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November 18, 2003
Notes from forum 2
Notes from the conversation:
Anne Fitzsimmons was the moderator for this forum. Why the title of the forum: is diversity allowed to be talked about in classrooms? Are courses designed around diversity?
While Anne introduced the forum, pictures taken by Public Safety of bias related incidents on whiteboards in the dorms were passed around. The messages on the boards: Dave and Will AKA "Gay Dave"; I hate nigger dudes.
Questions framing the conversation:
Where does free speech become hate speech?
Have bias-related incidents been handled and handled well?
Jennifer: The hate crime against the gay friend of students--it wasn't handled well by the university. The Women's Studies classes did handle it well. Maxwell didn't handle it well at all. The response was: "It happens to everyone, it really shouldn't be a big deal." It doesn't affect government as a whole, was their stance, so it wasn't important. Granted, it might not be their main focus, but they didn't really try to address it in a meaningful way.
Kayt: In African American Studies, the study of oppressed people anywhere is taken up seriously. The professor spent an entire class on the gay-bashing issue. The assigned material for that day was covered another day. The professor emphasized how the incidents were hate crimes, and they discussed the university's response to the hate crimes. The blackface incident had several forums, several university-wide events; there weren't as many (if any) for the gay-bashing. There needs to be more connection between oppressed groups. The problems need to be addressed equally--by the community. These issues can't be segmented, one can't be valued over another. (An example) With the war on Iraq: women with equal experiences being treated differently. How do you look at a situation and decide who gets more treatment?
Steph: In VPA classes, the bias related incidents weren't discussed at all. It shouldn't depend on the major, it should be important to us all.
Jessica: There needs to be a class that specifically addresses such issue.
Kayt: There used to be a "diversity curriculum" that was a variety of classes. It tried to be reinstated but the group of students have since graduated and no one has really worked diligently on the issue to my knowledge. There is a group of students working to get this reinstated.
Anne: we are also really interested in what is going on with events that are not public incidents-the everyday events.
Jessica: I know the freshmen were exposed to the idea of diversity during orientation, but this didn't do much to sustain diversity after orientation.
Jennifer: There was a film shown in the dorms that made a big deal out of public safety punishing people who write things on white boards. Everyone laughed at the film. Guys would write dyke on the board and mean it to be funny. And this is a problem in society. People say that something is "gay," meaning it is stupid. This can be a big deal to someone who isn't out. These messages creates a hostile community. It affects everyone in some way. It affects visitors because it sends the message that this person thinks gays are bad.
Representative from Residence Life: They decided last year to tell or train RA's to take all messages seriously (bitch, fag, etc) and report it. They were tired of the environment it created. This year so far is there have been 58 incidents. They have decided to confront the issue and not make it acceptable. They take it seriously. Most students respond that they were just joking, but they don't let them off the hook. They try to let the students know why this isn't funny.
Jennifer: My floor meeting was two minutes. The message is that these phrases and words upset a group. But there is not a discussion about the way that it affects the entire community. No one really takes these meetings seriously.
Mara (Professor of Education): What are we not learning in our classes? We don't have enough faculty that are committed to teaching diversity, even if we revive the "diversity curriculum." What keeps faculty from talking about it?
James (Office for Multicultural Affairs): Not every faculty member is comfortable with talking about or addressing diversity in the classroom.
Margaret Himley (Director of Undergraduate Studies, The Writing Program): How do we work with the word diversity in the classroom?
Kayt: Are we really talking about the same things when we talk about diversity? It's such an intangible thing. And do we employ the idea of diversity in our everyday activities at the university?
Tim: How can a student make it through four years of college without understanding how blackface or messages on a whiteboard can be offensive? Diversity is something you have to want to experience. There are divisions that the university has tried to address: like random housing for Freshman. The university needs to create a way to get people together more. The way things are now, you can ignore it if you want to.
Steph: People usually define diversity as oppressed groups, but we are diverse only when considered as a whole. I come from a small town. It wasn't close-minded. Even though I come from a small area, diversity incorporates a variety of experiences.
Mark: Concerning black face: When I first started reading about it, I kept thinking: did the person know? Did they know they were representing a history? These incidents should be examined on a case-by-case basis. Does being unaware affect the university response? Would a diversity curriculum actually change anything?
