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Yesterday in my Ed Philosophy class, we were talking about a court case from the 60s where this woman was on unemployment and refused to take any job that required her to work on Saturday.  She was a Seventh Day Adventist and they celebrate the sabbath on Saturday.  She was going to stop receiving unemployment because she had refused possible jobs, but she sued because she was basically saying that if she were forced to take a job that required her to work on her sabbath, then that was a infringement on the free exercise clause.  The courts were on her side in this case.  Since then, there have been a few more cases reversed this and then called it into question again.  But, what this made me think (and this is sort of a stupid tangent) is, what if no one worked the weekend, ever?  I know most of us don’t, but what if no one else did either?  So then we couldn’t really go anywhere or do much.  What would we do?  We’d kind of have to stay home, cook for ourselves, hang out, maybe go to a park, watch movies… it sounds kind of awesome.  It would be like Christmas day, when everything is shut down, but every weekend.  I wonder if it would make the week too busy though, like if we would have to cram our grocery shopping in in the evening or whatever.  I don’t know.  It’s not a profound thought, I know, but it’s fun to think about.

At ODE we receive an email everyday with all the news clips from around the state that have to do with education.  Today, there was a story about how the state is considering allowing school districts to make up snow days online.  There have been lots of stories about this lately.  People are sort of excited about it, but there was one article where a state congresswoman said, “Hey, what about the kids without computers at home?”  This is always something that’s hard to keep in mind when you start to get excited about the capabilities of technology, but it’s a huge problem.  So, here’s my solution (and it’s not really a new one).  Every kid should be handed a laptop in Kindergarten.  They should get free maintenance, upgrades, replacements, etc. all the way through twelfth grade.  It’s just too big of a disadvantage not to have access to a computer at home.  Oh, and there should be free wireless EVERYWHERE.  What do you all think?  One laptop per child?  (Say yes.)

My walk to work this morning was sunny with mild temps.  By the afternoon, it was absolutely perfect outside.  On campus, it was nice to see more people lingering as they walked, many had already abandoned their coats, and I could smell spring.  I met with a professor about a paper.  It was a good talk and there’s just something about the sunshine that makes everything seem bright and hopeful.  I stopped to get coffee before class, ran into a fellow grad student and chatted for a bit.  I’m starting to feel at home here, a part of things, as much as is possible in a place marked deeply by change, growth, and departure.  At this moment, I’m enjoying being in the middle, growing and enjoying the springtime.

Ohio, don’t let me down.

Today during my Ed Tech seminar, we skyped with a professor from Syracuse.  Even though her research interests aren’t directly aligned with mine, I thought it was great that we were all sitting there having a real conversation with a scholar at another university.  She seemed genuinely excited that we were interested in talking with her and it was good to hear another perspective.  It was cool.

Also, during that meeting I changed my desktop background from a picture of a glacier to a picture of a ladybug on a leaf.  It was sunny today, so I’m hopeful.  Take a hint, Ohio.

I’ve been dying to write.  This quarter, I’m taking three classes and, for some reason, I feel like I have to have all of my reading done before I can write.  I’ve spent some time writing, it’s true, but not as much as I’d like.  Today, I finally finished all of my reading for the quarter (next week is the last week of classes) and tomorrow, I have “writing” officially on my to-do list.  But, as soon as I crossed the out last reading assignment, I got a little nervous.  I have to write tomorrow.

My freshman year of college at American University, my roommate Tracey laughed at me when I declared that I liked reading better than writing because at least when you read, you don’t have to think.  I guess what I meant was that you absorb, you take notes, but the output is minimal.  I’ve learned over time that this shouldn’t be true, but at least at the time it was for me.  Now, reading is just as active as writing, but it’s still a lot less scary.  Tearing apart, thinking critically, figuring out how ideas fit together while reading still makes you less vulnerable than putting the mess of ideas in your head into a coherent linear format that will then be read, torn apart, criticized and “figured out” by some other reader.  I like writing.  I like creating a story, a narrative, making some sort of an argument, trying to grasp connections and identify disconnections, but it feels like more work than reading.  After a day of writing, if it was a really good day, I feel physically drained.  I feel like I’m one with that written page (screen?) and I’m communing with my computer and all of the ideas that have been slowly leaking into my brain for the past 28 years (but mostly the past 2).  It can be intense.

