becomes what Rodriquez refers to as a scholarship boy, is that he has to live in two distinctly different worlds. At home he is surrounded by people who are accustomed to expressing

themselves on an emotional, intuitive level. In school he faces the challenge of

articulating himself on a cooler, less emotional, reflective level. As such, he may feel

somewhat detached from his family as a result of the fact that they have not been exposed

to the kind of thinking he has.

Key Points in Roses Essay

1. Vocational education is intended to increase economic opportunities for working-class students. However admirable this intention may be, for the most part such programs fail

to recognize or deal with the gaps between the mindset of the students and the kinds of

things they are expected by their teachers to learn. Sadly, the result is that for the most

part, vocational education is a kind of wasteland for disenfranchised youth.

2. One way some kids deal with the unwanted pressure of being in a vocational program is to resign themselves to being just average and to act accordingly. This relieves them of

the stress that comes with the need to succeed. The downside of this is that it frustrates

the teachers who are trying to help the students and in the end minimizes the likelihood

that the students will progress and develop the skill they need to survive. In the end, the

intent of students like Ken to remain just average is self defeating.

3. Even for a working-class child it is possible to benefit from formal education. Regardless of the cultural gaps involved in the education of such a student, he can, as Rose did,

expand his horizons and learn to see beyond the limitations of the environment in which

he was raised.

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Examples & Narrative Elements for Rodriquez

1. He has to be more and more alone, if he is going to "get on." He will have,

probably unconsciously, to oppose the ethos of the hearth, the intense

gregariousness of the working-class family group. Since everything centers upon

the living room, there is unlikely to be a room of his own; the bedrooms are cold

and inhospitable, and to warm them or the front room, if there is one, would not

only be expensive, but would require an imaginative leapout of the tradition which most families are not capable of making. There is a corner of the livingroom

table. On the other side Mother is ironing, the wireless is on, someone is

singing a snatch of song or Father says intermittently whatever comes into his

head. The boy has to cut himself off mentally, so as to do his homework, as well

as he can.

The next day, the lesson is as apparent at school. There are even rows of desks.

Discussion is ordered. The boy must rehearse his thoughts and raise his hand before

speaking out in a loud voice to an audience of classmates. And there is time enough,

and silence, to think about ideas (big ideas) never considered at home by his

parents. Not for the working-class child alone is adjustment to the classroom

difficult. Good schooling requires that any student alter early childhood habits. But

the working-class child is usually least prepared for the change. And, unlike many

middle-class children, he goes home and sees in his parents a way of life not only

different but starkly opposed to, that of the classroom. (He enters the house and

hears his parents talking in ways his

teachers discourage (2).)

Rodriquez demonstrates the challenge of being a scholarship boy, a phrase coined by Hoggart signifying a student who does well in school, by depicting two scenes. The first

of these is the living room of the working-class family; the second is the classroom. In

the living room, the child is confronted by a somewhat chaotic environment not well

suited for study. Part of the problem, Rodriquez points out is that bedrooms in a

working-class home are cold and inhospitable and as such provide the child with no viable alternative than to attempt to do his homework in the living room. The chaos of

this environment, to which Rodriquez alludes by mentioning several distractions such as

singing and intermittent conversation, stands in contrast to the well ordered setting of the

classroom where there are even rows of desks, discussion is ordered, and where there is time enough, and silence, to thing about ideas. In the working-class home order and silence appear to be non-existent. The only way a working-class child can

succeed is thus to alter early childhood habits since the way of life to which he has been accustomed is not only different but starkly opposed to, that of the classroom (2).

9

2. Examples & Narrative Elements for Rose 1. We were talking about the parable of the talents, about achievement, working hard, doing

the best you can do, blab-blab-blab, when the teacher called on the restive Ken Harvey for an

opinion. Ken thought about it, but just for a second, and said (with studied, minimal affect),

"I just wanna be average."

The anecdote of Kens expressed desire just to be average is at the heart of Roses essay. This is not to say that Rose shares Kens desire to be average. It is rather, Roses way of demonstrating how working-class kids find a way to bypass the pressure of trying to fit in to

an academic environment that is inherently alien to their way of life. Kens desire to be average is part and parcel of the age-old need for comfort and for following the path of least

resistance. Rose does however explain later on that students like Ken pay a price for the

comfort they get by choosing the less painful path. The reward of expanding ones horizon, something Rose did eventually come to enjoy, is lost to students who avoid the struggle

entailed in the quest for knowledge and a higher level of consciousness. It is possible that the

desire to remain average is in part responsible for the lack of progress that is evident in the

vocational programs Rose is discussing. One possible implication of this is that whatever

rigidity in the class structure that exists may depend to a fair extent on the unwillingness of

working- class individuals to face the challenge involved in the acquisition of knowledge.

