BROAD A Digital Media Movement
Education
may 2017 issue 92
BROAD understanding our approach
SECTIONS Critiques, reviews, opinions, and information from your BROAD team in several mediums
COLUMNS Our most passionate contributers share their stories, opinions, and experiences by intersecting each magazine theme with their lives.
ARTICLES Our BROAD communities contribute expression in many forms: stories, listacles, essays, cathartic 4 am epiphanies, etc.
OUR ARMY
CEILI ERICKSON Editor-in-Chief
CURTIS MAIN
Founder and Advisor
RACHEL GOLDENSE Section Editor
MARIS YURDANA Design and Layout Editor
RENEE ZAGOZDON
Copy Editor and Poetry Curator
columns
Punctuation Marks: Teaching Ourselves, Teaching Our World C.M.E. Archives in Action: Making the Known Unknown: Sr. Therese Langerbeck Nancy Freeman
articles
One More Teacher Leaving the Profession Tells Why Jessica B. Burstrem One Nation, Undereducated Jena DiMaggio Learning, Learning, Always Learning Mike Erickson An Educator’s View On Accessibility Katie Konstant
CONTENTS
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d . k n
words are useless Art by Lennart Normann
quote corners Esme Raji Codell Marva Collins
other sections Tell-A-Vision WLA (Re)Animated Search This Screen/play Who To Follow
words are useless Photo by Lennart Normann, freelance photographer, Berlin
Art by Paul Bennett
“So much of teaching is sharing. Learning results in sharing, sharing results in change, change is learning. The only other job with so much sharing is parenting. That’s probably why the two are so often.” confused.”
“...’Loving children is what teachers do for extra credit. It’s not the main assignment.’ ‘Seems to me that the extra credit is more important than the main assignment,’ observed Cordelia.”
quote corner “The difference between a beginning teacher and an experienced one is that the beginning teacher asks, “How am I doing?” and the experienced teacher asks, How are the children doing?”
“Even if I fail, I have to try and try. It may be exhausting, but that is beside the point. The goal is not necessarily to succeed but to keep trying, to be the kind of person who has ideas and see them through.”
ESMÉ RAJI CODELL
“I gave them my speech about how mean I was and how I’ve taught football players and cowboys and dinosaurs and Martians, so a few fifth graders aren’t too challenging, but I need the money, so I’d give it a shot.”
column
Punctuation Marks TEACHING OURSELVES, TEACHING THE WORLD C.M.E.
The theme of this issue is education. It’s an important topic, a vital one. There are kids all over the world who don’t have access to the education they deserve. Kids living in poverty often can’t afford school supplies, or lunches, or even, in some cases, such simple necessities as shoes to walk to school in. In many countries, girls miss out on school because they have no way to control their menstrual periods, or because men have decided they don’t deserve an education because of their gender.
They are viewed by default as being less intelligent and capable than their male counterparts, and their education suffers for it. Queer and trans kids find themselves erased and discriminated against in schools every day. Kids with behavioral issues are punished and written off as “bad”, and kids with disabilities lack the accommodations they require in order to learn. We teach kids to hate themselves,
huge, deep-seeded problems that are woven into the fabric of society, and solving them is a very big undertaking, unfortunately. Our first teacher is society, and its lessons start with our parents, our schoolteachers, and even the media- but we are also our own teachers. And it’s our responsibility to always keep learning. School doesn’t teach you how to write a check or apply for a job or balance your own budget, although it probably should. School in most places unfortunately fails to teach us good, comprehensive sex ed, and almost never teaches us about the LGBTQIA+ community. School doesn’t teach us enough about sexism, racism, homophobia, or any of the other rampant prejudices in our society. It doesn’t teach us enough about the movements that have set out to dismantle these prejudices and oppressions, and it doesn’t teach us how best to join those movements and raise our voices for change. Society doesn’t want to teach us these things, because society wants everything
We have to make a commitment to always be teaching ourselves, if we ever hope to be trully, trully informed about the world.