So, I finally get to write.  I guess I better prepare myself.

“First, I want to thank you all for agreeing to be on my committee.  You have each been influential in my graduate work and I am thrilled to have your support and guidance through the exam process.”

This is the first line of the email I sent today regarding my first committee meeting.  What this means is that, my committee and I will meet for the first time to approve that I have the required courses and we will begin developing my exam questions.  I will be taking my exams over the summer.  Once those are finished, I will be able to work on my dissertation and… eventually graduate!  This is a big, scary thing.  The first committee meeting…  I have a committee!  I have a group of people that are invested in helping me complete a PhD.  I’m just about done with coursework and I’ll be on to my own, specialized work.  I feel like I’m finally becoming.  Wow.  I’m really gonna do this.

This morning, Dan and I got up and went to Stauf’s for awhile.  I worked on school stuff, and Dan was doing his regular work.  Around lunch time we came home.  I did a bit more work, then needed to run to to campus to drop off some papers and work out.  There’s this one street on campus, where there are lots of crosswalks and yield signs.  It’s right in the middle of campus, so there are always students criss-crossing the street and, as a driver, it is very slow going.  Over time, I’ve noticed that there are three types of street-crossers.  The typical street-crosser looks up at the car to make sure the car is going to stop and then sort of half waves and hurries across the street.  A second type of street-crosser, the passive aggressive type, just walks right out into the street, sometimes on a cell phone, sometimes not, almost challenging you to hit them, but still walking briskly and in a hurry.  The third type is my favorite type.  They stare at the ground, and walk slowly across the street, barely realizing that they are standing in a place of some danger, a place where walkers really don’t belong, a street (!).  The one I saw today was so slow about her pace, that I thought that she might actually enjoy being in the street.

I started to think about these three types of street-crossers.  I think I’m mostly the first; when I was younger I was the second, but never have I been the third.  Although I kind of like the idea of the third.  It reminds me of this quote from Gloria Anzaldua:

Borders are set up to define the places that are safe and unsafe, to distinguish us from them. A border is a dividing line, a narrow strip along a steep edge. A borderland is a vague and undetermined place created by the emotional residue of an unnatural boundary. It is in a state of constant transition. The prohibited and forbidden are its inhabitants.

The street is a borderland of sorts, a place dividing up where “pedestrians” walk.  The street is a place where pedestrians shouldn’t be, or should only be for a short amount of time in certain places (crosswalks).  The street is only safe for cars, not people.  Even the term pedestrian is sort of strange.  One who travels on foot… we’re all really pedestrians, but we are restricted in this space made for one who travels by car.  The arbitrary boundary of the street is constantly in transition, cars coming and going, people hurrying or putzing through the crosswalks, some even darting, forbidden, outside of the designated crosswalks.  So, those ones who don’t acknowledge that they are in a borderland, who wander freely, enjoy the forbidden nature of the street, a place that’s not for people on foot, I kind of like them.

One time when I was walking downtown, there was a man, clearly out of his mind, who began to play a sort of hopscotch in the middle of High Street.  He was jumping on one leg, trying not to land on any cracks.  Cars started coming, but he paid no attention.  It could have been ugly, but instead, cars slowed to a stop, watching, in awe.  It makes me wonder what we’re so afraid of, in those borderland spaces.  What happens if we stay in the borderland for awhile, disregarding rules of typical behavior?  What if we discovered that instead of getting hurt, you might find that you change the borderland in an unexpected way?  What if the borderland changed you?

