Contextual Growth

Growth mindset is a concept coined by Carole S. Dweck of Standford University's Psychology department. Essentially, it's the idea that a mind is capable of developing new skills or improving old ones without limitation. This stands in contrast to a fixed mindset that believes the mind has finite limitations for learning.

Dweck argues that a growth mindset is essential to deep learning. When a student has decided, they are just not capable, but they lose motivation to learn. On the flip side, when a student believes they have learned everything about a subject, they also stop learning.

Of course, that is the simplified explanation-- not everyone has the fixed or growth mindset all the time and the growth mindset can be developed. Context is important.

The concept is appealing to educators because it means, in the right conditions, students can flourish. They can become learners.

Unfortunately, some educators bought into the "cliff notes" version of the growth mindset, focusing their energies on praising effort. In an interview with Christine Gross-Loh, Dweck explains:

Yes, another misunderstanding [of growth mindset] that might apply to lower-achieving children is the oversimplification of growth mindset into just [being about] effort. Teachers were just praising effort that was not effective, saying “Wow, you tried really hard!” But students know that if they didn’t make progress and you’re praising them, it’s a consolation prize. They also know you think they can’t do any better. So this kind of growth-mindset idea was misappropriated to try to make kids feel good when they were not achieving.

The mindset ideas were developed as a counter to the self-esteem movement of blanketing everyone with praise, whether deserved or not. To find out that teachers were using it in the same way was of great concern to me. The whole idea of growth-mindset praise is to focus on the learning process. When you focus on effort, [you have to] show how effort created learning progress or success. 

Writing my dissertation about student engagement, I've definitely been interested in what Dweck has to say about mindsets. I also think back to my own education as a "terrible math student."

Math + Me = X

I wasn't particularly bad at math until 10th grade. I had suffered through two years of the same teacher whose teaching methods were dry and difficult to follow. Sometimes, she even incorrectly solved problems on the board. By the time I got to my junior year Algebra II class, I was convinced I was just bad at Math-- the fixed mindset. I was pulling in Cs on my report card, and on my mid-term, I got an F. I had never seen an F on my report card in my life, and it was startling.

My math teacher gave me some tough love. She would start swinging by my desk and asking me about what I was doing, not just seeing if I had any questions (students never want to ask questions). She walked me through complex equations step-by-step. She encouraged me to just practice lots of problems, saying that would be the only thing that would help me learn it. She didn't falsely praise me or make a big deal out when I did get things right. She didn't coddle me. The week before the final exam, I crammed. I did pages and pages of practice problems on my own.

Last day of school, final grades were posted outside the classroom. I got a 96! I gave her a hug and teared up a little. She didn't take any credit. She said I worked for it and praised my process.

The next year, I opted out of math. They put me in Pre-Calculus anyway. I was saddled up with another "lecture while staring at the board" teacher. I didn't understand anything she was explaining. I told her I hadn't expected to be put in the class. After a few days, she told me to "go down to the guidance office and change classes because you're wasting both of our time." And I did. I took one semester of simple math in college, and that was the last of my formal education in mathematics.

I still don't particularly like doing complex math. I often get answers wrong. But thanks to Mrs. Lenihan, I know it's not because I'm just "bad at math," but because I'm out of practice and because I chose to stop learning more.

As an educator, I also now know that those teachers need to improve their practice if they want to engage students, but they were operating from a fixed mindset:

• Some students will get it; some students are just not cut out for it
• This is my method, and it either works for you or it doesn't

Despite this, I also realize that sometimes, I have a fixed mindset. It's not something that just magically disappears all together. I can be stubborn at work. I get fixated on specific ways of doing things that work for me. I am afraid to try new challenges, so I do the same things over and over again (rereading the same introductory paragraph and rewrite it 16 times instead of finishing the chapter).

Some simple ways to foster growth mindset

Through leading professional development and teaching, I've stumbled upon some methods of teaching that foster growth mindset. They're not perfect, and they don't work for every one in every context, but here they are anyway:

• Feedback that focuses on specific actions rather than "good" or "bad." EX: Instead of "Much better!" explain, "You included a lot of specific detail in your description that helps me to understand the character's motivations."
• Low-stakes assignments and time for practice. Imagine if professional teams only ever played in big games and never had time to practice their skills?! That's what it's like when students only get to demonstrate their abilities on exams or large end-of-term papers.
• Talk to students about their process. Ask a lot of "how did you come to that conclusion?" and "why did you make that decision?" Too many students are afraid of asking questions in front of their peers. This will help you understand their process and help them adjust as needed.
• Make action plans for working on their weaknesses. Many times students/employees know they're bad at something, but don't have a real idea or any guidance on how to fix it. Having actionable goals, and checking them off, is incredibly rewarding. It enables the feeling of accomplishment and shows that improvement is possible.

Why We Still Need Feminism: Just Another Day in the Life of a Female Academic

I've seen some of the arguments that we don't need feminism anymore that have been shared via #IDontNeedFeminism and #WomenAgainstFeminism on Twitter. They aren't very good arguments, as most of you can imagine, and usually play more into the rhetoric of feminism than the actual body of theory and work that is feminism.