Even the kids who don’t face these particular obstacles, who have access to good schools, are shortchanged by the system. Kids of color who are often from poorer homes and neighborhoods are kept from the opportunities they deserve by a toxic combination of classism and racism, and told that they can’t achieve what other students can, that they’re hopeless cases. Girls are pulled out of class because of sexist school uniform regulations that place the sexualization of young girls in the eyes of their male classmates as more important than those girls getting an education.
and each other, on a frighteningly regular basis. Higher education combines all these issues with exorbitant prices that send many students into debt, and workloads so stressful they start to have a severe impact on physical and mental health. Yes, education faces a whole host of social justice issues in America and around the world. These are-
to stay the same. It is very hard, almost impossible, to get society to change. But we can change ourselves. We must. We have to make a commitment to always be teaching ourselves, if we ever hope to be truly, fully informed about the world. We have to learn to do our research, to use resources like the library and the Internet and publications such as this one,
which are working to uplift marginalized voices. We have to learn from each other and validate each person’s experiences. We have to learn by our own experiences, through our own writings and actions and conversations. We can teach ourselves, and we can change ourselves, free ourselves from ignorance. Once we do that, we gain the power to do even more important work- the power to teach each other. We are all teachers. We all have wisdom to share. We teach that womanhood, and queerness, and gender nonconformity, and life in color, and disabled life, and life in poverty all come with their own very real struggles and experiences that shouldn’t be ignored. We teach that we have to check our privileges, and we teach that there are many things we all have to unlearn, before we can relearn better. We are teaching ourselves, teaching each other, every single day. It’s hard work, and important work- as important as the work of teachers-byprofession. It’s work towards change, towards being better individual people, towards making a better world. We all have a lot of hard, introspective, self-bettering homework to do. School can only do so much. After that, your continuing education is in your hands. We never stop learning, our whole lives long. Not for a momentand maybe that’s the most important lesson of all.
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One More Teac th I used to be a good teacher. I have won teaching awards. I put my students before all else. I believed in teaching, even when it was insufficiently remunerated, and even when I was endlessly overworked. But, as I have finally allowed myself to realize now, things have changed. I still believe that education could be the solution to all of the problems of this world. I still believe that learning writing and rhetoric and studying and discussing literature and film are critical to work, citizenship, and society now, as always. I still love standing in front of a room, or sitting in a circle with students, and striving to create knowledge. But being a teacher, I have decided – or, really, just come to accept – is not in my professional future anymore. Over the 12 years since I first stood alone in front of a classroom, I have seen the profession change, both at the K-12 and at the college level. I have seen teachers increasingly devalued, their expertise ignored or denied. Consequently, we have lost all autonomy. At the beginning of my college teaching career, I selected my students’ readings and designed every last one of their
Jessica B. Burstr assignments. This way, I understood the goals and philosophy behind each component of each course, believed in its relevance, and was even excited about sharing it with my students. Now, with well over a decade of classroom experience, at four different colleges and universities plus at three for-profit companies in the education industry, after working with probably close to 2000 students in my career, I nonetheless find that I have the opportunity to design and select almost nothing. I am no longer allowed to be a teacher. At the college level, I am, first and foremost now, a grader, and really, these schools care about little else from me. I am a warm body in the front of the classroom. It is disrespectful to me as well as to my students. One of my adult students, preparing himself to launch into a second career, pointed out to me recently that the day that my classroom, located well over an hour from my home, had no working projector available, so that I had to use nothing more than
cher Leaving he Profession Tells Why
rem
markers and a dry-erase board to teach, spontaneously, that three-hour class, resulted in the best class that he had ever seen me teach, and the best classroom experience that he had had in his entire college career. He could see, he said, that the provided material that I was required to use was holding me back. I would have been a better teacher without it. At one time, I believe that I was. Worse, both my students and I are being exploited financially in a most despicable way. They pay increasingly higher and higher tuition, while I am paid $2200 per course, regardless of the number of students, regardless of how far I have to drive to get there, with no benefits of any kind besides library access and not even a guaranteed income. I would effectively get a better hourly rate, a more family-friendly work schedule, good benefits, and
a greater likelihood of advancement making fries at a fast-food restaurant than I do teaching college. And as long as I continued to do it, I was part of the problem. The problem is that the teaching of writing itself, when taught almost exclusively by graduate students or contingent laborers, seems to be less important work than the loftier subjects taught by those in full-time, tenured, or tenure-track positions. The problem is that there are too many students accepted to graduate school so that those professors can teach them, and so that they can take on the kinds of work that the professors don’t want to do. The problem is that after they leave those universities, there are too many writing teachers available, so when we are asked to work for ridiculous wages, we do it. The problem is that educational institutions are increasingly being run like businesses interested only in cost savings at the bottom but bloated with oversized administrations and CEO-level salaries at the top. The problem is that businesspeople, rather than educators, are increasingly
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running educational institutions, which are consequently, not surprisingly, becoming less effective at education. The problem is that there are still too many White instructors in front of classrooms and not enough teachers of color. How could I ever in good conscience apply for a job teaching ethnic studies and thus violate some of the principles that drove me to make that a critical component of my professional focus? Now there is one fewer White underpaid instructor contributing to these problems by her very existence within the profession. There was a time when I hoped that I could change it from the inside. What I didn’t realize until recently is that I would probably never make it to the inside to do that, especially as a single parent. My God, I wish one of my undergraduate professors had been honest with me about the state of the profession when I was first discussing applying to graduate school! I could have still double-majored in math or something else! I could have gone in a different direction in my life.
