The purpose of this assignment was to imitate Socrates in the way he delivered his speeches. We would talk about things that no one would want to talk about. So, for our assignment we made speeches about issues that we were passionate about.
My favorite part of this project was listening to the other students’ speeches. The topics of the students were interesting — and the creativity of the speeches was nice to see.
I choose the theme “Chicago school districts” because that topic is personal to me. I have had an experienced were I wanted to go to a school I really like, but because the school was not in my school district I could not go to the school.
Doing my research for this project, I learned that a lot of Chicago is segregated. I also learned that it is important to express yourself and don’t be afraid to speak about something you believe in, even if people don’t want to hear it. That is what Socrates did.
I am a student. You all are students. Teachers, you once was a student yourself. Students what school do you think you would be at if you was not at GCE? Would you be in a neighborhood school in your school district? The reason why I am asking these questions is because students in Illinois, especially in Chicago students have to go to schools in their district. They can’t just choose what school they want. A benefit to this is distance. By going to a school in your district you don’t have to travel a far distance to go to school. But shouldn’t that be a student decision on how far he wants to travel to school and not the government’s? Students should be able to choose a school regardless of what their school district is.
Look at this map what do you see? What do you think the colors represent? This this map of Chicago shows that a lot of Chicago is segregated. If students stay in a same area that their school district is in they are segregated and won’t experience diversity and other people’s cultures.
You should care because this affects the community of the students. We are a community of students. This problem either affects you directly or indirectly. Maybe you are like me or had a friend that wanted to go to a school you really liked because it had a safe environment and good education, but couldn’t because the school wasn’t in your district.
In Socrates’ speech, the “Apology”, he said that “ the law has no cognizance of unintentional offences”. Now in the beginning of Chicago maybe in the “law” didn’t mean to or attentional separate Chicago, but over time that changed. They wanted to separate people. The word cognizance means awareness. We need to make awareness of this issue. What you can do is first you can voice your opinion. Make it known. Tell how you feel about this matter. Tell people (teachers, school board members, the mayor) how you feel. Then maybe a bill can be passed in Illinois allowing students to choose what school they want to go to and not have to go to a school in their school districts. Remember this, be the change you want to see in the world.