Anatomy of a Model Student: Personal Educational Empowerment for Change, Growth, and Knowledge

By Dr.Tyrone Bennett

The attempts of fixing our nations school system since 1964 have not been a walk in the park. Several legislations and laws have been reformed to improve ways to implement the improvement plans in our school system. Looking back at the anatomy of our education system in the last fifty years brings up very few solutions as to what direction is righteously affordable for the next generation. Whether you talk about equality of education or legislation for the common standards for K12, what really matters is how well our next generation of youth is ready for the twenty-first-century workforce and/or college pathways.
This book was written on behalf of students, teachers, and parents, who lack the understanding, guidance, stability, and hope in the twenty-first-century educational system. This is a system of turmoil. We have seen changes over the last fifty years, yet millions of students from elementary to freshmen year in college are suffering academically. Many are failing, and few are making the grade. Our nation ranks below the top 20 worldwide in math and science, and we are not moving fast enough to change it.

It is very important to note that students of all ages can benefit from this book to improve their education and get the much-needed support academically through counseling and mentoring. Parents and students need advisement. Students need to know what tools are available to succeed in their academic affairs, and parents need to know if those tools are adequate. Education is the key for success, and perseverance unlocks the door. This book opens the door to a rewarding career and best decision making for a prosperous future and allows students to grasp a better understanding of what it means to be educated. This book gives the essence of where we were and where we are headed. Many students dont know how to study and lack the understanding of why reading is important. Millions of students come to school with raw minds and starving brains. This book looks at the mind of a teenager and the brain. In this book, youll learn about proper nutrition that will enhance the mind and spark the thinking cells. As you read this guide, you will learn more and more answers to readiness for the twenty-first-century workplace and the needed skills to succeed. Anatomy of a Model Student dares to speak out on whats wrong with todays youth and behavior issues that hinder learning. This book is the bible of educational fitness for parents and educators alike. It will empower, encourage, and mesmerize its readers, so please read it to be wise, practice it to be educated.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Sep 24, 2015
• ISBN: 9781514410042

Dr.Tyrone Bennett

Dr. Bennett has over twenty-five years’ experience as a research engineer, educator, author, and infrastructure technologist and over fourteen years’ experience as an administrator of science and technology programs at Stony Brook, Hofstra, and City Universities. As a student advocate, Dr. Bennett received several awards, including the Black Men of Distinction Award from NYS Senate and the First Junior Goodwill Ambassador from the Better World JL Institute. He was also selected in Who’s Who in America 2005 Almanac. He has been nominated for the 2012–2013 Who’s Who in North America Almanac for Educators and received the 2011 City University of New York’s Chancellor Award. Dr. Bennett and a team of aerospace engineers were invited by Congress in 2013 to lobby against needless reform in education and promote STEM. He also presented research topics on science and technology to government officials in Washington DC, New York State, the Department of Defense US Military, and the National American Council of Education, just to name a few. Dr. Bennett has been an active member of a few organizations: member of the Board of Directors for the City University of New York, University Transportation Research Center, certified lobbyist for Stony Brook University and Long Island for the Association of Program Administrators for CSTEP and STEP (APACS), American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA) passport for future teacher, and program and judge/host at the Johns Hopkins University Annual AIAA Region 1 Young Professional, Students and Education (YPSE) Conference. He authored three novels and currently is working on an academic textbook about bridge design through math infusion for elementary, middle school, and high school students. It is Dr. Bennett’s goal to teach students the importance of math and science in their lives and to produce scientists, engineers, and math and health science professionals in the twenty-first century for New York State and the country. Dr. Bennett studied manufacturing engineering of electronic materials at Polytechnic University and holds a bachelor’s degree in mechanical engineering from SUNY Institute of Technology in Utica, New York; a master’s of science degree in technology management from Stony Brook University; and a doctor of education from St. John’s University School of Education for Leadership and Accountability, Administration, and Supervision. Currently, Dr. Bennett is executive director of Math-Infusion, LLC; educator for the Wyandanch School District, Long Island, New York; educational researcher and former director of College Now, and director of high schools/college collaborations at the City University of New York LaGuardia Community College. He was overseer of thirty-one high schools in Queens, New York, where juniors and seniors have the opportunity to take college-level credit-bearing courses through a program called College Now. He was the liaison for the early college program at middle college and international high schools and was principal investigator for three grant programs, including Upward Bound, STEP, and LSAMP. He served as member of the University Transportation Research Center board of directors at City University of New York,City College

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Copyright © 2015 by Dr. Tyrone Bennett.

