is my last semester too late for an internship?
I guess not! I have one with Central PA magazine for the month of November. It’s kind of an unusual thing to do an internship for just one month, but I’m excited to see how the process works with another magazine and gain a little more hands-on experience.
I’m especially glad to be around for hands-on experience after a scary Tuesday. On the way to New York City to hang out with friends, Greg and I got into a little car accident due to the strange snowstorms in New Jersey and a patch of ice. . . Thankfully, not even one person was hurt. Whew!
Now that I’ve successfully acquired an internship. . . I only have to face the challenge of getting a real job when I graduate! Right???
Filed under general | Comment (0)once upon a time I read something profound
about distrusting any kind of artwork which came easily.
If that is true, and the difficult undertakings are the only good ones, then my life is full of very good things.
Currently, I’m embarked on a mission to learn to draw, something that should have happened a long, long time ago. Oh, sure, I took intro to drawing and got an A, but there’s so much more to drawing I never discovered.
Here’s the thing about being a super-senior that I love — all the professors know me, and as I’m looking forward to the things I need to be an artist after I graduate (like knowing how to draw really well) they’re totally willing to help me work out a way to reach my goals. One of my favorite professors ever took some time out of his busy Monday-after-break and gave me my first assignment:
Drawings of bell peppers, due next Wednesday.
Where will I find time in my schedule? I’m not sure. But if I’ve learned one thing in my extensive education, I’ve mastered prioritization of tasks. And this one? It’s near the top. I also think Messiah would be proud — I think I might officially be a life-long learner.
Filed under general | Comment (0)remember how i mentioned that great lecture on race and education?
Did you know that the forerunners to our standardized testing system are immigration tests, way back in the day at Ellis Island? Authorities decided they needed a way to tell who was feeble-minded and wouldn’t do the country much good as a labor force. So they adapted a French testing system (designed to tell if any members of a class were what we might think of as mildly retarded). Let’s just say these tests were a little flawed — something like 80% of Jews were turned away because of them, and there is no way that 80% of any ethnic group is mentally handicapped.
No, this is not a diatribe against having to take the SAT to get into college. I learned about the history of standardized testing from Beverly Tatum, one of several speakers in Central Pennsylvania for a series of conversations on race and education in Pennsylvania’s schools. My favorite part? She didn’t just remind us of the problems facing the public school system, she gave us ideas about concrete things to make the situation better.
All of these tests — back in the day and now — are based on the idea that intelligence is hereditary. But really, Tatum reminded us, it’s not. Intelligence is a dynamic thing, and students who are taught that show marked improvement in school. If students believe their intelligence is up to whatever task the teacher sets, and if teachers are setting high standards and clearly communicating those standards, Tatum believes that students’ performance could be radically improved.
An excellent way to communicate to students’ that the teacher perceives their ability to learn and holds high standards for them is a “criticism sandwich.” (It does not sound as tasty as grilled cheese, but it serves an great purpose.) For example, a teacher tells a student “Your paper showed a really good understanding of the material and I can tell you thought about it a lot. It needs work on your grammar and sentence structure, though. If you fix these things, it could be a really great paper.” The teacher communicated firstly what the student did right (belief in the student’s intelligence), then what the student should work on, and and finally the high standard the teacher expects and a reiteration of the idea that the student can fulfill those expectations.
I’d never heard the term “criticism sandwich” before, but it instantaneously found a home in my vocabulary. And someday, when I’m a professor, I am so going to hand out criticism sandwiches right and left, especially if it helps my students. I left Tatum’s lecture feeling better equipped to be an educator and able to talk a little more easily about race and education — and race is not something I have ever been comfortable talking about. One of the things I appreciate most about Messiah is the willingness of the college as a whole to host, begin, and sustain complicated, uncomfortable conversations — including conversations about race as a systemic thing and as something individuals can perpetuate or not. And where it is in our educational system.
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