It convinced me that I need to be more vocal about the experiences that shape my life as a young white female in academia. My experiences may not reflect all experiences, but I can bet that many women have found themselves in my shoes. Here are just two experiences--there are many more I could have shared-- that tell me why we still need feminism and have nothing to do with "man-hating."

Today...

I am writing consultant. I like to do online sessions. WCOnline has this great program that enables you to chat with a user in order to help them better their writing. The program allows each user to see what the other user is writing as they type, so it's more like face-to-face conversation. Well, I was working with a male today, and after saying "hello, how are you?" someone on the other end typed:

So I wanna fuck you...

This message was deleted before the "send" button was hit so that the comment was excluded from the transcript, but at some point, someone on the other end typed those words. All the person on the other end knew about me was that I was female, as it was a new user with no previous reports.

He claimed it was a friend, so I continued, but why should I have to deal with feeling uncomfortable and harassed when I'm trying to help you do better in school? I shouldn't. Unfortunately, patriarchy treats people telling women that they are sex objects as a joke.

So, then, this girl would say:

Except, feminism doesn't do that; it doesn't make me a victim. Feminism gives me the power to speak about this issue, and if I see fit, take action against it. Allowing you to see that something exists, like the dichotomy she mentions, is not the same thing as making it exist. Feminism makes me see that I don't need to be passive when someone says something that makes me uncomfortable or harassing.

Last Semester...

I stopped to speak with a former male student in the hallway about his school work this semester, something I would never have been able to do if the feminists before me didn't clear the way for me to achieve the same education as my male counterparts. The student pointed to a colleague coming up the stairs saying he was in his class. That colleague chose to make a snide comment, snarkily asking "Are you friends? Are you connected?" Because, you know, it would be impossible for a young female professor to have any legitimate academic relationship with a student.

Some people might think I'm reading too much into that one, but this was a colleague who was shocked when I said my students respected me in the classroom and even more shocked when I said my male students didn't make passes at me, after he insisted they must. The comment was intended to say the same.

On the surface, this might seem harmless to an anti-feminist, but people who believe these ideas, that young females can never be anything of real intellectual value, are the reason females are overlooked for promotions, publication, and leadership opportunities.

Then, the icing on the cake-- after lodging a complaint with my chair, I was told I should expect an apology and further discussion with the colleague or his department chair. Neither ever happened. My complaint clearly was not taken seriously by either of the two, who just happened to both be old white men.

We need feminism because...

women deserve to be successful if they put in their best efforts, and this can only happen if feminists encourage women to share experiences and to work against misogyny. No one should make me seem less than I am simply because I was born with the biological components of a female.

But then this girl says:

Look, I don't hate men. That's misandry, not feminism. This isn't about men treating me differently or buying me stuff or whatever crazy ideas are out there about what feminists want from men. This is about taking apart false perceptions created by patriarchal society that prevent women from moving forward, whether it's the idea that women are not as capable as men, not as smart as men, don't want to work as hard as men, are more complicated than men, don't want as much money as men, or are here only for the sexual pleasure of men. 

Here's just a few examples of what feminism does:

• works against the idea that women are weak and dependent creatures and shows that women are only weak and dependent in situations where we have been socialized to be so and/or given no choice (e.g., laws demanding the mutilation of female genitalia)-- and hey, that doesn't sound like victimizing!
• makes it safe for me to express my views and try to attain those things that are important to my existence as a human being, e.g., access to health education, not having to ask a man to escort me to a doctor's office, obtaining a driver's license, voting, using Twitter even when I'm saying stupid things...
• fights against being threatened by rape or told I'm a hideous bitch every time I disagree with someone's political stance or am not interested in someone making a pass at me. 
• demands women be treated as human beings instead of a source of sexual entertainment, especially, not only, in the workplace. 
• advocates for men's ability to have and express emotions, their right to report and be respected as victims of rape, and their freedom to behave in non-violent, non-sexual ways without being degraded as "not manly."

Breaking down those barriers is the work of feminism. Given that I still come across people, male and female, who believe women are not as capable as men or that I should be subordinate or even silent simply because I have a vagina tells me we still need feminism, despite being surrounded by many wonderful men and strong women.

IWAC 2014: Where did the currents take me?

I just returned from the 2014 IWAC (International Writing Across the Curriculum) Conference at the University of Minnesota, and I have to say it was one of my best conference experiences yet. The presentations were engaging, the people were open and friendly, and Minneapolis was a great city.

During my brief two days there, I managed to sit in on 5 panels, one in which I presented, a keynote, and an incredible plenary session. In truth, it made me a little sad that I'm not a WAC WPA because I would have loved the opportunity to implement some of the ideas that were discussed at the universities where I am involved in writing pedagogy.

The Panels

Here is a brief overview of the titles of the panels that I attended:

• Role Reversal: When Students Teach Faculty in WAC Programs - Deanna Daniels & Brandy Grabow, Kate Ronald & Lucy Manley, and Greg Skutches
• Writing Beyond the Curriculum - Nicole Papaioannou, Dan Reis & Caroline Klidonas, and KaaVonia Hinton & Yonghee Suh
• Interrogating Disciplinarity in WAC/WID: An Institutional Ethnography - Anne Ruggles Gere, Naomi Silver, & Melody Pugh
• Teaching Meaningful Writing: What Faculty Say About Writing Assignments in Their Disciplines - Michele Eodice, Anne Ellen Geller, & Neal Lerner
• Multimodal Literacy: Writing, Reading, & Transfer - Andrea Glover, Maggie Christensen, and G. Travis Adams

I will take some time to address the larger issues in each of these panels in separate posts, but I wanted to recap some of the big questions that I've started to ask as a result of these panels and some of the discussion that followed. I picked one large question that was sparked by each.

