Getting a college education is a 20-year investment. When you're growing up poor, you're not accustomed to thinking that far ahead. Instead, you're thinking about where you're going to get your next meal and how your family is going to pay rent that month. Besides, my parents and my friends' parents seemed to be doing just fine driving taxis and working as janitors. It wasn't until I was a teenager when I realized I didn't want to do those things. By then, I was two-thirds of the way through my education, and it was almost too late to turn things around.
Memperoleh pendidikan di perguruan tinggi adalah sebuah investasi bernilai 20 tahun. Jika Anda tumbuh miskin, Anda tak terbiasa untuk berpikir sejauh itu. Malahan, Anda berpikir tentang di mana Anda dapat mengisi perut nanti dan bagaimana keluarga Anda membayar sewa rumah bulan itu. Lagi pula, orang tua saya dan orang tua teman-teman saya tampak baik-baik saja bekerja sebagai supir taksi dan pembersih gedung. Barulah saat remaja, saya sadar saya tak mau melakukan hal-hal itu. Saat itu, saya sudah menyelesaikan dua pertiga pendidikan yang saya jalani, dan sudah hampir telat untuk mengubah segalanya.
When you grow up poor, you want to be rich. I was no different. I'm the second-oldest of seven, and was raised by a single mother on government aid in Queens, New York. By virtue of growing up low-income, my siblings and I went to some of New York City's most struggling public schools. I had over 60 absences when I was in seventh grade, because I didn't feel like going to class. My high school had a 55 percent graduation rate, and even worse, only 20 percent of the kids graduating were college-ready.
Jika Anda tumbuh miskin, Anda ingin menjadi kaya. Saya pun demikian. Saya anak kedua dari 7 bersaudara, dibesarkan seorang janda dengan bantuan pemerintah di Queens, New York. Karena tumbuh dalam kemiskinan, saya dan saudara saya bersekolah di New York City yang berkualitas paling rendah. Saya absen lebih dari 60 kali sewaktu di kelas tujuh, karena saya tak suka datang ke kelas. Persentase kelulusan SMA saya hanyalah 55 persen, dan lebih parahnya, hanya 20 persen dari yang lulus itu yang siap berkuliah.
When I actually did make it to college, I told my friend Brennan how our teachers would always ask us to raise our hands if we were going to college. I was taken aback when Brennan said, "Karim, I've never been asked that question before." It was always, "What college are you going to?" Just the way that question is phrased made it unacceptable for him not to have gone to college.
Ketika saya akhirnya berkuliah, saya memberi tahu Brennan bahwa guru kami selalu meminta kami mengangkat tangan jika kami akan lanjut berkuliah. Saya kaget saat Brennan bilang, "Karim, saya tak pernah ditanya seperti itu sebelumnya." Biasanya selalu, "Mau kuliah di perguruan tinggi apa?" Pertanyaan itu diutarakan sedemikian rupa sehingga dia merasa tak berkuliah adalah hal yang mustahil.
Nowadays I get asked a different question. "How were you able to make it out?" For years I said I was lucky, but it's not just luck. When my older brother and I graduated from high school at the very same time and he later dropped out of a two-year college, I wanted to understand why he dropped out and I kept studying. It wasn't until I got to Cornell as a Presidential Research Scholar that I started to learn about the very real educational consequences of being raised by a single mother on government aid and attending the schools that I did. That's when my older brother's trajectory began to make complete sense to me.
Kini saya mendapat pertanyaan lain. "Bagaimana Anda bisa berkuliah?" Bertahun-tahun saya bilang saya beruntung, namun bukan itu saja. Ketika saya dan kakak saya lulus SMA secara bersamaan dan kuliah dua tahunnya tidak dia lanjutkan, Saya ingin mengerti alasannya berhenti dan saya terus belajar. Tidak sampai saya tiba di Cornell sebagai Presidential Reseach Scholar barulah saya mulai mengerti dampak sebenarnya pendidikan anak yang dibesarkan seorang janda dengan bantuan pemerintah dan pergi ke sekolah di tempat saya. Saat itulah saya mulai memahami mengapa kakak saya berhenti berkuliah.
