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The Importance of Multiculturalism and how it has Affected My Career

Mr. Travis Schill

Ignorance leads to insecurity and insecurity precipitates antagonism. An understanding of other cultures

provides people with the capacity and the intellectual resources to solve problems and circumvent

conflict. Understanding promotes tolerance. This is where the value of multiculturalism lies. As the

world continues to globalize, this understanding and tolerance will become all the more imperative.

Therefore, in preparing our students for the challenges of the future, international education becomes

increasingly vital and important.

Throughout my life I have striven and continue to strive to achieve a better level of understanding of the

diverse cultures all around us. My family always highly valued cultural tolerance and welcomed all

people into our home. This accepting disposition was instilled into me and greatly influenced my choice

of study as a student of learning about other cultures, and even my pursuit of a career in education so as

to help to fight the ignorance that precipitates the cultural conflicts and antagonisms that perpetually

plague our society.

Throughout the early years of my life, I was friends with friends of all religions, races, ethnicities, family

backgrounds, sexual orientations, genders, and even nationalities, always treating them equally. This

became particularly true in college, where I was given the opportunity to interact with a far wider range

of people and to learn even more from their cultural experiences. I especially seemed to make a lot of

friends from the international exchange program. I always felt compelled to greet and welcome them so

as to ease the difficulty of living and studying in a totally foreign land. I always believed it had to be

really difficult and I always tried to be helpful.

In one instance, a friend of mine was from the Gaza Strip in Palestine. I met him in September and

helped him get accustomed to life in my town. We spoke off and on for a couple of months. Then, one

day in late October, it was snowing and cold and I came across him wearing sandals and a short sleeved

shirt! I said "Buddy, it’s almost winter! You need to dress a bit warmer." He then laughed and

responded, "I don't have any other clothes or money!" It would have been funny if I hadn't felt so bad.

So, I took him to my car and gave him the couple of sweatshirts I had with me to wear, and then I took

him to the mall and got him some warmer clothes until his home university was able to get him some

money.

I have also studied Spanish off and on independently for the past couple of years and have developed a

solid foundational knowledge of the language, though my goal of fluency remains to be achieved. Last

summer, I made great strides with my summer program in Costa Rica. This was my first international

experience and my sympathies with the foreign exchange students in my university were well founded,

and reciprocated. The people of Heredia, Costa Rica were tremendously warm and welcoming, leaving

me hoping that other people are given a similar impression of Clarion, PA. While I was there, I travelled

around the country and, in so doing; I met people from all over Central America and the Caribbean. The

diversity of cultures located in that region, though we in the U.S. often simply refer to them collectively

as Latin American nations, is truly overwhelming. An appreciation for this diversity will become

increasingly essential as immigrants from these countries become ever more prevalent in our society.

I had a similar experience when I spent the spring of 2011 in Sweden. As I discussed in my cover letter, I

learned an immense amount regarding the different cultures of the world. Various Europeans, Koreans,

Chinese, Pakistanis, various Arabian nations, Mexico, Brazil, Canada, and numerous other nations were

all present in Karlstad. In the student housing in which I lived, every morning I would be greeted by no

fewer than 5 different cultures every day! My corridor included students from China, Mexico, Germany,

France, and Italy with many others living nearby. Every month, we had an international dinner in our

collective kitchen, in which we would each make a dish from our respective home lands and share them.

The food was great, but the educational experience of the cultural sharing was incredible.

I am currently living and teaching in Al-Khobar, Saudi Arabia at the Bayan Gardens International School.

Here I have learned an immense amount regarding the culture of the Saudi people. It is a fascinating

place to live and I have learned a great deal. I also greatly enjoy my students. I teach 6 classes of Math

and Science at the Elementary, Middle School, and High School levels, and each class and each group of

students offers unique challenges and interesting perspectives. The faculty, both English and Arabic

speaking teachers, are amazing to work with. They have provided me with immense support and advice

in my first year of teaching and they have helped me to drastically improve my performance in the

classroom. They have all eagerly shared with me the wisdom accrued in their extensive and varied

experiences as educators and I am far better because of it.

I believe that these experiences have helped to prepare me to do my part in the promotion of

multiculturalism and cultural understanding so as to not only promotes the tolerance of other cultures,

but to encourage the embracement of diversity I have always felt. I have adjusted wonderfully to my

new career as an international educator largely due to the tolerance, flexibility, cooperativeness, and

respect I developed in my youth, my international experiences as a student, and finally in my time as an

international teacher in Saudi Arabia. The educational opportunities held within these cultural

exchanges are immense, and I believe that in pursuing a career in international education I could

contribute immensely to the educational and multicultural goals of that profession.

