Education Commons^™

Interview With Mary Margaret Stewart, December 18, 2013, Mary Margaret Stewart, Michael J. Birkner

Oral Histories

Mary Margaret Stewart was interviewed on December 18, 2013 by Michael Birkner about her early life in California and Nebraska during the Great Depression, undergraduate experience at Monmouth University and graduate experience at Indiana University, and early career in the English department at Gettysburg.

Collection Note: This oral history was selected from the Oral History Collection maintained by Special Collections & College Archives. Transcripts are available for browsing in the Special Collections Reading Room, 4^th floor, Musselman Library. GettDigital contains the complete listing of oral histories done from 1978 to the present. To view this list and to access …

Little Soldiers, Macy F. Collins

Student Publications

"Little Soldiers" is a poem that examines the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting on a personal level.

High School In Bali, Samantha R. Eck

Bali Soundscapes Essays

In the Indonesian education system, high school is comprised of 10^th, 11^th, and 12^th grades. In their first year of high school, a Balinese student’s curriculum might look very similar to an American student’s. At this point in their education, the Balinese are still following the national general curriculum, studying mathematics, science, language, and history. During the eleventh and twelfth years of school the Balinese school structure diverges from the American system. Indonesian students must choose one of three areas of study on which to focus for the last two years of high school, a …

Balinese Elementary Schools, Jane A. Best

Bali Soundscapes Essays

Kerambitan’s elementary school houses approximately 100 students. These students, from first to sixth grade, attend class six days a week from 8 AM until noon (the afternoon heat is too strong). Like in many American elementary schools, the teachers on this level teach all core subjects; in Indonesia these subjects are math, reading, culture, and social studies. Subjects are highly standardized on a national level; students in Bali are learning the same things as students in Java or any of the other islands. The exception to this rule is the culture class; here students learn about Balinese culture, arts, and …

Fearless: Sneha Shrestha, Sneha Shrestha

SURGE

Sneha Shrestha ’10, a native to Kathmandu, Nepal, recently received an Advancing Leaders Fellowship from World Learning for her fearless project. With it, she aims to provide a creative outlet for art and culture among young people in Nepal through the Kathmandu Children’s Art Museum (KCAM). This project will support a creative learning space for children as well as an opportunity for them to express themselves and investigate their own culture through art. [excerpt]

The Race For Honors, Hannah M. Frantz

SURGE

Over graduation weekend, it was pretty common to see people weighed down by massive numbers of honor cords hanging around their necks. This is a mark of respect at Gettysburg College, so students wear them proudly. I had the privilege to attend Spring Honors Day and watch many of my friends receive achievement awards. As we started winding down to the end of the ceremony, something hit me:

The recipients were overwhelmingly white. [excerpt]

What The Unglamorous Side Of Study Abroad Taught Me, Kathryn E. Bucolo

SURGE

I’ve been gallivanting around this beautiful planet posing as a study abroad student taking classes and writing papers for the past academic year, one semester in England and one in Argentina (where I still am) and, just like all the brochures, promotions, and panels of study abroad survivors say, it has been absolutely chock-full of amazing experiences, people, places, foods—I think “transformative” is the proper term.

But transformative can mean many things. It doesn’t just mean that you “find yourself” or “change your life”—it means you see the less glamorous stuff about yourself, too. [excerpt]

Man To Man: We Can Stop Sexual Violence, James H. Garrett

SURGE

I was lucky enough to grow up with a loving mother who taught me early on to respect every woman and, more so, to never overstep the boundaries between people unless I am invited to do so with full cognizance of the actions of both parties. To be less philosophical, she was always very clear with me that touching no-no parts with any person (in my case, a lady) without express consent is wrong every time and that I would never forgive myself if I forgot that maxim in a flight of “passion.” At no time in my life have …

The Secret Life Of Schoolgirls, Emily A. Miano

SURGE

Even as a Catholic, I hated Catholic school. I hated our uniforms. They were a horrible yellow and green, with skirts that felt like heavy curtains and shirts made of 2% cotton. On hot days the shirts would stick to your body and slowly creep up to your armpits every time you moved.

So forget that Catholic School girl fantasy because there’s a lot of baggage that comes with those knee socks. [excerpt]

Mobile Knowledge, Karma Points, And Digital Peers: The Tacit Epistemology And Linguistic Representation Of Moocs, Lisa Portmess

Philosophy Faculty Publications

Media representations of massive open online courses (MOOCs) such as those offered by Coursera, edX and Udacity reflect tension and ambiguity in their bold promise of democratized education and global knowledge sharing. An approach to MOOCs that emphasizes the tacit epistemology of such representations suggests a richer account of the ambiguities of MOOCs, the unsettled linguistic and visual representations that reflect the strange lifeworld of global online courses and the pressing need for promising innovation that seeks to serve the restless global desire for knowledge. This perspective piece critically appraises the linguistic laboratory of thought such representation reveals and its …

And None For Gretchen Weiners, Center For Public Service

SURGE

In the four years I’ve spent at Gettysburg College, it’s safe to say that my experience has been largely influenced by my membership in Greek Life. I’ve developed a personal leadership style and feel accomplished by the strong relationships I built with other women. But this year, I developed a stronger understanding of the inequities that exist within the Greek community. [excerpt]

A Developmental Approach To Civility And Bystander Intervention, Jennifer Q. Mccary

College Life Publications

The students of color in your classroom experience discrimination every day, in small and large ways. They don’t often see themselves represented in their textbooks, and encounter hostility in school, and outside. For them race is a constant reality, and an issue they need, and want, to discuss. Failure to do so can inhibit their academic performance.

Failure to discuss race prevents White students from getting a real, critical and deep understanding of our society and their place in it. It is essential for the well-being of all students that they learn to have constructive conversations about the history of …

Liberal Education And Moral Education, Daniel R. Denicola

Philosophy Faculty Publications

Mark Van Doren, the noted literary scholar, once remarked, "The college is meaningless without a curriculum, but it is more so when it has one that is meaningless." Many current critics of undergraduate curricula in America assent to the crucial need for programmatic renewal in our colleges and universities. They bemoan the cookie-cutter sameness in far too many of them. The oddity is that U.S. colleges have long touted their "diversity" while largely holding fast to rather traditional pathways. This illuminating volume goes beyond formulaic nuts-and-bolts recipes for constructing curriculum: it seeks to interpret and analyze the contemporary landscape of …