Response to Alumni Reception with Jane Maher

I write in response to Jane Maher's speech at the alumni reception.  In her brief, yet captivating speech she said something along the lines of how she is amazed by how scholars and educators today still continue to bring down her name and her association with Open Admissions.  I guess I hadn't thought of that view.  Sometimes, we read articles and books in this program, and don't pay too much attention to the author.  However, with Mina, it's as though she can't escape her inevitable connection to Open Admission, despite it not being of her own design.  As Jane spoke, I could sense how bothered she was by the fact that people keep attempting to tarnish her image and legacy nearly forty years after her passing.  Mina was a revolutionary.  Sure, she didn't have it perfect, but she sought to fix the imperfect nature of the broken system.  Too often do we look at the negative, when we ought to look at the other side.

Third Book Group Meeting, Nov. 25, 2014

The four parts of our presentation are taking shape. They are:

1)      Mina Shaughnessy, her character, a woman of contrasts (Karen)

2)      Mina Shaughnessy and the Open Admissions Movement at CCNY (Sok)

3)     Mina Shaughnessy’s legacy for teachers (Nick)

4)      Mina Shaughnessy author interview, photographs, possibly audio (Maria)

Each presentation should be 8 to 10 minutes long, to be followed by questions. We are also asked to prepare a two-page flyer to hand out to classmates.

We should meet at least once before our presentation, which is now on our last class day, December 16. We said we would decide at our next class, December 2. It looked like Karen, Nick, and Maria had time to meet on Thursday December 4 mid-day. Can we all have a first draft of our presentation to make to each other on that day?

Jane Maher is having trouble finding the audiotape of the Mina Shaughnessy interview. She wrote this morning to say she may have given it to her son-in-law to make a copy. She’ll ask him on Thanksgiving. 

Open Admissions and the City College Takeover of 1969

As the day of our book club’s presentation nears, I find myself digging further into CCNY’s history. I’m interested in the history and effect of the Open Admissions policy at our school, as well as the takeover that led to this result. I’m finding a number of sources through JSTOR articles. One that stands out is a two-part series retrospective of Open Admissions at CCNY by former City president, Robert E. Marshak, who was appointed in 1970, shortly after the policy was put in place. After last week’s Highland College simulation of a stakeholder’s symposium, I’m curious to see what Marshak’s view was as a professor-turned-administrator who stepped into the college at a time fraught with political tension and significant structural changes.

Continuing on the path of finding perspectives by people who were physically there during this pivotal time, I found an article at Hunter College’s Centro, the Center for Puerto Rican studies (which publishes a journal by the same name) with interviews of five (Puerto Rican) participants of the City College takeover.

I’m also interested in examining how the political climate played in part in the lead up to the City College takeover. (Keep in mind that this is in the midst of the Vietnam War, and one month before the takeover, the “secret war” of bombing Cambodia had begun).

And of course, I intend to do further research (outside of the Jane Maher book) about how and where Mina Shaughnessy fits in all of this.

 

Photos from Jane Maher Interview

Hi everyone,

Here are some photos I took the day we interviewed Jane Maher.  She provided us with Mina's first and raw draft of Errors and Expectations that she kept in a binder.  You'll see the typed papers have her notes handwritten on them.  Further, there are photos of some the students' blue books which Mina studied to create her book.  You'll also see the actual spiral notepad her mother Ruby used to keep notes about the ranch in.  Hope you enjoy and hopefully we can use some of them for our presentation!

-Maria


Photos from Jane Maher Interview

Mina Shaugnessy: The Legacy vs. The Individual

It would be understandable to expect in a blog for our book club about Mina Shaughnessy that posts would include new realizations about her life and work. However, going over the end portion of Jane Maher’s biography of MS alongside a transcript of a recent interview by my fellow classmates (Bravo!) with Jane Maher, I’m finding MS to be  an even more elusive figure.

I’m having a hard time reconciling the difficulties of her personal life with her tireless, brilliant efforts in establishing the field of Basic Writing and the scholarship along with it. After uncovering more about the personal side of MS, even Professor Maher mentions how she struggled “with what [she] was going to do with that information.”

