EDU 60 Memo #1

Darlene McCoy
dmmccoy@ucsc.edu
Segment 1 Memo - Option B
Yolanda Diaz-Houston - Section 1E
April 13, 2011
506 words

To Whom It May Concern:
My name is Darlene McCoy, and I’m a student at UC Santa Cruz. Merely getting to this school was a near impossible challenge for me because of where I grew up. I live in an area right outside of Sacramento – Rancho Cordova, and let me tell you, it’s not exactly the best place to go to school. When I was in elementary school, in the ‘90s, there was paper provided in the classrooms, there were pencils if someone forgot or needed one, and there were functional materials. My teachers were incredible, and happy to be there teaching each day. While my elementary school was still poor, it was alright. It wasn’t a huge challenge to get through a day of class. In high school, I was hearing about how my beloved music program might be getting cut every other week, my textbooks were falling apart, my classes were at least 30 students to one teacher, our library was a joke, and our career center was a distant memory. In school, I was in the honors/AP program - I can’t imagine what it was like to be in the normal classes, with even less material. Just this year at least half of my high school’s sports programs were cut. I’m pretty sure my music teacher got about $500 for the orchestra for the entire year. There were about fifteen people of my graduating class of anywhere from 250-300 who went to a four-year college. Our original class freshman year was about 650 students. What happened to all of them? Why is the school system failing so miserably?
I believe that if the state gave more funding to schools, that students like me, from my background, would have opportunities to thrive in life, and all of society would benefit. If my school had more funding, we could have had better classrooms, better teachers, and better material. College would not have seemed like a far-off impossible dream. Other students could have had the chance to thrive more in elective classes. We could have a library that was worth taking the time to go to, or a career center to aid us in our future endeavors. I feel like with more funding, graduation rates in my area would go up. And furthermore, because graduation rates would go up, crime rates would go down. Just the other year, at Rancho Cordova’ annual 4th of July Celebration, someone was shot, and the whole thing had to be shut down. How is education not a public good? There are far too many benefits from having an educated populace to not fund education through tax dollars. Why is it that I, my former classmates, and my community have to suffer due to our lower income? Why is the state not protecting us, not helping us become educated citizens? The cuts to education are insane – how can a society function without educated citizens that are able to perform their duties well? I expect more from my state.
Sincerely,
Darlene McCoy