Mahdia: It is the university's job to educate the students here. Yes, people will do what they want to do, but we need to put our courses into action. If we learn about diversity in our courses, there will be no excuse: "I've read it, I've seen it, I understand it." Then there will be no questioning whether a person had previous knowledge and was exposed to the subject and consequences before hand. With, the incident two years ago: the student who dressed in blackface didn't even do the community service assigned as a penalty that they were supposed to do. If we have training in class, there are no excuses and the Judicial Review Board needs to follow through on the penalties given to ensure that what was given out as a penalty is upheld.
Mark: Where do we draw the line? Who gets to make jokes? What is the line between humor and hate crime?
Kayt: Is it as unacceptable for a non-white student to put on white face? As for a white student to put on blackface? We have to know the history, the culture, the economic impact of history on the group being represented. Marylin Monroe, for example, is on a pedestal, is idolized, so dressing up as her is probably not going to be thought of as humorous-it would be glamorous. Pacific Islanders, African Americans, Asians, etc., do not enjoy that privileged stereotype in society. If we don't understand the implications of these acts, we would approve or allow or participate in these activities. The same forces don't act on the Marilyn Monroe's of the world. Or to think about specific leaders: How was Malcolm X idolized? How was Bill Clinton idolized?
Jenn: SU doesn't punish crimes the same way. Drinking: get a ticket, 60 hrs. of community service, academic penalty. 1st Blackface: didn't even follow through on community service. It took someone getting hurt before it became important to the university. The LGBT Resource Center had to come up with ways to handle this because the university had nothing in place. Our hate crime policies are a joke. Students should be more afraid to hit a black or gay student than to drink in front of a frat house. Hate crimes are addressed by saying: "Please don't use the N-word." That was it.
Margaret: If it becomes judicial, it might become harder to address in class. "My RA made such a big deal over this" might shut down conversation. I am worried about the unintended consequences of judicial responses.
Jenn: I'm not sure. Diversity does affect policy and governmental writing. It shouldn't be hard to relate diversity to our curriculum. And if it were judicially backed up, it might motivate students more.
Tim: Is that type of motivation an attempt to controlling behavior or changing beliefs?
Steph: About judicial responses: Isn't this a problem in the first place, being afraid to talk about it or not wanting to confront students? Students shouldn't be babied, even if it scares them away.
Mara: In educational literature, people are starting to change the term zero tolerance to zero indifference. Choosing to no longer just let it go by. It doesn't have to be typical punishment, but it needs to be addressed.
Adrea Jaehnig (LGBT Center): Documenting the whiteboards makes visible the discrimination that students feel. Is the problem the whiteboard? No. It's easy to see them, but they are just a symbol of the problem. By the time it's a crisis situation, the judicial answer can't be the only answer. We need to address our community standards are beliefs. And what students say to each other is more influential than what teachers or administrators say, so we need to educate students on how to talk about these things. Whose responsibility is it to do this? It is often put on the "underrepresented" students, and this isn't right. How much do we want the authority to solve the problem? If we rely on punitive actions, on the authorities, things might not go as quickly or as well as we'd like.
Mahdia: This type of training in classes is best taught in conversation.
Jessica: What will teaching diversity in 105 do? How will this change the university? Or how will the university change? A class won't change beliefs. And students don't seem to care.
Elisa Norris (Ph.D. student, The Writing Program): Diversity is tricky because this is a socialization process. The hesitancy of diversity in classes is that short term changes are short lived. When they go home, things might go back to the way they were before. Until we have conversations that let people address their feelings honestly, and then it might sink in.
Mark: Forcing stuff down our throats doesn't change feelings. There needs to be a way to address diversity without forcing.
Anne: Complicate the dichotomy of, it is either addressed too much or not at all. If students are uncomfortable with one thing, they may well think it is being forced down their throats. We are trying to create an atmosphere that allows people to talk about uncomfortable things.
Brian: The university doesn't do much to promote that conversation. After these bias incidents happen, I feel like attaching that big 'No Place for Hate' sticker to my clothes. The biggest problem is that too many people aren't even aware of what is going on. If you don't read the D.O., you're basically unaware of these incidents unless you hear it from other people. We need to do everything we can to just get people talking. You know how the school gives everybody those 'Real Men Wear Orange' tee shirts? Wouldn't it be better using that money to give everyone a "No Place for Hate" tee shirt? Whenever a hate crime of bias-related incident happens, everyone would start wearing them and telling their friends to wear them, and sooner or later everyone will be talking about it. Unless we find ways like this to communicate these incidents to the people who feel unaffected by them, we're still just preaching to the choir.
Jenn: We already have resources to teach diversity, i.e. women's studies and AAS. >Kayt: AAS and women's studies are part of American History, but they are taught as something separate. They are added onto rather than included in.
