When MSU alumna Ariadna Ginez stepped into her new classroom at Renaissance High School in Detroit last fall, she was met not by students eager to learn, but by skepticism.
Her students had a history of teachers abandoning them, and they doubted her commitment to teaching — asking her, “Are you for real?”
“I knew that we had failed the moment they asked me that,” Ginez said.
Ginez, a Spanish teacher for Teach for America, or TFA, spoke to more than 200 people Saturday afternoon in Wells Hall at the Now More Than Ever Rally for Educational Equity, presented by TFA and ASMSU, MSU’s undergraduate student government.
Examining proficiency and dropout rates for students across the country, each speaker called for MSU students to commit to help provide students with quality, affordable education.
Education needs to take center stage with everyone from students to teachers to legislators playing a role, TFA recruitment manager and event organizer John Matthews said.
Tosha Downey, recruitment manager at the Academy for Urban School Leadership in Chicago, said when she was a student, she was headed down a bad path until she was mentored by local college students.
The experience showed her the importance of having teachers who believe in their students’ success.
“If lettuce doesn’t grow well, do we blame the lettuce?” she said.
After the speeches, attendees had the opportunity to visit with campus organizations and learn how to help end the educational gap.
Economics freshman Raymond Lu said he attended the event with members of MSU Multi-Racial Unity Living Experience but also to learn more about education.
Lu said he might be interested in getting involved with an educational equity program after graduation to help address the problems with education.
ASMSU Provost Zach Taylor — who will be working with TFA in Detroit next year — said problems in education also appear in higher education, particularly at MSU, where tuition has doubled in the last seven years.
Taylor said legislators and policy-makers appear to have “forgotten” about kids and schools, but students have the opportunity to take a stand to combat the issue.
President Barack Obama addressed some similar problems with higher education Friday at the University of Michigan, where he announced new federal efforts to help college students pay inflating tuition costs.
Ginez said she got involved with TFA after growing weary of legislators not being able to find many real solutions for educational equity.
People need to develop a concrete idea on how to fix the education system and the best ways to teach kids, she said.
“It is critical that we take part in that change,” she said.
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