Arturo Tinoco

Oct/25/16

My skin color makes a difference in education.

Some educators make misperceptions about students of color or first-generation

college students just for their skin color. As a Latino student, I have many ideologies

from my family, for instance, I need to believe everything my educator says because

hes a studied person, students cannot judge their teacher and that educators are our

guidance. However, because all these beliefs that we have, we are responsible of facing

these types of misperceptions. In the article by Tara Yosso (a professor at the University

of California, Santa Barbara) entitled, Whose Culture Has Value? A Critical Race

Theory Discussion of Community Cultural Wealth, Yosso presents six forms of cultural

capital that are: aspirational, linguistic, familial, social, navigational, and resistance.

Yosso argues that all forms of capital can be used to empower individuals. Yosso used

this model to show the strengths and experiences that students of color bring with them

to their college environment. Although educators think People of Color knowledges are

not valuable in education, actually they can be good to teach in class because they

come with experience, happiness, and love. However, as a college student, I find

aspirational, resistant and social as the main capitals to bring into the classroom.

Particularly, aspirational capital is the most important for me because a student

must have an aspiration to something even though it looks impossible hence that

person can achieve it. On page 78, Yosso argues, Its the ability to maintain hopes and

dreams for the future, even in the face of real and perceived barriers. It illustrates that
people need to have goals and aspirations even in the most difficult circumstances. For

example, I have the aspiration to be an important gamer designer, which implies that I

need to put a lot of effort in school, have the dedication to attend early to class and do

my homework. Nevertheless, Its been challenging because Im going to be the first

person in my family to go to College, thus when I have a question about it, nobody can

help me because they dont know how to. However, my family, especially my

grandmother says to me, "You need to go to school because it's important, thus you can

have a better future, not like us." These words are very important to me because we are

coming from the bottom; from cleaning other peoples houses, walking deserts and

drugs. In spite of that, we never gave up but my aspiration growth. Putting all this

together, make this capital very important valuable for education in general because, in

order to succeed as a person, we need to have goals, dreams, and aspirations. We

need to have the aspirations set in our minds consequently they can become true.

Subsequently, resistant capital is important for me because I have an immigrant

family and I see how the government treats them different from other people; I don't like

to be humiliated by other people just for the way we look because they don't know our

circumstances or what we needed to do to stay in the US. Therefore, a person must be

resistant and fight for their rights. On page 80, Yasso argues, This capital refers those

knowledge and skills fostered through oppositional behavior that challenges inequality.

It illustrates that people need to fight to change inequality and subordination. For

example, I have participated in so many marches in Mexico and in the US. In Mexico, I

went to a march because the government didn't want to give money to upgrade
education; I didnt like how the government preferred to build unnecessary buildings

instead of new schools. However, I love to fight for my rights and those of others. I like

to battle for what I know is wrong. I open the eyes of my family telling them that we need

to fight for what we deserve and that they need to vote (those who can) because the

vote is their voice. Therefore, all these points make this capital important for education

because if we allow other people to humiliate us or to dont allows us to the success we

are not going to achieve our goals. We need to fight for what we want even though it

looks difficult, we can do it.

Lastly, Social capital is important for me because new college students dont

know how the College system works. However, asking for help will benefit to get involve

into the school. On page 79, Yosso argues, It can be understood as networks of people

and community resources. It illustrates that people can help other people with a

different kind of information. For example, when I first came to college I didnt know

anything about it because it was a new school. I decided to go and ask for help with a

teacher and he told me about a SOAR event. The SOAR event helped me to walk

around the school and to know the basic information about Foothill. Also, the SOAR

event brought me to the Puente program in which Im learning a lot of skills and reading

very important articles. Therefore, all this information makes social capital important for

me to value education in general because students always need help to understand

how the new systems work. Without help, many students can fail but with a little bit of

help, we can success as community.

 Students of color bring different types of knowledge into the classroom that can

actually benefit education. However, as students of color we have to pass through many

difficulties, but in order to achieve our goals, we have to resist against all types of

racism and stereotypes. Its important that educators honor these various forms of

knowledge, or cultural capitals in todays educational system and US social institutions

because it actually can help students. By bringing these capitals to our classroom, we

will succeed faster than before but change requires more than words on a page -- it

takes perseverance, creativity and acts of love.