Jenn: AAS and Women's Studies should be mandatory.
Representative from Public Safety: I have been here for 34 years. I grew up with blackface as part of everyday life. It was normal. So I have wear two hats when dealing with these incidents. What I try to do is to be a medium for people to say what they have to say and also provide a medium for those who have something to say and don't have a way to say it or can't say it. Most of these things are occurring during the first few weeks of school. Is this something they come here with or are they learning it here? Some of these situations need to get back home to the families of students. Conversations in the homes would help change things in the homes as well.
Tim: These incidents may be part of the process of change. It might be an example of our teaching it. It might be part of the clash of cultures.
Kayt: Concerning the demonstrations following the blackface incident at Halloween: One of the Chancellor's partygoers suggested that the protesters teach them. But they are students. It isn't their job to teach the administration or the rest of the university community/population. It isn't her job as a black person or as a student to educate anyone about anything. It shouldn't be put on, the job of teaching, on the AAS or Latino studies departments. It is the responsibility of the university. There needs to be some sort of affinity between the teacher of the 105 class and the students.
Vivian May (Women's Studies Professor): About "comfort": whose comfort do we value? Whose throat do we care about shoving stuff down? Classrooms aren't safe for everyone, so for whom do we decide to make them comfortable? We need to figure out how to be together uncomfortably.
Dana Harrington (WP Professor): And keeping the conversation going is the key.
Posted by mryonker at 11:22 PM | Comments (0)
Whiteboards/Blackboards
Diversity Forum 2
Whiteboards/Blackboards
How much student "empowerment" is too much? When does "fun" speech become "hate" speech? When does safety and accountability override creativity and anonymity? How do we approach these questions in the dorms and in the classrooms? Students will discuss the controversial effects of recent bias-related incidents, including anonymous messages written on dorm whiteboards, on relationships in/outside dorm life. Respondents will include representatives from the Office of Residential Life, Judicial Affairs, and Public Safety.
Posted by mryonker at 11:13 PM | Comments (0)
November 07, 2003
Diversity as Signature (Revised Grant Proposal)
Writing and Diversity in a Globalized World
Fund for Diversity 2003
Vice Chancellor’s Curriculum Innovation Initiative
Margaret Himley
November 7, 2003
Diversity as a Signature
Writing in a globalized world requires starting from an assumption of difference, of limited knowledge, of perspective. Writing teachers prepare writers to produce written and electronic texts that take that assumption into account. We ask students to learn more about the geographic and historical contexts in which they write, analyze audiences, listen to others’ points of view, recognize the limits on their perspectives and their knowledge, and be self-reflexive about their particular history and language experiences.
With this grant, the Writing Program commits to this assumption of difference integral to WRT 105 and WRT 205 (and also to WRT 307, a course focused on professional and technical writing that by definition now has to take a transnational perspective on writing and document design).
Students will come out of these courses with a much richer understanding of the many ways communication is cross-cultural, as they learn to ‘translate’ a press release from US to British English, or analyze the rhetorics of different racial or ethnic groups, or conduct critical research, or write for particular audiences, or help urban teens publish a literary magazine.
By the end of the grant period, the program will have made this work a signature of the curriculum. We will require that teachers demonstrate in each section of WRT 105, WRT 205, and WRT 307 imaginative, exciting, and explicit ways they have made this assumption of difference a fundamental feature of the course. It will be a criterion of evaluation when we review syllabi, evaluate teachers, and design course evaluations.
Working Groups
Given that there are many points of entry into this very large topic, we propose that the grant fund seven to eight working groups over the next three years. The main task of these groups will be to produce teaching materials to be disseminated throughout the program. The groups will:
• be composed of representatives from the main constituencies in the Writing Program (full time faculty, professional writing instructors, CCR graduate students, and possibly English graduate students);
• be given a budget (up to $5000) which they could use to develop teaching materials in whatever ways they find useful (e.g., they may use the money to pay teachers stipends for developing materials, or to bring in speakers, or to purchase films or other texts, or to sponsor a student conference);
• make these teaching materials public by posting them to the diversity website, by presenting them at Fall Conference and Spring Conference, and by other means such as student conferences or publications;
• develop ways to assess what happens (e.g., each year we do a descriptive study of student writing produced in the new TA version of WRT 105).
