Sources of Power

One relationship that I have had in the past would be with my teacher. I feel that many times none the less we find ourselves in situations where students do hold some power, especially in high school classrooms. In particular I do remember that in my AP Government class the teacher had basically given a majority of the power to the students. His main objective for us was that at the end of the year we would all choose to take the AP exam on our own because we felt so confident in the material. Thus, I remember in particular that during the first week of class he had all of us students write up the syllabus; adding in exams, quizzes, presentations, and two topics that should be covered during the year. This alone seemed like a lot of power for high school students at the time. However looking back on the situation it is interesting to see how little power did have. He had given us a strict number of quizzes, tests and presentations to insert into the syllabus. Therefore it is interesting because in a way we were given power to accommodate to our own schedules on when we wanted to have these things, but at the same time the power was very limited because we were not given full authority or control over what we wanted on the syllabus. It was also very interesting because every group that was assigned to create this syllabus still did not always get what they wanted because once we had filled out when we wanted to do things, the teacher had taken dates in the similar time frame and modified the due dates for each of the assignments.

Another thing that really sticks out to me in this situation is the distribution of power. Each group was given the ability to make changes and do what they wanted to, however, the ultimate source of power was still held by the professor. We as students were able to change the outcome of when we wanted to have certain things during the upcoming year, but in the end we also would ultimately be the ones deciding whether or not we wanted to take the AP exam at the end of the day. This distribution of power in a way had a shift over the course of the year. Although he may have accommodated to our schedules and we may have had the opportunity to learn everything in a timely fashion to feel confident to take the AP exam at the end of the year, we as students were the ones who would choose whether we would sit for the exam or not. Even if we were prepared, we had the ability to not take the exam. It was never made a requirement from the beginning; thus, we at the end of the day had a lot of say in the class because the whole purpose of taking an AP course is to sit for the exam, regardless of the structure of the class. I think that in the end our source of power came from the teacher, however over the course of the year, the power was switched to us, because the more students who took the test the better the professor looked in the eyes of the board of education and the school, and ultimately that decision was up to the students.