Philosophy on Education and How to Enable All Students to Achieve

Mr. Travis Schill

All students deserve to have an equal and appropriate opportunity to achieve a quality education. It is

the teacher's responsibility to ensure that this window of opportunity remains open for all students. I

plan to pursue this in my career through the maintenance of a learning conducive environment,

differentiated instruction, effective planning, and effective and varied assessment techniques.

The maintenance of a learning conducive classroom environment is of the utmost importance to the

attainment of high levels of student achievement for all pupils. Students must feel safe, secure,

welcome, valued, and those they belong in the classroom. Discipline and an appropriate rapport must

be achieved between the teacher and students. Also, the students must be made to respect each other.

Only if the students feel that they belong in the classroom and are accepted on every level can they be

expected to learn and to achieve.

All students learn differently, so the classroom instruction must be constructed in such a way so as to

accommodate all learners. The simple lecture style does not suit all types of learners; some require

more discussion, visual aids, creative and relatable examples, and other forms of individualization to

help the students to achieve. It is the responsibility of the classroom teacher to ensure that all students

are engaged and performing at the optimum level. This is where the effective planning comes in.

Teachers have a finite amount of class time to achieve the objectives set; therefore, getting to know the

students and accordingly adjusting the form of instruction is essential for the achievement of quality

results.

Just as all students shouldn't be expected to learn in just one predictable way, they shouldn't be

expected to perform in one predictable way. Therefore, I will use a diverse selection of assessment

strategies and will continually assess not just weekly, but daily so as to ensure that all students perform

adequately. Diverse formats of assessment help to ensure that we are assessing their comprehension of

the content knowledge, not just their familiarity and ability to perform well on a multiple choice test.

Upper level forms of assessment such as essay writing, project completion, research projects, papers,

displays, presentations, and myriad others are essential to ensure that every student gets an equal

chance at a quality education and it also helps to show that all students are performing where they

should be, not at an incorrectly perceived higher level.

The recognition of the students' human capital, its strengths and weaknesses, and how improve their

weaknesses and utilize their strengths is a great way to help students to achieve. To speak economically,

not all students are equipped with the same social, cultural, educational, or 'test taking' capital. Some

are great essay writers, others strive on multiple choices, and still others excel at the creating of creative

visual displays to express their understanding. As educators, we must help them to improve their

'human capital weaknesses,' and, perhaps equally importantly, play into their strengths. A student who

faces nothing but difficulty will get frustrated; therefore, it is necessary to ensure that academic

situations can arise for all students to perform well in. For it is not the medium of expression that

matters, it is the content knowledge comprehension that we wish to see and assess.

The recognition of diversity in student character traits and aptitude strengths is particularly important in

the realm of international education. In addition to the standard diversity of each individual pupil as a

person, you have to factor in the differentiated cultural backgrounds. The modification of lesson plans

so as to attempt to neutralize cultural misunderstandings regarding content area are similarly necessary.

For example, when teaching a lesson on graphs in Math Class, a book with references to baseball

statistics or even the political system of one particular country. We want the students to be evaluated

on their understanding of the content being taught, and we do not want them to be penalized for

complications regarding their unfamiliarity with the mentioned sport or country. Therefore, the

international educator must be alert and conscientious of possible complications regarding situations

like this and adapt to each unique situation.

Also, a key ingredient to a successful educational environment is flexibility. In education, it is the student

performance that matters, as it is the only meaningful reflection of teacher performance. Consequently,

a good teacher must be flexible and adaptable to each situation and each student’s needs in each

situation. A good educator must also be the safe, welcoming, optimistic, and benevolent center of the

learning and developing conducive environment that he desires to establish. The teacher sets the mode

and the pattern for the classroom, and he must set what pattern he desires. A teacher who walks in

weary, bleak, and pessimistic and then watches the clock the whole period will establish an atmosphere

that is very detrimental to learning. However, if he walks in enthusiastic, optimistic, and eager to pursue

the day’s lesson, then that attitude will reverberate through the class and a great educational

opportunity can be opened.

In essence, setting the bar high, but attainably high, coupled with the enabling of all students to pursue

and achieve is essential. Ensuring all students perform well, feel welcome, and become academically

engaged are all inexorably linked to each other. Attaining one all but ensures the attainment of the

others. The teacher must also project the attitude and disposition that he wishes to have reflected so as

to create the environment that is desired and necessary for quality education to occur. The teacher

must also be able to adapt and be flexible so as to create a ‘malleable classroom’ in which all students

can find a place and fit to make their own. All these concepts combined come together nicely to

establish the philosophical foundations on which my approach to education is based and from which my

career in the field shall progress.