Even though ideally Americans feel like we are all equal, that doesn't mean we have equal opportunities. This is very evident when it comes to education. Although not limited to it, most of our future careers and life experiences will be some sort of outcome of our education, and while it should be equally provided to everyone, it's not. With the upper-class, many wealthy parents can afford to send their children to private and boarding schools, and they can even afford to send them to study abroad or on educational trips. Even with public schools, the quality of resources and amount of teachers available differs depending on the area. Our school is a great example of a school that has ample resources for our students, but we have to realize that not even all of the schools right next to our area have some of the resources we have. In regards to the middle class, they can also typically afford to choose which area to move to in order to provide their child with a good school district,and they typically can afford private tutoring as well. This isn't the case with the lower class, however, as they don't have the luxury to always choose where they want to live or afford any extra help for their child's education. And city public schools are notorious for having lack of efficient resources, possibly affecting how students feel about school and education in general, and even for those who do wish to do well in school don't get an equal quality of education. This is in the long-run can greatly affect the outcomes of children coming from different classes. Although there are always exceptions, school's with more status tend to aid students while planning on which college to attend, while students from other schools may have to try even harder in order to stand out in a school that isn't as well-known. Paying for college tuition also prevents many from even the middle-class from attending their ideal college, even with the possibility of receiving scholarships (which ties back to having to work even harder to earn those), while the upper-class don't necessarily have to worry about scholarships and paying for tuition.

It was interesting to learn about the different agents of socialization as I always thought of things associated with gender, school, and even media as common knowledge. However, I was able to learn that there is actually a difference in the way to view "gender" and how it differs with "sex" and "sexual orientation." It was a new perspective to think about how the students involved in the panel described their experience of not following the social norm of gender. Another new perspective I had was with media. I thought I was aware of how it affected people, and I never thought of it much because it never directly affected me as I'm not too concerned about how it defines beauty. But it was interesting to reflect on how it's affecting possibly other people, especially with younger children. Another agent of socialization that I never really thought about before was with gender and school. Even though I witness it everyday, I've never really reflected on how different genders are treated differently, whether it be intentional or not. It was interesting to see how gender roles in general were portrayed in society because I never realized how media shaped males and expectations to them, so it was interesting to see something from their point of view as well.

It was interesting to read the various articles on different views on parenting and how that differently affects the future generation. Although there were many aspects of the "Nation of Whimps" article that I agreed with, such as kids are becoming more and more reliant on their parents and less likely to deal with pressures of becoming an adult due to parents being overprotective, some of the evidence used in it was also very extreme cases. The same also goes for the "7 Things" parenting article as although I agree with some points such as over-encouraging kids even when they are wrong, there are also some extreme cases that can go either way depending on the context/extreme such as the let your kid "be who they want to be" regardless of what others may think. The "Tiger Mom" article especially stuck out and connected with me though because I related to this style of parenting the most. Not to be steriotypical, but as my parents were both Asian, they're very strict and hold traditional values. Although they weren't as extreme as to not let me join sports teams or have sleepovers or what-not, they did in fact value school-work and responsibilities the highest. When I was younger and didn't do a homework assignment due to playing with my friends instead, my mom got angry and didn't let me have a birthday party even when it was only in elementary school. I was also forced to practice the piano and even would hide my books because I would get sick of practicing. But the work ethic they raised me up with has certainly been beneficial, and they've supported me with things that I actually wanted to do as well, so I definitely see the value in this style of parenting as well. Overall, there's some aspects of either parenting style that work well, and some that can be too extreme, but it was interesting to see just how vast the contrast was in some cases.