In this sense Rose appears to be laying the burden of responsibility for economic as well as

intellectual advancement on the shoulders of the individual rather than on society. As such

his view is rooted in capitalistic mindset that highlights the will as a force for advancement

more than fundamental restructuring of economic systems.

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Points of Comparison

Similarities: What do Rodriquez and Rose have in common?

1. Both Rodriquez and Rose discuss the challenges faced by a working-class child in an academic environment.

2. Both Rodriquez and Rose recognize the potential of education to broaden the horizons for a working-class child.

3. Both Rodriquez and Rose benefitted from their education.

Differences: How are Rodriquez and Rose different?

1. Rodriquez focuses on the effect of education on family life in the working-class home, pointing out that once a working-class child learns to adopt the more reflective manner of

thinking typical in academia, he becomes detached from those in his family who have not

shared the benefits of formal education. Rose does not mention this issue but focuses

rather on the approach some students take to avoid the pressures of trying to succeed. He

refers the case of one individual who preferred to remain just average rather than confront

the stress involved in seeking to overcome the boundaries he was facing.

2. While Rodriquez emphasizes the fact that he was able to succeed in school because he recognized that education was changing him, Rose focuses on impulse on the part of

certain students to avoid change and the challenges that it entails. This is not to say that

Rose is unaware of the rewards of education. He does say that his horizons widened as

a result of going to school. The difference between Rodriquez and Rose does not lie in

their conclusions but in the things they choose to focus on. It is reasonable to say that

there is no basis for asserting that there is any disagreement between Rodriquez and

Rose. The primary difference between them is they way in which they depict the plight

of the working-class child. It essences it is their narrative style that separates them.

It could however be argued that the difference is more than stylistic since Rodriquez does

appear to place a higher premium on the transformative effect of education than does

Rose. His notion that the recognition of this transformative effect as a basis for success

is not present in Roses analysis.

3. Rodriquez points out that there is a price to be paid for being an above average student, whereas Rose demonstrates that there is a price to be paid for being average. For

Rodriquez the price of being a successful student for a working-class child is that he

experiences a sense of separation and alienation from his family. Rose explains that

while maintaining the pose of being average serves to mitigate the pressures of striving

for success, something is lost. At the end of his essay he refers to knowledge as a

bonding agent, a means by which he is able to communicate with people he respects and finds interesting. Both Rodriquez and Rose value education but narrate the struggle

of the working- class child from a somewhat different perspective, emphasizing different

aspects of the challenge.

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Sample Essay:

Challenging the Working-Class Child

How does ones background affect the way he or she performs in school? Do people

from different sides of the track adapt differently to academic settings. According to the authors

whose views are the subject of this composition the answer to this question appears to be in the

affirmative. Both Richard Rodriquez in his essay, The Achievement of Desire, and Mike Rose in

his essay, I Just Want to Be Average, discuss the challenges facing the working-class children

attending vocational programs. The goal of this composition is first to discuss the key points of

each essay and then to delineate the similarities and differences between them.

At the heart of Rodriquezs essay is the idea that the education of the working-class child

can incur a sense of separation. Once the child succeeds at adopting the analytical method of

reflection typical in academic settings, he is likely to have difficulty engaging in the more

emotional, less logical, and more intimate kinds of communication typical in the working class

home. As such, the gains he makes at school are counterbalanced by a loss of closeness with

family and friends. Rodriquez points out that once exposed to academia he became a different

person with different ways of thinking. As such, he could not relate to the people in the

environment in which he was raised as he had before. Consequently, the gains he made through

education entailed a loss as well.

Rodriquez goes on to explain that one of the challenges for a working-class child who

does well in school and becomes what he refers to as a scholarship boy, is that he has to live in

two distinctly different worlds. At home he is surrounded by people who are accustomed to

expressing themselves on an emotional, intuitive level. In school he faces the challenge of

12

articulating himself in a cooler, less emotional, reflective level. As such, he may feel somewhat

detached from his family as a result of the fact that they have not been exposed to the kind of

thinking he has.

Rodriquez demonstrates the challenge of being a scholarship boy, by depicting two

scenes. The first of these is the living room of the working-class family; the second is the

classroom. In the living room, the child is confronted by a somewhat chaotic environment not

well suited for study. Part of the problem, Rodriquez points out is that bedrooms in a working-

class home are cold and inhospitable and as such provide the child with no viable alternative

than to attempt to do his homework in the living room. The chaos of this environment, to which

Rodriquez alludes by mentioning several distractions such as singing and intermittent

conversation, stands in contrast to the well ordered setting of the classroom where there are

even rows of desks, discussion is ordered, and where there is time enough, and silence,

to think about ideas. In the working-class home order and silence appear to be non-existent.

