Pauline Sameshima | College of Education | Washington State University

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Spring in their steps

May 1, 2009 Washington State University

Woo-hoo, something to celebrate

Sunshine, lively songs, dancing, laughter and the promise of some fantastic teaching careers ahead. All were part of the 2009 spring arts celebration presented by Pauline Sameshima’s arts integration class. Every year, the creative energy of this class brightens up the patio in Pullman, leaving some of us to wish it could happen every week. For many more photos and a taste of the clever lyrics set to tunes ranging from “Hokey Pokey” to “YMCA,” click here. Among the lyrics, to the tune of “Wishin’ and Hopin'”: Show ’em that you care just for them. Do the things they like to do. Wear your smile just for them…

Golden grads

The College of Education hosted lunch and a tour for 45 of the 270 alumni and spouses from ’49 and ’59 who visited the Pullman campus for the annual Golden and Diamond Graduates Reunion. One memory told and retold was of “the coldest football game ever,” notable for having one paying customer and a lot of frosty student fans. The colorful written memories offered for an alumni booklet included this one from Judith Bount (now Sanders): “We took Homecoming floats seriously. It never occurred to us to not build one, even with almost all the girls in the house down with the Asian flu. Barbara Doutrich and I found ourselves the only people in a barn, way out of town, stuffing purple napkins into the chicken-wire castle on our float the night before the parade. … Frantic stuffing until the last minute, until a student came and hooked up his purple car, to match the castle, to pull the float to the stadium and along the parade route. The car and castle looked pretty darned good, we thought, as we pulled in behind and headed down the highway. The driver took off like a rocket. We were driving in a blizzard of purple napkins, with no way to catch him to slow him down. When we arrived at the stadium, the float was the skeleton of a castle, with a handful of pathetic purple napkins hanging on it. As the float was pulled through the stadium, Barbara and I ran along behind with some napkins in a box stuffing them into the chicken wire as fast as we could.”

Our expert on veterans’ issues

With the new GI Bill’s generous benefits to begin this August, thousands of additional vets are expected to be enrolling in higher education. But fully 30 percent of them are struggling with depression, post-traumatic stress syndrome and/or traumatic brain injury. How can universities help them succeed? Bernadette Mencke, WSU retention counselor and a Ph.D. student in higher education, shares some practical tips in the May issue of the Student Affairs Today newsletter. Among other things, she and her co-author Robert Mock advise: Identify at least one veteran in each campus department, such as financial affairs and counseling; share the list with vets, who will feel more comfortable seeking help from other vets. Hire a veterans affairs government liaison. Have properly trained counselors. And assign vets to the first floors of residence halls near an exit. (When vets enter a room, they’re trained to immediately identify quick exits and potential weapons, so may get anxious if they don’t see a quick way out.)

Most clever workshop promotion

“Wine Tasting as a Metaphor for Responding to Student Writing.” It’ll be held on Friday, May 8 from 2-4 PM at the 12th floor lounge of Webster Hall, Pullman. RSVP to Sharolon Carter at sharolon@wsu.edu.

Reading matter
No Child’ Law Is Not Closing a Racial Gap Between 2004 and last year, scores for young minority students increased on a federal test, but so did those of white students.
Obama’s Long Education To-Do List Awaits Action

Book news & more

March 20, 2009 Washington State University

All in the family: There was celebrating at the home of Vancouver professors Gisela Ernst-Slavit and David Slavit when copies of their latest books arrived three days apart.

David’s book, co-edited with Associate Professor Tamara Nelson and Anne Kennedy, is Perspectives on Supported Collaborative Teacher Inquiry. Gisela’s book, regarding the daunting task of teaching English language learners, is Paper to Practice: Using the TESOL ELP Standards in PreK-12. Her co-authors are Anne Katz of San Francisco and Margo Gottlieb of Chicago.

Meanwhile, in Pullman, Clinical Assistant Professor Kimberly Robertello is awaiting a copy of her new book, Evidence-Based Practices in Alcohol Treatment: The Robertello Evaluative Tool for Assessment and Evaluation. It’s based on Kimberly’s dissertation research, which grew out of her concern about revolving-door nature of many substance abuse programs.

Sharing expertise: Professor Linda Mabry of Vancouver is a keynote speaker at this week’s educational technology learning institute, “TechPraxis 2009,” at the Massachusetts College of Liberal Arts. Read about it here.

Art report: Three examples of light photography by Assistant Professor Pauline Sameshima are on display as part of the “Reinterpreting Reality” exhibition under way at various venues in the Palouse region. Pauline’s works can be seen at the Market Square Building, 107 S. Grand Ave., in Pullman. They include Reaching Out, shown here. Says the artist: “These photos are part of Ann-other’s Dreams, a book of poems by the same name. The poems and art look at a woman’s search for the space between being Ann and Ann-other. Her stories of love, no matter how real, always weave themselves into dreams where she is seeing in from the outside; being in, and yet watching the dream.”

Web update: Click here to see the School & Community Collaboration Center’s impressive list of partners and projects.

Reading matter:
Where Education and Assimilation Collide. A record influx of immigrants has put classrooms on the front lines of America’s battles over whether and how to assimilate the newcomers and their children.
Reinventing Professional Development in Tough Times. Many experts don’t see the current financial crunch in schools as necessarily being all bad when it comes to teacher professional development.
Title I Turnaround Programs Due for Big Cash Boost. In the seven years since enactment of No Child Left Behind Act, the number of academically troubled schools identified for turnarounds has grown steadily. The federal money for the work of turning around them hadn’t—until now.