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Articles Conference Reviews |
2007A25GlennonA.25: "Locating The Scholar Among The Grading Stacks: A Response To The TYCA Document 'Research And Scholarship In The Two Year College'” Chair: Nell Ann Pickett Bradley Bleck: “Engaging Scholars and Scholarship in the Blogosphere” The first speaker, Bradley Bleck, had changed his topic. Today he was presenting on “ePortfolios in Washington State Community and Technical Colleges: One CC’s Pilot Project”. This was a little disappointing, and turned out to have little to do with the TYCA statement or blogs. He announced at the start that the PowerPoint show he was using today would be available on his blog: http://bleckblog.org. He talked about the eportfolio system being implemented at 24 technical and community colleges in Washington State, and his role on the planning group for the state. He was the only person on this group who was a teacher. The first step for this group was to choose a vendor and platform for the eportfolio system. A program called Chalk and Wire was the only one that was ADA compliant, and so they decided to go with this. Bleck says he liked the software. The challenge from his perspective would be to figure out how to integrate this software program into the existing paper portfolio process at his school. He demonstrated a bit of the software: for example how it allows you to view a document side-by-side with a rubric. He talked a little about his approach to portfolio assessment in general. This presentation made me mildly curious about eportfolios and how they are used at various institutions. I suspect that their usefulness may be compromised if different constituents have different goals for their use. It also seems that the various technical considerations could be quite complicated. Joanna Howard: “On the Map: Using Wayfaring and Writing to Develop a Community of Students” After a few moments of technical glitches, Howard’s PowerPoint presentation was up and running. The title of the PP show was: “Wayfaring Basic Writers: Writing A Map, Learning A Place. While A Community College English Professor Develops A Keener Sense Of Their Identity And Hers.” Her stated goal for this presentation was to create a PowerPoint about the TYCA document that would be both powerful and “pointful”. She also said that she created a blog on the topic of scholarship at http://Profh.typepad.com/4CS. She displayed a web chart on the screen, titled “Community College Scholar-Teacher.” She observed that a community college instructor doesn’t have time to function as a traditional scholar; indeed we often can’t even keep up with the journals. She has worked to do what she can in her work with learning communities, First-Year Experience, her own little course, and some goals around technology and new media. Her most recent success has been with a course in which the students are taking on a project of making a map of their college, taking photos, going to real places on campus and crafting a document. Howard ran a little short of time, but I appreciated her description of the complexity of a community college instructor’s job and her own modest attempts to be a reflective practitioner and model scholarship to her students. The mapping project itself sounded like a great way to engage students in creating a document for an authentic purpose and audience. Patti Smith: “Critical Literacy for Critical Times: Using Integrated Reading and Writing Assignments to Support the Development of Strategies for Lifelong Learning” Smith began by talking about starting out as a community college writing instructor. For the first few semesters, she followed what had been done before her. But she soon wanted to create her own materials, drawing in part on her extensive background in literacy. When her college decided to do a re-accreditation process, including addressing their approach to reading comprehension, she was brought in to the process because of her background. Here she wanted to argue for the value of reading in a college writing classroom. Here first assignment for her students each semester is called “My Life As A Reader And Writer.” She gives this assignment with the hope students will relay positive literacy experiences from their pasts. Unfortunately this hope is not always fulfilled. She is surprised at the reactions her students often have to reading assignments. They whine about being asked to do reading, and come in with no idea what a reading was about. They complain that a writer “rambles, she rants, she makes no sense.” “Why are you making us read this?” They genuinely do not seem to understand the point of reading in the context of her class. Smith talked about being taught at an early age to appreciate the written word, perhaps not explicitly, but by example and modeling. The library was and is a comforting place for her, and she tried to understand why this is not always true for her students. She designed a research project to seek answers to questions she was having about students’ literacy experiences, their attitudes about reading and writing, and how these affect their performance in a first-year writing course. She provided a good handout with her research questions and goal. One strategy she mentioned that seems useful is this: When giving a reading assignment, she has students use an online discussion board before the actual class discussion to talk about the readings. Sometimes she steps in to moderate, sometimes not. She has found that these online discussions help to improve the quality of the in-class discussions. I found this presentation to be clear and focused and of practical use in my work. I work with college students with learning and reading disabilities, and students’ lack of enthusiasm and interest in reading has ceased to surprise me, although it can be discouraging. I am interested in learning more about how to reverse this trend, and provide students with positive and engaging reading experiences that can help them to appreciate and value the process of reading. I would have liked to hear more about how Smith’s background in literacy has informed her work with college-level readers. I would also like to hear in the future about the results of her ongoing research. (Smith’s paper is available online: http://www.writing.ucsb.edu/faculty/dean/SmithPaper.doc) Sharon Gerald “Quilting on Paper: Oral History and the Student Writer-Researcher” Gerald provided a great handout packet at the start. She began by playing an oral recording of a woman with a wonderful Southern accent talking about her memories of school when she was young…after one week of school she decided not to return. She would just stay home. It turns out that this was an interview with Nell Ann Pickett, the chair of the session. Gerald began by addressing the current discussion regarding the role of faculty scholarship at the two-year college. She related a blog conversation she had with John Lovas, who was on the TYCA committee that drafted this document. He made a significant point when he said this document is not necessarily a call for TYC teachers to “do more,” but to encourage them to speak up more and share what it is that we do know. I found this to be the most useful point made in the entire session, as I think it really is a way to deflect faculty complaints that two-year college faculty do not have enough time to engage in meaningful research. Gerald provided a bit of her own personal history to frame her work with an oral history project at her school. Her parents were public school teachers, and her grandmother attended what was then the Mississippi Normal School and is now the University of Southern Mississippi. She is the third generation of her family to graduate from the same university. Her family roots and connections help to explain her interest in oral history. Her work on this project has helped her to develop writing assignments and has allowed her to speak out more professionally. This was an institution and state-wide project. She had to learn about recording equipment and technology. When the president of her college called upon faculty to “go forth and podcast,” Gerald was in a position to move forward on this, because she had already developed some relevant skills. Her students have found these projects incredibly powerful and fun and moving. They are motivated to spend time on papers that are fun and meaningful to them, their families, and their communities. Most of the audience follow-up questions sought to make connections back to the issue of scholarship and how community college instructors can find the time to engage in meaningful scholarship. People talked about the challenges of making connections with colleagues, especially as adjuncts. Several people explained that their teaching loads were 5/5 or 6/6 classes. Howard and Gerald explained that blogging has been a powerful way for them to connect with other professional colleagues who share some of their scholarly interests. In fact Gerald was on a panel at CCCC last year, chaired by Peter Elbow, because of connections she had made through blogging. I think this session was a good window into the challenges two-year English instructors face as they try to juggle the demands of effective teaching and sustaining focused work in research and scholarship. Faculty have a wide variety of teaching challenges and professional interests, and the pursuit of one focused interest is often interrupted by teaching or institutional service demands. Having opportunities such as CCCC to share what we do as teachers, even in very small ways, is one way to respond to the invitation of the TYCA document. These presentations also reinforced my belief that the kind of research and scholarship that can reasonably be pursued by two-year faculty is not likely to ever be very far removed from our work with our students. Comments? |