From my previous Brown Report blog I think I’ll return to writing less academically and more personally, for this last (internship) blog reflecting on the summer.
I feel right now, as I did when I wrote the blog, that my last “…your experiences so far…”blog should have been saved for this last post. Oh well. Here are some questions and answers about the summer.
What did you like?
Throughout the internship I liked: the speaker series, trips, readings, and some blog posts. My favorites of each were the Barksdales and Dr. Winkle (they tie), the Delta (both times), the Brown Slavery and Justice Report, and the Brown Report blog, respectively.
What would you improve?
Short of having the University rent a car for the interns over the summer, I would:
• Lose the sarcasm (Ben)
• Get all the interns IDs
• Buy another ScanSnap
• Have a USB (or two) only for the Oral History Project
• Make sure to make clear when the internship is over, and that all the interns are clear on this
• Have one intern at the summer school, and one or two at the office from the very beginning.
• Stay overnight in the Delta
• Take the interns around campus to find some of the interesting things (e.g. archives and records) this University has to offer.
• Include a parent and/or student as a speaker in the speaker series
• Mandatory school board meeting
• Take students to IHL while in Jackson or have someone from IHL speak to interns in Oxford
• Meet with superintendant, preferably of the state.
What was the best part?
The best part of the internship was by far the speaker series. I have to say, 99.9% of the speakers were engaging, but 100% were worthwhile. I think it’s important
Who was your favorite speaker?
As stated earlier, and throughout the summer, my favorite speakers were the Barksdales and Dr. John Winkle.
What did you learn from the internship? How did you change?
I really don’t want to answer this question, not because I’m copping out on this blog, but because I don’t know how to express the impact this internship has had on me. In the poem I wrote last week I used the phrase “something happened” repetitively. I used it because something did happen. It’s like when you know someone is going to report bad news, you don’t want to hear hit so you brace yourself. Still, when it hits, it knocks you down. This internship knocked me down a few pegs. I’ve lived most of my life not oblivious, but ignorant of how deep the education problem in this nation is. I’d never been so close to the disparities. When you read, hear, and see the educational tragedy caused by poverty and by race, I don’t reason anyone can leave unchanged. At the least we can proclaim the wrongs in our education system to others who haven’t seen or experienced the bottom.
Has this internship made me stop running from education? I just might have.
Would you recommend it to someone else?
Of course, to anyone who wants to do “like right” and to anyone who just doesn’t know.
Thanks Ben.
Tuesday, July 20, 2010
Larissa’s Top 10 Need to Know for Next Year’s Interns
10. Complete your blog posts early, you never know what might come up later in the week.
9. Clean up the office. Most likely when you come in it will be in need of some interior designing, do this because it will make working in the office a lot easier.
8. Wise up to Ben Guest’s sarcasm early, I mean for the first week don’t believe anything he says, save “My name is Ben Guest”—not even that’s entirely true.
7. Start your summer project (most likely continuing the oral history project) early and add to it regularly. This includes transcribing the interviews within a few days of conducting them.
6. Get to know the teachers but remain cognizant that you are not a teacher, you’re an intern; therefore, you might not be able to do everything that the teachers do.
5. Join the gym. Join a group fitness class (I recommend indoor cycling a.k.a spinning). Check out the trainers—oow!
4. Treat the internship like a class: put some effort into the reading and writing assignments.
3. Check some of the amazing organizations, facilities, and other things that the University of Mississippi has to offer.
2. Engage the speakers, all the speakers, and you will be enlightened.
1. Open yourself to the experience, you won’t leave the same person, you’ll be better.
9. Clean up the office. Most likely when you come in it will be in need of some interior designing, do this because it will make working in the office a lot easier.
8. Wise up to Ben Guest’s sarcasm early, I mean for the first week don’t believe anything he says, save “My name is Ben Guest”—not even that’s entirely true.
7. Start your summer project (most likely continuing the oral history project) early and add to it regularly. This includes transcribing the interviews within a few days of conducting them.
6. Get to know the teachers but remain cognizant that you are not a teacher, you’re an intern; therefore, you might not be able to do everything that the teachers do.
5. Join the gym. Join a group fitness class (I recommend indoor cycling a.k.a spinning). Check out the trainers—oow!
4. Treat the internship like a class: put some effort into the reading and writing assignments.
3. Check some of the amazing organizations, facilities, and other things that the University of Mississippi has to offer.