I also learned that our most admirable education reformers, people like Arne Duncan, the former US Secretary of Education, or Wendy Kopp, the founder of Teach For America, had never attended an inner city public school like I had. So much of our education reform is driven by a sympathetic approach, where people are saying, "Let's go and help these poor inner city kids, or these poor black and Latino kids," instead of an empathetic approach, where someone like me, who had grown up in this environment, could say, "I know the adversities that you're facing and I want to help you overcome them."
Saya juga tahu bahwa tokoh pendidikan terhormat, seperti Arne Duncan, mantan Menteri Pendidikan AS, atau Wendy Kopp, pendiri Teach For America, tidak pernah bersekolah di sekolah bertaraf rendah. Reformasi pendidikan kita banyak didorong oleh pendekatan simpatik, di mana publik berkata, "Ayo bantu anak-anak kurang mampu ini, anak berkulit hitam dan Latin yang miskin," alih-alih pendekatan empatik, di mana orang seperti saya, yang tumbuh di lingkungan ini, bisa berkata, "Saya tahu kesulitan yang kalian alami dan saya ingin membantu mengatasinya."
Today when I get questions about how I made it out, I share that one of the biggest reasons is that I wasn't ashamed to ask for help. In a typical middle class or affluent household, if a kid is struggling, there's a good chance that a parent or a teacher will come to their rescue even if they don't ask for help. However, if that same kid is growing up poor and doesn't ask for help, there's a good chance that no one will help them. There are virtually no social safety nets available.
Kini jika saya ditanya bagaimana saya bisa berhasil, saya bilang salah satu alasan terbesarnya adalah bahwa saya tak malu meminta bantuan. Pada umumnya, dalam keluarga kelas atas atau menengah, jika seorang anak mengalami masalah, kemungkinan besar orang tua atau seorang guru akan membantu mereka bahkan jika mereka tak memintanya. Namun, jika anak yang sama tumbuh miskin dan tak meminta bantuan, kemungkinan besar tak ada yang menolong mereka. Sama sekali tak ada bantuan sosial yang tersedia.
So seven years ago, I started to reform our public education system shaped by my firsthand perspective. And I started with summer school. Research tells us that two-thirds of the achievement gap, which is the disparity in educational attainment between rich kids and poor kids or black kids and white kids, could be directly attributed to the summer learning loss. In low-income neighborhoods, kids forget almost three months of what they learned during the school year over the summer. They return to school in the fall, and their teachers spend another two months reteaching them old material. That's five months. The school year in the United States is only 10 months. If kids lose five months of learning every single year, that's half of their education. Half.
Jadi tujuh tahun yang lalu, Saya mulai merombak sistem pendidikan publik kita, terbentuk melalui sudut pandang saya. Dimulai dari sekolah musim panas. Penelitian menyatakan bahwa dua pertiga dari kesenjangan prestasi, tentang kesenjangan dalam pencapaian pendidikan antara anak keluarga kaya dan miskin atau anak berkulit hitam dan putih mungkin berasal dari hilangnya pembelajaran musim panas. Di lingkungan miskin, anak-anak lupa hampir tiga bulan dari apa yang dipelajari di sekolah selama musim panas. Mereka kembali masuk di musim gugur dan guru mereka menghabiskan dua bulan mengajar ulang materi lama. Itu lima bulan. Tahun ajaran di Amerika Serikat hanyalah 10 bulan. Jika anak-anak kehilangan 5 bulan belajar tiap tahunnya itu setengah pendidikan mereka. Setengah.
If kids were in school over the summer, then they couldn't regress, but traditional summer school is poorly designed. For kids it feels like punishment, and for teachers it feels like babysitting. But how can we expect principals to execute an effective summer program when the school year ends the last week of June and then summer school starts just one week later? There just isn't enough time to find the right people, sort out the logistics, and design an engaging curriculum that excites kids and teachers.