• Does the campus culture empower students?
• How can on-campus organizations make use of student writers and also enhance student writing?
• How do we frame disciplines? Should we moving toward a theory of centers rather than a theory of boundaries?
• What makes a writing assignment meaningful?
• Should we shift to a WRAC model (writing and reading across the curriculum)?

These questions may be brief in text, but responses are complex, and the ways in which those responses shape student learning experiences and faculty development are important.

The Plenary

The plenary session focused on creating sustainable WAC programs and was led by an A-team of scholars-- Chris Anson, Kathleen Blake Yancey, Chris Thaiss, Linda Adler-Kassner, and Bob McMaster-- who role-played how they would deal with a failing, under-resourced WAC program (a very cool divergence from the traditional plenary talk). Anson would propose scenarios, building the complexities facing the school bit by bit, and the 5 others would respond on the fly. They did not know what they would be asked beforehand.

 As some who hopes to be a WPA one day, I was really intrigued by how the scholars embodied the different thought processes, concerns, and strengths of each individual involved in a WAC initiative, ranging from department chairs to WAC directors to provosts to students. I thought, aside from having a bit of fun, they were incredibly in-tune with those that they served and incredibly empathetic. It helped me see what I might come up against should I someday be invited to try to enhance or save a WAC program.

The speakers reminded the audience that sustainability went beyond a current context and a current moment and planned for the future. The solution also had to be built within the framework of the local context with input from all stakeholders (as much as possible, that is). Top-down initiatives would feel imposing and oppressive and often fail to effectively use the strengths of the parties involved. Collaboration, where possible, is a wonderful thing.

The most important things I took away were:

1. Understand the campus climate and be prepared to work within it, even if the aim is to change it. No model is one-size-fits-all when it comes to campus writing initiatives.
2. Be sensitive to people's fears and frustrations. See challenges as moments for reflection, negotiation, or collaborative education.
3. Bring joy into the work. Focus on the pleasures of learning from one another and the pleasure of writing.

What seems evident from these talks and discussions is that the people here really care about their students and their colleagues. While many people were doing serious research, it was easy to see how much of it could be put into practice and was largely aimed at contributing to a positive learning environment for everyone involved. IWAC really made me excited about the work I'm doing, the field that I intend to contribute to, and continued interactions with the people who I am privileged to call my colleagues. I'm looking forward to (fingers crossed) attending again in 2016.

I would love to hear from IWAC-attendees about their experiences at the conference and from those interested in campus writing initiatives what to make of some of these big questions and themes.

Class, Upward Mobility, and the History of Literacy

Recently, I've been thinking about the issue of upward mobility, especially how education plays a factor in that process. Theoretically, a college education will help ensure that an individual winds up within or above middle class, but the ability to complete that education or make use of that degree is becoming more challenging, especially for those who do not have the advantage of wealth.

In thinking about these issues, I stumbled onto "Literacy, Technology, and Monopoly Capital" by Richard Ohmann in my Cross-Talk in Comp Theory book. The first part of the essay describes the development of the terms "literacy" and "illiteracy" as we use it today. One idea becomes very clear. The term is tied directly to class. Ohmann explains "[literacy education] was a top-down discourse from the start, and its participants almost invariably took the underlying question to be: how can we keep the lower orders docile?" (701). Indeed, the main purpose seemed to be for white men to keep immigrants from taking the country into moral ruin and crime. Ohmann continues on: "Once the lower orders came to be seen as masses and classes, the term 'literacy' offered a handy way to conceptualize an attribute of theirs, which might be manipulated in one direction or the other for the stability of the social order and the prosperity and security of the people who counted" (701). In other words, the people at the top developed education to continue reaping the benefits at the top. I have to admit that reading this brief history of the development of mass education made me feel pretty grimy, but I also have to admit that this 19th century view of education sounds very much like the 21st century view.

Ohmann's history delves into the economic reasons for literacy discourse, as well. He notes that the "dangerous classes" were created by industrialism and the fierce competition. Attempting to avoid falling profits, businessmen continuously cut the wages of workers, which "led to all but open class warfare" (702). This also led to the development of "monopoly capitalism," the type of capitalism that is characterized by large impersonal corporations with multiple tiers of management. All of this was occurring at the end of the 19th century, about the same time literacy discourse, as we know it today, was developing. In Marxist terms, "docile bodies" were needed to work.

Ohmann extends his conversation on literacy to include mass culture and computer literacy. Though published in 1985, his predictions about computer literacy are hauntingly spot-on:

Graduates of MIT will get the challenging jobs; community college grads will be technicians; those who do no more than acquire basic skills and computer literacy in high school will probably find their way to electronic workstations at McDonald's. I see every reason to expect that the computer revolution, like other revolutions from the top down, will indeed expand the minds and the freedom of an elite, meanwhile facilitating the degradation of labor and the stratification of the workforce that have been hallmarks of monopoly capitalism from its onset. (709)

 Is this not our reality today?