2. Engage the speakers, all the speakers, and you will be enlightened.
1. Open yourself to the experience, you won’t leave the same person, you’ll be better.
Sunday, July 18, 2010
Slavery and Justice: Report on the Brown University Committee on Slavery and Justice: My Perspective
In 2003 Brown University President Ruth J. Simmons and the Steering Committee on Slavery and Justice took a monumental step in the University’s history. That year, President Simmons chartered the Steering Committee that began investigating Brown’s historical relationship to slavery in the Americas. However, the scope of the investigation encompassed more than just identifying Brown’s direct or indirect ties to slavery; the investigation also pondered the meaning of repairing the legacy of hatred, inequality, and “dark liberty”, produced by slavery, as a University and as a nation. The Brown Report lays out a clear and concise argument for some form of reparations due in the United States and begins the dialogue the United States needs in order to tend its wounds from slavery. 
The first section of the Brown Reports elucidates Brown’s direct profit from slavery. The connection to slavery courses so deep as to be bound to the University’s namesake, Nicholas Brown. The Steering Committee’s continuous emphasis on Rhode Island’s direct role in the Triangle Slave Trade and indirect profit from textile manufacturing reinforces a motive for the investigation. The emphasis also serves to dampen arguments against investigations, arguments founded on the façade that slavery was not a Northern problem.
While establishing the historical context, the Steering Committee does not fail to omit the contradictions in Rhode Island’s position on slavery. The Report examines the robust profits and, direct or indirect, perpetuation of slavery and the contradicting abolitionist movement. The contradictions explicated during this section of the report are important because they become the microcosm of nation’s schizophrenia and contradictory position on the slavery.
The nation’s schizophrenia towards liberty persisted long after January 1, 1863. Since that date, although terribly slow moving and often incomplete, the nation has taken a number of steps forward to its creed “liberty and justice for all.” Arguably the most controversial step involves the reparations question. The Steering Committee keenly addresses the meaning of reparations and reparative justice in a global perspective as well as within the United States. The global perspective of the Report allows readers to see more clearly the United State’s indecisiveness and failure to come to terms with its past. The Report highlights numerous cases, including the perpetual push for an apology from the Japanese government to Korean “comfort women”, where the United States urged foreign nations to offer some form of reparation. However, no president of the United States nor body of Congress has delivered a formal apology, in the United States, for the sins of slavery. This speaks to the problems the United States faces today with copious injustices faced by millions; the Steering Committee deserves commendation for including this in their official Report.
In balance, the Steering Committee Report was protracted in its lead up to Affirmative Action, one of the most controversial forms of reparation. In truth, the Report lacked a comprehensive discussion of Affirmative Action. Understandably the Report is restricted in what it can cover in only 82 pages, however, the nature of Affirmative Action as a staple political, judicial, and social concern in the United States, it merited more than a single line mention in the Report. Preferably, the Steering Committee can amend the Report to include a brief history of the origin of Affirmative Action and the implications today, notably in the judicial arena.
A second topic the Steering Committee failed to expound upon are the injustices today that have a direct link to slavery. If the Steering Committee examined and discussed these links in the Report from Brown, a prestigious University, the force and credibility of the University would be thrown behind this acknowledgement. People around the nation would see, hear, read and be encouraged to examine and repair those links.
The Steering Committee organized the “Concluding Thoughts” and “Recommendation” sections of the well. Readers access the Committee’s finial ideas without having to wade through cumbersome rhetoric. Likewise, the “Recommendations” section details the steps Brown can take for reparative justice in clear succinct language. Furthermore, the Committee’s recommendations are achievable and lie within the values espoused by the institution. The Steering Committee recommendations are simple, yet complex. For example, the recommendations for” acknowledgement” and to “tell the truth in all its complexity” are easily said and possibly easily done, however, the emotions and expectations of the University that come after those actions are more difficult to deal with. Other recommendations such as “memorialization” and “create a center for continuing research on slavery and justice” are more tangible but no less provocative in what they symbolize or the conversations they generate.
