Paper #2 Mr. Escalante vs Mr. Keating Paper (draft)

This is a comparison of Mr. Keating and Mr. Escalante.

I originally believed that Mr. Keating is the better teacher because he works continually to bring up the students to his level without causing undue stress on the students. In the following paper I will examine the differences between the teachers and explain why I now think that Mr. Escalante is the better teacher.

To begin with Mr. Keating and Mr. Escalante came from two different cultures.  Although Mr. Keating may not have come from a well off family, as this is not addressed in the film, his family had enough money to send him to a private boarding school.  The school Mr. Keating attended was Welton Academy a boys preparatory school. Private schools give the students the opportunity to focus on school work thereby giving students a chance to excel.  Mr. Keating is hired by Welton Academy to teach english.  Mr. Keating being an alumnus of the school is accepted by the staff at Welton Academy at first.  Mr. Escalante comes from Bolivia and was poor growing up, he makes a comment in the film that he washed dishes when he first came in to the United States.  Mr. Escalante is hired to teach computer science at Garfield High School.  When Mr. Escalante arrives at the school he finds that there are no computers in the school to teach computer science with.  Mr. Escalante is then assigned by the mathematics department chair person to teach mathematics.

There are many different aspects to the methods of teaching that Mr. Keating and Mr. Escalante use.  Firstly the language is different. Mr. Keating inspires and brings students up to his level using his style of language and eloquence.  Mr. Escalante uses the slang language of the students to pull the students along.  This probably makes it a little easier for him to fit in with the students, and be accepted by them, as we see in the film that the other teachers do not do this.

Both Mr. Keating and Mr. Escalante involve themselves in the personal life of their students. For Mr. Keating it was with Neil and Todd.  In the case of Todd it was to help him to bring poetry to life.  In the case with Neil it was coaching him to deal with his father.  For Mr. Escalante it was primarily Ana, Angel, and Poncho. In the case of Ana it was going to the restaurant to talk to her father and make the case for her to come back to school.  In the case of Angel it was helping him to learn while at the same time hiding his desire to be better academically.  In the case of Poncho it was to help him to realize that if he desired to he could succeed at doing high level mathematics just like the other kids in his class.

Both teachers push their students to excel.  Mr. Escalante devotes a lot of time and energy in the classroom focusing on Math and then Calculus. Mr. Escalante tries to bring math to life for the students by cutting up apples for fractions and using word problems involving humorous things the kids can understand.  Mr. Keating devotes time in and out of the classroom focusing on poetry, but involving physical skills to make the poetry more of a living thing in their mind. Using walking to illustrate how hard it is to be independent in thought when with others. Mr. Keating used kicking balls and other activities while reading poetry to help make the poetry more alive for them, making it a fun activity instead of a function in academics.

The way Mr. Escalante teaches and what he is trying to accomplish is very stressful to him, eventually leading him to have a mild heart attack.  He teaches the students that they do not have to just exist in the barrio continuing the status quo, they can also achieve great things if they put their minds to it.  The way that Mr. Keating teaches is light hearted as he teaches the students to express themselves and live life to the fullest and not to just accept what is handed to them, to have a questioning attitude.

Both teachers want to give back to the students, by that I mean that they are both successful academically and they want to help the students become successful also.  Mr. Escalante was apparently poor growing up and came back to teach to help the minorities living there to achieve.  Mr. Keating was an alumnus of the school and he wanted to give the joy of poetry and life to the students, knowing the dreariness that existed in the school's curriculum and their methods of teaching in the school.

Both teachers fought or challenged the schools administration or institution.  Mr. Escalante because he believed the students could achieve if they were shown that there was an expectation that could achieve.  Mr. Keating was unorthodox in his teaching methods challenging the academic mediocrity or lifelessness of what was expected of him in the classroom and out of it.

Both teachers had to deal with parents that wanted to restrict the kids to the status quo, however Mr. Keating left the issue completely up to the student(s) to solve with the parents.  This may have been to help them grow as individuals.

In the end after analyzing the individual characteristics I would say that both teachers are good teachers, but I would say that Mr. Escalante is a great teacher.  He works very hard to help the students to succeed and expects the students to work hard which they do.  Mr. Escalante gets the students to achieve things they did not believe they were capable of.  Mr. Keating gets the kudos for helping the students to enjoy school more but I'm not sure how much he helped to improve them academically.  We are shown in the movie that the kids are enjoying themselves but not that they are excelling.  That I think is the key difference. You compare academic skills versus happiness.  You can be happy being a ditch digger if you enjoy it, you cannot be happy being a mathematician if you don't know math.