The past two days have been really busy.  I’m tired, but I wanted to share a couple tidbits of good news.  First, I got this email today:

“I got your contact information from your article in the February 2010 NSTA ScienceScope.  I notice you are a former middle school science teacher working on your doctorate.  Western Illinois University is currently looking for an Assistant/Associate Professor in Science Education at the Elementary-Middle School level.  I am attaching our position announcement.  If you feel you meet the qualifications I would encourage you to apply for the position.”

Nice, right?  I’m not the perfect candidate for this position, nor does the timing line up (I won’t be finished with my degree yet), but there are two good things about this.  1) Faculty members read the teacher journal I like to write for and 2) one of them read it and thought it was good enough to look me up to send me this announcement.  Yay!

Also, I met with the professor I worked with on that article that got rejected.  We brainstormed what we could do and we think we’re going to get more feedback and rewrite, but she also asked if I wanted to help collect data (conduct interviews) from teachers in a local school district!  She has a contract to work on their technology plan and she wants to see what teachers need and want from technology.  This is a good opportunity to get some field experience and I’m pretty excited about it.  But, I’m also still really tired.  Night!

Just a few questions for today:

Do you care about educational policy (things like standards, accountability, charter schools, vouchers, teacher quality, etc)?  If so, what would you want to know more about?  What would be helpful for you to know more about?

I did a bunch of work today and attended two classes that I hadn’t been to in three weeks (conference plus snow days).  In my educational philosophy class, I’m working on a paper and I thought I’d post the introduction here to see if anyone wanted to give feedback.  Enjoy!

‘I never let my schooling interfere with my education’.
Mark Twain.

Education is important to humanity; education, that is, in its broadest sense.  Here’s how wikipedia puts it: “Education in its broadest sense is any act or experience that has a formative effect on the mind, character or physical ability of an individual.”  This definition, constructed by collective wisdom on a mostly open piece of new media called a wiki, is at the heart of the concept of school.  School does present a certain sort of education, and we tend to conflate the two, but by this definition, you can receive an education by watching television, helping your dad fix a car, apprenticing with an artist, etc.  With the current proliferation of the internet and resulting “new media,” people are participating in a form of education, once again, in new ways in new venues with new tools at their disposal.  New media, according to wikipedia, “is a term meant to encompass the emergence of digital, computerized, or networked information and communication technologies in the later part of the 20th century. Most technologies described as “new media” are digital, often having characteristics of being manipulatable, networkable, dense, compressible, interactive and impartial.”  Of course, not everyone is able to participate (so I might not use the word “impartial” in my own definition), but I have hope for increased accessibility alongside a healthy skepticism that people will be able to live without it for much longer.

As a doctoral student in an Educational Technology program, I have been looking closely at new media and its interactions and effects.  New media, in my mind, is more than anything, a learning mechanism.  A state-sponsored school is also a learning mechanism.  These two entities function in very different ways and with different sets of regulations (or lack thereof).  My interest then, in this paper, is to compare the educational possibilities present in new media and in state-run schools with regard to the ideals of liberalism and multiculturalism.  I posit that the values of liberalism and multiculturalism are better served by the capabilities of new media than by state-run schools.  I also argue that the values of liberalism and multiculturalism do not necessitate state regulation and, therefore, our philosophy and practices of education should be more open to collective experimental play; new media can serve as an aid to this process.

Today, I worked on my presentations.  I will be giving two in the next two days.  I was feeling strangely calm about the whole thing earlier, but right now, I am feeling a little tense and I have a headache.  I don’t know why I’m getting anxious, I am actually pretty excited to share what I’ve been working on.  My body just needs to listen to my head and relax.  This is a good thing though, giving presentations, and here are the two different conferences where I will be sharing:

Digital Media in a Social World

Miami University’s Graduate Student Conference on Social Justice

I taught a class tonight and decided to go to the library for awhile afterward.  On my way, I realized that I don’t venture out onto campus at night much.  They have white lights all around mirror lake and the library was looking very nice surrounded by the glassy snow.

Thompson Library

I better get to work.  I need to pick Dan up from the airport at 11 tonight.  Wish me luck tomorrow!