Thoughts on the Biography Process

I'm not sure if this applies to anyone else, but another way that I was struck by this biography and by the biography Mina helped to write, is learning the methodology used in producing such a work.  I always found the prospect of writing a biography to be interesting, but must admit, have never once considered the process.  After reading Mina's experience with Foddick (via Maher) I was a bit surprised with the amount of work was needed.   And then after meeting Maher and learning what she did in order to create this one I am just astonished. It clearly makes sense now though.  One way that Maher put it in an essay she wrote about writing Mina's biography, is that you have to write the life of someone.   How do you get that right? How do you pack decades' worth of experiences, growth, emotion, accomplishments and lives that were touched by a single individual?  I imagine the incredible anxiety in the hopes of ensuring the details are true and that the story is really as it was and not simply the author's interpretation of the events.  We all have our own experiences and perspectives and unconsciously reflect those onto everything we do.  I wonder what it must be like to be constantly metacognitively removing yourself  from the text as well as yourself from current social norms.  Maher explains,

"It is at times like these when a biographer begins to feel the burden, the responsibility of the task. There I sat with Mina's papers in my lap. Mina' s brother had entrusted them to me-I was about to try to tell a life. Imagine trying to get someone else's life right. Many months later, I would mention this to Adrienne Rich, who had been hired by Mina in the late 1960s to teach basic writing at City College. 'Of course you can't get it right,' she told me, 'but you can get it righter.'" (Maher 54)


Maher, Jane.  "Writing the Life of Mina P. Shaughnessy."  Writing Across the Curriculum Clearinghouse.  wac.colostate.edu Web. 20 Dec. 2014   http://wac.colostate.edu/jbw/v16n1/maher.pdf

Additional Resonating Quotes

"Mina's ability to concentrate was amazing.  At about this time, people began to realize her importance; her reputation in the field was growing. Many people wanted to meet with her, to be with her, to be seen with her.  They wanted a piece of her, but Mina did not let anything get in the way of her work.  ...She moved very quickly from one thing to another; she was very good at that.  She did not talk very much about what she was doing...she just did it." (137)

"Everybody says this, I know, but Mina Shaughnessy changed my life.  She was one of the most charismatic people I have ever met, and her interest in the students was so far above the politics swirling around her. Her motives were genuine; that's what set her apart." (99)

The influence that Mina had on other people's lives is so inspirational to me. As a woman and as an educator.  As a woman because there is a certain strength females must possess in order to be able to achieve great and impactful things like she did.  Maybe less today than in the 1960s and 1970s, it still rings true that woman are expected by many in our society to adhere to a more passive role of caretaker or support of some kind.  When women begin to succeed, which may also demand respect or attention, they are usually regarded as masculine or as "bitches," such as in the case with Hillary Clinton or certain female CEOs.  Additionally, women have a great deal to consider when pursuing a demanding career, such as having a family.  As an educator, she inspires me because the same care that she had for her students is the way I feel about mine.  I sincerely want the best for them all.

Link to Presentation Slides

Here is a link to the presentation slides via Google Slide.

Presentation of Mina P. Shaughnessy: Her Life and Work

The Reality of Diving In

In her work, Jane Maher outlines the four stages of a teachers development in Mina Shaughnessy's Diving In:

1. Guarding the Tower

2. Converting the Natives

3. Sounding the Depths

4. Diving In

I read Diving In for the first time about a year ago. While I certainly enjoyed the piece and could recognize the gravity of her words, it wasn't until I reread it when the gravity actually sunk in with me.  As a tutor in the Writing Center and an instructor of writing at City College, I too, have experienced the very stages she outlines in her essay.  It's amazing (or scary) how accurate her depiction of each stage. 

