My Promise to the Working Class

Let this be a promise, put in writing, that I will not abandon my people for the sake of my own success. I will not buy into these ideas of higher education being about research, individual successes, and how much I can cram into my curriculum Vitae. Instead, I promise to use my education to better the lives of others. To reach out to those who are most like me, living working-class lives, experiencing discrimination in multiple forms, and teach them to better understand their predicament, how to get out of it (if they so desire), and how to help others.

I do not aspire to be a published, well-known professor at a well-known research institution. I do not seek to only further my own research interests, and the research interests of other detached, highly educated, impersonal scholars. Instead, I want my research to speak to people, everyday people. I want my research to tell a story that ALL can understand, not only those with status initials at the end of their name.

Let me remember, at the end of this ordeal, where I come from and where it is I desire to go at this very moment. Let me remember that sociology is about helping those in need, creating social change for the better, and that it is not about the fattening of my personal pocketbook.