Q & A Session!

You asked, I answered. Well, tried to answer.

So what exactly are you doing?

In about twelve days, I’ll be flying to Italy for three months for a study abroad program called “Florence: Arts, Humanities, & Culture.” Study abroad has been a dream of mine for a quite a while (just ask my parents, who patiently sat through many meetings with college admissions counselors where I grilled said counselors on study abroad options).

Is this a Coe program?

Nope! The semester I’m doing is through the Associated Colleges of the Midwest, a consortium of liberal arts colleges that collaborate mostly for study abroad programs, like the one I’m attending in Florence.

Are you the only one going?

No I am not! There are plenty of other people who have also signed up for the ACM Florence program — I believe it’s about 29 people total, including one other girl from Coe.

Where are the other people coming from?

Other ACM schools! I’m not sure of the breakdown yet (mostly because I haven’t met anyone face to face), but the majority of the students I’ll be with this semester are from other smaller, liberal arts colleges located in the Midwest. 

What exactly are you doing there?

Well, studying. And eating. And traveling. I’m there to learn and to soak up the culture. I plan on traveling as much as I can, so that I can see as much as I can, but I will have classes and a full semester’s workload. Also, I plan to eat my weight in pasta.

Do you know what classes you’ll be taking?

Right off the bat, I’ll be taking an Italian language class. That class will continue for the whole semester (at which point I hope to be able to stumble through a conversation with random people on the street). In October, I’ll start three other classes (so I’ll have four classes total). I’m taking “The Early Medici as Patrons of the Arts,” “Power, Protection, and Commerce: Divine Figures in Early Renaissance Florence,” and “Patronage, Gender, and Power in Early Modern Florence.” Yes, I’m a little too excited.

Are you only studying with those people or is this through a larger university in Florence?

I’m sure I’ll run into other students studying abroad in Florence, but the only people in my classes will be the other ACM students (those other 28 people I talked about before). Our school is an ACM site, not a larger college or university in Florence, and we’ll be spending our class time there and “in the field” — getting the full Florence experience.

How did you decide on Florence?

For as long as I can remember I have loved classical civilizations; in college, my “specialty” has become ancient Rome. Where better to study the Romans than in Italy? Plus, let’s be honest, think about all that food… why wouldn’t I choose Florence? Kidding, of course (but not completely). I am excited to go though; the artwork, the architecture, the history, the culture, and, yes, the food — what’s not to like?

What was the process of actually getting into the Florence program?

First I had to discuss things with the study abroad coordinator at Coe. Then I had to apply at Coe for approval to study abroad (with a December deadline). After being approved to study abroad, I then had to apply to the actual ACM program. After I was accepted to that, I began the paperwork for both Coe and the ACM — logistical work, mostly — and now here I am! Twelve days away from living the dream. (If you’d like to hear more about this process, please contact me and I’d be happy to share more details with you.)

Are you going to be staying just in Florence?

I’ll be staying with a host family in Florence, so, yes I’ll be living there and spending most of my time there. However, we’re taking some groups trips (to Rome and places like that) and a number of us students are talking about traveling around Italy together. It promises to be an adventure-filled semester!

Are your parents coming to visit you?

No. They don’t love me that much.

But seriously, I’ve asked them not to visit — this is still school for me. While it’d be really cool to share some of this experience with them, this is 100% for me. Thankfully, I have great parents who respect me and (most of) my wishes, and they’ve told me that they’re happy to let me have this adventure all to myself.

Do you plan on snagging an Italian guy while you’re there?

For the sake of my dad, I’ll say ‘no’ to this one. You’re welcome, Dad. Honestly though, I’m more excited about the food than I am the men. This should come as no surprise to those of you who have met me.

What Italian phrases are you going to learn to keep Italian men away from you?

Thanks to my Free Kindle Italian Phrasebook, I’ve already learned to say “leave me alone” (“mi lasci sola”), “don’t touch me” (“non mi tocchi”), and, in case things get really bad, “I’ll call the police” (“chiamo la polizia”). Best free download I’ve gotten yet.

How are you going to pack three months worth of stuff into one suitcase? Is that even possible?