Finally, the “single theme [that] runs through this report…is education”. Education is also the theme of this internship. The motto of the Sunflower County Freedom Project sums up the theme in the report and in the United States, “Education is the seed of freedom”. For hundreds of years in the United States Whites kept education, and thus power, away from Blacks. Even today Blacks continue to be disadvantaged in access to quality education; poverty perpetuates the problem of access but does not rely on race alone as a standard. The best means to repair injustice is to keep it from haunting future generations. Let the skeletons in the closet see light, let the history be written and transferred between generations, and let the posterity have to suffer less than each generation before it.
-Radical.
Click the photo to access the Brown Report
The first section of the Brown Reports elucidates Brown’s direct profit from slavery. The connection to slavery courses so deep as to be bound to the University’s namesake, Nicholas Brown. The Steering Committee’s continuous emphasis on Rhode Island’s direct role in the Triangle Slave Trade and indirect profit from textile manufacturing reinforces a motive for the investigation. The emphasis also serves to dampen arguments against investigations, arguments founded on the façade that slavery was not a Northern problem.
While establishing the historical context, the Steering Committee does not fail to omit the contradictions in Rhode Island’s position on slavery. The Report examines the robust profits and, direct or indirect, perpetuation of slavery and the contradicting abolitionist movement. The contradictions explicated during this section of the report are important because they become the microcosm of nation’s schizophrenia and contradictory position on the slavery.
The nation’s schizophrenia towards liberty persisted long after January 1, 1863. Since that date, although terribly slow moving and often incomplete, the nation has taken a number of steps forward to its creed “liberty and justice for all.” Arguably the most controversial step involves the reparations question. The Steering Committee keenly addresses the meaning of reparations and reparative justice in a global perspective as well as within the United States. The global perspective of the Report allows readers to see more clearly the United State’s indecisiveness and failure to come to terms with its past. The Report highlights numerous cases, including the perpetual push for an apology from the Japanese government to Korean “comfort women”, where the United States urged foreign nations to offer some form of reparation. However, no president of the United States nor body of Congress has delivered a formal apology, in the United States, for the sins of slavery. This speaks to the problems the United States faces today with copious injustices faced by millions; the Steering Committee deserves commendation for including this in their official Report.
In balance, the Steering Committee Report was protracted in its lead up to Affirmative Action, one of the most controversial forms of reparation. In truth, the Report lacked a comprehensive discussion of Affirmative Action. Understandably the Report is restricted in what it can cover in only 82 pages, however, the nature of Affirmative Action as a staple political, judicial, and social concern in the United States, it merited more than a single line mention in the Report. Preferably, the Steering Committee can amend the Report to include a brief history of the origin of Affirmative Action and the implications today, notably in the judicial arena.
A second topic the Steering Committee failed to expound upon are the injustices today that have a direct link to slavery. If the Steering Committee examined and discussed these links in the Report from Brown, a prestigious University, the force and credibility of the University would be thrown behind this acknowledgement. People around the nation would see, hear, read and be encouraged to examine and repair those links.
The Steering Committee organized the “Concluding Thoughts” and “Recommendation” sections of the well. Readers access the Committee’s finial ideas without having to wade through cumbersome rhetoric. Likewise, the “Recommendations” section details the steps Brown can take for reparative justice in clear succinct language. Furthermore, the Committee’s recommendations are achievable and lie within the values espoused by the institution. The Steering Committee recommendations are simple, yet complex. For example, the recommendations for” acknowledgement” and to “tell the truth in all its complexity” are easily said and possibly easily done, however, the emotions and expectations of the University that come after those actions are more difficult to deal with. Other recommendations such as “memorialization” and “create a center for continuing research on slavery and justice” are more tangible but no less provocative in what they symbolize or the conversations they generate.
Finally, the “single theme [that] runs through this report…is education”. Education is also the theme of this internship. The motto of the Sunflower County Freedom Project sums up the theme in the report and in the United States, “Education is the seed of freedom”. For hundreds of years in the United States Whites kept education, and thus power, away from Blacks. Even today Blacks continue to be disadvantaged in access to quality education; poverty perpetuates the problem of access but does not rely on race alone as a standard. The best means to repair injustice is to keep it from haunting future generations. Let the skeletons in the closet see light, let the history be written and transferred between generations, and let the posterity have to suffer less than each generation before it.
-Radical.
Click the photo to access the Brown Report
Wednesday, July 14, 2010
Sputter, Sputter, Spark!--I think.
I think something happened this summer. I think. 
