Michelle Wardlow

Summer is Here!

mlw107 — Thu, 11 Jun 2009 04:03:56 +0000

I’m taking Econ 548 and AAS 571. Both classes will challenge me in many ways, but I’m liking the philosophical constructs of the ECON class. I like the lectures. He goes right along with the book, which is amazing in and of itself. I’m excited about the class. The problem lies in the math that is required. I failed math 100 four times, only the fourth time I got rounded up to a C. Most professors give a curve once in a while, this was a freaking circle! I had a 25% on my own.

It’s finally over!

mlw107 — Thu, 14 May 2009 09:06:49 +0000

Well, We are done with the semester. It is officially over for me until summer! WOOHOO! I’m thrilled to get this one out of the way and filed into the archives! I’m so drained from all the garbage that I had to deal with and from the crazy mix of grad and undergrad students. I had never felt sorry for grad students beore, but now Icertainly do. I fell bad that they had to deal with em as an undergrad! YUCK! Neveragain, as the rest of my classes for my Post-Bacc certificate in African American African Diaspora studies is going to be independant study. I really look forward to this next three classes. I will be working with two different professors, no three. I really am excited about what I will be learning. I’m hopign maybe I can pick up an introductory economics course to get me up to speed concerning African Economics, so that the terms don’t throw me off, or I don’t use the wrong term in an essay and look completely brainless. I’m not a snowflake, really! So the really sucky class I pulled a B in, which I’m proud of. Thrilled is the exact word I’ll use. Don’t think I deserved it, but I’ll take it for certain! I think I got a B in the other class as well. Might get me to some for of a list on campus, we’ll see!

