Interview with Caroline J. Smith, George Washington University: Innovators in Education Series

A new collection of essays, Feminist Cyberspaces (Cambridge UP, 2012) addresses innovations in technology and how they can be used to expand access to education. In addition, the collection brings together new views / approaches to feminist theory in light of technological innovation.

1. What is your name, affiliation, and relation to education and/or e-learning?
Caroline J. Smith, Assistant Professor, The University Writing Program, The George Washington University

At GW, I teach a first-year composition course. In our program, instructors are encouraged to plan their courses around themes that interest them. I've taught courses about women's contemporary popular fiction, food writing, and even the television series Mad Men. Many of my courses focus on gender representations. And, I am a big advocate of online resources. We use blogs each semester as a place for students to practice their writing and read and respond to each other's work. I've also taught an online version of the course over the summer.

2. What was your role in Feminist Cyberspaces?
Sharon, Alvina, and I - along with another colleague, Carolyn Bitzer - presented on a panel together at the National Women's Studies Association. The panel focused on teaching, technology, and the Women's Studies classroom. There was such interest in it that we decided to edit an anthology. I served as one of the editors and co-wrote the conclusion for the anthology.

3. How does the body of work / the work you did with the collction complement your own research, teaching, and other activities?
As a graduate student, I taught for the Women's Studies program at the University of Delaware. Though I teach writing courses now, I feel they are very much influenced by the teaching that I did at Delaware and my scholarly interest in representations of women in contemporary popular fiction (I have a book about chick lit and another coming out about food memoirs). In each of my writing courses, we analyze, research, and write about texts often in relation to gender. I find feminist philosophies of pedagogy to inform the way I structure my courses and conduct myself in the classroom.

4. What are some of the key issues addressed in the collection?
I think an overall theme that I took away from the anthology was the idea of community. Each essay discusses really interesting approaches to using technology in the classroom, and while it may seem that technological advances could separate individuals (i.e. you might imagine each student typing away on her laptop from the comfort of her own home rather than engaging with each other in the physical classroom space), many of the essays explicitly or implicitly discussed how students still felt connected to one another. For me, this continuing theme was interesting to discover and speaks to just how important community is for feminism.

5. How do some of the core concepts of feminism and gender equity theory apply to technology?
Some of the essays in our anthology address the way in which technology can be an "equalizing" factor for women. For instance, Sharon's introduction talks about the way in which women are making their presence known in virtual worlds. Other essays, though, talk about the ways in which real life gender inequalities can manifest themselves online.

6. Where has the Internet fulfilled and failed to fulfill some of its early implicit promises?
This is a good question. I'm not sure I have the best answer, but I do think that - for those women with access to the Internet - that the Internet can offer some amazing opportunities for publishing to a wide audience. I'm working on a project now where food blogging is a component, and I find that many food bloggers started writing for themselves, publishing on the Internet, and realized how much their work resonated with others as they started getting more and more feedback. It's exciting to me that so many women have embraced blogging - many who might not have had a chance to be formally published.

7. What are some of your teaching, research, and other activity plans for the future?
This year, I've been on leave from teaching at George Washington. I had a baby last May, named Henry, so I had the fall off from teaching for family leave. This spring, I am on sabbatical, working on a project about contemporary women's food memoirs. When I return to teaching in the fall, I'll once again be teaching my course of Mad Men.

Wifi in ElderCare: A Must for Assisted Living / Nursing Homes / Senior Centers

With improved bandwidth and availability of high-speed wifi, advances in assistive technology, lower-cost hardware (laptops, handheld devices, touch-screen monitors, etc.) and new, easy-to-use web applications, the elderly have more access to a wide array of information and services, from email to lifelong learning.

There is no reason keep the elderly isolated and out of touch from their families, no matter how far away they might be. The initial investment can be quite modest, especially if a nursing home or assisted living center takes an approach similar to ones taken by hotel business centers. They have two or three workstations, each of which is equipped for their clientele's needs, which would include the right kind of software and hardware (detailed below).

Support staff could be available during certain times of the day. There would be a time limit for work on the workstations (20 minutes, perhaps). Although many of the elderly users would have their own computers, having a small computer center would help keep everything running smoothly, and would help with individuals with vision, hearing, or mobility issues. Having a support team would also be very helpful for those residents with cognitive challenges.