I said that I wanted to see
And now I’ve seen.
I said I wanted to know.
And now I know.
I can’t pretend like these problems aren’t a motif.
So I think something happened this summer. I think.
It’s weird when you come in no strings attached.
I’m here only for this not that.
It’s scary when you may let go of one dream.
You don’t want to disappoint, not others but yourself
Even so, I think something happened this summer. I think.
Yeah, I’m pretty sure I still want to get that degree
But this time it’s not just to help me
I’ve been given so much
Now I know I have much to give
Therefore, I think something happened this summer. I think.
I want to start something, maybe not here but there
Maybe it be cast to the wind and spread everywhere
I’m pretty sure right now I’m in the gutter
But from here I can look up and see the stars
And then you know, I think something happened this summer. I think.
From a minor fall to a major life
There seems to have been a shift
Talk is cheap
People want people, need people, who do
Hence, I think something happened this summer. I think.
It’s a never ending battle
It starts with the rattle.
I need to play my part.
The question is will I start.
Yes.
That’s how you know, something happened this summer. Something happened.
I said that I wanted to see
And now I’ve seen.
I said I wanted to know.
And now I know.
I can’t pretend like these problems aren’t a motif.
So I think something happened this summer. I think.
It’s weird when you come in no strings attached.
I’m here only for this not that.
It’s scary when you may let go of one dream.
You don’t want to disappoint, not others but yourself
Even so, I think something happened this summer. I think.
Yeah, I’m pretty sure I still want to get that degree
But this time it’s not just to help me
I’ve been given so much
Now I know I have much to give
Therefore, I think something happened this summer. I think.
I want to start something, maybe not here but there
Maybe it be cast to the wind and spread everywhere
I’m pretty sure right now I’m in the gutter
But from here I can look up and see the stars
And then you know, I think something happened this summer. I think.
From a minor fall to a major life
There seems to have been a shift
Talk is cheap
People want people, need people, who do
Hence, I think something happened this summer. I think.
It’s a never ending battle
It starts with the rattle.
I need to play my part.
The question is will I start.
Yes.
That’s how you know, something happened this summer. Something happened.
Education is Political
Last week the other interns and I went to the Oxford school board meeting at Oxford high school. Even before I left the meeting I kept thinking one thing: if politics is personal, then education is political.
All of the meeting that we were privy to (before they went into executive session) covered a bond issue for Oxford. The school board wants to issue a bond to build new accommodate expanding existing builds, improving facilities, and constructing a new school. These things cost money, and in a public school money comes from the tax payers. Simply, money comes from taxes.
Before the school board risked asking constituents if they wanted to fund the endeavors, the school board hired Mr. Davis (no relation) from a survey company to test the waters. In a 10 to 1 ratio the company was able to collect only 301 complete responses, 70% of those coming from senior citizens.
Sitting in on that meeting made me understand more fully how education is political. I’ve heard people complain about the devalued status of education in government or the educational bureaucracy from k-12 to higher ed. But hearing opinions is nothing like sitting in the room and watching it happen in real time. Moms, dads, alumni, cousins, all lost their faces; they lost their individuality and meaning beyond their vote. “I know how the voters move.” Mr. Davis repeated this several times. Although I think the information he provided in his cross postulations was valuable and needed, I still can’t look past people being no more than a vote.
This is what happens in political campaigns. Candidates often play to people to get their vote and not necessarily their story. Individuals become a mass known simple as ‘the voter.’ I’m not saying this is a bad thing. I mean it is what it is, but it’s something to notice.
Towards the end of his presentation Mr. Davis said he would love to get a focus group of just women or just African-Americans (two of the hardest, along with senior citizens, to sell the bond to). He wanted to see what they think about the bond issue. When Mr. Davis said this I started considering the students and parents in Mississippi public education system. What do they think is wrong, or right, with the system? How much responsibility do they think they have? What do they think about the Teacher Corps?
What do the students and parents think about the Mississippi Teacher Corps. I think I told this the MTC Program Manager last week. I wondered what things would come up in a focus group of students and a group of parents. What are their thoughts on the Corps? Do they even know that the Corps exists or which of their Teachers are participants? I wonder if they would feel anything if they knew that statistically speaking their teacher was only like to remain in Mississippi, let alone teaching, for only two years. Would they be indifferent because they’ve been conditioned to expect turnover in the education system.