Spring 2004:
• Working Group #1: the service learning coordinating group will use their funds to develop literacy initiatives at one of the elementary or middle schools near the campus as a site for students to work with these school kids in a host of ways – tutoring, drama productions, publishing literary magazines, etc. We will approach Levy Middle School first, because it is within walking distance and because there is a clear need and a new principal. (Appendix A)
• Working Group #2: the coordinating group exploring visual rhetorics and literacy will use their funds to develop teaching materials on transnational approaches to visuality (e.g., document design, websites, graphics, etc.). (Appendix B).
Summer 2004:
• Working Group #3: The 670 team (those who prepare materials for the new TA version of WRT 105 and WRT 205) will use their funds to develop the assignments we have begun to teach in this course, based on critical geography’s concept of spaces of exclusion and inclusion. (Appendix C).
Each semester new groups will form and develop teaching materials. Given interest in the program, groups might form around issues of gender and sexuality, race and ethnicity, globalization and work, and World Englishes.
By the end of the grant, we will have designed and field-tested teaching materials that approach diversity through multiple points of entry, and as students make their way through WRT 105, WRT 205, and WRT 307, they will have learned to take diversity into account as a key component to successful communication, from audience analysis to document design.
Note: We will designate internships for CCR PhD students to do support work for the grant – such as updating and maintaining the website, alerting teachers to related events across campus, creating flyers and publicity materials, and helping with organizing events. These internships come out of the budget in the Writing Program.
Diversity Speakers Series
The grant will also fund the Diversity Speakers Series for the next three years. Each spring we have brought in a speaker with expertise in some aspect of diversity and developed a one-credit Masters class around that visit.
Forums: Integrating Diversity
The purpose of these forums is look at diversity from a local perspective by organizing conversations with the campus. We have two planned for the fall, and will do two or three each semester:
• Interrogating Diversity Forum 1: Freshman Orientation-Who Owns Diversity? Nov. 3, 2003 at 9:30 am in HBC 239
Invited to initiate the conversation: Adrea Jaehnig, Director of the LGBT Resource Center; Mariana Lebron, Director of Orientation and Transition Services; Monica Roberts, Co-Chair of the Team Against Bias (TAB); and James Duah-Agyeman, Director of the Office of Multicultural Affairs. Students from WRT 105 will respond.
• Interrogating Diversity Forum 2: Whiteboards/Blackboards
Tuesday, Nov. 18, 4:00 pm, HBC 239
How much student “empowerment” is too much? When does “fun” speech become “hate” speech? When does safety and accountability override creativity and anonymity? How do we approach these questions in the dorms and in the classrooms?
Students will discuss the controversial effects of recent bias-related incidents, including anonymous messages written on dorm whiteboards, on relationships in/outside dorm life. Respondents will include representatives from the Office of Residential Life, Judicial Affairs,
and Public Safety.
Assessment
Assessment will take different forms, and each working group will develop its own assessment procedures. For the forums and other events, we will ask participants to fill out evaluation forms. When diversity becomes one of the learning outcomes and part of course evaluation, we will be able to calculate the effect of these initiatives numerically.
Dissemination
We have started a special website for Writing and Diversity in a Globalized World, which makes course designs, assignments, readings, and student writing available to teachers in the program. Teachers (and others) can turn to the website for teaching resources and ideas.
We are also focusing our Fall and Spring Conferences on this topic, so that teachers, faculty from across campus, and students will have a public site for discussing diversity, writing, and pedagogy.
We will also sponsor sites for students to talk – conferences, weblogs, focus groups, etc.
Posted by mryonker at 04:30 PM | Comments (0)
November 03, 2003
Notes from Forum 1
Notes from the conversation:
Margaret Himley, Writing Program Director of Undergraduate Studies, began the forum with comments explaining why we were meeting and what we wanted to get from this forum. Because diversity is such a broad term, much of its meaning is lost: it simultaneously stands for everything and means nothing. A couple of overarching questions, things to keep in mind during the forum: How is the value on diversity received?; What is the underlife of diversity?
Mariana initiated the discussion. Began by addressing how and why diversity became a (the) theme of orientation.
Two years ago, the chancellor decided to start a new orientation program. A diversity sub-committee was one of several sub-committees formed as part of restructuring the orientation program. Apparently, this new orientation format was supposed to begin in 2004-5. At some point last year, the chancellor decided to begin the orientation this school year. So the department of orientation was created and had only a few months to prepare this years' orientation.
