This Is Not A Test By Jose Vilson Summary

For week six, I read the book this is not a test: A new narrative on race, class, and education, by Jose Vilson. Vilson is a well-known education blogger, speaker, and math teacher in New York City. In the late 70’s he was fathered by a Haitian father and Dominican mother in Miami. His life is greatly impacted by his Catholic School teacher, father Jack Podsiadlo. He tells about his personal successes and failures through the lenses of poverty, inequalities in education and racial discrimination. The author skillfully weaves his own story with experiences of his students to grip the emotions of his readers while pretending to have all the answers to life’s problems. He sympathetically reaches out to help his students overcome their circumstances …show more content…
This is not to undermine nor diminished Vilson experiences between class and race. As a black woman I have also experience black on white racism and it was totally different from the incident I described above. While studying in Nebraska I was a service station fueling my car. A group of young men drove by in a red pickup and shouted “go home nigger”. The words floated over my head, drifting to the end of the block and returned to slam me in the face. When another motorist pumping fueling their car asked if I heard what was said. The motorist waited a few minutes for me to react and when I did not respond as expected they pulled off uttering a disgusting remark. I was insulted twice in one day because of the color of my skin. That was the day when I discovered that I was a threat; I choose to not respond because both remarks did not affect me. I had a goal to fulfill I was in pursuit of a college degree and “Nigger” was not going to stop me but rather it served to motivate me. I had traveled half way across America to embrace what those boys have free access to by right of citizenry. And I chose to believe that they were indeed the ignorant ones not me. All of the racial stories I have heard and read did not prepare me for this moment. I felt nothing! However I was angry that I had been insulted not because they called me Nigger! Later that evening as I recounted the incident …show more content…
However it’s time to fix the broken mechanism and like Vilson, ‘who was driven to teach because he knew he could do a much better job and make a career out of doing it better.’ (Vilson, 2014) Congress and big businesses should not be allowed to determine the cause of education. Educators, teachers union, activist, legislators, parents’ administrators and students must come together collaboratively and be more vocal and visible in favor of reform or nothing will change. Like Vilson, a lone ranger in isolation can shed light on the issues but will still remain unheard and unnoticed in a system controlled by the powerful. In a small country I have watched unified groups of individuals on numerous occasion force an entire country to come to stand still. The teacher’s union supported by more than 10,000 teachers unified to create reform to the education system. There is still more changes to implement however the government in collaboration with the major stake holders in education have agreed and are formulating laws to change the landscape of education in the