Average Rose

I enjoyed reading "I Just Wanna Be Average" by Mike Rose. His style of writing is direct and entertaining to read. I couldn't help but feel slightly infuriated at the system that misplaced him into the wrong school, something that Rose himself speaks of somewhat passively. On the other hand, I suppose that being sent to that school has turned him into the writer he is today. One could speculate ad nauseum on whether or not he would have turned out differently, better or worse, had he been sent to the right school.
One thing that I found particularly interesting was on page 169 when Rose is describing the thought process of a student who is having trouble with their homework problems. The student is recognizing the fact that these problems should be easy because they know they have seen them before, know that they have learned how to solve them before. Spoiler alert: The student eventually gives up. The hopelessness within the student was heart-breaking. Rose describes that there is "embarrassment and frustration and, not surprisingly, some anger in being reminded once again of long-standing inadequacies." Any student who has ever struggled in any subject knows how this feels. The specifics may change, but the hopeless feeling of never being able to understand something wears on a person's psyche. Which is why, Rose explains and I agree, that many students come to believe that their inadequacies are "inborn, organic".
I think the lesson that I learned from this essay is that when I am a teacher I will reconsider a student whom I don't think is trying. Effort does not merely mean there is a solid, physical outcome that can be graded. Effort is in the thought-process that the student had in trying to solve the problem. Granted, this student gave up, but they tried. In the end they thought it was hopeless, which led to them giving up. I know that I don't want any of my students feeling hopeless in my class (or ever, really). Every student deserves the opportunity to have their efforts recognized and to have that which they think is hopeless become something they can feel confident of.