In opposition to this top-down regulated literacy construct, Ohmann offers the Cuban campaign to improve the literacy of illiterate peasants. Instead of teachers, brigadistas, tutor/mentors as young as 10-19 years old, volunteered to help their fellow countrymen. The peasants wanted to learn because they saw being literate as a step towards revolution. The system worked well because the people felt they had a purpose, and it was important to their own well-being.

So what can we learn from Ohmann's piece, even though it was written nearly 30 years ago? Literacy crises are made up to suit capitalist needs (What's that? You have bad teachers. Don't worry, we'll make fool-proof scripted curriculums for $1 million dollars a pop. What's that? You don't know how to tell if kids are smart or not. We've got a great billion-dollar testing package for you to try out). It creates problems that need products and services, and it creates consumers who are committed to buying products to help them succeed. At the same time, literacy has become tied into the reality of the world we live in. In order to help individuals succeed, we cannot treat literacy as morality. We can't assume those who struggle with reading, writing, or computer skills are "bad" or "poor" students (just look at the terms we used to describe them). Furthermore, we need to show people how to use literacy for their own purposes, not just to pass exams or get a job, whether that's filling out a form for financial aid or writing a text to a friend.

Ohmann ends with these lines, and I would like to, as well: "It's worth trying to reconstitute literacy as a process of liberation-- but also to remember that work for literacy is not in itself intrinsically liberating. The only way to have a democracy is to make one" (713).

Haters Gonna Hate: Victoria's Secret and Ugly, Jealous Women

Last night was the highly-anticipated annual Victoria's Secret Fashion Show, the runway that in many ways sets the standard for "sexy" in America. As expected, my social media feeds flooded with statuses about the show-- or I should say, about the models. Not a single one of the posts was about the production or the garments; they were all about the women working the catwalk.

Most of the posts fell into two categories: adorers and "haters." Some of these people thought the models were absolutely stunning and some were unhappy with the how thin the models were. However, this one Instagram post really seemed to capture the theme of the conversations:

In case you can't read the text, it says "Hating on her makes you fat, ugly, miserable, and jealous." Indeed, across the board, those who were supporting the models weren't just saying, "they're pretty," but that if you don't like the models, it's because you're insecure. The idea behind this post is that women don't like the Victoria's Secret Fashion Show simply because they are jealous of the models, not because they actually see something wrong (of course, we're women; we're incapable of thinking rationally).

This quote perfectly demonstrates everything wrong with the media's representation of female beauty. I refuse to watch the Victoria's Secret Fashion Show. It's not because I'm jealous of these women or hate them. It's because I recognize that there is something fundamentally wrong with the way beauty is portrayed, and it's not that the models are thin.

The problem with Victoria's Secret is that it sells an idea of what's sexy that is extremely limited. Yes, these women are beautiful. There's no doubt about it. But all of them are extremely thin, light-skinned (even the women who are not Caucasian, who are the overwhelming majority), and much taller than most women. The problem is not that they are these things, but that they are ONLY these things. 

There are no dark-skinned women. There are no short women. There are no bottom-heavy women or women with broader shoulders. Essentially, according the Victoria's Secret Fashion Show (and most of the media), the only people who are sexy are tall, thin, fair-skinned women. THAT is a problem.

Let's go deeper: The problem with the tall, thin, fair-skinned model is that it is not attainable for the majority of the female population. As super model Cameron Russell said in her TED Talk, having the features to be a supermodel is basically hitting the "genetic lottery." So, why, then, is that the standard if it is anything but standard?

Because CAPITALISM, duh. 

Consumer culture relies on the purchase of commodities. People only buy commodities when they feel need. People with money typically are able to meet many of their physiological needs without spending much. How, then, do we get them to part with the excess? 

We create social need or fear. The media presents a standard of beauty, which is anything but standard, so that women purposefully feel dissatisfied and imperfect. And we use the words "sexy/beautiful" or "ugly"  and "confident" or "jealous" to foster this feeling. We create a fear of rejection and convince women that they are lacking, so that they will fill the void with things-- cosmetics, clothes, hair dye, skin bleach, laser hair removal, gym memberships.... lingerie. 

This should piss you off.

If doesn't, also think about the fact that with Victoria Secret's PINK line, this dislike of the self is being sold to young girls, not just women. And remember that studies show that girls as young as 9 years old now think that they are fat and need to go on diets.

And because, PATRIARCHY, duh.

And on top of the media broadcasting these images, the messages embedded within are internalized and shared. Men tells us that sexy is tall, thin, and fair-skinned. They circulate images of heavily photoshopped, unrealistically thin women (women who are photoshopped to look thinner when they are already underweight) who somehow magically still have large, symmetrical breasts and butts. Also, they don't have pores, lines, or cellulite. We have people of both sexes telling us that if we don't worship these women as the most beautiful women on earth, we're jealous.

When we don't buy into the standard, we are quite literally stripped of our voices-- called ugly and ignored. Ugly is basically a word for useless women in our patriarchal society. If you aren't aesthetically pleasing, you become ugly. But of course, now that you see how the media markets beautiful, you also understand that most women easily fall into the "ugly" category.