mlw107 — Thu, 23 Apr 2009 16:47:49 +0000

Racial uplift in the education of African American children is a rather new area of concentration for me in the academy. There seem to be numerous writings on the education of African American children; however, many of the articles appeared from their titles to be centered from a negative perspective. I would like to examine, in subsequent pages, some studies and the researchers’ interpretations of racial uplift as well as Culturally Relevant Pedagogy. From that starting point, I wanted to examine ways in which this form of Racial Uplift is being implemented in the preparation of future teachers in the Teacher Education Program at Western Illinois University, as well as look at ways Western Illinois University can encourage a more diverse teacher training program. I ran into some difficulties with scheduling constraints and missed a very good opportunity to speak with a gentleman in the field. Therefore, I have decided to look at one program that Western Ikllinois University is has utilized in times past to encourage a more diverse student body in the Teacher Education Program, called Golden Apple Foundation.
A Review of the Literature
There are a myriad of ways in which a people can begin the process of Racial Uplift. While these researchers I have chosen to focus on do not tackle the exact term “racial uplift,” the concept is readily apparent in the nature of the articles they have written and in the studies they have conducted. What these researchers have indeed chosen to focus upon is the correlation between success in the classroom and in the boardroom, with a closeness that most often comes from within the Black community itself, rather than from the “mainstream classroom.” By “mainstream classroom,” I am referring to the common classroom, predominantly white, and not culturally relevant.
The first article I would like to focus our attention on is a study conducted by an Associate Professor at the University of Georgia, James Morris. This gentleman’s article was published in the American Educational Research Journal’s Spring 2004 issue. The study was a qualitative case study called “Can Anything Good Come out of Nazereth?” The study compared two predominantly Black elementary schools; Fairmont Elementary School, in Saint Louis, Missouri and Lincoln Elementary School in Atlanta, Georgia. Morris’ research methodology consisted of participant observation, such as attending gatherings like “Meet The Teachers Night,” Open House, and Field Days; as well as attending holiday celebrations such as Black History Month and Kwaanza. Morris was present at Fairmont Elementary School periodically between the years 1994-1997. His time spent in the Lincoln Elementary School community in Atlanta, GA. occurred between the years 1999-2002.
Based on Morris’ observation at these two predominantly Black elementary schools, we notice a positive correlation between the achievement of Black elementary school students and receiving one’s primary education in a predominantly Black educational environment; since these children are surrounded, according to Morris, by people who are genuinely concerned and interested in their academic success. It seems apparent as well, according to Morris’ critical observations, that these same students’ success would be hampered if they were bused to a predominantly White institution with predominantly White teachers, even if these institutions are seen by the greater public as academically higher achieving.
bell hooks concurs with this theory, as she states in the introductory pages of her book: Teaching To Transgress: Education As The Practice of Freedom. She says: “My teachers were on a mission. To fulfill that mission, my teachers made sure they ‘knew us.’” (hooks, 2) hooks began her educational journey at Booker T. Washington School, where nearly all of her teachers were Black women. She goes on to say that “School changed utterly with racial integration. Gone was the messianic zeal to transform our minds and beings that had characterized teachers and their pedagogical practices at our all-Black schools.” (hooks, 3) By being taken away, even with the best of intentions, from the community that raised and nurtured her and fanned within her mind the flame of a hunger for knowledge, she was forced to endure the mere transfer of factual information by her mostly White teachers. In the Black comunity to which she was accustomed, the teachers functioned as “othermothers.”
This term, ”othermothering” is explored further by Dr. Douglas Guiffrida, who serves as an Assistant Professor in the Department of Counseling and Human Development at the University of Rochester. His study, titled “Othermothering as a Framework for Understanding African American Students’ Definitions of Student-Centered Faculty,” deals with students located with the post-secondary environment. This study was also Qualitative in construction and the methodological processes by which the research was carried out included focus groups, as well as primary and secondary interviews. Dr. Guiffrida was careful to select a Predominantly White Institution (PWI) which contained only 7.5% of the student population as black. He was also careful in using focus groups as his data collection methods to ensure that the students felt much more comfortable to speak at liberty, considering the fact that he is a White researcher. This practice ensured that the Black students participating in these discussions felt in no way threatened, and proved to be quite a productive and successful course of action.
The students Guiffrida spoke with did not use the term “othermothering” explicitly; however, but rather described those African American faculty members who had “asked students about personal and academic issues,” who adopted a “holistic approach to their advising” as those instructors who were ready and willing to go “above and beyond the call of duty.” (Guiffrida, 2005)
Dr. Jawanza Kunjufu has tackled the problem of educating African American students in his book, Critical Issues in Educating African American Youth. He looks to answer these five questions:
1) Why are so many African American Students Lower-Achieving?
2) Can a single low-income parent produce a high achieving student?
3) What is the relationship between self-esteem and academic achievement?
4) If the tests are culturally biased, how do Asian Americans outperform everyone else?
5) How can we reduce the dropout rate?
Dr. Kunjufu writes this book in a conversational question-and-answer style. The question is asked, and then he spends a number of pages addressing the issue at hand. I looked through this book looking for information about culturally relevant pedagogy, and did not find anything that I could use in that regard, although there was a lot of great information concerning some of the biases schools have toward African American children and how learning styles affect the retention of critical information. Something Dr. Kunjufu mentioned which I believe is critical to overcoming the achievement gap between Black children and White children is the fact that “the average Asian American student spends about twelve hours per week studying, and the average White student spends about four hours less, and the average Black student spends seven hours less than THAT.” (Kunjufu, 1989) It seems to me that the best way to have a rise in the achievement level of African American students, is to encourage more time at home studying. This means that parental involvement must increase, otherwise there will be no hope of ever gaining ground on this achievement gap. It is not just up to the teachers to foster a love of learning in the student, but that must begin at a very young age within the family structure. It is the teacher’s responsibility to present the material, and it is the student’s job to retain it. No amount of test taking or test-prep will make a student WANT to learn.
Dr. Gloria Ladson-Billings presents a better idea, in my opinion of what the term “Culturally Relevant Pedagogy” really is. She did not explicitly identify this term in her book Crossing Over Into Canaan, but she did use one example of a young teacher, new to the field. She called him Carter Forshay, and described him as an excellent educator of African American Children. He came to the west coast looking for a bit of a change in scenery, and eventually got a job in a school, teaching a class of all African American students. He tried many times to encourage them to write and used many techniques, all to no avail, until he decided HE was doing something wrong. He was not connecting, so he looked in his collection of music and found a CD by Wynton Marsalis, fashioned along the same lines of “Peter and the Wolf.” He brought it in, and had the students role play ways in which the dialogue should occur with the music, and this enticed the students to be more creative in his classroom. This is a prime example of “culturally relevant pedagogy.” (Ladson-Billings, 2001)
I wanted, in the remainder of my paper, to take a look at the Teacher Education Program here as it relates to educating future teachers, who will then be going into the Chicago area to teach in the public school system. I wanted to see what was being undertaken in the encouragement of a more diverse education, especially for African American children.
The site I selected for my study of the education of African American children was the Teacher Education Program at Western Illinois University. WIU has been known to train teachers for approximately one hundred years. This is where teachers first began arriving in order to learn the proper way to educate the next generation. The school sits in the Northwest quadrant of the city of Macomb, Illinois. Current population sits right near the 20,000 mark. The town is small and getting around can really only be called easy. It takes approximately five minutes by car to get to any destination within city limits. This makes this town quite an appropriate place to educate our young people. Not much to distract from important matters of study. A quick look at the dynamics of the town revealed these dismal numbers: Over 85% of the population of Macomb, Illinois, according to www.city-data.com lists themselves as Non-Hispanic White. Only 5.9% of the town’s population is black. With those disturbing numbers, it is not a surprise that there are so few students of color entering the Teacher Education Program here at WIU. The median family income is listed at a mere approximately $30,000 per year. That is approximately $19,000 below the state-wide average. If that isn’t enough, there is also, according to Dr. Ternakski, a bit of a flight of talent. Most students of color, when they reach the age to do so, are leaving for more urban settings such as Chicago.
Quite a bit of research was needed in order to look at the education of African American children correctly, and not with any sort of bias on my part. I read several journal articles, and perused several books on the subject, looking for the most pertinent information concerning my topic of interest. I spoke with the Associate Dean of Academic Affairs in the College of Education, Dr. Ternaski, about the department’s role in preparing teachers for fieldwork, and his observations were quite intriguing. Dr. Ternaski said that quite a few African American students from the Chicago area were brought to Western’s main campus through a program called Golden Apple.
What is The Golden Apple Foundation?
The Golden Apple Foundation was formed in 1985 in order to “honor outstanding Chicago-area teacher as grandly as Hollywood honors its actors at the Academy Awards.” This was according to information gleaned from their website as of April 22, 2009. There have been over 200 teachers who have been honored with this award and the foundation ensures a nice publicly held reception, which is aired on Public Television every year.
This program offered scholarships a number of years ago to students coming to Western Illinois University for campus visits and recruiting. The biggest issue these students from the Chicago area faced when considering Western Illinois University was proximity to home. The financial load was often easier to bear when students could stay in their home, and attend one of the local universities, such as Northern Illinois University. This makes recruitment of African American students from the Chicago area very difficult. WIU, as a result, must depend more heavily on the local population for recruitment if it will se much in the way of diversity in the Teacher Education Program, and if the population figures are correct, there needs to be a bit more done to encourage students from the Chicago area to want to journey downstate for their higher education needs.

