Part 1:

After about 24 hours of community engagement at the Koreatown Youth and

Community Center, I have caught a glimpse of the educational disparities that are likely

present in many parts of the US through the context of Los Angeles.

The most important insight I learned about which I have not thought thoroughly is how

vast the spectrum of student abilities could be. The most notable observation I made

throughout my time at KYCC was that students exhibited academic abilities from being able

to keep up with class material, to not being able to perform basic mathematic operations or

not being literate in third grade. A factor that I failed to consider in most of the time I was at

KYCC was how much the COVID-19 pandemic could have affected these students’ learning,

as remote learning reasonably set back many student’s grasp of academic content.

KYCC, as an NGO, helps local K-12 students through an afterschool program that includes

homework help, academic and social enrichment activities that encourage diversity and

inclusion. In the context of CESC, this organization does not offer solutions to upstream

conditions, though it has evidently built a welcoming community for students who use the

service. From my observations, I presume KYCC does not aim to resolve upstream issues in

the framework of educational disparities; instead, they offer a space for academic help and

socialization, which does not overall contribute to eliminating educational disparity.

Inspired by my time with KYCC and the course content of CESC 50XP, I further learned

about how educational disparities could stem from racism in my research paper. The

students at KYCC were majority Latinx and thus have historically been a target of

discrimination and racism, thus, it is entirely possible that this is the reason some students

experience setbacks in their academics.

Additionally, from my time at KYCC, I have learned that I do not dislike working with

young children as I thought I did. I started working at KYCC fearing that I would not have a

pleasant experience due to previous experiences working with children. It turns out, children
are often some of the most genuine people around, and I often found myself forgetting

about the burden of my own academic obligations while interacting with the children at

KYCC.

Part 2:

Looking back at my Week 1 writing assignment where I identified my learning goals for

this course, I could confidently say that I met and exceeded my learning goals. I enrolled in

CESC 50XP hoping to learn from classmates of diverse backgrounds and learn about the

inequalities of Los Angeles, enriched by experiences of my peers and instructors.

In section, I learned about how my classmate’s father was deported back to Mexico

after an arrest for a minor traffic crime, I learned about my Japanese international classmate

who was reminded of the 2011 earthquake in Japan after the recent Turkey-Syria

earthquake, among many others. Connecting the dots between the diverse backgrounds and

experiences of my section peers and the conditions that cause inequality, my understanding

of the inequalities of Los Angeles lectured by Professor Staub and taught by course readings

were greatly enriched.

In my learning goals assignment, I wrote that great understanding of a topic is marked

by being able to hold a long, sophisticated discussion about said topic. From my time in CESC

50XP, I have learned, to the greatest extent relative to other topics, the conditions that

shape educational disparities in Los Angeles, to where I could discuss the topic in a

sophisticated manner, as I have done with my peers in section.

Part 3:

Sociological imagination is a central concept of CESC 50XP. The concept, coined by

sociologist C. Wright Mills, essentially means connecting the social and personal aspects of

an individual when evaluating a social issue. A learning goal of the course was to be able to

apply a sociological imagination to all types of social inequality; throughout the course, we
focused on applying sociological imagination on each social inequality included in the

syllabus that was investigated in class.

The most memorable example of applying sociological imagination that I learned from

the course was through guest speaker Theodore Henderson’s presentation. Henderson is an

unhoused activist who started and runs the podcast We The Unhoused, which focuses on

highlighting the experiences of unhoused Angelenos. As many would perceive houselessness

as merely another issue to solve, Henderson offered an important perspective that many

forget that unhoused individuals are human beings with a world of experiences and

unfortunate circumstances that led them to become unhoused. Through Henderson’s

presentation, I started to think more critically of houselessness, and began to connect

preexisting conditions leading to houselessness with the individual experiences of those that

are unhoused. We also learned from Henderson that in many cases, houseless individuals

have had devastating and unpreventable life changing events, such as terminal illness of a

family member or car accident, that led to their becoming unhoused; in most cases, no one

is to blame when an individual is unhoused, as many would think otherwise.

Through my community engagement with the Koreatown Youth and Community Center,

I also applied sociological imagination on the elementary school students with whom I

worked. The observation from my community engagement at KYCC that stood out to me is

how seemingly behind the students were. Applying sociological imagination, I thought about

educational disparity in the context of the backgrounds and experiences of the students,

which was the topic of my investigation in my research paper. In my paper, I explored familial

racial background as a factor affecting students’ education. In doing so, I connected

individual students’ experiences to the social inequality they experience.

Through the community engagement and guest speakers of CESC 50XP, I have learned

to think critically about social inequalities. Social inequalities are often thought in a single

dimension; by applying sociological imagination, the multidimensional nature of all social

inequalities become more apparent, and, as a result, upstream conditions and possible

resolutions to these inequalities surface.

Part 4:
Through my experiences in CESC 50XP, I was prompted to think critically about social

inequalities in the context of Los Angeles. Along with a deeper understand of looming social

inequalities and injustices, I have also thought about possible solutions, especially in

educational inequalities, focusing on upstream conditions. Educational inequalities are a

gear in the engine of financial trouble, so eliminating educational inequalities is important

for improving the economic conditions of many communities in Los Angeles.

In the realm of educational disparities, the main goal I believe needs to be reached to

solve disparities is achieving equal opportunities for all students (or, at the very least, a

baseline quality of education that each student can expect to receive) that provides a sturdy

foundation leading into higher education. This could be done through pushing for the

government to redistribute funding to prioritize school districts that are less affluent, to

provide for more opportunities and better education for students. In a similar vein, providing

job opportunities within less affluent communities could also encourage long-term growth

of the community financially and therefore growth in local educational quality as well. These

solutions focus on upstream conditions—instead of directly helping students with academics

or directly creating opportunities for students, these proposed solutions tackle issues that

lead to these inequalities in the first place.