Passion Project/ Relationship between Passion and Privilege

The video, The Passion Project, spoke to me because it opened my eyes on the perspective of what the classroom should also be for the teacher. Not only is it their job to teach and make sure we understand the concept, but for themselves to also be learning at the same time. Their job is to also learn new ways of teaching but also new ways to make sure the student is involved in what they’re learning. Not only to grasp the concepts they’re learning, but to teach that having a passion about something is also important."The teacher's job is instilling passion and I've had several teacher's who've done that, it's constant communication with students and constant reassurance." It doesn’t necessarily have to be something that turns into a career, as long as there’s something in your life that sparks a fire within yourself and keeps you going and keep striving yourself to learn more and never settling for just one answer. 

Another perspective that opened up to me while watching The Passion Project was the fact that not only does the teacher have a job of teaching us written material, they have the job of creating this sort of environment where we feel comfortable enough to broadcast our thoughts to others and gain insight from our peers. Teacher's have to be able to make the classroom a place where student's minds can grow with new ideas always coming in with multiple different solutions or additions to those ideas. "In a classroom it's like a home that people can be their self and let their thoughts and things out to other people without being judged." Students would never be able to strive if they didn't feel comfortable in their classroom enough to speak their mind and voice their opinions. If they were afraid to say what they were feeling that would result in an environment for the classroom where the feel is just tense and wouldn't encourage any student to continue coming to class. Teachers also encourage this type of atmosphere in the classroom with group discussions and "fishbowl" type of teaching techniques. "Allowing students to teach each other, grow solidarity, trust and comfort between each other allows for now to rid themselves of their time consuming ego and rather spend time paying attention to the different worlds around them. We find that when you're surrounded by others exploring and expressing you can't help but explore and express your own self, triggering the mirror neurons." In a classroom where others are expressing their own ideas and opinions, students naturally want to voice theirs. Their opinion might be almost similar but completely different when it comes to one aspect of the subject but with new opinions always being thrown out in the discussion, the learning never stops.

What is the relationship between passion and privilege?

The relationship that comes with passion and privilege isn’t necessarily so easy to see at times, but makes complete sense when acknowledged. Middle class Americans are so concerned now a days with making sure they’re children are set financially for life, they forget that they have their own interest for their life. Those interests they first show signs of passion should be harvested and cultivated as children to create happier people as adults. Too bad in society today, the only people that can truely devote as much time as they want to into their personal passionate hobbies are those who are born into already well off families. When children are born into families that don’t have to  worry about their child struggling as an adult solely on the money they’d be earning, parent’s are more likely to sign them up for sports or music programs to find something their child shows interest in. Which explains why private schools have more enriched extracurricular programs than public schools. Public schools aim to send their students out into the world with all the knowledge in the world to get them the best job and earn them the most that they possibly can. While private schools do focus on academics, but also are extremely more well rounded when it comes to subjects that aren’t textbook smart. The privilege that comes with being born within a well off wealthy family is that there’s no fear their child will struggle for money as an adult if they follow their passion. They can also fall back on their family’s wealth and do as they please. Unlike average middle class Americans who have to stress getting an education that will ensure their children will get a job that is guaranteed to bring them in some sort of money to survive, and just survive, not a job that will fill their creative urges and finances at the same time.