Admittedly, when I began at the writing center, I was rather taken aback by the quality of writing.  I had come from a very different institution, so I suppose my expectations were higher than they ought to be.  I was, in essence, guarding the tower.  Still, I can remember vividly one student in particular who truly pushed me to dive in.  She was a Russian student struggling with article usage.  In her native language, there are no articles, so naturally this was a great difficulty.  I could see, however, that she was a diligent student who could "catch up" with my help.  Here, I was attempting to convert the natives.  From here, I tried to simplify the rule of article usage to something as simple as: whenever you have a noun, you need an article.  As our sessions continued over the semester, we reached a roadblock: uncountable nouns.  I had completely ignored such an obvious obstacle.  I realized that perhaps article usage was only simple to me because, as a native, I inherently understood how to use them.  Now, I was sounding the depths.  I began to closely study the intricacies of the English language on to realize that there is really no logical to it.  I now understand the difficulty of learning it.  So, I had but one choice: to dive in.  If I truly wanted to help her to succeed I had to dive in as an educator to remediate myself and become a better instructor. 

Resonating Quotes

        "Unless we revolutionize our colleges, where we are producing only a few people who master the skills and do all the analytical work of the society, we are betraying the students. The task of a writing teacher in a basic course is to prepare students to write close, organized, reasoned prose and to encourage students to make judgments and to work with larger and larger collections of date. I would consider this a bit like some of the basic skills you need in a society, driving a car, knowing how to penetrate the rhetoric of politicians.
       It's hard for me to imagine anyone entering into any job or particular civic responsibility where they don't have a chance to control things of being controlled by them.  The people who are so ready to dismiss the need for this skill are generally the people who have already acquired it to a great degree themselves and are using it to make an argument against it" (216).

Mina has such a wonderful way with words.  There's such a constitutional ring to her statements, without being overly political and obtuse, which would alienate her audience.  She knows how to balance the line well.  While I believe in her message, I have difficulty envisioning it coming to true fruition.  I'm reminded of the video Discounted Dreams, where the Dean of a community college explains the "churn" method of education.  In short, so long as there is an equal or higher number of students entering the doors as there are leaving, then the institution is happy.  The school really does not care for the progress of their students, which is quite upsetting.  Still, we need more people like Mina to believe in an ideal world and strive to make the one we're in a little bit better.

Tangents and Readjusting Focus on My Research

I’m a bit embarrassed to say how much time I’ve spent on my research so far, but it’s certainly been more than a full workday. And it seems that even as I make progress, there are more questions that need answering. Karen is right, all the information within Jane Maher’s biography could easily spread over the course of a semester.

I think time management is where I’ve really honed my skills. On principle, I can’t do mediocre work without feeling guilt and disappointment. Take this for example: for me, most of last week was spent exploring the 1960’s and the important political (both national and international) figures, movements, and catastrophes. It wasn't enough to just get some dates and statistics and move on. Eventually my decision came down to only using the essential facts required to give a background on the political tension that led to the City College takeover and eventually the implementation of the Open Admissions policy. Still, I found myself getting carried away, reading newspaper archives, searching for protest photos of various movements, and even watching a presidential address by President Nixon. In fact, I listened to Creedence Clearwater Revival! I said this to Karen last week but it’s worth reiterating, I'm immersed in the period and find myself being ripped apart from the tragedies and consequences of the Vietnam War while also being inspired by the energy of the Black, Latino, and Women's movements.

However, I see the importance of letting certain things go in my research. I'm back to focusing  on Open Admissions with relation to Mina Shaughnessy and I can say, pretty confidently, that her innovation in the field of Basic Writing is directly correlated to Open Admissions. And this is part of what I will spend the next couple of days focusing on in my part of the presentation

The lingering difficulty of Errors and Expectations

         Nearly 40 years after its release, Errors and Expectations still rings true today.  Instructors like myself struggle addressing, recognizing, and categorizing student errors.  It's quite tempting to simply mark up a student's essay in red ink, circling all the errors; however, this exercise it rather useless to both student and teacher.  For the teacher, it is a lot of work; for the student, it is overwhelming and discouraging.  In the writing center, when working on a student one on one, we typically locate two common errors in their writing, as per Mina's suggestion, and focus on those.  This makes for a much more successful session as the student can absorb the limited information and the teacher can focus closely on only two concepts.  This is, as Mina notes, diving in.

Some worthwhile historical NYT documents

Hi all,

During my research on the Open Admissions policy, I came across Mina Shaughnessy's obituary and profile in the historical edition of the New York Times. The profile on her is especially noteworthy since before this piece City College had received a lot of negative press in the media.

Sok