The only way a working-class child can succeed is thus to alter early childhood habits since

the way of life to which he has been accustomed is not only different but starkly opposed to, that

of the classroom (2).

Rose focuses on another aspect of the picture. He begins by saying that vocational

education is intended to increase economic opportunities for working-class students and points

out that however admirable this intention may be, for the most part such programs fail to

recognize or deal with the gaps between the mindset of the students and the kinds of things they

are expected by their teachers to learn. Sadly, according to Rose, the result is that for the most

part, vocational education is a kind of wasteland for disenfranchised youth.

13

He explains that one way some kids deal with the unwanted pressure of being in a

vocational program is to resign themselves to being just average and to act accordingly. This

relieves them of the stress that comes with the need to succeed. The downside of this is that it

frustrates the teachers who are trying to help the students and in the end minimizes the likelihood

that the students will progress and develop the skill they need to survive. In the end the intent of

students like Ken to remain just average is self defeating.

Rose concludes his essay by suggesting that, in spite of the challenges involved, working-

class children can benefit from formal education. Regardless of the cultural gaps involved in the

education of such a students, they have the potential to expand their horizons and learn to see

beyond the limitations of the environment in which they were raised.

At the heart of Roses essay is the anecdote of Ken, a student who expresses his desire to

be just average. The anecdote demonstrates how working-class kids find a way to bypass the

pressure of trying to fit in to an academic environment that is inherently alien to their way of life.

Kens desire to be average is part and parcel of the age-old need for comfort and for following

the path of least resistance. Rose does however explain later on that students like Ken pay a

price for the comfort they get by choosing the less painful path. The reward of expanding ones

horizon, something Rose did eventually come to enjoy, is lost to students who avoid the struggle

entailed in the quest for knowledge and a higher level of consciousness.

It is possible that the desire to remain average is in part responsible for the lack of progress

that is evident in the vocational programs Rose is discussing. One possible implication of this is

that whatever rigidity in the class structure exists may depend to a fair extent on the

unwillingness of working- class individuals to face the challenge involved in the acquisition of

knowledge. In this sense, Rose appears to be laying the burden of responsibility for economic as

14

well as intellectual advancement on the shoulders of the individual rather than on society. As

such, his view is rooted in a capitalistic mindset that highlights the will as a force for

advancement more than fundamental restructuring of economic systems.

As to the similarities between Rose and Rodriquez, we can say the following. Both

Rodriquez and Rose discuss the challenges faced by a working-class child in an academic

environment. Both of them recognize the potential of education to broaden the horizons for a

working-class child. Both authors benefitted from their education.

What then are the differences between Rodriquez and Rose? Rodriquez focuses on the effect

of education on family life in the working-class home, pointing out that once a working-class

child learns to adopt the more reflective manner of thinking typical in academia, he becomes

detached from those in his family who have not shared the benefits of formal education. Rose

does not mention this issue but focuses rather on the approach some students take to avoid the

pressures of trying to succeed. He refers the case of one individual who preferred to remain just

average rather than confront the stress involved in seeking to overcome the boundaries he was

facing.

While Rodriquez emphasizes the fact that he was able to succeed in school because he

recognized that education was changing him, Rose focuses on the impulse on the part of certain

students to avoid change and the challenges that it entails. This is not to say that Rose is

unaware of the rewards of education. He does say that his horizons widened as a result of going

to school.

The difference between Rodriquez and Rose does not lie in their conclusions but in the things

they choose to focus on. It is reasonable to say that there is no basis for asserting that there is

any disagreement between Rodriquez and Rose. The primary difference between them is the

15

way in which they depict the plight of the working-class child. It is their narrative style that

separates them. It could however be argued that the difference is more than stylistic since

Rodriquez does appear to place a higher premium on the transformative effect of education than

does Rose. His recognition of this transformative effect as a basis for success is not present in

Roses analysis.

Another difference is evident in Rodriquezs assertions that there is a price to be paid for

being an above average student. Rose, on the other hand focuses on the price one pays for being

average. For Rodriquez the price of being a successful student for a working-class child is that

he experiences a sense of separation and alienation from his family. Rose explains that while

maintaining the pose of being average serves to mitigate the pressures of striving for success,

something is lost. At the end of his essay he refers to knowledge as a bonding agent, a means

by which he is able to communicate with people he respects and finds interesting. Both

Rodriquez and Rose value education but narrate the struggle of the working- class child from a

somewhat different perspective, emphasizing different aspects of the challenge.

16

Writing Assignment

Write about The Achievement of Desire by Richard Rodriquez and I Just Want to Be Average by

Mike Rose. Begin by summarizing the key points in each essay and then compare and contrast

them. How are the views of Rodriquez and Rose similar? How are they different?