The short answer: I’m not sure. At all. The long answer: my inimitable packing skills will be put to the test. The plan is to pack a suitcase within a suitcase so that I might be free to shop (it’s a rough life I lead). My family keeps pushing for this plan, but I think it may be because I’m coming home right before Christmas…. Jury’s still out.

I’m getting down to the wire. Twelve days! The next post will probably deal with my packing extravaganza, but if you have questions that I haven’t addressed here, put them in a comment and I’ll do my best to fill you in.

Calling All Questions!

It's now only 27 days until I leave for Florence. WOW. I can hardly believe it. In looking through my blog, I realized that I haven't exactly been very clear on what I'll be doing in Florence this coming semester.

So here's what I'm going to do about that. 

Send me your questions. Put them in a comment below or (if you have my contact information), send me an email or shoot me a text. My next post will be a sort of Q&A session, where I'll answer all the questions I've gotten about my upcoming semester. I've already got some but I'm looking for more, so put your thinking caps on!

Until then, check out this picture of Florence. Use it as inspiration. Drool over it. Do your thing.

Respect the Process.

Disclaimer: I’ve been trying to write this post since I returned from Spring Green a little more than two weeks ago, but, for some reason, it has been incredibly difficult for me to put my thoughts into words. I learned so much during this retreat, but a lot of it feels specific to just me, so I apologize if some of this doesn’t seem important or doesn’t make sense.

On July 19, I drove from Kenosha to Spring Green, Wisconsin for a faculty writing conference and retreat held by Coe for the benefit of its professors (any professor may attend the retreat, but it’s not required). The retreat and conference are held every few years to examine and discuss writing prompts. Right away it was obvious that professors have much the same attitude toward writing assignments that we students do — they don’t usually want to write the prompt and we often don’t want to write the paper they’ve assigned. This year they wanted a few students to join them so that they could get real student feedback before handing out new or revised assignments. We were there, in a sense, to troubleshoot.

It was a small group — only seven professors and two students (including myself) — but we all got along really well and were able to talk easily. I enjoyed meeting professors that I normally wouldn’t have (I have no reason to take any nursing or upper level education classes) and learning from them in a non-classroom setting. We had been in email contact for a few weeks, discussing the details of our trip, but I had never met the majority of the faculty members who had signed up to come along. I was actually kind of glad that I didn’t know most of the professors; this way, I could come in without the bias that I think a lot of students have: that their professors are not quite human — they exist only in the classroom and their sole purpose in life is to push too hard and demand the unrealistic.

Once we got to Spring Green and were settled in our respective rooms at the B&B, we all introduced ourselves with the usual “name, hometown, and discipline” and then sat down to lunch. After lunch we talked about our favorite and least favorite writing assignments and made an interesting discovery: the assignments themselves do not seem to affect us as strongly as the context surrounding the assignments. The reason we remembered certain assignments was because of our attitude toward them, how we felt about them. It wasn’t that a writing assignment was inherently good and bad, it was how we felt about the circumstances surrounding them. For instance, both my favorite and least favorite assignments were ones that had frustrated me, though I was able to learn a valuable lesson from my “favorite” assignment. I learned from my “least favorite” assignment too, except I was also frustrated by the lesson.

After that we really got down to business. We split into two groups (which happened to be guys and gals) and went to opposite ends of the B&B to talk about writing. Our first task was to talk about what could go into a rubric designed for faculty members meant to help them in crafting writing assignments. It took us a while to make our list (mostly because every time we came up with another item we would discuss it at length), but eventually we had a number of bullet points, listed below.

- Use both a prompt (to get students thinking) and directions (which deal with the mechanics of the assignment).

- Consider the audience; give the students a little help in determining the audience for a paper (educated and informed or unfamiliar?).

- Include citation information in your directions, including if you actually want citations, which citation style you would like, and which sources students are allowed to cite (can they cite from lecture? Do you only want to see print sources?).

- Suggest students come to the Writing Center and remind them to bring the assignment guide with them! (Many times, I find students don’t totally understand the assignment but forget to bring the assignment guide. This means that Writing Center consultants can’t help! It’s beyond critical that students bring the assignment guide with them to a conference.)

