The MAT@USC is specifically designed to prepare current and aspiring teachers with the knowledge, skills and experience needed for today’s classrooms. The program offers a course of study for aspiring teachers as well as one for current educators. Each program track takes a forward-thinking approach to confront the reality of today’s classrooms and reflects the Rossier School’s focus on strengthening urban education. The following blog post offers insight into the type of critical thinking required of students and the type of discourse that may occur.
When I look at my parents, I pray that I never become like them — locked-in to a narrow (and narrowing) world, doing the same things, making the same comments, and never doing anything new. Their self-imposed restrictions sadden me, but they have earned them. However, similar attitudes by students in the MAT@USC seem out of place.
In some ways, the MAT@USC is a rather in-your-face program. Every week in 517A (Issues in Urban Education), I, as a white male, was confronted with my apparent culpability (and intentionality) in issues of race and equity in US education. All of the disenfranchisement suffered by people of color appeared to be laid at my doorstep as a member of the “oppressor” class. To be honest, I became quite heartily sick of it, and began to question why I should bother to consider working in schools with “minority” populations, if I would be as unwelcome there as many of the readings suggested (such as the suggestion that people of color should only be taught by teachers of their race). Yet, as maddening as the content was, and as challenging to my worldview as I found it, the course opened my eyes to what is being done (I’ll say by others, not by me) in education that results in the marginalization of large segments of the student population in this country. It wasn’t easy or pleasant, but by working through considerable amounts of material which really got my back up, I came out richer, more versatile, and better able to meet the challenges of education in the 21st century.
A couple of members of my cohort have taken the route of outright rejection of the bulk of the theory and research examined in the TESOL MAT@USC. As nearly as I can determine, their personal experience and/or value systems do not align with the theory and practice we have been studying. (For example, one of them believes in an absolute objective reality, which consistently conflicts with the cultural and linguistic relativism which dominates current learning theory. My experience in 517A gives me some sympathy with their situation, but I believe they are cheating themselves out of an opportunity for a huge amount of personal and professional growth.
There is a huge gulf between saying “That’s not true!” and saying “That hasn’t been my experience. How were these conclusions arrived at?” The MAT@USC floods us with situations where our first reaction is “Wait a minute!” (This often occurs for me when my experience in education, going back into the 1950’s, does not align with current theory). If we are to be true to ourselves as educators who actually want to educate, (and, as a side issue, to attempt to prepare ourselves to meet the social equity goals of the MAT@USC), we ought to choose the open-minded path of inquiry and questioning, rather than a knee-jerk rejection of those things which make us uncomfortable or which challenge our beliefs and experiences. I’m not a great fan of “Fight on” (it sounds too much like foreign policy or politics), but I suggest that “keep grappling” is a good, open-minded approach, both to the MAT@USC, and to one’s future career in education.