At least my conscience is clear there. Whenever one of my students came to me to ask about going into my own field of study, I leveled with them about the odds that they were facing. That is, of course, why they came to me. They knew that they would get that kind of honesty from me. Is it a loss for the profession, my leaving like this? Who knows? I believe that the profession still operates on the notion that anyone who does not succeed is undeserving, that anyone who does not continue to excel at their jobs does not properly believe in all the Right Things. As my former boss once told me, when I criticized the working conditions that she had imposed: “This is a tremendous responsibility. We consider this a tremendous honor to be able to help make even a small positive impact on hundreds and thousands of lives, for better. . . . We can only afford to have . . . those who want to become superstars, those who are willing to work with us to reach their peak potential. . . . We realize that we are not the right fit for everyone and that this is not the type of work for just anyone. Only a few qualify, only the ones with the amazing passion, the incredible drive who share our vision.�
Only the ones who are willing to let themselves be exploited, that is. Only the ones who don’t have children at home for whom they are solely responsible. Or only the lucky ones who are able to get themselves one of the increasingly rare positions that will lift them above that. No one will feel any loss now that I am gone, I’m sure. And so I find myself, 35 years old, far away from family and most of my close friends, broke, deeply indebted, and basically alone with a 14-yearold son whom no one will support in four years but me, needing to find and venture on an entirely new career path, to re-envision myself, to re-present myself in today’s economy. Don’t worry about me, though. I have a plan, as always. I will finish my dissertation first, of course, and then consider my strengths and find a way to climb back onto dry land again, just as I always have. I know myself. I used to have an excellent work ethic, back when overwork, burnout, disappointment, financial desperation, and professional despondency had not destroyed it. It’s still in there somewhere. I will find it again.
I will miss what I know can happen when I am standing in front of a classroom, though, with nothing more to utilize than my mind, my students’ minds, a goal or two, a couple of hours, and a few dry-erase markers.
Photo by Lennart Normann
DONOVAN LIVINGSTON’S
HARVARD GRADUATE SCHOOL OF EDUCATION SPEECH HarvardEducation channel on YouTube
Valedictorian Donovan Livingston gives a commencement address to his fellow Harvard Graduate School of Education Class of 2016 graduates, in the form of a spoken-word poem he wrote and performs. Livingston uses outer space, stars, rocketships, and black holes as metaphors through which to discuss the ways that students of color are held back from achieving their full potential in school and in life, and urges future teachers to work to reform the current system to help these students succeed and thrive as they deserve to. View Livingston’s speech here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9XGUpKITeJM
What are some issues in the education system and in society that Donovan Livingston brings up through his poetry? What solutions does he urge teachers to adopt? How can we be more aware of the ways that racial prejudice blooms in every aspect of our society, especially in schools? If we still say “education is the key”, how can we keep those in power from continually “changing the locks”?