The university, Mariana stressed, wants students to know that diversity is a key value. Which is why diversity was promoted so much during orientation. Diversity was incorporated into the mailings students received during the summer. The last mailing, in particular, was something on diversity. This led to the first event of orientation-an event focusing on diversity. This event, as all of the events during orientation, were celebratory in nature, a carnival atmosphere. As students entered their dorms, there were No Place For Hate campaigns going on. The first night, students were directed to Schine. As they entered the student center, there were Steele drums playing. Music from around the world was played to expose students to things they weren't familiar with. And the entertainment for the evening was a lesbian comedian. All of this-the music, the carnival, the comedian-was to surround students with diversity, to teach them about diversity without preaching to them.
Diversity was incorporated into every part of orientation in some way. The student leaders for orientation were from diverse backgrounds. Orientation promoted as many "diverse" events as possible. And students were broken into small groups in order for them to have the chance to get to know a few other students a little better.
Monica (Team Against Bias): TAB was formed two and a half years ago after the "black face" incident. There was a group of students who were outraged by the incident and had no resources to help them address this issue. TAB provided support for what the students wanted to do. The students chose the course of action and TAB helped them do it. This seems to be the course TAB takes: they let students decide how they want to respond, and TAB supports the response within reason.
TAB's response is typically to be a support system for the affected community or individuals. Three things TAB does: respond to major events (black face); respond to daily events; they are proactive in educating the campus.
There are and have been a lot of bias-related messages written on white boards this year (for instances: race, religion, sexual orientation). Sexual Orientation is the most frequently targeted. There are the major events, such as the gay-bashing on Comstock and the racist comments/language/music in the dorm, but these are just the ones that we hear the most about. The everyday bias-related events often go unreported at all or are simply ignored by the general population.
Question: Why do you suppose students don't report classroom incidents?
Power relations of the class. They don't feel they have a way to address these incidents.
Anne Fitzsimmons to the students: What sense do you have on how "diversity" was received in Orientation? What sense do you have on how the biased-related incidents are received by students?
Leslie: People try to justify the bias-related events: "it's a big campus, these things happen," etc. There needs to be a way to bring these bias-related events to light. As a first year student, she lived on a multi-cultural floor and took a multi-cultural class. This living environment and the formal setting of a classroom gave her a way to address these issues, to talk about them and hear different perspectives. Leslie: "students should have formal training-classes-not just social stuff."
Student: She lives on a multi-cultural floor this year. Race isn't the only form of bias; money and economics plays a huge part in bias. And although this type of bias isn't typically reported, it is, apparently, prevalent in the dorms. And Perline informed us of a black face incident that occurred this weekend.
Jessica: Students are NOT aware of things. They ignore the emails about these incidents. Like Leslie, she thinks there should be a mandatory class or forum of some sort. Not all students are interested, but she thinks that this could be because they don't know much about it. They hear about it, maybe too much, but it doesn't mean anything.
All three students talking:
Diversity isn't brought up in class. And when it is, people do not feel comfortable talking because they do not want to be attacked for their views. In order to talk about things, students need to be able to speak their minds without worrying about being attacked or being labeled.
Dana Harrington learned this very thing from the writing center's research: students are constantly "misunderstood" and having to clarify their statements. And these students are anonymous.
Question: How can we get people to talk and take chances in a classroom?
Jessica: Smaller classes (like summer start). No one wants to talk in a lecture hall. They might be lectured, but they are not allowed to discuss it themselves. And Summer Start classes are themselves diverse-most "regular" classes are not.
Monica: Class is not a safe environment. Students of color must choose the battles they wish to fight. Sometimes they might not feel like fighting a battle in class. And before this can ever be taken up in the classroom effectively, there would have to be a commitment by the faculty. They would need to understand how they have been affected by oppression, racism, etc.
Jessica: (Some) students do not take white board incidents seriously. They don't think it is a big deal. And, again, students DO NOT KNOW about most of these incidents.
Mariana: They'd like for the diversity focus to be a year long thing somehow-connect with a class or classes or something.
Monica: Needs to be practical. It can't just be talk or theoretical. People need to be in small groups and experience
Posted by mryonker at 11:16 PM | Comments (0)
Who Owns Diversity?
Diversity Forum 1
Freshman Orientation: Who Owns Diversity?
Initiating the conversation will be Adrea Jaehnig, Director of the LGBT Resource Center; Mariana Lebron, Director of Orientation and Transition Services; Monica Roberts, Co-Chair of the Team Against Bias (TAB); and James Duah-Agyeman, Director of the Office of Multicultural Affairs. Students from WRT 105 will respond.
Posted by mryonker at 11:11 PM | Comments (0)