HW 46

2. The text that I chose to read is called The Blind Side, By Michael Lewis. A couple of months back it was made into a movie and as usual the book was a lot better than the movie. The story however, is about a boy who grows up in Mississippi and is taken in by a rich Caucasian family. They turn this boy into a sought after college football recruit. Although he has natural talent, he has never been to school and the family winds up hiring tutors and being in close contact with teachers in order to get the boy, Michael Oher to attend Ole Miss, the mother and fathers Alma Mater. He is given the support by the school and winds up making it to college and later to the NFL.
3. This book relates to my topic because the main character, Michael Oher has never been to school and enters high school for 2 years and because he studies for a single test, he is able to go to a good university. It just portrays how rigged the American school system really is especially in places like Mississippi. He does not do well on this test because he has learned it in school, he does well because he has spent hours memorizing things that would be the test. I give it to him that it must have taken a lot of ambition and work to get where he has today and I am not saying he does not deserve a chance. I just think that testing is too easily rigged and it would be different if it was not valued so incredibly much but the fact of the matter is different.
4. Michael Oher and family go about it the right way. More often than not I hear about colleges advising basketball prospects to have someone else take the SAT for them so that they are eligible to play. Derrick Rose, now a basketball player for the Chicago Bulls took the ACT and failed it 3 times. He also took his PSAT and scored in the 10th percentile. Then Miraculously he traveled to Detroit and passed it by a long shot. And although Derrick Rose was caught and his college was penalized, think about how many times it has been carried out and not been caught by the NCAA. Even regular students. Us relying highly on a 4 hour test is asking for problems.