Liberal Studies Commons^™

Steam In Arabia, Troy Bickham

The STEAM Journal

In late 2014 Texas A&M University at Qatar, which is a small branch campus focusing on engineering, launched its own STEAM initiative. Its goals are to better integrate the liberal arts into the engineering curriculum and to demonstrate the relevance of the arts to STEM-based education and research. What follows is a description of the initiative and the reception it has received.

A Posse Comes East: Houstonians Share Tight Bond And A New World, Christina Dong

Colby Magazine

Parker is one of nine students in Colby Posse 13, the first group of students from Houston to attend Colby through the Posse Foundation after a 12-year affiliation with Posse New York. Posse recruits high-achieving public high school students and offers an opportunity to attend a partner college or university with support of a full-tuition scholarship and fellow Posse scholars.

Turning Assumptions Upside Down, Gerry Boyle

Colby Magazine

Lisa Arellano reveals the dissonance of the paradox behind the contradiction. Arellano wants students to see that there are not only different viewpoints but also to be aware of the traceable and revealing ways those viewpoints—including their own—are formed.

From Trump To Pope And Back Again, Aaron R. Hanlon

Colby Magazine

An English professor and political commentator hazards an opinion—that public writing is worth the risk

Review Of Sustainable Energy -- Without The Hot Air By David Mackay (2009), Kira Hamman

Numeracy

David MacKay. Sustainable Energy: Without the hot air. (Cambridge, England: UIT Cambridge Ltd., 2009). 384 pp. ISBN 978-0954452933 (also available as a free e-book).

Physicist David MacKay transforms what has historically been a debate fraught with skepticism and hysteria into an informed conversation. He does this by providing clear, accurate quantitative information on energy production and consumption in a form that allows comparison and invites thoughtful analysis. By recalibrating power into kilowatt-hours per day per person, he makes the numbers meaningful on an individual level. He then meticulously estimates the productive capacity of various renewable energy sources, explores alternative …

Confessions Of A Media Literacy Scholar-Practitioner: Job Market Advantages, Research Agenda Challenges, And Theory-Driven Production, Christopher Boulton

Journal of Media Literacy Education

This essay explores how higher education’s move away from the liberal arts tradition of learning by thinking and towards more vocational “experiential” approaches has implications for media literacy educators’ career options, scholarly identities, and teaching strategies. Specifically, I consider my own negotiation of increasing administrative and student demands for “hands-on” production courses by confessing both my advantages on the job market and my post-hire challenges in articulating a clear research agenda. I then conclude with a case study of how I repurposed my scholar-practitioner identity and used critical theory to drive production by bringing film students into a cultural studies …

Audience Response And From Film Adaptation To Reading Literature, Klaudia H.Y. Lee

CLCWeb: Comparative Literature and Culture

In her article "Audience Response and from Film Adaptation to Reading Literature" Klaudia H.Y. Lee analyses results from 3000-plus interview conducted across university campuses in Hong Kong in order to investigate the roles of screen adaptations and their intertextual relationship for developing students' critical textual practice. Lee combines reader-response theory (Iser and Rosenblatt) with empirical data to explore students' actual encounters and experience with texts. While the data suggests an influence of screen adaptations on students' choice and motivation of reading, this interest can potentially be developed into a critical awareness of the various intertextual possibilities that exist in different …

Bearers Of Diverse Ecclesiologies: Imagining Catholic School Students As Informing A Broader Articulation Of Catholic School Aims, Graham P. Mcdonough

Journal of Catholic Education

The purpose of this paper is to provide a comprehensive, although not exhaustive, picture of the kinds of real concerns and concurrently inferred ecclesiological perspectives practicing Catholic students have. It reports findings from an interview study with 16 students at a private Catholic high school in Canada who self-identify as Catholic in order to demonstrate that it is in a Catholic school’s best interest not to rely on narrow or singular definitions of Catholic identity, especially insofar as these are tied to minimal and external markers of institutional affiliation. While the sample’s size and particularity do not generalizing to a …

For The Dreamers, Mariajose Gomez

First-Gen Voices: Creative and Critical Narratives on the First-Generation College Experience

"For the Dreamers" reflects the author's experience on a De Colores immersion trip to Casa de Migrantes in Mexico, Tijuana. This was Gomez's first time traveling out of the country, and the experience helped her realize that no human being should be considered “illegal” simply because of man-made barriers. The piece exposes the complex social dynamics that inform the experiences of both immigrants and citizens of the United States. The purpose of the poem is to challenge readers' views on immigration and highlight the role social constructs and stereotypes play in establishing preconceived ideas about immigrants. The author hopes readers …

