True Motivation for Initially Attending College, Essay Example

My true motivation for attending college is to have the ability to work a high paying job after I graduate. However, since I’m in the beginning of my education, a secondary goal is to define what I want to do for a living. I’m hoping that the college courses I take will help me identify my strengths and weaknesses and how I can incorporate this knowledge into a career. Credentialism is an emphasis on credentials such as degrees, grades, courses taken, and experience as selection criteria for hiring employees or assigning job tasks. Credentialism has contributed to my motivation because it appears to be impossible to truly succeed without accumulation of the necessary credentials. I’m in college primarily to receive a Bachelor’s degree because many jobs believe that this is a credential of primary importance.

Schools transmit culture because they instill values in their students. Different schools emphasize different aspects of socialization and emphasis on learning that attendees are likely to incorporate as their own culture and carry with them throughout life.

The teacher-expectancy effect demonstrates that teachers typically get what they expect from their students. As a consequence, it is occasionally essential to set high expectations. Symbolic interactionists believe that people act towards things based on the meanings that they have for them. Therefore, these individuals would view teacher-expectancy as an effective method if the teacher is able to give his or students a meaning for succeeding in their studies. A useful way to do this is to determine why the students are there and to allude to this purpose throughout their studies.

Teachers and other students label students while students primarily label their teachers. Students acquire labels based on classroom interactions that are viewed as different from others. Examples of this includes the “bad” student who talks out against the teacher and the “teacher’s pets” who always raise their hands. Teachers and administrators acquire labels from student gossip. This typically characterizes their classes as difficult or easy, and their personalities as mean or nice.