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One Nation, Un Grammar mistakes make me furious, and it’s not because I’m an English major. Let me back up: I was watching a video-blog on YouTube the other day and listened to the vlogger make error after error. On their channel, this person jokes about never being able to pronounce things properly and finds it goofy and quirky that they make all of these blunders, but more and more I find myself irritated. At a glance, I saw that this particular vlogger, who has made a career mostly off of makeup videos, has six million subscribers. Hundreds of thousands of views per video, all adding up to a salary for this blogger of over $1,000 per video. And they don’t even use proper grammar. I think this makes me so mad partly because this vlogger spoke about being an English major in college. I think it also makes me mad because people demand that immigrants learn English—regardless of the fact that the United States has
Jena DiMagg no official language—and yet this “native-born,” college-educated individual still can’t speak fluent English. But mostly I think I’m upset because we don’t value education in the United States. We value makeup tutorials, not proper grammar. I’m not saying we can’t value both. And I’m also not saying that being uneducated makes you a bad person, or that being educated, conversely, makes you a good person. But damn it, education is essential if we want to make any kind of positive progress in our society. Education is key to fighting bigotry and hate. None of this is new information. But for some reason, we love to reward the privileged and the uneducated. Of course, privilege is a pivotal variable in this equation: fast food workers are often said to not
nder-Educated
gio “deserve” a livable wage because they aren’t highly educated; only those privileged enough to access higher education should also access the higher salaries that accompany their respective jobs. Ironically enough, however, if you’re super privileged (read: socially connected, young, beautiful, and coming from a rich family) you probably don’t have to be educated at all! People will just throw money at you! Exhibit A: most of America’s “Hollywood”/celebrity scene, the most beloved and idolized figures in the country. Now, this vlogger is not super privileged (if my concept of thinking of privilege in terms of gradation is legitimate). They are moderately wealthy, but they are by no means in the earnings bracket
of a Beyonce figure. With over six million subscribers, however, they’re arguably a very public figure. But the question again is not one of having an education versus not having one: education doesn’t make you abetter person, and the American education system is too much bound in privilege and politics to be equitable and accessible for all. The problem is that education as a cultural ideal, as a value, as an end of itself just isn’t really worth anything to most people. And if you don’t believe me, consider this: there’s a pretty good chance Donald Trump might be our next president. That’s about as uneducated as it gets.
tell-a-vision
ARE WE EQUAL? CHICAGO PUBLIC SCHOOLS Luma YouTube channel Luma is a group of independent filmmakers who “have come together to shine light on the issues that matter. We believe in the power of cinema to create social change and make an impact on the world” (from the video description). In this video, Luma tackles the issue of the $200 million in budget cuts to Chicago Public Schools proposed by the state of Illinois in 2016. These budget cuts will leave schools short-staffed and underfunded, with larger class sizes, less faculty, and fewer available extracurricular programs. In the video, data is presented as a series of CPS students, most of whom are poor students of color, hold up signs asking “Why me?” The video asks the question- why exactly should CPS students pay the price here? Why don’t they deserve funding? The video urges the state to try harder to find a solution for CPS that does not jeopardize the futures of the students, who deserve a chance to succeed.
How does the video call out the state for its poor decisions regarding the CPS budget? What factors are at play here? Why are poor students of color disenfranchised time and time again? How can independent filmmaking and video production like Luma are doing function to create social change? Would this video make you want to stand up and do something to help Chicago Public Schools get the funding they need this year?
Photo by Lennart Normann
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Learning, Lear Many people will work their whole life in a relatively tiny cubicle. I passed 15 years in 2 of them, working downtown for the government. Cubicles are not for learning, they are for isolating. Even so, you can adjust to them, retreat back to them after a day out, and eventually, if lucky, escape them forever. I got out. This is the story of where I am learning now, and how I learned what I learned along the way. I am a teacher. I traded a full-time cubicle for the world of parttime education. For the last 8 years I have taught in over 6 cities, a dozen schools, and in greater than 150 classrooms. With the instructions of hundreds of teachers I have taught thousands of students over the years. Mostly my new working world has been a whirlwind tour of substitute teaching assignments, always learning something new, rarely in the same place twice. My escape began through the largesse of the second cubicle’s owner, Metra Commuter Railroad. Though they had no obligation to do so, they paid for half my tuition, half the fiduciary expense of a Masters in Teaching. What they gained immediately was an employee with a mind switched on, a new man. What I gained was a new life. Lots of book schooling, then lots of survival training as a student teacher, and finally a chance to walk into a class and learn on the job. My first baby steps were twice a month, an hour at a time, in Sunday school. A co-teacher and I
