Monthly Archives: December 2013

The Classroom Closet

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Teaching Tolerance posted an anonymous blog entry from a gay elementary school teacher:  The Classroom Closet .  He is responding to a district’s screening of the Teaching Tolerance movie Bullied.  (We do have a copy in the College of Education if you want to see it.)  The blog entry is a moving read with several personal stories in the comments from readers.  I highly recommend taking a look at this and following some of the “You might also like” links on their side menu, especially in light of our upcoming panel discussion event.

Do you have your calendars marked yet?  We’ll be posting more information soon, but the date is now set:  Tuesday, January 21, 2014 at 5 PM on the 4th floor of Furman Hall.  We are hosting this panel discussion in partnership with OSU’s Pride Center.  Our goal is to discuss gender and sexual identity issues in education from both a student and teacher perspective.  This is part of our professional development efforts, and we hope everyone leaves with some new resources/ideas for continued professional development.

Black Beavers

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A group of OSU students, narrated by Education Double Degree student Anderson DuBoise III, posted a video on YouTube this week:

It’s a response to another YouTube video by UCLA students who called themselves the Black Bruins: http://youtu.be/BEO3H5BOlFk. In both cases, the students are Black men talking about enrollment and retention of Black men at the university.

How serious is our university about diversity?  How can we respond to the issues these men are addressing and experiencing?

Education in Indian Country

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Education Week has a new multimedia presentation, including articles, commentary essays, photographs, and videos, about education from an American Indian perspective.   They focus particularly on the Oglala Lakota Sioux nation in South Dakota and the Morongo Band of Mission Indians in California.  As one of the articles states, “Between 2005 and 2011, American Indian and Alaska Native students were the only major ethnic group to demonstrate virtually no improvement on the 4th grade reading exam administered as part of the National Assessment of Educational Progress.”  Read about these tribes’ efforts and struggles to improve education: http://www.edweek.org/ew/projects/2013/native-american-education/.

Teaching Tolerance Staff Picks

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Have you made a winter break reading list yet?  Teaching Tolerance posted staff picks of recently published “culturally aware literature and resources” for teachers of all grades: http://www.tolerance.org/magazine/number-45-fall-2013/department/what-we-re-reading?elq=f48bbd2862a6452d8090bc04f35adb25&elqCampaignId=186.  Warning: This is a interesting list that may inspire to rush off to the library, Grass Roots Books, the Book Bin, or your other favorite source of new books.  Finish finals first.

Sundown Towns in Oregon

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Our own associate professor emerita Jean Moule, co-taught an honors course this fall with Natalia Fernández from Oregon Multicultural Archives.  Their focus was on researching Sundown Towns in Oregon.  They’ve now displayed some of their findings on the 5th floor of Valley Library and online at http://wpmu.library.oregonstate.edu/oregon-multicultural-archives/2013/11/30/sundown-towns-display-2013 and http://www.flickr.com/photos/osuarchives/sets/72157638268099734/.  Sundown towns excluded African Americans and/or racial minorities from living in them, creating purposefully ‘all-white’ towns.  Was Salem a Sundown Town?  What about Silverton?  Damascus?  Lake Oswego?  Check out their work.