Jika mereka bersekolah di musim panas, tak akan ada kemunduran, tapi sekolah musim panas, dirancang dengan buruk Bagi anak-anak, itu serasa hukuman, dan bagi para guru, serasa mengasuh bayi. Tapi bagaimana kita harap kepala sekolah menjalankan program musim panas yang baik kalau tahun ajaran berakhir Juni minggu terakhir dan sekolah musim panas dimulai satu minggu kemudian? Waktunya tak cukup untuk menemukan orang yang tepat, mengurus logisitik, dan merancang kurikulum yang menarik bagi anak-anak dan guru.
But what if we created a program over the summer that empowered teachers as teaching coaches to develop aspiring educators? What if we empowered college-educated role models as teaching fellows to help kids realize their college ambitions? What if empowered high-achieving kids as mentors to tutor their younger peers and inspire them to invest in their education? What if we empowered all kids as scholars, asked them what colleges they were going to, designed a summer school they want to attend to completely eliminate the summer learning loss and close two-thirds of the achievement gap?
Tapi bagaimana jika kita membuat program selama musim panas yang memberdayakan para guru sebagai pelatih pengajar untuk mengembangkan calon pendidik? Bagaimana jika kita memberdayakan para panutan bersarjana sebagai teman pendidik untuk membantu anak-anak mewujudkan ambisi berkuliah? Bayangkan, anak-anak berprestasi sebagai mentor untuk mendidik teman mereka yang lebih muda dan menginspirasi agar memperhatikan pendidikan? Bagaimana jika anak-anak diberdayakan sebagai pelajar, tanyakan mau kuliah apa nanti, rancang sekolah musim panas yang mau mereka ikuti untuk menghindari hilangnya pembelajaran musim panas dan mendekatkan dua pertiga kesenjangan prestasi?
By this summer, my team will have served over 4,000 low-income children, trained over 300 aspiring teachers and created more than 1,000 seasonal jobs across some of New York City's most disadvantaged neighborhoods.
Sampai musim panas ini, tim saya akan melayani 4000 anak miskin, melatih 300 calon guru dan menciptakan lebih dari 1000 pekerjaan musiman di semua lingkungan miskin di New York.
(Applause)
(Tepuk tangan)
And our kids are succeeding. Two years of independent evaluations tell us that our kids eliminate the summer learning loss and make growth of one month in math and two months in reading. So instead of returning to school in the fall three months behind, they now go back four months ahead in math and five months ahead in reading.
Dan anak-anak kita terus berhasil. Dua tahun penilaian mandiri menunjukkan mereka tidak kehilangan pembelajaran musim panas dan tumbuh sebulan dalam matematika dan dua bulan dalam membaca. Jadi alih-alih mundur tiga bulan di sekolah musim gugur, mereka maju empat bulan di matematika dan maju lima bulan di membaca.
(Applause)
(Tepuk tangan)
Ten years ago, if you would have told me that I'd graduate in the top 10 percent of my class from an Ivy League institution and have an opportunity to make a dent on our public education system just by tackling two months of the calendar year, I would have said, "Nah. No way." What's even more exciting is that if we can prevent five months of lost time just by redesigning two months, imagine the possibilities that we can unlock by tackling the rest of the calendar year.
Sepuluh tahun yang lalu, jika Anda bilang bahwa saya adalah 10% lulusan terbaik dari institusi Ivy League dan berkesempatan memperbaiki sistem edukasi publik kita dengan menangani 2 bulan dari kalender pendidikan Saya akan berkata, "Tidak. Tak mungkin." Yang lebih menarik lagi, jika kita bisa mencegah lima bulan yang hilang hanya dengan merancang ulang dua bulan, bayangkan kemungkinan yang ada jika tahun ajaran yang tersisa juga diperbaiki.
Thank you.
Terima kasih.
(Applause)
(Tepuk tangan)