Benefits
*Connection to family
Everyone needs a support group, and, it goes without saying that people need people. However, the quality of the connection is often compromised in a nursing home or in assisted living where the connections between individuals are of necessity, or of commerce. Having a vital, daily connection to one's family can provide an emotional anchor for individuals who are going through a phase of life where they feel lonely, fragile, and cut off from caring alliances. Advancing into old age can be a frightening experience, and the elderly often feel the sting of prejudice and patronizing attitudes. They often appear to go into a downhill slide immediately after moving to assisted living. Is the slide real or not? Many times, what looks like a cognitive decline is, in reality, shame and fear.

*Cognitive stimulation
Not only do videos, audio, and images provide stimulation, the interaction brings another level of engagement. The major difference between retrieving information with a computer and watching it on television is the fact that computers are interactive. Numerous learning styles and strategies are accommodated through an array of computers, web applications, and information sources. Cognitive stimulation exercise for the elderly can yield very positive results.

*Connection to prior knowledge
The elderly are immensely valuable to our society, not only because of their knowledge, experience, and wisdom, but also because they show us our humanity. We have points of contact -- and often those points are through shared experiences, and also through prior knowledge. Having access to wifi and a solid computer with good web applications and reliable repositories of information can keep that prior knowledge alive through web searches, readings, and connections with friends and family. Individuals can connect prior knowledge to new experience and feel they are continuing to evolve and to grow.

*Connection to outside world
It's worth repeating. Perhaps the most immediately jolting experience for the individual who enters assisted living is the loss of a connection to the outside world. Television and radio are not true connections. If anything, television and radio reinforce the sense that the elderly individual has been marooned on a faraway planet that no one wants to visit, although people from the outside world are comfortable with transmitting sound or images to the faraway planet (!) Since radio and television do not offer the opportunity to communicate back to the source, it does not take long for the elderly residents in an assisted living center to wonder if they have become pariahs -- simply by virtue of age and diminishing physical abilities. Having an interactive connection is extremely valuable.

*Lifelong Learning / Continuing Education
Some of the most motivated learners are those who are living in assisted living or eldercare facilities. Taking courses provides connections to lived experience and prior knowledge, and stimulating the neural pathways helps individuals make connections, develop new problem-solving techniques, and to feel self-confidence. Sharing work with others, or continuing investigations into one's interests -- often memoirs, literature, history, comparative religion, science, or medicine -- develops self-esteem and a renewed sense of self-respect. Creative writing courses, and those dealing with stories (community, family, personal) are quite popular. It is also often a goal to complete a degree -- often a master's degree. At any rate, since the 1990s, the concept of "elderlearn" has been vital on college campuses. It's time to move it inside the walls of assisted living.

Essential Applications
*e-mail
*Facebook
*Flickr
*YouTube
*News feeds
*Search (google / bing / yahoo) on key words
*Online libraries / repositories of pertinent information

Essential Hardware
*Large monitor
*Touch-screen monitor
*Memory sufficient for graphics / video (RAM)
*High-capacity video card
*Desktop (rather than laptop)
*Microphone
*External speakers
*Webcam
*DVD player / recorder
*Touchscreen option
*Camera (detachable) for images / video
*Kindle reader (scalable text)
*iPad reader (scalable text)

Workstations for Visually / Hearing / Cognitively Impaired
*Hearing Impaired
Close-captioning
High-volume, high-quality speakers
Headphones

*Visually Impaired
Large print / scalable images
JAWS assistive technology (audio)
screen-readers (news / e-mail, etc.)

*Cognitively Impaired
Easy to navigate menus
Simple text, large text
Two or three dedicated applications, very easy to use

Connecting Real-Life Issues and Writing Courses: A Few Sample Topics for Essays and Research Papers

A great way to motivate students to conduct research and to write with true enthusiasm and passion is to let them select writing prompts that relate to everyday life and occurrences, and which give them an opportunity to express their point of view. Engaging students in issues they care about, and making sure that the topics are current and up-to-date helps writers avoid the problem of cliched responses, stale statistics, and a flat emotional appeal. Further, guiding students away from cliched, standard prompts may help eliminate copying and pasting and retrieving canned papers from repositories.