Library of Congress Control Number:   2015915740

ISBN:      Hardcover      978-1-5144-1006-6

                Softcover        978-1-5144-1005-9

                eBook             978-1-5144-1004-2

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright owner.

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Thinkstock are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

Certain stock imagery © Thinkstock.

Rev. date: 10/07/2015

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Contents

Fifty Years of Academic Improvement

Definitions of Major Terms

You Are What You Eat

The Triple F Effect

What’s Common about CCSS?

References

Dedication

To my children—Kiah, Tyler, Tristan, and Jayden

Acknowledgment

With great honor and love to the late Mr. John La Corte, Italian historian and businessman who took me under his wings and mentored me for nearly ten years in the mid-’80s and early ’90s. His instructions, letters, stewardship, and godfather approach were a key factor in my years as the first model student leading up to that honorable day in June 1984 in New York City Hall, under the late mayor Ed Koch, when he appointed me president of the Model Student Clubs of America from the Better World JL Institute. It gave me the fortitude and tenacity to be all that I could be and never lose focus on being the best. To him I shall always remember and love with all my heart.

To Mrs. Linda Siegmund, principal of Middle College High School in Long Island City, New York, who was the first school building administrator to give me the opportunity to teach her students on STEM and lecture toward college pathways. I thank you. May God bless you and the class of 2015.

To Chris Galbraith and John Neidecker for believing in me during those few years in school, long nights at the depot and after the loss of my older brother Calvin, I say thanks for keeping me well grounded and not allowing me to quit from completing my goals.

Finally to my mother, Janie Bennett, and brother, Steven Little Rock, who kept me grounded and never allowed me to move or think without giving honor and thanks to God. I thank you, Mom, for whom and what you are, not just in words but your years of many deeds. Love for all seasons.

Thanks to my step father, Mr. Everett pop Fortune for being such a great example of a good father.

Anatomy of a Model Student

Personal Educational Empowerment for Change, Growth, and Knowledge

Practical precepts and concepts that students, teachers, and parents can use that can assist in their dealings with life and societal problems during the twenty-first century as students pursue their educational goals

Preface

This book is designed to assist students, teachers, and/or parents who lack the needed guidance, stability, and hope during the turmoil of being subjected to the candid world of academia. In addition, this book can be used as a service guide to navigate you through the school systems and things to know that would empower you when needed. It can also be used as a prelude for students in any level beyond elementary. It is very important to note that students of all ages can benefit from this book. The information could help to improve their education and get you the much-needed support academically. We can lead you toward school counsel, mentoring, and advisement needed to succeed in your children’s academic affairs.

Education is the key, and guidance opens the door. Education can open the door to a rewarding career and best decision making for a prosperous future and allow students to grasp a better understanding of what it means to be educated and to know that they have been educated. According to Webster, the word guidance means to give advice or information to resolve a problem or difficulty. We attempted to do just that in this book. We will give you advice and help you resolve problems that are hindering you and/or your children from academic success.

Personal Empowerment Exercise Formula

Here is an exercise you can do to get started in this quest for empowerment. List your strengths and weaknesses. If your strengths are more than your weaknesses, then that number should be used to spend the amount of time to get rid of your weaknesses. For example, if you listed ten strengths and three weaknesses, then it should take you ten hours per week to get rid of your weakness. Don’t knock it until you try it. If your weaknesses outnumber your strengths, then you must take that number and work on increasing your strengths daily and getting rid of those weaknesses. Sooner than later, your weaknesses will be eliminated. This may seem like extra work on top of your daily lives and routines; but if you are serious about empowering yourself for change, growth, and being successful, you must take this guidance seriously and believe with your heart, soul, and mind. It is not every day that you meet someone who has 100 percent strength in all that he or she does, but once a weakness is developed during the course of life, we must revert to eliminating it as quickly as possible to reach fulfillment in the quest for success and personal empowerment. The information given in this book could help you for life and give you a better academic support in approaching your study goals and skills.

