Cheers to Year One!

One year of my Ph.D. is now under my belt! I'm glad to see it gone, but I had a lot of really great opportunities and milestones in the year for which I am so thankful. Here is a look back over the past semester and a glance at what is to come this summer and next school year.

Spring

My teaching was a big focus of my school year. In my everyday plans I have found that I spend about two weeks focusing hard core on teaching- lesson planning, research, grading, etc. while keeping up with my course work. Then, I have to switch and spend the next two weeks or so with intense focus on my course work- reading, researching, writing, etc. while keeping up with my teaching responsibilities.

If you ever wanted to see more of my work inside of the classroom, then the VITA videos that I have mentioned in the last two blogs are a great way to do so! I will post the links to all three videos here, as well as a final project that served as the culmination for a lot of the work I discussed in the second video.

VITA Video One
VITA Video Two
VITA Video Three

Multimodal Assessment Culmination Report 

This pedagogical work paired well with my own scholarly research as I looked at course design through the lenses of composition theory and professional and technical writing theory in two of my classes. In my third course, I wrote a seminar paper focused on social justice issues in my hometown of Madison, WI and constructed an argument for the power of memoir writing by black women to help combat some of the racist and sexist ideologies that are present in the city. I am excited to see the future of this work because I believe it could have a positive impact in a place that I hold very dear.

My second semester started with conference activity at SWPACA and SWES (as discussed in my last post) and ended with a trip to Menomonie, WI for the annual Computers & Writing Conference. This was my first time attending C&W and I found it to be an extremely friendly, helpful, and informative conference. It was an exciting opportunity to gather with these scholars who are passionate about the future of technology in the field of rhetoric and composition.

I presented on an ongoing project at the Graduate Research Network (my abstract found on page 5). The feedback and suggestions were so helpful, as was the afternoon session of the network focused on job preparation, interviewing, and negotiation. The conversations in both parts of the network were so informative and will have an impact on my future decisions. This conference in (chilly) Wisconsin was a great way to wrap up my first year and second semester.

Summer

This summer I will be teaching for the Institute of Reading Development. I will teach two five week sessions with ten reading classes in each session. I will teach ages four through adults in these classes. I am really looking forward to engaging with some of the middle school through adult students specifically as we will be reading some really fascinating literature and nonfiction (my speciality). If you want to know more about the institute or the specific programs I will teaching, check out my CV for the full list, or the site for more information.

This summer I will also, of course, be working on my own projects for submission to journals, edited collections, and as the portfolio paper component of my degree requirements. I hope to have completed these papers by the time the new semester starts... if I don't melt in the desert heat first. If only someone would have told me that it is hot here before I moved ;)

Fall

I think that one of the highlights of the fall 2015 semester will be attending and presenting at the Feminisms and Rhetorics conference held at ASU! The preliminary schedule is stacked full of amazing speakers in the field talking about really important issues. Just based on what I have read and heard so far, I think this conference may be my favorite conference of the year.

I am also very excited about the teaching opportunities that I have in the fall. I am scheduled to teach ENG 217: Writing Reflective Essays and ENG 301: Writing for the Professions, as well as the possibility of some community college work. I am looking forward to every teaching class but specifically to ENG 217, as I hope to base dissertation work on the texts and activities that my students produce and participate in in the class. The flyers for these two classes are linked here:

ENG 217
ENG 301

Looking forward even further to spring 2016, my co-chair, Abigail Oakley, and I are already planning and brainstorming and cementing details for SWES 2016. Excited to have scholars converge in Tempe for Fem/Rhet and SWES next year!

Here's to what the summer and year two of my Ph.D. will bring!