Mike Erickso got kids and their parents ready for First Communion. We learned to find passages in the Bible. I gave polished rocks as prizes. We practiced ‘Art to Start’, at the start of every hour, and put on ‘homemade’ in-class plays by year’s end. I learned how to have fun, enjoy snack-time, and after a few years I took this experience and moved on to public schools. Part-time public school education can mean teaching for a minute, until the teacher gets back, a period, a day, a week, until the teacher gets back, or a month, or even a half-semester grading period. Pretty quickly, you realize you do not become the teacher over time, you are the teacher when you walk in the door. Get there early if you can, before the students arrive to distract you; find the full-time teacher’s written instructions, and put an abbreviated version on the board. Good luck, because you are on your own, and you may have just walked into a 4 th -grade class, as the bell rings, with dog poo on your shoes. Yep, you who teach will have stories to tell. There may be a field mouse in the garbage can one
ning, Always Learning
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day, and a student for whom this is their first day out of jail the next. There may be a full-grown developmentally delayed student who won’t give back the rock hammer, or a girl who is more than ‘happy’ to yell at you at the top of her lungs. Some early-childhood teachers are required to change diapers. There may be a time when your sweater, your shoes, and the extreme lack of humidity will allow you to teach static electricity using your head of hair and little visible sparks of electricity from your finger. You may teach reading from a primer on the Everglades to a room full of Special-Ed boys the day after biking around the Everglades on spring break. Who wants to read next, you do, OK, Joe. Nothing is out of the ordinary, unless it is ordinary. Now I have my own classroom of students. Thanks to a friendly teacher who pointed out that I had 2 Masters, and could learn more about teaching as an adjunct professor at our local community college. So, now I share with my college students our books, documentary movies, and field trips. I also share my past, my present,
and the learning path that brought me to them. Sharing experience is great teaching. The path to my own classroom has been a progression of experiences. I was blessed to share many thousands of students with hundreds of teachers. Each classroom is as different as is each class of students. Years of maps, pictures, poems, photo-essays, inspirational quotes do more than decorate, they educate. I am often called, “the best substitute ever”, and I am aware that many other substitute teachers have heard this too. Kids will commemorate their favorite teachers. And teachers commemorate their students. I have student artwork and ‘thank you, Mr. E.’ notes in my kitchen. I have photos of students walking stream beds, and finding life-forms in microscopes. I have taught without a lesson plan. I have worked hard on my lesson plans. Now, I can play with taking attendance, explain global warming, and sing ‘California Dreaming’ in Freshman Girls Chorus . I went from Sunday school, to grade school, to Junior High, to High School, to Adjunct Professor. I still sub at a nearby high school. Soon I will also teach in the great outdoors. It is back to my roots, because I was lucky enough to have nature as my first great teacher outside of family. Step out of the cubicle if you dare, and go on learning, learning, always learning.
Archives in Action MAKING THE KNOWN UNKNOWN: SR. THERESE LANGERBECK Nancy Freeman
Education, this month’s BROAD topic, is something we at the WLA know quite a bit about, as education is a collection strength for the archives. For non-archivists, the term collection strength means we have records of a certain subject in spades. Education is one such subject, and the WLA holds the personal collections of approximately 42 educators. In addition to personal collections, the WLA contains records of organizations. An educational treasure trove are the records of Mundelein College, the largest collection at the WLA. Mundelein College, founded in 1929 by the Sisters of Charity of the Blessed Virgin Mary, provided education to women until 1991 when it affiliated with nearby Loyola. The Mundeleinrecords document the history of a small, private college from 1930 (when classes first began) until 1991, when Mundelein closed due to financial problems and declining enrollment. In the WLA Re-Imagined BROAD feature this month, Sr. Therese Langerbeck is highlighted. Sr. Therese
taught physics at Mundelein from 1936 to 1970. When I first came to the WLA in 2013, Sr. Therese totally fascinated me. I researched aspects of her life and work, feeling awe-struck at what she accomplished as a women religious educator and a scientist. The biggest thing about Sr. Therese that impressed me then, and still does, is that she rode what I call the “Sputnik wave” of government
I am not sure why it surprises me that a woman religious teaching at a small, Catholic, all women’s college, applied to the Department of the Navy and the Atomic Energy Commission and received grants during the 1950s and 1960s. When I first came across this in the records I thought “really, these government entities gave successive grants to a nun in Chicago at an all-women’s college that most likely none of them had ever heard of?” From my vantage point in 2016, that seems incredible, although maybe in Sr. Therese’s day it was just what she did to educate her students. Sister Therese is an example of a phenomenal woman who is not well known. At Loyola, the Langerbeck Faculty Research Mentor Award is named for her and the award’s winners are highlighted on Loyola’s website. Until 2015, the website contained no mention of the award’s namesake. I began a
I want to actively and intentionally bring hidden women to out from the records to be known. grants for scientific education. Russia launched Sputnik, the first artificial earth satellite, in fall 1957, and sparked the space race. The US government began funding grants to colleges and universities to educate students in the sciences. Sr. Therese received several such grants including one to receive and study radioactive isotopes.
