Rhetorical Analysis Of I Just Wanna Be Average

J.M. Power always says, “If you want to make your dreams come true, the first thing you have to do is wake up.” And just like the quote portrays, Mike Rose’s essay “I Just Wanna Be Average” demonstrates his true realization as he experiences the importance of his education. By using a rhetorical device like aporia, as well as literary devices like pathos and ethos, Rose proves that everyone in society has a habit of overlooking the potential of students based upon their abilities, which can in turn affect the student’s behavior towards school. Throughout Rose’s experience with his misplacement in the vocational education, Rose demonstrates the use of aporia. Aporia is a type of rhetorical device that expresses a form of doubt or hesitation. …show more content…
This created a controversy on whether or not Rose should mention it to the school board; however, he put himself in Tommy Rose’s shoes and asks himself, “[…] how would someone like Tommy Rose, with his two years of Italian schooling, know what to ask? (1). At that point, he starts to feel sympathetic for the guy as well as hesitant to take a class that is not meant for him. But because of his kind nature, he decided to remain in the vocational education track and endure what it is to be thrown at him. On Rose’s third year of high school, the error in his placement test created multiple hesitations for Rose as his superiors tell him to switch from the vocational program to the college prep program. The shift from “a dumping group for the disaffected” to a college prep program “was a mixed blessing” and well-known to be “virtually impossible” (2, 2, 4). This is because, at the time, it is very rare to have a student to …show more content…
He explains how he overcomes and makes the best of the situation that he has enrolled in as well as explains how the teachers in vocational track “had no idea how to engage the imaginations of [them] who were scuttling along at the bottom of the pond” (2). Because the students lack the knowledge and encouragement from teachers in the vocational program, it influences their learning abilities. This is because as students see how teachers put no effort into the school’s curriculum, they are influenced by their “role model” teachers; therefore, they, too, would not care much for their education. Mike Rose shows that in his two years in vocational education, he “developed further into a mediocre student and a somnambulant problem solver as [he] fooled around in class and read [his] books indifferently,” meaning that he would read his books without paying attention to any of the meaning or even the purpose of reading the book. (2) So, with children in the program where no teachers care enough to engage them into education, their learning abilities that is supposedly building in high school would be lacking in the future, causing the students to be incapable of succeeding in life. In Mike Rose’s personal experience with the credibility of his teachers that he has come across, he also experiences a

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Rhetorical Analysis Of I Just Wanna Be Average

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