So, these standards of beauty not only make women feel unhappy and drive us to buy products (that are mostly produced and marketed by men), but also create a culture where it easy to suck the power from women by simply insinuating that those unable to meet the unrealistic standards of beauty are not worthy of notice, not capable of saying anything worthwhile. They're just "fat, ugly, miserable, and jealous."

And just saying....

we all know Victoria's multi-billion dollar secret now: Victoria was a man, Mr. Roy Raymond, and the store was created so men didn't feel humiliated when they wanted to buy lingerie for their ladies, not to make women feel sexy.

Are you angry yet?

You should be.

Fake Passes and Rapes: Athlete Entitlement Culture in the University

Today, Adam Weistein published a post titled "Jameis Winston Isn't the Only Problem Here: An FSU Teacher's Lament," in which he discussed how high-profile college sports are creating an atmosphere that fosters intimidation, cheating, and irresponsible behavior. And while I can't support his careless use of Islamic extremists as a metaphor for college sports culture, I can empathize with the struggles FSU teachers have faced when dealing with high profile athletic teams. I, too, have dealt with them firsthand, both as a student and as a professor.

The Almost Rape

As a college student, I was an athlete. That means I socialized with other athletes from other teams. In particular, as freshman, I took a liking to one of the older baseball players, and I decided to go to one of his baseball player house parties...

I bet you think you know where this story is going, but it's not... Nope, Baseball Guy didn't touch me inappropriately at all. He was actually a very nice guy. He wasn't drinking much, and I wasn't drinking at all, and we had fun talking over the loud music until we retired to his bedroom to cozy up a little. We did nothing more than kiss.

But then things took a turn... It was chilly out that night, and I was wrapped under layers of blankets. Baseball Guy and his baseball player housemates were hosting a few potential recruits, and so the party had been about showing them a good time. I had met a few, and they seemed like good kids. Baseball Guy wanted to check on them before he passed out, but seeing as I was cold and tired, he left me in bed while he went downstairs. I was pretty much asleep when I awoke to someone climbing over the top of me. I assumed it was Baseball Guy, but when I came out of my sleep daze, I saw that it wasn't Baseball Guy at all. It was one of the recruits! I was pinned under the blankets, still in a bit of a fog, and couldn't react. Confused and terrified, I laid there frozen and wide-eyed.

Lucky for me, Baseball Guy opened the door just in time and sent the recruit running in fear when he bellowed for him to get off of me. I can tell you that the kid's intention was NOT innocent, and he probably assumed I was drunk and passed out and an easy target. He also assumed that he was entitled because he was supposed to be shown a good time, a common trend in college athletics. He probably also thought that because he was drunk his actions would be excused... and he was probably right.

"Boys will be boys" would have been what I would have been told the next day by university athletic officials and university administrators. Had someone on the baseball team told him he was being a scumbag, beyond just being yelled at to get off of me, or told him they didn't want him on the team, it could have had a real impact. But as I've learned, male athletes, in particular, especially those in contact sports, are told "be aggressive. Take what you want. You're the star. It's yours."

Not drinking didn't save me at all, which is usually what rape-apologists, especially those siding with "poor athletes under a lot of stress" would say-- "if she hadn't been such a drunk slut, she wouldn't have been in that situation." But even if I was wasted, it wouldn't have given him a right to treatment as his personal entertainment. This kid just thought he was entitled to take what he wanted and there would be no consequences because he was a prospective athlete, someone who might make the school some money, and he knew it. The players knew they had to show him a good time if they wanted to bring his talent to their team. Reprimanding him or telling him "don't go after that girl" would have dampened his fun and affected his decision to come to the university. Happily, I never saw him again, so I assume he chose another school.

I'm fairly certain the incident was never spoken about again, which means he probably still thinks it's ok and probably raped some other girl at some other point before or after or both.

Summer Schooled

My almost-rape is, of course, an extreme case, and there are lots of very nice male student-athletes. However, the entitlement problem that leads to things like rape and assault start with little occurrences, like the ones I faced while teaching summer courses at a DI university. 

Coaches would make unreasonable requests on behalf of their players, like asking for final grades the same day finals were turned in. Or give me the "isn't there something we can do?" when players weren't doing well. Players would assume they could slack all semester and then pass. I failed a student whose excuse was "but I didn't know anything was due" for all the assignments that he had missed the entire semester. I was also asked, after submitting final grades, if there was "anyway to make up the work I missed" by several athletes, who had simply failed to do work at all. They were shocked they failed. I was even more shocked that they were shocked.

Lucky for me, I had a strong supervisor, who had my back when I stuck to failing athletes or having to put their eligibility in jeopardy. But the pressure to give these students leeway was immense. Basically, these athletes were told that they were exceptions to the rules of higher education. Someone would "take care of it" if they messed up.

Of course, when things don't go their way, these athletes become aggressive and throw temper tantrums because they've been taught that intimidation is the way to succeed. They'd try to guilt me into passing them, making me feel like I was letting the whole university down by preventing them from playing. They've been told the university needs THEM, not that they need the university. 