Now, how did I get from education is political to school board meetings to focus groups on the Teacher Corps? Well, if education is political and the constituents in the Teacher Corps are the students being served, aren’t we obliged to hear their perspectives?
Do the students even know about MTC or TFA?
Back to reflecting on the school board. Even though most of the members (we were unable to tell which ones) were elected to their positions, I must say they asked Mr. Davis some pertinent questions about the results of the survey (what factors influenced the results) as well as the methodology (calling home phones versus cell phones, which many in the 35 and under crowd are turning to exclusively). I think this speaks more the environment and, I hope I’m not making too grand an assumption, the character of the school board members. For the most part, I got the vibe that most of the members were there because they genuinely wanted to work towards the best possible school system in Oxford, rather than as stepping stone to other political offices. I also think the school board had a decent representation of sexes, age ranges, and occupations. There was only one Black female, madam secretary, and she was quiet throughout the meeting, save reading the issues to be discussed in executive session.
I think education blew up on the national level as a political issue under No Child Left Behind, passed during the inauspicious Bush era administration. I think many people on the left automatically discounted the law because it passed during Bush administration. Yes I think teaching to tests is stupid and ineffective, but let’s get real there has to be some way to measure growth and hold students and teachers accountable. A number of stipulations in the program can stand to be changed, funding for one, but for all uproar that the Act cause in 2002 it sure as heck didn’t lead to anything. We still have a shoddy public education in the poorest areas of the United States and we’re (the nation) are still steadily descending the education prowess ladder.
Somehow education is too political in some respects, but not political enough in others. Wait, let me temper that statement, education is not political enough in the sense that public education doesn’t yet seem to be personal enough…if at all.
-Radical.
Monday, July 5, 2010
The Oral History Project
What are we even doing with this? No really, what are we doing? I felt that way last week when we interviewed MTC alumni. Here’s what I know so far, the oral history project is for the history of the MTC. This involves interviewing alumni, founders, directors, program managers, and anyone else affiliated with MTC. 
I usually like starting a project with the end in mind, that means having an idea of how the final product will look. This project was not like that. Now I know that the transcribed interviews will probably go online (hence the meeting for iweb), but what else? What about it? So what’s the point. I’m missing this. I’ve read a few of the transcribed interviews on the Southern Foodways Alliance, but I’ve also read of a purpose or mission. Any way let me answer some questions about what I do know about (or from) the project:
What have I learned so far?
So far I have a a good deal about the founding of Corps. I was surprised to hear the idea for the program came from a journalist. Weird. Stranger, or perhaps not so strange, the idea came from someone outside of ‘the closed society’. I thought the program always offered a Master’s Degree and was state funded since it was located at a state university. Not! MTC was originally funded by the Phil Hardin foundation (the only private foundation for education in the state) and the Master’s Degree was offered about four years after the program started to help attract applicants and increase retention in the education field.
From the summer training that I witness and hear about this summer (2010) I would think the summer aspect has always been adequate. Not! From participants such as Michael Cox and Andrew HaLevi (both in the first MTC cohort in the class of 1990) the summer training was “weak” (HaLevi, 29 june 2010) The summer training consisted mostly of acclimating the teachers to Southern culture, not the classroom environments that culture produced. In my opinion, the only reason why the Class of 1990 was so strong was because a number of the teachers came from teacher training programs before they came to the Teacher Corps; therefore, their success in the class can be credited more from their training prior to MTC than to training provided by MTC.
Mr. HaLevi touched on a point I thought about a couple time during the summer, what do you do about retention? For the most part the teachers come here for two years and then move onto teaching outside of Mississippi (if they even stay in education) or onto a career field that’s not directly related to education. I know a large goal, or what should be considered a goal of the program, is not needing MTC anymore. However, how can that ever be achieved if no one wants to stay in the state. Do we need to fix the economy and amenities of the state to attract the people that could positively influence education? Which comes first: education or economics? This touches on a deeper issue that could use a blog, or book, of its own.
What questions do I still have?
Some of the I still have about the project I wrote in the introduction to this post. Some questions I have for in the interviews are:
Why did you leave education?/Why did you stay in education?
What were some of the steps you needed to go through when first starting the organization?
What were some of the start up challenges?
Do you stay in contact with the program or current participants?