Immersions In Global Equality And Social Justice: A Model Of Change, Kevin Guerrieri, Sandra Sgoutas-Emch

Engaging Pedagogies in Catholic Higher Education (EPiCHE)

In the work for global equality and social justice, how should “change” be understood? Who determines what must change or be changed? In the efforts to carry out social change, what is the academy’s relationship with the community, society at large, and the broader world? This article parts from these and other key questions and then proposes a model of change that can be used as a lens for examining any project, program, or organization with the aim of creating positive change that is meaningful, sustainable, and holistic. The article provides both an explanation of the underlying interdisciplinary theoretical framework …

The Spirituality Of Immersion: Solidarity, Compassion, Relationship, Michael E. Lovette-Colyer

Engaging Pedagogies in Catholic Higher Education (EPiCHE)

While the term spirituality can be problematic, obscuring as much as revealing, immersion experiences cannot be understood fully without exploring the contours of what can only be described as spirituality. To the extent that they work, immersions effect change when they speak to the deepest longings of the heart. While manifesting in many different ways, the spirituality of immersion revolves around three major components: solidarity, compassion, and relationship. The spirituality of immersion is a developed relationality, a desire to enter into richer, wider, more expansive relationships with others, which naturally leads into deeper relationship with God.

Reflections On Skipping Stones To Diving Deep: The Process Of Immersion As A Practice, Judith Liu Dr

Engaging Pedagogies in Catholic Higher Education (EPiCHE)

Reflecting upon over 30 years of teaching courses with a community service-learning and engagement component, this article is a personal piece that explores the author’s journey through voluntarism, community service-learning and civic engagement, and how that path has led to embracing immersion as a critical pedagogical practice for community engagement.

Engaged Pedagogy: Reflections From A Barriologist, Rigoberto Reyes

Engaging Pedagogies in Catholic Higher Education (EPiCHE)

This essay offers advice to University faculty and administrators on how best to implement the work of engaged pedagogy and community development work. The author is an established activist and community organizer for the past 40 years. His most important recommendation when doing the work of community engagement is to begin work that starts and benefits the community.

Beyond Behavior, Craig C. Laupheimer

Scholarship and Engagement in Education

Teaching to engage students with Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) can inspire the whole classroom and make teaching and learning engaging and exciting. Although teachers and students alike face a challenging educational landscape, much can be done to empower students with special needs. Teaching with the whole classroom in mind with an emphasis on hands on, explorative and inspirational learning experiences to accommodate for these students strengthens and causes student engagement and agency. This article highlights the challenges and potential breakthroughs possible for classroom instruction specifically where the ADHD student is concerned and looks towards teaching mindfulness and empowerment as …

Be Your Own Guru: Authoritarianism And The Problem Of The Guru In Conscious Evolution, Mcauley, Charles E.

Journal of Conscious Evolution

This paper is an exploration of the problematic nature of the guru/disciple relationship, specifically, in Western Society. It begins with a discussion of the nature of spirituality and the spiritual quest. To contextualize the process, I also discuss my own spiritual path based in Roman Catholicism, Taoism, Buddhism and my thoughts on the philosophy of Krishnamurti. I explore the topic of the authoritarian follower in some depth. Its connection is symbiotic to the existence of the authoritarian leader. This connection is demonstrated within this paper as well. Additionally, I look at the flaws in some well-known guru figures and how …

Front Matter

The Journal of the Assembly for Expanded Perspectives on Learning

No abstract provided.

Jaepl, Vol. 21, Winter 2015-2016, Joonna Smitherman Trapp, Brad Peters

The Journal of the Assembly for Expanded Perspectives on Learning

Essays

Fond Farewells: Judy Halden-Sullivan and Helen Walker

SPECIAL SECTION: RHETORIC AND ETHICS

John M. Duffy - Reconsidering Virtue

Lois Agnew - Why Rhetoric and Ethics? Revisiting History/Revising Pedagogy

Paula Mathieu - Being There: Mindfulness as Ethical Classroom Practice

Scott Wagar - Composition as a Spiritual Discipline

Erec Smith - Buddhism’s Pedagogical Contribution to Mindfulness

Peter H. Khost - “Alas, Not Yours to Have”: Problems with Audience in High-Stakes Writing Tests and the Promise of Felt Sense

TEACHING AND LEARNING

Sheri Rysdam & Lisa Johnson-Shull - Introducing Feedforward: Renaming and Reframing Our Repertoire for Written Response

Mark Noe - Autoethnography …

Why Rhetoric And Ethics? Revisiting History/Revising Pedagogy, Lois Agnew

The Journal of the Assembly for Expanded Perspectives on Learning

Coupling rhetoric and ethics has helped create a coherent undergraduate writing major in one of the nation’s first free-standing composition programs.

