April 18, 2013
Reaction Paper #3 “A mind is a terrible thing to waste.” This was a campaign slogan used by the United Negro College Fund in 1972. In every aspect of life, minorities face challenges. These challenges can bar minorities from getting ahead in this fast paced life that we live in. This paper is going to take a look at one of the most challenging situations that most minorities will face at some point, the way of higher education and the issues that minorities may face here at Florida State University. The two main reasons that I believe responsible for the difficulties faced by minorities in terms of college are: lack of finances and ability to go to college, and then once in college the diversity they may face could cause them to drop out or feel isolated. Minorities, more commonly from underprivileged backgrounds than white students, may suffer from inadequate schooling prior to their college experience. Most are the first in their families to pursue a college career, therefore their families cannot provide the type of support that they need the most. Aside from that, they are more likely to go to schools that don’t properly prepare them for standardized tests and help them with the college application process. Without proper instruction, many minority students may not be aware of the amount of financial resources that are becoming more and more prevalent for college bound students every year, specifically for minorities or not. Every school and every campus have their similarities as well as their differences. I feel that the barriers a minority may face for the duration of their college experience may vary from one side of the country to another. Here at Florida State, I have not really noticed much negativity toward minorities, but that could be due to my sense of “colorblindness.” I am a white, female student, and I have not noticed any blatant racism on campus. I hear about minority groups and clubs and have not witnessed anyone speaking negatively about any of these said groups. However, are all colleges the same, or just as accepting of minorities? I am certain that in every college they face their own set of issues. Students here at Florida State might not be as accepting as students at UCF or they may just be more accepting but in just a different way. As long as there is a significant level of unfairness in the public school system, there will always be students with different views towards minorities. In order to change the issues that I have previously mentioned, I feel that the public school system should seriously be worked on. Funds should be distributed more fairly between all of the schools in each district. It simply does not display a sense of fairness when a school not even ten miles from another is suffering to a higher