Where do you see MTC now as compared to when you were a participant? Where do you see it 10 years from now?
If you could change one thing about education in Mississippi what would it be? Is that the same answer you would have given when you were a participant or when the program was founded?
Can things change?
Some of these questions may not apply to the cut and dry history of MTC, but I think they relate to the progress of the organization and of education in the state.
What has the process been like?
The process? Well, the people we have been able to interview were great. Other people, well...I think they’re trying to avoid us or something. I’m not quite sure and won’t waste my time speculating on the issue. The alumni and have a lot of insightful comments on their experiences as a participant, on MTC in general, and education in Mississippi (or elsewhere if they know about other places). The process isn’t as bad as I first imagined it would be. Namely, the transcription process, which I was dreading, hasn’t been as bad as I thought it would be. We haven’t started to put build our website, but I’m confident that we’ll be able to build a decent website and will learn a thing or two in the process.
All in all, I think we’re building a foundation others can use if they’re looking into the origins and perceptions of MTC. That being said, we’ll make the foundation strong, but don’t expect a mansion. :)
-Radical.
I usually like starting a project with the end in mind, that means having an idea of how the final product will look. This project was not like that. Now I know that the transcribed interviews will probably go online (hence the meeting for iweb), but what else? What about it? So what’s the point. I’m missing this. I’ve read a few of the transcribed interviews on the Southern Foodways Alliance, but I’ve also read of a purpose or mission. Any way let me answer some questions about what I do know about (or from) the project:
What have I learned so far?
So far I have a a good deal about the founding of Corps. I was surprised to hear the idea for the program came from a journalist. Weird. Stranger, or perhaps not so strange, the idea came from someone outside of ‘the closed society’. I thought the program always offered a Master’s Degree and was state funded since it was located at a state university. Not! MTC was originally funded by the Phil Hardin foundation (the only private foundation for education in the state) and the Master’s Degree was offered about four years after the program started to help attract applicants and increase retention in the education field.
From the summer training that I witness and hear about this summer (2010) I would think the summer aspect has always been adequate. Not! From participants such as Michael Cox and Andrew HaLevi (both in the first MTC cohort in the class of 1990) the summer training was “weak” (HaLevi, 29 june 2010) The summer training consisted mostly of acclimating the teachers to Southern culture, not the classroom environments that culture produced. In my opinion, the only reason why the Class of 1990 was so strong was because a number of the teachers came from teacher training programs before they came to the Teacher Corps; therefore, their success in the class can be credited more from their training prior to MTC than to training provided by MTC.
Mr. HaLevi touched on a point I thought about a couple time during the summer, what do you do about retention? For the most part the teachers come here for two years and then move onto teaching outside of Mississippi (if they even stay in education) or onto a career field that’s not directly related to education. I know a large goal, or what should be considered a goal of the program, is not needing MTC anymore. However, how can that ever be achieved if no one wants to stay in the state. Do we need to fix the economy and amenities of the state to attract the people that could positively influence education? Which comes first: education or economics? This touches on a deeper issue that could use a blog, or book, of its own.
What questions do I still have?
Some of the I still have about the project I wrote in the introduction to this post. Some questions I have for in the interviews are:
Why did you leave education?/Why did you stay in education?
What were some of the steps you needed to go through when first starting the organization?
What were some of the start up challenges?
Do you stay in contact with the program or current participants?
Where do you see MTC now as compared to when you were a participant? Where do you see it 10 years from now?
If you could change one thing about education in Mississippi what would it be? Is that the same answer you would have given when you were a participant or when the program was founded?
Can things change?
Some of these questions may not apply to the cut and dry history of MTC, but I think they relate to the progress of the organization and of education in the state.
What has the process been like?
The process? Well, the people we have been able to interview were great. Other people, well...I think they’re trying to avoid us or something. I’m not quite sure and won’t waste my time speculating on the issue. The alumni and have a lot of insightful comments on their experiences as a participant, on MTC in general, and education in Mississippi (or elsewhere if they know about other places). The process isn’t as bad as I first imagined it would be. Namely, the transcription process, which I was dreading, hasn’t been as bad as I thought it would be. We haven’t started to put build our website, but I’m confident that we’ll be able to build a decent website and will learn a thing or two in the process.