Composition As A Spiritual Discipline, Scott Wagar

The Journal of the Assembly for Expanded Perspectives on Learning

Analyzing a widely-read history of composition yields clear elements associated with the contemporary definition of spirituality.

Buddhism’S Pedagogical Contribution To Mindfulness, Erec S. Smith

The Journal of the Assembly for Expanded Perspectives on Learning

Considering the rhetorical elements in the Buddhist text “The True Aspect of All Phenomena” opens the possibility of teaching students a more mindful approach to writing.

“Alas, Not Yours To Have”: Problems With Audience In High-Stakes Writing Tests And The Promise Of Felt Sense, Peter H. Khost

The Journal of the Assembly for Expanded Perspectives on Learning

Expanding the applications of “felt sense” can help students become more aware of audience—a corrective to the a-rhetorical effects of standardized testing and the Common Core Standards.

Introducing Feedforward: Renaming And Reframing Our Repertoire For Written Response, Sheri Rysdam, Lisa Johnson-Shull

The Journal of the Assembly for Expanded Perspectives on Learning

Categorizing instructor comments on student drafts leads writing center researchers to argue for the need to reframe our professional discussion on instructor response, based on the concept of “feedforward.”

“When Do I Cross The Street?” Roberta’S Guilty Reflection, Irene A. Lietz

The Journal of the Assembly for Expanded Perspectives on Learning

Following a student’s evolving attitudes on race issues through her undergraduate years, a researcher concludes that a critical pedagogy can have long-term effects on student and instructor alike.

Autoethnography And Assimilation: Composing Border Stories, Mark Noe

The Journal of the Assembly for Expanded Perspectives on Learning

Introducing autoethnography in composition classes brings together personal narratives, academic discourse, and awareness of audience in surprising ways among students in south Texas.

Toward A Poetics And Pedagogy Of Sound: Students As Production Engineers In The Literature Classroom, Karen Lee Osborne

The Journal of the Assembly for Expanded Perspectives on Learning

Pairing students to be recorders and production editors of poetry readings results in a collaborative assignment that embodies students’ experience of reading through media.

My Mom’S Letter, Robert M. Randolph

The Journal of the Assembly for Expanded Perspectives on Learning

A longtime poet explains how a letter from his mother reminds him that regardless of our language skills and backgrounds, our writing can still bear witness to the values and ethics that guide our lives.

Book Reviews, Julie Nichols, Peter Fields, Walter L. Reid, Jeffrey H. Taylor, Warren Hatch

The Journal of the Assembly for Expanded Perspectives on Learning

Julie Nichols - Reading Ethically

Peter Fields - Gregory Marshall. Shaped by Stories: The Ethical Power of Narratives. Notre Dame, IN: U of Notre Dame P., 2009

Walter L. Reed - Gregory, Marshall. Teaching Excellence in Higher Education, ed. Melissa Valiska Gregory. NY: Palgrave Macmillan, 2013

Jeffrey H. Taylor - Musgrove, Laurence. Local Bird. Beaumont, TX: Lamar U Press, 2015

Warren Hatch - Lynch, Tom, Cheryll Glotfelty, Karla Armbruster. The Bioregional Imagination—Literature, Ecology, and Place. Athens, GA: U of GA Press, 2012

Connecting, Helen Walker, Sheryl Lain, Matthew B. Ittig, Laurence Musgrove, Julie O'Connell, Leslie A. Werden, Donna Souder-Hodge, Tanya R. Cochran, Rasha Diab, Thomas Ferrel, Beth Godbee

The Journal of the Assembly for Expanded Perspectives on Learning

Helen Walker - More Apt, Connected Title

Sheryl Lain - Hey, Teach! Do You Love Me?

Matthew B. Ittig - Ask Me Tomorrow

Laurence Musgrove - Writing Program

Julie O’Connell - The Power of a Slave Narrative

Leslie A. Werden - Embracing Chaos

Donna Souder-Hodge - Teaching Dachau

Tanya R. Cochran, Rasha Diab, Thomas Ferrel, & Beth Godbee - Hanging Out: Cultivating Life-Giving Writing Groups Online

Reconsidering Virtue, John M. Duffy

The Journal of the Assembly for Expanded Perspectives on Learning

Re-appropriating the Aristotelian concept of virtue in composition classes could become the means of transforming the polarized state of public discourse in America.

Being There: Mindfulness As Ethical Classroom Practice, Paula Mathieu

The Journal of the Assembly for Expanded Perspectives on Learning

Incorporating mindfulness practices in teacher training for writing programs is supported by disciplinary scholarship in composition, spiritual writing, and research in neuroscience.