Wednesday, September 29, 2010

Bits and Pieces

1. I attended a great reading last night by Elizabeth Brundage, a novelist and creative writing instructor at Sage. Her new book, A Stranger Like You, looks at power and gender in Hollywood. I got a very dark sense of the story from her reading, which also weaves terrorism and the stoning of women into the plot. It also uses the elusive "second person" narrative, which I hadn't been exposed to since English 101.

I went to the reading last night because I have to miss author Nicholson Baker, who is speaking at Sage next week. For more information on that reading, go to:

http://www.sage.edu/newsevents/events/?event_id=280087&date=2010-10-07&view=monthly

2. Peter Pan has opened and is playing to packed, enthusiastic houses. I am attending this weekend, but only barely got a ticket myself. The musical has been extended by one showing and will now close on October 8. For more information on Peter Pan, go to:

http://www.sage.edu/newsevents/events/?event_id=281036&date=2010-10-01&view=monthly

While I'm on the topic of theatre, NYSTI opens The Miracle Worker on campus this weekend. It features the talents of several Sage students and alums, plus the NYSTI directing debut of friend, John Romeo. It is an amazing story about the power of education to make a difference in the lives of others--don't miss it.

3. I'm preparing a talk on "Assertive Communication" to present for the New York State Bar Association in October. I feel very confident about spreading the message of assertive communication, but what is embarrassing to me is that I don't always practice it. Where do you lie on the scale of communicators: the passive communicator, the aggressive communicator or that dreaded combination of both, the passive-aggressive communicator?

I am certainly learning as much about myself doing this research as I am going to teach to others.

More later...

Thursday, September 16, 2010

Celebrating Constitution Day

Back to blogging. I'm beginning to discover what my students must feel like with rehearsals, classes, meetings and then, a paper to write on top of it all. Blogging was easier when school was not in session, but Sage is now into its third week of classes and beginning to pick up steam. Very soon, freshman students will be collectively hit with the enormity of their work load (so will faculty) as the honeymoon period is almost over and assignments begin to pile up.

Before the blitz begins, our entire first year class met yesterday for a Constitution Day town hall meeting. Organized by the English department, the Living-Learning communities and the WORLD (Women Owning Responsibility for Learning and Doing) program, the meeting is an opportunity to acquaint students with specific aspects of the Constitution, then to have an open microphone session for them to discuss those aspects with an experts panel of faculty. Yesterday's panel included Provost Terry Weiner, and Dr. Stephen Schechter and Dr. Pamela Katz, from History, Law and Government. The event was moderated by English department Chair, Dr. David Salomon.

The discussion focused on the 14th Amendment, which covers the rights of all citizens born in the U.S. The students turned out to be very curious about illegal immigration and why the government has failed to adequately enforce it's own laws. Some of the highlights of the student discussion included:
  • The physical act of rounding up 11 million illegal immigrants and sending them back home would be a disaster of epic proportions.
  • Information about immigration policy and amnesty proposals put forth by George Bush, John McCain and President Obama.
  • An idea to eliminate closed borders all together and re-appropriate enforcement funds to education, health and fighting terrorism.
  • That government should punish the powerful businesses that employ illegal immigrants and not the disadvantaged individuals themselves.
There were of course no easy answers. One student wisely said she would vote with candidates who addressed the problems humanely and realistically, allowing for the problems we have already allowed to escalate. Another topic of discussion focused on free speech and flag, Koran and book burning. It was generally agreed that if we live in country with free speech laws, then there will occasionally be things we don't want to hear, or see set on fire.

Two representatives from the New York Times Reading Program (another first year initiative) were in attendance and impressed with Sage's town hall approach to Constitution Day, raising provocative issues then allowing students free expression. My colleague in WORLD, Dr. Sybillyn Jennings, calls it the "pedagogy of voice", that is, giving the students a place to speak aloud the ideas that they are developing. Without too much horn tooting, it is something we do well at Sage.