For all those who have written essays, have you enjoyed them or dreaded them? Me personally I feel as I am part of the latter, I dread the concept of writing one. It feels as if I would just lose point on the small mistakes such as grammatical errors and word choice and won’t fit the premise of what the teacher would want. What does the teacher want, standard English. I always wondered why this was stress in school and if people could still understand what I had to say, why is it wrong? This is a common problem for Caribbean immigrant children in school environments which leads to underperforming in them. This is why schools should allow for other forms of English in school environments and how it is a good thing to allow for diversity.

People often associate proficiency in English with their quality as a person. They are viewed as unprofessional or undervalued in society. It is not the case all the time and should never really be correlated. People can have something important or significant to say, but are discriminate or not given a chance due to how they speak. It even stated in a study by university students from 2017 that, “Discrimination disproportionately affects Black students in K-12 schools across the United States, with 87% to 94% of Black adolescents reporting experiencing discrimination of some sort from their teachers within the past 3 months to 1 year”(“Perceived 1488). Having limited chances in schools to perform in early stages of school can stunt growth and development in students. I along with many other black students can relate to this claim since it can be shown by teachers having a hard time understanding you, or giving you limited chances. Other Black students have also reported that they’re, “being graded unfairly, discouraged from joining advanced level courses, ignored when they raised their hands, receiving more teacher referrals, subjected to harsher punishments, viewed as dishonest, threatening or of inferior character, accused of cheating, frequently searched for weapons and drugs, and held to lower academic expectations” which isn’t true for most students (Perceived 1488). Being associated to lowered expectations based upon english proficiency is not acceptable for students in these age groups. This treatment is associated with the concept of standard english and how it is normalized in schools as the status quo. This mindset is also prevalent outside of the classroom through assumptions and stereotypes. Even the daughter of a mother can claim that, “[their] mother’s “limited” English limited my perception of her. [she] was ashamed of her English. [she] believed that her English reflected the quality of what she had to say”(Tan 2). People often fall to that assumptions since they assume that the person would understand most things since they have not taken their time to “perfect” their english. The concept of standard english clouds and narrows people’s mind to believe that this is the only way to speak english and every other option is considered invalid in professional and academic standings. Language is sometimes deemed to be revolved about standard English and diversity isn’t always promoted in school environments. This shouldn’t be the case, people shouldn’t throw away their native language to assimilate with American people. We should be embracing diversity, not shunning it.

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