quiet campaign to have information regarding Sr. Therese with the award and I’m happy to say that’s happened.
http://www.luc.edu/experiential/ undergraduateresearchengagementsymposium/LUROP_Ment or_Award.shtml Now, if I can only get a picture of her on the web page, my quest will be complete. Loyola is to be commended for establishing the faculty mentor award in Sr. Therese’s name. She guided many young women at Mundelein to pursue careers in the sciences. Until 1975, Mundelein College ranked fourth in the nation among women’s colleges in the number of graduates who eventually earned PhD degrees in natural sciences. Sister Therese also wrote articles supporting women’s education in physics, years before the popular phrase “women in STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Math)” became common. One of my main goals for writing this column is related to the title “Archives in Action”. Action equals movement. I want to actively and intentionally bring hidden women out from the records to be known, to show their relevance to the here and now. Sr. Therese’s educational and scientific accomplishments are gradually becoming more known, a perfect example of archives in action.
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An Educat A Accessibility is certainly something I take for granted. Being an ambulatory biped with vision corrected by glasses and without hearing loss, moving about independently in this world is not difficult for me. This is not the case for a significant portion of Americans. According to Centers for Disease Control and Prevention numbers from 2015, about 53 million of us live with a disability. Why is so much of our world still inaccessible in so many ways? If you hadn’t already guessed, I am a special education teacher. I work with students who are blind or visually impaired who have a range of abilities and disabilities. This puts me in typical general education classrooms in all grade levels, as well as the special education programs and classrooms throughout my district. The impact of advances in societal consideration of this population, as well as the failures of our society to properly address certain issues, can be seen every day. A responsibility that is passed along to all that learn Braille is to be a “Braille Ambassador”.
Katie Konsta Wherever I am, whatever chance I get, I check Braille signage in public places to make sure it is displayed correctly and in an appropriate location. The horror stories abound: Braille signs upside down, men’s and women’s restroom signs reversed, Braille signage posted above doors or in other hard-to- reach places. I encourage my students to alert an employee, write letters, or to post their finds on social media. While my students love this idea (I have received emails and picture messages from hotels, theme parks, museums and restaurants across the country), the necessity of this practice illustrates a huge problem in our society. While we have legislation that requires signage in Braille, we simply do not care enough to ensure that it is installed correctly. The inclusion of people with disabilities in society is a relatively new concept. It was not until 1927 that the Supreme Court ruled that it was unconstitutional to sterilize people with disabilities (Buck v. Bell, 1927). Among other factors, World War II and
tor’s View on Accessibility
ant the polio epidemic of 1952 increased the population of Americans with disabilities, and when the Civil Rights Movement gained momentum in the 1960s, people with disabilities took the chance to join in. A personal hero of mine, Ed Roberts, is considered the father of the Independent Living and Disability Rights Movement. Roberts fought to attend the University of California at Berkley in the early 1960s; he was initially barred from attending because of his disabilities. From there, the activism inspired by Roberts and other groups would radically change how people with disabilities perceive themselves, and in turn increase visibility and respect for this population. The Rehabilitation Act of 1973 addressed discrimination based on disability in any program or service that receives federal funding, and the Education for All Handicapped Children Act (later named the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act, or IDEA) established the right of children with disabilities to public education in 1975. It was not
until 1990 that the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) was signed, mandating that all public buildings and businesses make “reasonable accommodation� to ensure access for people with disabilities. Consider that the disability laws we have developed generally deal with access to public buildings, businesses and access to a public education. There are so many areas of daily life that are untouched by our disability rights laws. What about consumer products, or the design of the interior of those buildings and businesses? In my vision for a perfectly accessible world, Braille or tactile markings would adorn every personal care product or food item label. All shelves in the grocery store would be within reach of a person who uses a wheelchair. Closed captioning would be improved and expanded to all areas where information is presented in auditory format. Technology has certainly increased access for all people. The internet is a necessary part of modern life, allowing people of all abilities to connect and learn about the world. Advances in technology have allowed students independent access to educational materials that may have
reviously required a translator or other support. The internet provides a level of socialization that may have been impossible for people with certain disabilities; access to a community in which advocacy and support is possible. Unfortunately, there are large portions of the Internet that are inaccessible to people who are blind or visually impaired, and after many lawsuits the Department of Justice is currently delaying rulings regarding accessibility regulations on the web (Launey & Vu, 2016). These regulations would make it mandatory for companies to make websites accessible to all. There are some promising advances in accessibility for people who have disabilities, indicating a new level of attention and consideration for these groups. The Wiz Live! on NBC in December 2015 was the first ever live broadcast with audio description, making it accessible to people who are blind. The new ten-dollar bill, which will feature notable women in United States history, will also be the first to have a tactile feature for people who are blind or visually impaired. Uber and Lyft were recently sued for denying rides to people with guide dogs and wheelchairs; accessible vehicles hit the Chicago streets in May (Graham, 2016). Change is gradual, but it is happening.
