Posted on 08/16/2013 6:52:53 PM PDT by thecodont
School had always been his safe harbor.
Growing up in one of South Los Angeles' bleakest, most violent neighborhoods, he learned about the world by watching "Jeopardy" and willed himself to become a straight-A student.
His teachers and his classmates at Jefferson High all rooted for the slight and hopeful African American teenager. He was named the prom king, the most likely to succeed, the senior class salutatorian. He was accepted to UC Berkeley, one of the nation's most renowned public universities.
A semester later, Kashawn Campbell sat inside a cramped room on a dorm floor that Cal reserves for black students. It was early January, and he stared nervously at his first college transcript.
There wasn't much good to see.
(Excerpt) Read more at latimes.com ...
Only in the lunatic heart of LiberalStan would segregating black students be seen as a way to fight back against segregation.
African American Studies.....
I know exactly what his writing was like because I taught many students with similar writing. I also know that if he actually composed the papers for his African American Studies course, those papers were equally incomprehensible.
He will benefit from his education --- far more than the "bro's" in the 70's - 80's who cruised by year after year slack, lazy and threadbare thanks to Affirmative Action.
I hope Keshawn hangs in there. I will say a prayer for him, as I'm sure his mother does; and his honorary grandma, who watches from afar.
I feel really sorry for this kid.
He has a good attitude. He wants to make something of himself. That’s a good start.
Unfortunately he was saddled with the name “Keshawn” and I don’t think that helps him.
More than that, it’s really rattling to hear his story and understand that this kid was getting straight A’s in his high school, then hit a wall when he went to a real university. Someone did him a real disservice, apparently, with grade inflation and social promotion. I don’t doubt that if someone had caught him early on, say in early middle school, and mentored him in a tough and diligent way, he’d not only enter a good college but would sail confidently through his freshman year, and be studying something substantial, not “ethnic studies.”
I’ve seen the kind of writing you described. It was posted at an exhibit at a community college. It apparently used the Latin alphabet, but that’s where its resemblance to the written English language ended.
I’m so sorry for this kid and I’d like someone to give him real help.
“extremely long, awkward and unclear sentences.”
Hey...that’s how I write!
Yes, I hope he hangs in there too. And majors in something useful.
I liked the part about him watching “Jeopardy!” on TV when his peers were out in the streets getting into trouble. You don’t often run into someone who is both youthful and focused.
The biggest of his burdens was schoolwork. At Jefferson, a long essay took a page and perfect grades came after an hour of study a night. ****************************** They even took a class together, African American Studies 5A, a survey of black culture and race relations. It was key for Kashawn: A top grade could ensure he would be invited back to Cal. ****************************** Although the African American studies class was a bright spot — Kashawn had received an A on an essay and a B on a midterm, the best grades of his freshman year — the writing course he'd been forced to repeat wasn't going well. ****************************** His heart raced. He saw that he'd passed a three-unit seminar. He scanned further, his eyes resting finally on a line that said African American Studies 5A. There was his grade. A-. "Yes!" he exclaimed. An A- lifted his GPA above a 2.0. He wasn't a freshman anymore. He would return to Cal for his sophomore year.******************************
He gets an A- in the pretend class.
He needs intensive retraining in writing. He needs to be shown examples of simple, clear written sentences and taught to emulate them, along with remedial grammar lessons. When he masters a sentence, he can move on to a paragraph, then to short essays, then longer ones. If he applied himself, he could raise his skills up to a C level over the summer. But nobody will tell him this.
On the bright side, he has a bright future in government work.
You probably don’t know any young musicians.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vfh8_XyAb80
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IvZIiWxgr9w
Many of his peers would say this is "acting white."
This happens all the time. The kid is in the wrong college. A two year community college with some one on one help would really improve his chances for the future because he seems like a bright enough kid. After two years at a CC he could go on to a four year school.
This is sad on multiple levels.
It was baked in the cake when Berkeley accepted a guy who, if he were white, would have qualified to enter community college.
Sounds fishy. They usually beat the crap out of the good students who are trying to be "white."
Almost 15 years ago, I was sitting outside at a coffee shop next to U.C. Berkeley, when several students sat next to me and started a discussion. One was a black male, apparently a freshman in his first quarter at the university. He was having trouble understanding the way he had been treated. He had enrolled in a theater arts class, and was surprised to find himself at the center of his instructors' attention. He had immediately been given his own theater project to run, apparently the only one in the class so honored. His instructors sought out his opinion on subjects that he knew nothing about. He understood that he received this special attention solely because of his race. This bothered the hell out of him -- he had not asked for any special treatment and wasn't at all sure that it was a good thing. He just expected to do the classwork along with the other students, but he had somehow become some sort of racial celebrity, and what the hell was that about?I suspect that this was his first encounter with white academic liberals and their obsession with race.
I liked his attitude.
Don’t they have college entrance and placement exams anymore? Sounds like a great kid, but he would have been much better served with an honest assessment of his skill level before getting to college.
Social promotion and grade inflation is nothing less than child abuse.
He was a nice kid, the teachers liked him so they passed him on with grades he didn’t earn.
Now when he needs the education he didn’t get in High school he is up S—T creek.
I suspect 50 Asian kids got turned down so they could get Keshawn.
These are a journeyman's errors. If Keshawn sticks with it, he will prosper. He needs to live longer, work different kinds of jobs, meet more people, talk, listen, live: then write.
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