Thursday, September 30, 2010

More from Dos Vatos

Global Voices: Beyond the Border

From the makers of Beautiful Knowledge, a new documentary on PBS worth checking out. When I heard the production duo Dos Vatos speak, they said that it was surprising easier to find funding for documentaries and grants for the arts when dealing with issues of race in Kentucky than in Arizona. Just another example of proving stereotypes wrong.

http://www.pbs.org/itvs/globalvoices/beyondtheborder.html

Saturday, September 25, 2010

New Precious Knowledge Trailer!

A Great Documentary about the Tucson Unified School District

Precious Knowledge Trailer from Ari Palos on Vimeo.

Wednesday, September 15, 2010

Writing Less Badly

Tips for Writing

In The Chronicle of Higher Education, Michael C. Munger writes an interesting article that I'm posting the link to as a reminder to myself to think about when writing and re-writing.

http://chronicle.com/article/10-Tips-on-How-to-Write-Less/124268/

His #1 tip is that "writing is an exercise," which is important to remember when setting out to write after not having written and maybe even a good incentive for updating this here blog.

Tip number five: "Everyone's unwritten work is brilliant" also made me chuckle, but that might come as a result of my creative writing experience, or experience with creative writing students who enjoyed talking about their writing more than they seemed to write.

Tuesday, September 14, 2010

Warren Buffet: 'Make Private Schools Illegal'

Will Throwing Money at Schools Really Help?

The answer to this question is a resounding 'yes,' but it's not just education researchers who are pointing out the common sense behind the economic segregation that has children living in the same neighborhood attending drastically different educational institutions, namely public and private.

I had heard someone discuss Warren Buffet's solution to raising the quality of our public schools and I found it in an article on Spotlightonpoverty.org. In the article, Buffet's comments enunciate what many fiscally conservatives who educate their children in private institutions already know, but choose to ignore:

"“Make private schools illegal,” he said, “and assign every child to a public school by random lottery.” Think about what this would mean. CEOs’ children, diplomats’ children, many would be going to schools in Anacostia and east of the river, where most of our schools are. I guarantee we would never see a faster moving of resources from one end of the city to the other. I also guarantee we would soon have a system of high-quality schools."

Inagural Issue of Present Tense

A Journal of Rhetoric in Society

According to editor Alexandra Hidalgo:
"Present Tense: A Journal of Rhetoric in Society is proud to announce its inaugural issue at http://www.presenttensejournal.org/. Present Tense is dedicated to exploring contemporary social, cultural, political and economic issues through a rhetorical lens. The articles presented in Volume 1, Issue 1 include a diversity of current topics, of no more than 2,000 words, ranging from disciplinarity and sovereign power, to Google bombing, to race and the new equality. We hope you find the articles engaging and we encourage you to continue the conversation by commenting on the articles online.

Volume 1, Issue 1:

Turning Composition toward Sovereignty- John Schilb
Momma’s Memories and the New Equality- Vershawn Ashanti Young
I’ll Google It!: How Collective Wisdom in Search Engines Alters the Rhetorical Canons- Jill M. Parrott
Making Rhetoric Visible: Re-visioning a Capstone Civic Writing Seminar- Heather Lettner-RustCooking Codes: Cookbook Discourses as Women’s Rhetorical Practices- Elizabeth Fleitz

Program Review: The Land-Grant Way – Connected Knowing and the Call of Service- James M. Dubinsky

Book Review: Scott’s Dangerous Writing- Sheri Rysdam"

Submissions Information: http://www.presenttensejournal.org/submissions/
http://www.presenttensejournal.org/

Monday, September 13, 2010

Writing and Working for Change

A Digital Archive of Social Activism by Teachers of NCTE/CCCC

It's always encouraging to see when NCTE/CCCC actively participates in fostering diversity and the work of their diverse membership and past members.

From the website below:
"
In conjunction with efforts to chronicle historical moments for NCTE’s Centennial Celebration, this project specifically celebrates the collective work of teachers within and across diverse identities to insure the field recognize and respect the language, educational, political, and social rights of all students and teachers."

http://www.ncte.org/centennial/change