All in all, I think we’re building a foundation others can use if they’re looking into the origins and perceptions of MTC. That being said, we’ll make the foundation strong, but don’t expect a mansion. :)
-Radical.
The Evolution-Incomplete
Usually on these “reflect on your experience so far” blogs I find someway to avoid writing about my experiences as a whole so far. This time I’m going to make a good faith effort to reflect on my experience, in the internship, so far:
Overall, I’ve enjoyed this internship so far. Even so, I can’t help but keep wondering what other people are doing. I doubt, highly doubt, that other ASIP internships expose people to the social issues Betsy, Hallie, and I see and reflect on each week. In many ways this internship is more like a summer course than an internship--that comes with perks and downsides, though. :)
I wish our internship was just touring around Mississippi, meeting people (not jut speakers, but “everyday” citizens) and learning about all these problems, and trying to do something about them. It’s so easy to get engrossed in conversation and metaphysical thought. Hence, I added that last desire---trying to do something about the problems. If you delight in repetitious office work, there’s something wrong. I know it needs to get done, that’s why I do it. But honestly, regardless if my official title is ‘Summer School Assistant’ I didn’t apply and accept this internship for the administrative facet.
Talking to speakers, reading publications, and actually seeing the terrible conditions in the Delta and across Mississippi (a motif in the South)...that’s what’s it. After I accepted the internship, especially since I wasn’t looking at the internship as a way to prepare me for a career in teaching, I went through a rejection period because I didn’t want to get pigeon-holed into education. For many people education means one thing--teacher, classroom, students. When I said, “I’m working for the Mississippi Teacher Corps this summer”, I could see it in their faces and hear it in their comments. They automatically labeled me, “Oh you want to be a teacher? You want to teach?” First of all, just because I’m working with the Teacher Corps doesn’t mean I’m actually teaching (it’s understandable that they would think this though). Secondly, so what if I did want to teach? I always said I would not get into education, I was more into other social justice issues. However, if I examine my life since the summer before my senior year, I haven’t been running from education I’ve been running to it. Corridors of Shame, Teacher Cadet, family history final on integration in New Roads, LA, Black Power/White Money, The Springfield Project, Race and Education course, and now this internship--either I’ve been running to it, or I’ve just stopped running from it.
I have yet to soul search or whatever and see if education is my calling, but I’m more comfortable now getting more involved because I see it as a social issue. I still like law (or I think I do, I’ll suspend ultimate judgement until I actually have to do it). It seems here people don’t like law school, especially with comments like, “Usually people go to law school when they don’t know what else to do” or “We don’t need any more lawyers.” Who says you have to be a lawyer in a traditional field or even a lawyer at all. Teachers are the infantry men and women and when it comes down to it they are the crux, but the law can help education and education can help law. Believe it or not I think this internship is helping me see that.
Last academic year, my Freshman year, I didn’t want to tutor in the local high school. It’s not that I mind or didn’t want to help these students, it’s just that I think 1) I think most people get into to have something on their resume 2) it’s already so popular.
The short time I spent at the summer school and from what I hear from teachers about guidance counselors in the schools, many poor and minority students who have no one at home to help them when it comes to post-secondary education also have limited resources in their high schools--the place where resources should abound. This problem has been floating in my mind for awhile this summer, but a light bulb (CFL, of course) came on when we spoke to Teacher Cadet alumnae/TEAM teacher Danielle Hall--MyOp!
MyOp! is the club idea I have to start at Amherst (maybe even a non-profit, now I’m thinking too big, let me take this one step a time). MyOp!--My opinion, my options, my opportunities--would be made up a current college students who can provide college advice and guidance to students in critical needs high schools that want help. We’ll be with them each step of the way and what we cover will reflect the timeline they have to follow in the college applications/admissions process (e.g. we’ll cover the application essay and private/institutional scholarships before we delve into the intricacies of the FAFSA). Students on campus would be willing to do this. I could sign-out vans from the CCE and make the college put its money where its policy is. The front load of the work would come from working in partnership with the schools and teachers, finding out exactly what these students want to know or what would be helpful to them, and ways to present information to them so they can see see a better life within their grasps.
I’m such a college student. I’m a pragmatic idealist. I want to do so much and I know that we can. With all of this, I’m glad I met people this summer who haven’t grown out this ‘phase’. It gives me hope. :) -Radical.
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