I strongly believe that, given
enough time and absent significant physical, intellectual, affective or social
barriers, it is possible to teach any willing person who is capable of reason any
subject matter in an intellectually honest manner. For the developmental
educator, overcoming students' barriers to learning is usually more important
than simply transmitting knowledge and skills. With an enthusiastic,
knowledgeable teacher, a reasonable curriculum, good advisement and a proper instructional
methodology, the only students who fail in the developmental education environment
should be those who choose (consciously, or by default as a consequence of their
own decisions and actions) to do so.
In the vast majority of cases,
"developmental" students are simply those who have not yet been
successfully educated to their full potential. For most students who
arrive in college without the skills expected of high school graduates, the
question must be not so much what these students have done wrong or failed to do, but rather, what has been done to them or denied
to them to produce such a state of affairs. While in many circles it is now
deemed politically incorrect to mention "victims," the sad truth is
that real, material victimization (in the forms of racism, sexism, poverty,
inadequate parenting, deficient and underfunded schools, ill health,
questionable past instruction and abuse of all sorts) has not been wiped from
the face of the earth by simply defining it away. Developmental education in
such circumstances is thus necessarily a political act::either an act of
solidarity and resistance, or an act of oppression, "another brick in the
wall." I opt for the former and struggle against the latter.
If an individual chooses not to
learn, it is, of course, that person’s free choice. However, a healthy respect
for human differences and different learning styles, as well as the essentially
subjective nature of the educational process itself, would lead me to allow the
widest possible latitude for different modes of learning and writing, different
pedagogical styles, different personalities, and different cultures.