Imagine being told this your whole life: do what you want because someone else will make sure you're successful no matter what. What things might you have done if actions had no consequences, if someone else would always be to blame? It might have started with cheating on exams, but I'm fairly sure it would grow worse as you got away with more and more harmful activity.

Remember the Job Description

We call them student-athletes, but we treat these talented players them like athletes who just happen to take a few classes. If we don't prioritize academics over athletics, or at least make them equal, and give these student-athletes the tools to succeed as normal human beings, seeing as most of them will never go pro, we are inviting horrific events-- rapes, beatings, hazings, cheating, etc. It's not a far stretch. 

But even when the horrors are more subtle, like someone plagiarizing a paper, we are simply failing these students by removing their sense of personal responsibility. These students will most likely struggle to be successful once the "golden years" pass if we fail to teach them how to negotiate their time, how to spring back from personal failures outside the sports arena, how to make amends when they have done wrong, and how to empathize with other human beings. 

If we shift the culture and move towards holding athletes responsible, what we will ultimately find is not failing sports programs, but programs with student-athletes who are truly role models for others, who inspire people with their actions on and off the field and who know how to succeed beyond the field. We will start to create leaders, people who have persevered through tough mental and physical practice and are able to help others do the same, rather than those who take advantage of "the others' weaknesses." And those would be people I would want to play with.

Take the Plunge: Mina Shaughnessy's "Diving In: An Introduction to Basic Writing"

Last week, I had to read Mina Shaughnessy's 1976 essay "Diving In: An Introduction to Basic Writing" for our professional development session at the writing center where I work. I've read her book Errors and Expectations (1977), but this was the first time that I had a chance to read any of her shorter works. Though the article is nearly 40 years old, the problems and solutions described by Shaughnessy are still applicable today.

Shaughnessy's main argument in the piece is that educators need to stop considering basic writing "a writing course for young men and women who have many things wrong with them" (291). Instead, she argues that writing instructors need to begin to examine their own teaching and learning processes and the complex and contextual needs of their students. To show how these issues manifest themselves in the university, Shaughnessy outlines a "developmental scale for teachers," complete with four stages. They are:

Guarding the Tower: gate-keeping and denying access to those who seemingly do not belong, a tactic of self-preservation.
Converting the Natives: assuming outsiders can be "tamed" and fashioned after the elite class, though they can never truly be part of the elite.
Sounding the Depths: realizing there is complexity and that students of all kinds have something to contribute.
Diving In: meeting basic writing students head-on, dealing with their complex needs, and breaking the tradition of thinking "what's wrong with them" 

Though the terminology is controversial, as it is steeped in racial and colonialist overtones, the message is clear. It's not "them" who needs to be fixed; it's "us," the educators, who need to reevaluate our methods. We need to be aware of our own practices, be willing to assess the needs of our students, and quit using one-size-fits-all pedagogies. We need to stop thinking these students are broken and realize that they simply need someone to guide them through the things they have not been privileged yet to know. We also need to stop privileging antiquated ideas of "the typical college student," the ones who come from high performing high schools with a middle class enthusiasm for formal education. These are ideas that are still practical and useful in our current educational climate.

Here are some things we can do to help students, especially basic writers, based on Shaughnessy's ideas:

1. See students as people with real problems, passions, and pursuits.
2. Do not think of students as empty vessels or know-nothings who need to be filled with your greater knowledge.
3. Accept that students bring their own knowledge and literacies to the classroom, even if they aren't the "standard."
4. Be willing to learn from students.
5. Remember that at one point, you didn't know either.
6. And... you didn't know what you didn't know until someone made you aware.
7. Don't use "it's not my job" or "they should have learned that in [insert course or grade level here]" as an excuse not to help a student with a task that you have the ability to help them with.
8. Recognize patterns of error and needs rather than worrying about "correctness" (what's correct anyway? whose version of correct?). 
9. Don't just mark errors. Explain your thought process.
10. Offer models of academic inquiry and inquiry processes. Students often need to learn how to ask questions more than they need to learn answers.
11. Do not underestimate your students. 
12. Challenge students to complete meaningful tasks, but also be willing to help them along the way.

Shaughessy ends these essay with these words: "DIVING IN is simply deciding that teaching them [basic writers] to write well is not only suitable but challenging work for those who would be teachers and scholars in a democracy" (297). If we want democracy, we can't have a fixed notion of who can and cannot be educated. We can't say, "oh they'll never make it" or "they're not 'college material,'" or only a small, likely homogeneous, group of students will ever have the opportunity to succeed. If we want to encourage diversity and all of the wonderful things that come from the intersection of different ideas, then we need to take the plunge and dive in.

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Shaughnessy, Mina. "Diving In: An Introduction to Basic Writing." College Composition and Communication 27.3 (1976): 234-39. Rpt. Cross-Talk in Comp Theory: A Reader. 3rd ed. Eds., Victor Villanueva and Kristin L. Arola. Urbana, IL: NCTE, 2011. Print.

EDM in the Classroom

Last weekend, I had the pleasure of experiencing a wild weekend of dancing at the Electric Zoo Festival in New York City, a huge annual electronic dance music (EDM) festival held on Randall's Island. It was an incredible experience. Thousands of people of all ages, from toddlers to the rare elderly individual, came to this event and danced together to different genres of EDM music and high-powered light shows. I met people from all over the country and even from other countries, including an entertaining trio from London on my ferry ride home the last day and a duo from Serbia.