I realize that I have made seemingly disparate points: that legislation for the rights of people with disabilities is relatively new, and that we have not done enough to make our world accessible to people with disabilities. My intentions are to share information and to promote awareness of these issues, and to ask that you add them to your docket. This is a time of immense change; we are all wading through an overload of information and opinion, a time when broken systems and harsh inadequacies are coming to the light. We need to decide to make changes to our society that enable each of us to feel welcome, to feel supported and to be able to function independently to the best of our ability. This is the time for each of us to be our most compassionate, decent and forward-thinking selves: to make changes that can positively impact future generations, regardless of any of those factors that put people into categories. As Ed Roberts so eloquently stated, “There are two kinds of people in this world: the disabled, and the yet-to- be disabled.�
References 1. “Buck v. Bell”. LII/Legal Information Institute. Cornell University Law School, n.d. Web. 15 May 2016. https://www.law.cornell.edu/supremecourt/ text/274/200. 2. &quot;CDC: 53 Million Adults in the US Live with a Disability.&quot; Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 30 July 2015. Web. 15 May 2016. <http://www.cdc.gov/media/releases/2015/p0730us- disability.html> 3. Graham, Meg. “Uber to Bring New Accessible Ride Services to Chicago This Month.” Chicago Tribune.com. Chicago Tribune, 3 May 2016. Web. May 15 2016. http://www.chicagotribune.com/ bluesky/originals/ct-uber- wheelchair-accessiblerides-chicago-bsi- 20160503-story.html
4. Launey, Kristina M., and Vu, Minh. “Web, Reg “Do Over?”: DOJ Withdraws Title III Notice of Proposed Rulemaking, Issues Supplemental Advanced Notice Seeking Further Comments.” ADA Title III News &amp; Insights. ADA Title III News &amp; Insights, 2 May 2016. Web. 15 May 2016. http://www.adatitleiii.com/. 5. “What is the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA)?” What is the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA)? ADA National Network, n.d. Web. 15 May 2016. <https://adata.org/learn-about- ada>
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MARVA COLLINS
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“Don’t try to fix the students, fix ourselves first. The good teacher makes the poor student good and the good student superior. When our students fail, we, as teachers, too, have failed.”
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TER MARY THERESE LANGERBECK
Mary Therese Langerbeck (1902-1993), a native Chicagoecame a Sister of Charity of the Blessed Virgin Mary (BVM) n she made her final profession of vows in 1933. Additionafter receiving her M.A. in physics, astronomy, French, and man from the University of Michigan, she went on to receive h.D. from Georgetown University in 1948, becoming one of first women religious with a doctorate in astrophysics. She often referred to, in BVM magazine features and Mundelein c briefs, as the first and only sister- doctor of astrophysics the world. Her unique status as both a Catholic Sister and nguished scientist found her from 1936-1970 at Mundelein ollege* as both a professor and chairperson of the physics department.
gerbeck can be lauded in a twofold sense for her activities Mundelein College. First, as a brilliant physicist, Langerbeck rought scientific prestige to Mundelein. She received many rch grants from the U.S. government and improved Mundephysics department facilities. Second, as an advocate for n in STEM, Langerbeck worked devotedly toward achieving eased female presence in the physics field, which brought meaningful changes to Mundelein and its female students.
1939, just three years after coming to teach at Mundelein, gerbeck worked to install and procure the funds for a Fout pendulum, a device that demonstrates the rotation of the h. The 120-foot pendulum, revolutionary as the longest one e time, was installed in an empty elevator shaft in the main delein College building known as the skyscraper. Due to its racy, Mundelein students, as well as scientists from around world, used the pendulum to collect data. A Time Magazine cle, “Sister Mary’s Pendulum,” in June 1938, described Lanerbeck’s pendulum not as a minor exhibition, but one of immense scientific value.
ndelein, Langerbeck took advantage of government scienrants during the space age of the 1950s and 60s. Two noe grant awards included a Frederick Gardner Cottrell Grant omplete her study determining the sodium and alkali metal ntent in foods and a United States Atomic Energy Commisrant for an upper-level Mundelein course on radioisotopes. ly and probably most spectacularly, Langerbeck witnessed e 1969 launch of Apollo 9 from the John F. Kennedy Space Center as an invited guest.
