Reading Notes #7 Margaret Brady

Reading Notes #7

What is interesting about this week’s readings regarding diversity is that just yesterday my officemate, who teaches FYE (First Year Experience) had a student write in their course evaluation, “The only reason diversity is made a problem is because certain people can’t get over themselves.” This is unbelievable to me that people can openly state something like this in the year 2011.

In my department, one of my colleagues needed to leave her lab classroom and asked another colleague to “just keep an eye on them.” That’s normal. But the next part isn’t: “There’s one white girl in there with four football players and they’re all BLACK.” Another time, this person was asking me about one of my students and the comment was made, “Well, he’s one of our black students...” The statement was not made as descriptive but, in my opinion, as racist. This took me aback. I really didn’t know how to respond to this because I simply wasn’t ready for it. And this is one of those situations where you don’t know what to say at the moment but then go home and replay it in your mind with all the different scenarios.

Another term that I find personally offensive is “non-traditional age student.” That is what I currently am at age 46. Why can’t I just be a “student?” I have never used that term regarding any of my students and I have a lot of them: veterans who’ve just come back from Iraq, women whose children are off to college, people who’ve actually made huge career changes because they wanted to go into something different, etc. I’ve heard my colleagues use that term. But, when I heard someone describe me in that fashion, for some reason I found that offensive as it was a “label.”

Regarding student interaction, I have not had a situation where students are inappropriate to each other regarding cultural or racial diversity. However, I did have a situation where one student who had performed poorly on an exam stated out loud in class, “I guess I’m just stupid.” Another student, one who is very much the class “know it all” who answers all my questions before I’m even done asking them without raising his hand and then asking other questions beyond the scope of the course...you know the kind...turned around and said, “Stupid or ignorant. There is a difference.” You could just feel the energy in the classroom rise as the other students were responding with “Ooooo, now what?” and “Better take it outside.” This is a very small class, about 30 students, and I was, luckily, able to diffuse the situation with humor by saying, “Well, let’s finish our lecture before you take it outside and no bets now.” Luckily, given the personalities of the students I was dealing with, that was it. But, what if this was to escalate?

I want to discuss distributing your notes to students vs. having them take notes.