EDM and Education

Like education, EDM is comprised of many different genres and draws people from all walks of life. Under the umbrella of EDM falls disco-like dance tracks, ambient trance music, punk-rock-esque dubstep and much more, and at EDM festivals, you are likely to find all of these genres of music co-existing. You are also likely to find a very diverse crowd, one that represents different style "cliques" (ravers, hippies, yuppies, etc.), as well as individuals of different socio-economic status, races, and genders from all different regions. This music has a pull that reaches far beyond any one group. In these ways, it is similar to liberal arts education. EDM asks its followers to respected diversity, encourages collaboration, and relies on technology. For this reason, I thought EDM was worth exploring as a tool for thinking about education.

Here are some of the basic concepts of EDM that are useful in the classroom:

Technology immersion and play: Students are often hesitant to learn new technologies or theories, and the education system prefers to "drill" students rather than give them hands on experiences. Electronic dance music obviously makes use of electronics. Technology is a staple of the business, and more so now, then ever. The music is often made on computers, mixed on computers, and played using computers. DJs tell me that when they are first starting to learn the trade, they just have to throw themselves in and play around. James Paul Gee's Why Video Games are Good for the Soul similarly states that students learn through play because it immerses them in worlds that they are forced to learn how to navigate. Students should have the opportunity to play and make mistakes, get feedback from an audience, and continue to improve their craft. 

Social networking: DJs and producers, as well as fans of the music, have said that social networking is a major part of the reason why EDM is becoming so popular. In an interview with The Huffington Post, Hardwell and Morgan Page agree that social networking is essential to the success of the genre. The music stayed underground for years. Considering the music was not mainstream, it was difficult to find and share tracks. Now, they get passed along through Facebook, YouTube, Twitter, etc, and most of the music-makers love it.

 What I learn from these DJs/producers is that people learn when they connect, and they find out things they "never knew they never knew." I see tweets almost daily from my favorite DJ/producers about new facts that they learned. In response, educators should be incorporating these tools in our classroom should be important to us.

Ethnography: Because the scene is bursting into the public eye, people are constantly talking about the EDM community, asking the question "What does it mean to be a fan of EDM?" Those who want to be a part of it or simply learn more about it are trying to navigate the codes and acquire the vocabulary. Blogs like Dancing Astronaut and magazines like Rolling Stone cover what makes this community tick and why it's finally surging into the mainstream after being kept underground for so many years.

Students learning to do ethnographic writing can study these glimpses into the community as a sample of what it means to do research on communities. Though it's clearly satirical, Dom Mazzetti's "Dom Mazzetti vs. EDM" YouTube video is just one example that I have used in the classroom. It's a great way to talk about the use of satire, stereotypes, and alternate forms of learning.

Creating an experience: EDM producers and event organizers aim to create experiences, not just pieces of music. They aim to take listeners on an emotional journey. This is what I also believe any really good piece of writing should do, and exploring how these musicians do it is just one way we can help students think about how they can do it with their own writing.

P.L.U.R. and Everyday Living

Finally, I know that electronic dance music (EDM) gets a bad wrap sometimes because people associate it with party drug culture (which I do not, and have never, participated in), but I think the actually foundations of the EDM movement are very positive and do in someways describe my outlook on teaching and life. Ravers are supposed to live by a code-- PLUR.

PLUR stands for peace, love, unity, and respect. These are the aspects that I feel are essential to living a good life and part of why I love EDM so much. They represent so much of what democratic education ideally intends to do. It encourages diversity, rejects violence, and asks people to collaborate. This doesn't mean that differences cannot exist or that people cannot disagree, but simply that we allow for pluralism and show each other kindness.

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To see more about Electric Zoo, you can check out this great photojournal from Rolling Stone: http://www.rollingstone.com/music/pictures/electric-zoo-festival-2012-20120831

Voice and Normativity

Yesterday, in one of my graduate courses (Composition Theory and Teaching Writing), we were talking about the work of Brodkey, Grimm, LeCourt, Port, Denny, and Villanueva. Some really interesting critiques/theories arose. For me, the most compelling idea-- given my interests in voice, authenticity, and grammar-- was the notion that one can only have a (writing) voice if she/he is close to the center/the norm. As a middle-class, well-educated, white woman, I am very close to that norm, which means I have been granted access to my "voice," and I never considered that the language of education might deny others their own.


I have since begun to understand that when students are far from that normative ideal, their voice is denied, labelled incorrect. Instead of embracing these different voices, education seeks to mold it into the language of the white middle class. Furthermore, in order to do this, students are forced to give up their accented language, which is ripe with their ethnic, cultural, and familial ideology and identity.

This idea is frightening. As a composition teacher, I unconsciously enact this middle class ideal all of the time. How many alternative voices am I squashing by saying, "This is a bit too conversational," or "This is a sentence fragment" or the dreaded "This sentence reads awkwardly"? On the other hand, when we have a society which functions primarily on middle class capitalist/consumerist ideals, is it right to dismiss these notions of middle class correctness and accept all voices as correct in my classroom? Should students be forced to make that choice? Is it ethical to teach them code-switching, or is that teaching them to lie about their identity? 

