Althusser And Surveillence

Essay by PaperNerd ContributorCollege, Undergraduate May 2001

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Resistance to the Institution of Education and the Role of Surveillance I spent most of my practicum hours in a fourth grade classroom assisting with various projects as well as working one-on-one with most, if not all students at some point during the term. My experience in that particular classroom was one that was rewarding. The nine and ten year olds that I worked with were, at worst, behaviorally exactly what I had expected. My expectations were based on my own recollections of my fourth grade year and the behavior I recalled as being appropriate as well as inappropriate at that time. In addition to working with fourth graders I also assisted in a "special education" classroom in a high school. The students in this particular classroom ranged in age from the youngest being fourteen to the oldest being eighteen. My experience in the high school did not resemble anything that I expected; the behavior of the students is easily classified as horrendous, disrespectful, and quite simply, shocking.

I agreed to volunteer my time to students who were in need of academic assistance at the high school level. At my first day at South Eugene High School I entered the "special needs" classroom accompanied by the volunteer coordinator and upon opening the door into the room I immediately understood why these students had been separated from the majority. I heard a young man, a boy only fourteen years old tell the room's supervisor to "fuck off" I don't know what the preceding events were, though I ask you; does it matter? I was shocked and ready to leave the situation, abandon the students, their problems and the disrespect that I knew I would endure, if I chose to stay. My immediate reaction was the desire for the student to be...