The word model means a three-dimensional representation of a person. Hence, the term model student in the title of this book, Anatomy of a Model Student, is one who has the power to be archetypal so others can learn from him or her and be exemplary in their tasks.

I often tell students that no one knows you better than you. Parents might know their kids, but the reality is that students too often like to make up their minds about tasks and do what it is they want to do but fail to see the importance of staying on top of the task to see it through successfully. Case in point, when a student is supposed to be studying for an exam or test, how many times do we find this student cram for his or her exam and rarely prepare properly? According to the Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development (ASCD), many students develop poor habits and set bad behaviors. As authors of Habits of Mind, the ASCD has developed sixteen icons that spell out the habits set by student behavior. The ASCD contends that students need to practice these habits in order to be successful in a classroom environment. For the purpose of this book, we are going to look at six of the sixteen habits of mind indicators, namely,

1. Persisting

2. Listening with understanding and empathy

3. Thinking and communicating with clarity and precision

4. Thinking interdependently

5. Finding humor

6. Remaining open to continuous learning

These six habits of mind, I find, are essential to students and adult learners as they encounter these habits in a learning environment. The other ten are nothing to look down upon, but these are much more to the scope of this book than the others. As educators, we must provide opportunities for these students to plan for, have access to, and reflect on their thoughts and explicitly be aware of how important it is to be able to think and do it logically.

This model described and created by ASCD gives us the opportunity to be the stimuli for student development. All students learn differently and come from a variety of backgrounds. Schools should continue, as they are mandated to, to collect data on their students as they relate these habits should they pursue further analysis or assessment in their school districts.

Persisting

It is often said that winners never quit and quitters never win. Although this may be true, everyone is given a second chance to improve his or her performance. A second chance is given mostly by those who can be persistent in their efforts toward success. If you cannot activate your will to want to do something productive, you will not succeed no matter the urge and time spent. Being persistent is fundamental after the start. How often do we find students start a goal plan and then stop that goal plan because of something like a boyfriend, a girlfriend, money, bad friends, bad choices, procrastination, or the like, which kept them from staying focus?

Trust me, we all have been there at some point in our lives. Life does get in the way, but it is important to know that nothing from nothing leaves simply nothing, am I right? However, if you start from nothing into something, then make the best of it so your time isn’t wasted. Remember, if you waste time, it is just as bad as annihilating the efforts of progress; so don’t start an objective or task for success and then stop or quit before the success train arrives. If you oblige yourself to this failure preference, then you are just as bad as the next procrastinator who wakes up in the early morning hour saying, I’m going to go to the baseball field and do the best sports performance for the team possible but never turned in his or her try-out application.

If you are going to be anything, be persistent and see how far progress can make your day much more profitable, but never allow negativity rascals put you off your objective goal plans. It can cost you a lot of money and time and, more importantly, your life will be wasted, and you will not achieve success. Many students drop out of schools, whether middle, junior, or high school. In the year 2012 statistics, more than 1.5 million students drop out of high school in the United States each year. This is very disturbing, but more importantly, it shows how many students aren’t persistent in their objective goal plans. Yes, people do have very circumstances that lead to them to drop out of school, and we do know there are many levels and issues out there that could be justified. However, young people in this country often feel they are in the know-it-all mode. Listen, only a fool would say, given the choice for survival, I’d rather drink a tall glass of liquor each day for four years than a glass of water. Many young people strongly feel they know more than the senior citizens, older adults, and those who have over sixteen years of education under their belt. Have you ever heard of students who are very outspoken and talk back harshly to their parents and older adults? Many of these students are just wet behind the ears, so to speak, and haven’t experienced life as we know it, but they can tell you all about the world and its problems they can solve. Young people must understand the simple things in the realm of common sense, and they are the following:

• Listening vs. hearing

• Age group and generation gaps

• Knowledge vs. intelligent base

• Wisdom and knowledge

Listening with Understanding and Empathy

The problem we see among thousands of young people is that they don’t know the difference between listening and hearing when a command is given to them for either instruction or statements to support their desires. Listen, according to the dictionary, means to pay attention or take note. The key words

Reviews for Anatomy of a Model Student

[Heber Mendoza Figueroa · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

it opens up my view to another way od looking at thing.