Feeling better

mlw107 — Fri, 27 Mar 2009 11:36:44 +0000

I received some prior work back from the professor this evening and I certainly felt much better than I did when I arrived this evening. I learned that we weren’t expected as new grad students to follow all the information concerning research that was given us, since we were only writing fifteen pages. That was a sure relief! I think a lot of the students in the class were a little concerned that they were being expected to do graduate level work as undergrads. I’m hoping that these students’ fears were abolished. Mine certainly was! I also learned that I’m not failing the course like I thought. I think I have a B going in this particular course! *sigh* That’s how I spell relief!!!

Semester uneventful

mlw107 — Wed, 25 Mar 2009 20:54:06 +0000

Well, here I am almost through the semester and I though for sure there would be groundbreaking insights and bits of knowledge I would be picking up and faithfully depositing here to this blog, but it doesn’t seem to be happening. It could be my lack of studious habits, or it could be the fact that I’ve been “doing school” for so long that it all becomes rather insignificant after some time.
Went to class monday evening and I was the only one of the three of us that showed up. That was nice though, because the lecturer for this week was a professor of economics, and I had him all to myself. It was very intriguing and he led me to a source for my research project for the final. I was thrilled. I don’t know a lot about my subject area, admittedly, but this might havwe been what I needed in order to get me a great paper by the end of the semester.

