Father of a 7th grader is shocked when his son’s school homework assignment consists of reading Tupac Shakur’s poem.
A 7th graders father, Alex Preston, took to Reddit and shared his son’s school assignment. Assigned by his 7th grader’s middle school English teacher, students were asked to read Tupac’s poem The Rose that Grew from Concrete.
Along with the reading of Tupac’s most popular poem, the teacher asked her students to dive further into Shakur’s writing. “This is a metaphor. Tupac isn’t really talking about a rose. What is he talking about?,” read the screenshot of the shared assignment on Reddit.
Tupac’s influence continues despite his early demise more than 26 years ago. Known for his story-telling raps, Tupac was also a poet at heart. Writing his first poem at a young age, Tupac always felt that was indeed his first rap ever written.
Thirteen years after his tragic passing, a collection of Tupac’s poetry was released. The Rose that Grew from Concrete, is a 72 poem collection of deeply personal poetry is a mirror into the legendary artist’s enigmatic world and its many contradictions, all hand written from the time he was nineteen.
Preston’s reaction to his son being taught Tupac in school in Dallas-Fort Worth, Texas, was both “surprised” and “excited.” “Tupac was everywhere when I was in high school and while I was a huge fan, my parents/teachers/etc were not so thrilled with the example they believed him to be setting,” Preston told Newsweek. “Flash forward a quarter-century and his lyrics are now being taught in school.”
“Tupac passed more than a decade before my son was even born, so he’s only aware of him as a ‘historical figure’ and isn’t familiar with his music at all; the wife and I were far more excited about this than he was,” he added. “I think the broader culture has turned a corner on rap and is far more likely to see it as legitimate music, and I (along with many other Redditors) were appreciative to see that represented on a middle schooler’s homework.”
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