Ph.D., BVM
Moreover, Langerbeck worked devotedly toward achieving gender equality in the sciences, a field historically dominated by men. Langerbeck came to teach at Mundelein in 1936, becoming the first and only physics professor at the college, with no declared physics majors. Langerbeck composed a plethora of papers, essays, and speeches aimed at encouraging women to enter into physics. One of the most progressive papers Langerbeck wrote,” Scientific Woman power – Our Country’s Need and what Women’s colleges are doing to supply Physicists,” she presented at Harvard during a Meeting of the American Association of Physics Teachers in 1953. In the paper, Langerbeck asks society to stop bringing ridicule to female science majors and thinking that women are incapable of grappling with the rigor of physics. By encouraging women to enter into STEM fields, Langerbeck and Mundelein College became devoted advocates of the women’s movement. Until 1975, Mundelein College ranked fourth in the nation among women’s colleges in the number of graduates who eventually earned Ph.D. degrees in natural sciences. Also, almost half of all doctorates earned by Mundelein graduates were in the natural sciences. Former president of Mundelein, Sister Ann Ida Gannon, stated in a Loyola newspaper article in reaction to the statistics, “we were doing these things long before the women’s movement, because it was something that we believed in.” A distinguished scientist, Sister Mary Therese Langerbeck should be lauded for her accomplishments as a physicist and professor. But her efforts didn’t stop with herself. Langerbeck felt a personal duty to foster female scientists and dismantle the lowered academic status quo for women, paving the way for future women in STEM fields at Mundelein and, in turn, Loyola University Chicago.
* Mundelein College, founded and operated by the Sisters of Charity of the Blessed Virgin Mary (BVM), provided education to women from 1930 until 1991, when it affiliated with Loyola University Chicago.
Amanda Malmstrom
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screen/play + bookmark here
STAND AND DELIVER Directed By: Ramon Menendez Release Year: 1988 Genre: Drama Where to Watch It: YouTube, iTunes, Amazon Video, Google Play Overview: This film is a dramatization of the real life story of Jaime Escalante, a math teacher at Garfield High School in East Los Angeles in the 1970s and ‘80s. Escalante’s students were poor, working-class, Hispanic and Latino kids who were learning at a remedial level, and the other teachers in the school did not believe they could do better. Over the course of the film, Escalante motivates and encourages his students to do well in math, with the goal of teaching them Advanced Placement Calculus by their senior year. But when the AP exam comes around, so do racially-motivated accusations of cheating in Escalante’s classroom. BROAD Thumbs Up: Powerful, socially conscious, and historically accurate, this film illuminates the power of a great teacher to bring about true change in the lives of his students. Edward James Olmos’ performance as Jaime Escalante was Oscar-nominated, bringing this real story to new life onscreen. The film confronts and illuminates the racism and classism that even today remains inherent in our education system, while also demonstrating the vital importance of teaching in a way that prepares students for the world while boosting their self-esteem, instead of tearing them down. Stand and Deliver is a must-watch for anyone interested in strong performances, social commentary, and the US education system and its history.
who to follow
KHAN ACADEMY
Website: www.khanacademy.org/ YouTube: youtube.com/user/khanacademy Twitter: @khanacademy Facebook: www.facebook.com/khanacademy
CRASHCOURSE
YouTube: youtube.com/user/crashcourse Twitter: @thecrashcourse Tumblr: thecrashcourse.tumblr.com Facebook: facebook.com/YouTubeCrashCourse Instagram: Instagram.com/thecrashcourse
SCISHOW
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TED-EDUCATION
Website: ed.ted.com YouTube: youtube.com/user/TEDEducation Twitter: @TED_Ed Tumblr: teded.tumblr.com Facebook: facebook.com/TEDEducation
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(a) means utilizing accessible language, theory, knowledge, and structure in your writing. (b) maintains a connection with your diverse audience by not using unfamiliar/obscure words, overly long sentences, or abstraction. (c) does not assume a specific audience, for example, white 20-year-old college students.
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Accessibility
Jesuit Social Justice Education & Effort
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