Did some poetry writing today, the first I have done in a very long time. It actually felt very nice to be able to put the pencil to the paper again. Like meeting an old friend. There will be more meetings in the coming days and weeks. Might put one here for the “world” to see.

Getting ready to finish

mlw107 — Sun, 01 Feb 2009 12:08:27 +0000

I’m currently almost through a book on research methodology by Jonathan Grix. I really do enjoy the thought process behind this book. It will prepare the students to encounter other works in this particular genre. Grix gives the reader a basic foundational understanding of what Research Methods are, and also the different perspectives for research. He introduces the students to the basic language of research, and how to properly use the language. It is all pretty fascinating. I’m learning in my research methodology class about the various resources available to me through our college library. The stuff I can find in there now is astounding. I never knew I had access to so much material. I wish I had allowed someone to take me through this as I was an undergrad. I never knew about refworks either. I understand that there is some tweaking one must do in order to hold to the various language standards whether it be APA, MLA etc. It s still an amazing application.
I met with one of my academic advisors and have decided that I’m going to gear the rest of my Masters Degree for persuing a PhD in Law. I would liketo take everything I have learned or had access to up to this point and use it to become a human rights defender. Yes, that’s right. I’m going on to Law School.

Reading and syllabi

mlw107 — Fri, 23 Jan 2009 21:13:33 +0000

I didn’t do any reading yet today. Will gt to that as the evening stretches forth. I have Bible study tonight as well as work at the store. I know I won’t get there until later on, so I’m planning on taking copious breaks in order to have time to squeeze in some reading. I’m plugging away on this introductory book about research, and learning to do my own research. I went to a little seminar on the offerings of the Malpass Library, so I picked up a few pointers, but fell asleep halfway through. Luckily I only dozed. I’m not narcleptic, I just took some allergypills to keep from hacking too much in public, and those things throw me around like a rag doll. I took ONE. They are the cheapie pink ones that are like benadryl. Whoa. If I take them, I try to take them with coffee or a caffeine pill to counteract the effect. I know it sounds harsh, but I have to do all these things to look normal. I still think it’s because I laughed at my political science professor because of his congestion, always clearing his throat…it WAS funny. What comes around goes around they say!

Being Vulnerable and Being Ethical With/In Research

mlw107 — Wed, 21 Jan 2009 01:32:37 +0000

This article/chapter was written by Kit Tisdale from University of Georgia and takes into account the position of the object of research. Her example looks at a subject who has just endured a trauma, while the researcher was already in the process of gathering information. She makes a point for the reader that sometimes there are ethical reasons for which one may decide to stall the process, or not proceed at all. The subject is a troubled teen who has just experienced the death of a close friend. She says that there are several ways that the researcher could proceed, either waiting, or letting the subject decide when the appropriate time is to talk about what happened.
Another thing that stuck out in my mind as I read is when she mentioned that another rough way to treat research is to do all the tough research you need to do and then NOT publish the study. I feel sort of bad about this, because I interviewed N’Jeeri Wa’Ngugi a couple years ago concerning the trauma she endured at the hands of thugs in Kenya. She went on to bring forth a support group for women to speak out about rape in Kenya, because so many women are shamed into believing it is their own fault. Ilost the notes to our conversation and only recently found them, and would now like to revive that study, possibly with new information. I don’t want to be the unethical one and just let the opportunity to make a difference slip by.
Forgive my lack of professional style with these reviews at first. I really don’t know what I’m doing quite yet.

Hello world!

mlw107 — Sun, 18 Jan 2009 05:46:08 +0000

This blog was created for the express purpose of chrnocling my success as a Graduate Student at Western Illinois University. I’ll be posting document and reading reviews here as time warrants. I welcome any and all suggestions those of my readers in Cyberspace might have to help me with tiem organization and study habits since Grad School is a much different animal than undergrad. Wish me luck.