education – Page 2 – The Trailer Park MFA

Repetition Is the Mother of Knowledge

A Russian proverb for the day. Straight from me to you. We seem to live in a redundancy-phobic age. Everything is about upgrades, innovation, the next season. The day after Christmas, furry pink hearts and boxes of children’s Valentines packed shelves at my local drugstore. “Yeah,” a cashier told me. “We already have Easter inContinue reading “Repetition Is the Mother of Knowledge”

Toastmasters Speech #3: The Challenges and Rewards of Teaching ESL

ESL stands for English as a Second Language, an academic discipline that aims to prepare students for a lifetime of effective communication in English. The field also goes by EFL (English as a Foreign Language), ELL (English Language Learning), and a whole barrage of other acronyms. It’s a large field with crucial importance. As ofContinue reading “Toastmasters Speech #3: The Challenges and Rewards of Teaching ESL”

Why I Love Grad School, or Please Talk Career Options with Your Daughters

When I was 22, my undergraduate professors started to ask where I’d be going next. Everyone assumed it would be grad school. My art history professor, a supportive, wry-humored expert in Mexican art named Deborah Caplow, especially believed I would make a career for myself in art criticism and teaching. My future, cast in theirContinue reading “Why I Love Grad School, or Please Talk Career Options with Your Daughters”

Listening as Discovery

On any given day, the writing center where I work exudes a cacophony of smells: there is curry–both African and Indian, the honey-musk of perfume, chalky talcum, roasted coffee, rain-steeped leather, and–on occasion–the rank sweat, aged and thick, of students who have not yet learned to wear deodorant in the U.S. To imagine I knowContinue reading “Listening as Discovery”

Why American Students Lag Behind

Every so many months, another article gets trotted out in the news. American students have fallen further behind their peers in China, Norway, Sweden, Korea, Japan, Singapore, the U.K, and elsewhere. The common analysis is that our teachers are overburdened and poorly trained, and our math and science curricula fall short. But it’s taboo to talk aboutContinue reading “Why American Students Lag Behind”

A Prayer for a Friend

I met her when I was 19 years old. I’d been recommended for a job at the campus writing center, and she was the first staff member to greet me. It took me a minute to absorb this. Jana has cerebral palsy and relies on a wheelchair to get around. I was blinded by theContinue reading “A Prayer for a Friend”

Standard of Living

I hear a lot of talk these days about our standard of living. Everyone has something to say about it. Parents worry about their children coming out of college. Will they get a job? What sort of standard of living will this generation experience, entering the workforce already deeply in debt? Cosmopolitans worry that theContinue reading “Standard of Living”

Generosity and Optimism

MFAs cost a lot of money. Upwards of $30,000. But a cookie at my local bakery? Not so much. Every Tuesday and Friday, in a small corner cafe, writers come from around Seattle to write alongside Robert J. Ray and Jack Remick. For two hours, we talk shop and creative process and life. And thenContinue reading “Generosity and Optimism”