Furthermore, once they have given up those working class ideals, it seems that students (or any one for that matter) can never truly go back. In my own life, my friends would certainly look at me funny and even think that I was pretentious if I began to talk about Foucault's theories of inscribing power in Discipline and Punish and their relationship to democratic education. It is something I simply cannot do if I want to remain an accepted member of our group. I must stifle my educated voice because it is incorect. If I wanted to fully embrace my scholarly identity, I most likely would have to give up my childhood friends. It seems that in order to enact one class role, I must give up the other. For me, these are minor denials of self, but for someone far from the center, they are forced to give up much more. 

Fan Shen's "The Classroom and the Wider Culture" is a perfect example of this. Shen came from China and was taught that the use of "I" was bad. He should never be concerned with the personal, the "I'; he should only be concerned with the collective "we." In American composition and culture, however, we are obsessed with the "I," and so to write well for school, Shen had to embrace the "I" and leave behind the "we." It wasn't just a shift of language, but a shift of ideology. He had to give up his Chineseness to become Americanized.

Truly, there are so many questions I am left with. How can I ethically teach when my views are clouded by classed ideologies? How can I advocate a "good use of voice" when it's clear that by invoking standards of grammar and English, I am pushing a certain voice on my students? After all, grammar is a set of rules for the most unruly thing-- language. While it sounds like a good idea to have a standard middle ground, whose middle ground is it really? Is it fair that some people are coming in closer to that "middle ground" than others and yet all being held to that same standard? And finally, if grammar is all about normativity, is it productive to enforce it, especially in a cultural that proclaims its appreciation for diversity and individuality? 

A "Gooder" Look at Language in the Media

Watching late-night television, a certain ridiculous commercial caught my attention. The commercial itself was really mediocre advertising at best (I don't even remember the product it was promoting), but as someone interested in concepts of Englishes, grammars, signs and signifiers, and audiences, I couldn't help be struck by one simple word-- "gooder." Hearing that word, my head bobbed up from my laptop to catch the last 10 seconds of the clip.

In the commercial, a woman named Jane and a female friend are talking about (I think) a weight loss product, which her friend says is "gooder." Jane's initial reaction is to say, "gooder isn't a word."

Following shortly after Jane's remark, her friend notes enthusiastically, "Jane, you look gooder!" This time, Jane ignores the grammar trespass and agrees. Jane, of course, comes to accept "gooder" as a real word, when it conveniently describes her weight loss and makes it better than just plain "good" progress.

I think this commercial, as simple and silly as it is, acts as a metaphor for hierarchies of rhetoric. Jane, the current traditionalist grammar critic, is unable to accept "gooder" as a word, until it becomes a term that enhances her own authoritative position. It also makes clear that the thin woman (the social norm) is in a higher position of authority than her friend who has not yet tried the weight loss product. Thus, the silly, seemingly benign interaction between two gal pals evokes power structures and mainstream ideologies hidden in language.

Just one of the guys... err, pals.

When people say "ignorance is bliss," they aren't kidding. Learning about language has totally ruined my life! Ok, so maybe that's a bit of an exaggeration, but really, taking Literary Theory and Composition Theory has completely changed my way of looking at the world. I can't do so much as go on Facebook without thinking about language and ideology-- which is how I was inspired to write this post.

Today, I was struck by something I say all of the time. A friend wrote about girls who are "one of the guys" in her Facebook status, and I thought, "Well, hey, I'm 'one of the guys.'" For most of my life, at least up until my sophomore year of college, my closest friends were predominately male. When I was younger, I would climb trees with the boys, ride bikes with the boys, hike in the woods with the boys, and light things on fire with the boys. When I got older, I watched football with the guys, drank with the guys, watched action movies with the guys, and talked "locker room" talk with the guys. To this day, of my three closest friends from home, two are male. When I'm feeling bummed, I can call "my boys" for a bar night, possibly followed by a diner run and Guitar Hero at 3 A.M. It's great being "one of the guys." They talk openly around me and never treat me like I'm a delicate lady, whose ears must be protected from curses, dirty jokes, and belches.

So what's wrong with being "one of the guys?" Aside from the fact that it assigns gender roles and puts women down as the weaker sex, annoying and overly-conscious of societal norms? I don't think I've ever heard a guy say he's just "one of the girls" (at least not seriously). Any guy who admitted to being "one of the girls" would undoubtedly be mocked for it. Why is it ok for girls to be "one of the guys," but not vice versa? In truth, I don't know many men, especially not straight men, who have mostly female friends, though I know many females who empathize with my situation as "one of the guys." That seems rather ridiculous.

I think this is a good example of how seemingly harmless language can really be quite harmful. "One of the guys" reveals quite a bit about our culture and about the dominating ideologies that circulate here in America. It suggests that women want to be men and that female friendships are somehow lesser than male friendships. While we think the gender landscape is evening out, small phrases like "one of the guys" are evidence that there is still quite a way to go. If we become more conscious of our language, however, we can began to shift the male-dominated language to one that is more gender-neutral and thus change the ideologies that privilege white heterosexual upper class males.

Can anyone think of other examples, or does everyone think that I'm completely out on a limb here?