For the entire history of American education, the gates to knowledge and power were kept closed from any minority, the key to which lies in teaching texts that students find accessible and relatively easy to understand. In the framework of American education lie the white, Anglosaxon forefathers who created institutions designed to benefit and propagate their ideas for generations to come. This framework still upholds American education. Its reflection lies in the pool of literature taught to secondary students throughout the country. Modern educational theory argues that students learn best when they are able to connect to instructed texts. The gap between the educational theory of the importance of student connection and the reality of the literature taught in American secondary schools begs for reexamination. While students are often blamed for the achievement gap, new insight examines how the system in place disenfranchises students from education