It’s hard to imagine that a person who was so productive, refined, charming, aesthetically-pleasing, and inspiring, who easily connected to students and faculty alike, to have what Jane Maher refers to as a “disaster” of a personal life. But I think it is this paradox that makes her so intriguing and remarkable to me. When I think of her last weeks of life, the amount of visitors and attention she received, the requests she received for speaking engagements, down to her memorial where each speech lasted almost twenty minutes long, I find myself trying to locate someone I know who could invoke such a memory or presence. And I struggle to find anyone who could fit the bill.

This reminds me of a comment that Professor Gleason made early on in the semester. I don’t remember the exact wording but it was something to the effect of the danger of Mina Shaughnessy’s legacy overshadowing who she actually is and the work she did. In my effort to learn more about this major figure who spearheaded the Language and Literacy program, I hope not to let my understanding of her be swayed by people who remember her more as an idea than a person with flaws alongside her success, those “flaws” being what made her so vulnerable and most importantly, so human.  

Second Meeting on Book Presentation, Nov. 4, 2014

During our second meeting, we shared our responses to Mina Shaughnessy: Her Life and Work now that we have read more of it. We determined that each of us would focus on what we are most passionate about in the book and try to weave that into our class presentation.

Karen is most struck with the enigma of Shaughnessy--from the West, but very cosmopolitan; a scholar but also a fashionista; loved and hated by people in equal measure, etc.. That may be a way to present the biographical information of her life.

Nick is considering using the address she gave to the Modern Language Association conference in 1975, "Diving In," as a jumping off point to address her approach to teaching basic writers. He may be able to address its usefulness to him as a teacher and to other teachers.

Shaughnessy's role in the open admissions movement at City College will be another huge part of our presentation. Both Maria and Sok are interested in this part of the story. We are working on ways to divide the topic.

We may also address strengths and weaknesses of the book, or what it is and what it isn't.

We may also create a power point or prezi to tie our presentations together.

Original Outline for Book Presentation, Sept. 17, 2014

During our preliminary conversation, we agreed that the goal of our project should be to give life to  the legend of Mina Shaughnessy. Each of us is finding a personal connection to her story and her  work that we can build upon in doing that. Our project may take this four-part form:      • Introduction – Summary of Shaughnessy’s life and times, including the Open Admissions         movement and the creation of the new discipline called Basic Writing      • Interview – Possibly videotaped. We will pursue an interview with Jane Maher         and/or other people who knew and remember Shaughnessy      • Teacher’s Perspective – Nick and Maria may discuss how Shaughnessy’s Errors and         Expectations informs how they work with students      • Legacy – Mention Journal of Basic Writing, the MLA Mina P. Shaughnessy Prize, the         Mina Shaughnessy Speakers Series, CUNY Language and Literacy MA. Also, what has         become of the Basic Writing discipline? Has it shaped or even transformed all college (writing) education as Shaughnessy hoped it would? What do critics of her approach say? Next steps: We will all finish reading Mina Shaughnessy: Her Life and Work, Errors and Expectations, and other documentation of Shaughnessy’s life. We will pursue interview/s with Maher and/or others. As we collect information and learn where our interests lie, we will sort out who does what. We will use our group blog to share thoughts and ideas as we progress (http://minashaughnessybasicwritingbookgroup.blogspot.com/).

Resonating Quotes

• "Mina did do her best: she devoted all of her formidable intelligence, experience, discipline, and energy to the SEEK students through her teaching, through her administration, in her writing, and in her presentations - and she did so despite great resistance to her work, resistance that often took the form of personal attacks." (90)

• "Mina and other SEEK instructors were accused of being incompetent; their credentials questioned; they were made to feel unwanted.  City College was no place to teach fundamentals of writing, many of the tenured professors claimed. 'Is this what I'm being paid to do?' asked Geoffrey Wagner, one of the staunchest (and most vocal) opponents to Open Admissions.  ...he exclaimed: 'You've brought the slums to my office.'  Mina often found threatening and insulting notes in her mailbox or scrawled on her office door, [or] pornographic photos...with the word 'whore' printed across them." (94)

These quotes remind me of Professor Gleason's point/warning made in class that those entering and working in the field of basic writing would receive less respect than professors that teach something of more prestige like history, language, or mathematics.  Our student base will be seen as a hassle, a weight bringing the institution down, a liability.  Mina charged through the opposition to reach the greater purpose of helping the disadvantaged succeed.  There is still opposition in having to have to "clean up other's messes".  Perhaps a part of the American identity of individualism?