1. Human Encroachment and Animal Maulings (why are so many people mauled by bears, etc each year?)

A. Opening -- an illustrative example. Show an example. Follow with a thesis statement and overview.
B. What is going on? What is the problem? Describe it. (Use current examples, and cite sources. The examples should be real. If they are composites or hypothetical examples of what could have likely occurred, be sure to mention so.)
C. What is the extent of the problem? Provide statistics and examples. (use reliable sources, and try to obtain the original statistics, not a watered down version from an excerpt or press release)
D. What are possible explanations? Provide two sides of the story. What do you think?
E. What can be done? Describe possible solutions. What are some communities doing? Do you agree? What would you do?
F. Conclusion (more than a summary) -- Restate what you believe to be the most urgent aspects of the situation, and the most pressing moral or ethical dilemmas. Discuss what you think would be the best approach.

Brown Bears in Kamchatka

2. When Pets Become Predators: What Happens when "cute" and "exotic" pets are released into the "wild" (aka the neighborhood) by their overwhelmed owners?

A. The Nightmare Scenario -- worst case situation (!) Opening -- an illustrative example. Show an example. Follow with a thesis statement and overview.
B. What is going on? What is the problem? Describe it. (Use current examples, and cite sources. The examples should be real. If they are composites or hypothetical examples of what could have likely occurred, be sure to mention so.)
C. What is the extent of the problem? Provide statistics and examples. (use reliable sources, and try to obtain the original statistics, not a watered down version from an excerpt or press release)
D. What are possible explanations? Provide two sides of the story.
E. Common responses and solutions: what are communities doing? Do you agree? why or why not?
F. Ethical Dilemmas: What are some of the issues?
G. The Ethics of the "Easy Answer" -- is the easiest, most expedient solution the most ethical one? Why or why not?
H. What might happen in the future?
I. Conclusion (more than a summary) -- Restate what you believe to be the most urgent aspects of the situation, and the most pressing moral or ethical dilemmas. Discuss what you think would be the best approach.

Pet Boa That Swallowed the Family Cat

3. The New Homelessness in America: Mortgage Crisis Consequences on Families

A. The Faces Behind the Statistics -- Did you know...? Opening -- an illustrative example. Show an example. Follow with a thesis statement and overview.
B. What is going on? What is the problem? Describe it. (Use current examples, and cite sources. The examples should be real. If they are composites or hypothetical examples of what could have likely occurred, be sure to mention so.)
C. What is the extent of the problem? Provide statistics and examples. (use reliable sources, and try to obtain the original statistics, not a watered down version from an excerpt or press release)
D. What are possible explanations? Provide two sides of the story.
E. Common responses and solutions: what are communities doing? Do you agree? why or why not?
F. Ethical Dilemmas: What are some of the issues?
G. The Ethics of the "Easy Answer" -- is the easiest, most expedient solution the most ethical one? Why or why not?
H. What might happen in the future?
I. Conclusion (more than a summary) -- Restate what you believe to be the most urgent aspects of the situation, and the most pressing moral or ethical dilemmas. Discuss what you think would be the best approach.

The New Homeless: The Mortgage Crisis and It Human Impact

4. New Homelessness in America: The Pet Face of the Crisis (Princess Chunk, etc.)

A. "Left Behind" -- and it's not a very nice place to be... if you're a cat, dog, ferret, or iguana...
Opening -- an illustrative example. Show an example. Follow with a thesis statement and overview.
B. What is going on? What is the problem? Describe it. (Use current examples, and cite sources. The examples should be real. If they are composites or hypothetical examples of what could have likely occurred, be sure to mention so.)
C. What is the extent of the problem? Provide statistics and examples. (use reliable sources, and try to obtain the original statistics, not a watered down version from an excerpt or press release) .
D. What are possible explanations? Provide two sides of the story.
E. Common responses and solutions: what are communities doing? Do you agree? why or why not?
F. Ethical Dilemmas: What are some of the issues?
G. The Ethics of the "Easy Answer" -- is the easiest, most expedient solution the most ethical one? Why or why not?
H. What might happen in the future?
I. Conclusion (more than a summary) -- Restate what you believe to be the most urgent aspects of the situation, and the most pressing moral or ethical dilemmas. Discuss what you think would be the best approach.

Princess Chunk