Eventually we were privy to the list the guys came up with:

- Be aware of the audience.

- Know and share the purpose of the assignment.

- Use written instructions (no spoken directions!).

- Have a feedback system ready to go.

- Make sure that everyone is learning from the assignment.

- Give a clear starting point for students to use as a springboard (in the words of Dr. Bob, “struggle in doing, but not in beginning”).

- Challenge students to always be thinking “so what?”

- Be aware of the process of writing.

- Have a method of reflection available to students, so that they might be both participants and spectators.

- Know the limitations of the assignment. No assignment can do it all.

Anyway, after an afternoon of deep discussion, we drove out to the American Players Theater for a picnic dinner followed by 6^th row seats to Richard III. What a great show. Being a Shakespeare buff myself, I appreciated the allusions to Henry VI (the history play which precedes Richard III chronologically). I also loved that they used ex-queen Margaret to her full potential… a lot of productions treat Margaret as a footnote or leave her out entirely; I feel that without Margaret and her prophecies, the play loses some of its karmic, wheel of fortune effect. I thought APT’s Margaret and Hastings were particularly well done. What a powerful play and how fun to share it with a few people who had never seen or read it before. (Also there may or may not have been some wine-drinking and late night conversations that happened when we got back from Richard III….)

The next day, we spent some time finalizing our sample rubric on creating writing assignments. Once that was done, the professors were given time to work specifically on writing assignments that they would be using in real classes this coming year. (Sorry, fellow students, I didn’t get many details, so you’ll get no heads up from me.) My role at this point was to sit there, quietly reading my book or writing my own notes, until a professor needed a hand. I ended up talking with one of the rhetoric professors for a while about the amount of work you can give a class before its just too much to take. Some of my fellow Kohawks may not like hearing this too much, but after hearing the anticipated workload for this class, I immediately told the professor that it was by far one of the easiest college workloads I’d ever heard of. Think of this: one easy chapter of reading per class, plus a one-page response post per class, plus one other short weekly assignment. I wish.

After lunch, the whole group gathered again to discuss the rubrics we had developed separately. After sharing our lists (which I included above), we also talked about what we had learned or what had made us think — really, just what would be sticking with us for a while. Things like “give professors a reason to read by having a personal epiphany,” “no one’s thinking ‘wrongly’ but there is potential for different interpretations of assignments,” “don’t stress, just be organic and accept the process,” “activate the kinesthetic,” and “don’t pretend to not want something from students when you do — own it!” I had trouble picking what would stick with me the most, so I’ve written down all the things that have been tumbling around in my head (they’re listed below).

Things I Learned:

- Write to explore. Writing assignments should be treated as an opportunity to explore a subject, not as a required show of knowledge.

- Don’t think of a word limit as a certain length to be met; rather think of it as a challenge. Instead of having to make it to 400 words, see just how much persuasive discussion you can fit into 400 words. Jam-pack those 400 words with important material.

- Writing isn’t always a test to make sure that you’re actually learning. Sometimes an assignment’s purpose is to help you make connections, privately, in what you have already learned.

- Just as our professors need to remind themselves that no writing assignment can do it all, we students must remind ourselves that no paper can do it all. You can’t talk about everything. Sometimes you need to cut some information because it’s not relevant enough or because it distracts from your argument.

- The writing process is just as important (if not more so) than the written product. The goal should not be simply to churn out a paper, but to learn something while you’re writing it.

Now that I’ve been thinking about it for a while, I am of the opinion that outside of going to class and learning in that setting, going to this conference was the best thing I have ever done for myself as a student. I learned an unbelievable amount that I don’t know if I’ll ever be able to fully describe, though I’ve tried here. This conference came at a great time for me; any sooner in my academic career and I don’t think I would’ve been able to fully appreciate it; any later, and I wouldn’t have been able to go, due to having graduated.

Most importantly, I was reminded why I chose Coe in the first place. We really are incredibly lucky to have the professors that we do. We are blest with some truly inspiring faculty members who I now count as role models. They genuinely love what they do; they care about us as students and are ready and willing to push those of us students who are invested in our education. They want us to succeed. And, guess what? They’re human too.