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<\/p>\nOver the past month, my research team has been conducting interviews with a student, Alejandro, who attends Croft School. He provides us with first-hand accounts of what it\u2019s like to attend a globally elite institution. The student was very vocal throughout the three interviews and was not afraid to disclose his true feelings about Croft School, especially concerning administration and punishment. The student we interviewed happened to be the president of his class, which leads me to believe he is highly knowledgable about what happens within the institution.<\/p>\n
When asked if he was willing to defend his own views in the classroom,\u00a0Alejandro replied that he stands by his own opinions even if they differ from others, but that if a student were to express their differing views in the classroom, they would be punished. He reported to us, \u201cWhen they go to decide your punishment when you do something bad, you go to a meeting with the counsel. If you are respectful, he normally gives you like a less harsh punishment but if you start to say like I disagree, or I didn\u2019t do anything wrong, he gives you a very harsh punishment, in my opinion.\u201d What is a very harsh punishment? According to Alejandro, the worst punishment is conditionality with the school. In other words, the student would no longer be able to represent the school.<\/p>\n
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What lessons\u00a0do these practices teach to the students of Croft School? Possibly, that it is okay to have your own opinions, but only if those opinions align with the values of the elite. For example, voicing disagreement with the faculty of the elite school may be seen as disrespectful or uncooperative instead of a form of expression or opportunity for discussion.\u00a0Perhaps this teaches the students that it is better to silence your own voice in the moment for the sake of your future success.<\/p>\n
What does it mean to have the highest form of punishment, apart from expulsion, to be disassociation with the school\u2019s name? Being associated with\u00a0Croft School is what classifies these students as elite. Alejandro\u00a0expressed the pressure he feels from his parents to succeed in school and attend a quality university. Graduating from Croft School, being attached to the school\u2019s name will strengthen the student\u2019s applications and increase the likelihood of being accepted into an elite university. Influenced by the social pressure they feel from their parents and peers, students may be easily manipulated to blindly follow the school\u2019s values without considering if the school\u2019s principles align with their own morals.![](\"https:\/\/media3.giphy.com\/media\/13gMTaTlgkO6Pu\/200w.gif#59\")
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In Alejandro’s opinion, it is not just himself and his classmates who are affected by the threat of punishment, but also the teachers. When asked to describe a typical teacher at his school, Alejandro\u00a0characterized the educator as \u201creally worried\u201d about getting in trouble themselves. In this student\u2019s opinion, the typical teacher at Croft School\u00a0is more focused on avoiding punishment from the school than they are with being nice and talking to their students. However, Alejandro did not elaborate on\u00a0the type of punishment the teachers could face.<\/p>\n
Throughout my conduction of research on Croft School\u00a0and elite schools in general, I have learned that it is important to approach the practices of the school with a critical lens. Interviewing a student who holds some negative views about his own school provides ample opportunity to do so, and provides Alejandro with an outlet to express his unfiltered beliefs (something you know this student may need if you read my last blog<\/a> on pastoral care).<\/p>\n\n Over the past month, my research team has been conducting interviews with a student, Alejandro, who attends Croft School. He provides us with first-hand accounts of what it\u2019s like to attend a globally elite institution. The student was very vocal throughout the three interviews and was not afraid to disclose his true feelings about Croft […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6780,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"builder_content":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/global-elites\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1305"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/global-elites\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/global-elites\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/global-elites\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/6780"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/global-elites\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1305"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/global-elites\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1305\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1594,"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/global-elites\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1305\/revisions\/1594"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/global-elites\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1305"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/global-elites\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1305"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/global-elites\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1305"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}\n <\/div>\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"