College of Education

Eastern Michigan University

Issue No: 104
September 20, 1993

RELIGIOUS HOLIDAYS

Please make appropriate accommodation for those observing religious holidays.  Yom Kippur is September 25. 

FACULTY NOTES

Valerie Polakow's Lives on the Edge was reviewed in the September 1993 Women's Review of Books.  The reviewer described it as "one of the most remarkable books I've read in years."  This review triggered an invitation for Polakow to address the Congressional Caucus on Welfare Reform in Washington next month.

Lives on the Edge has also been reviewed by Publisher's Weekly, Booklist, Kirkus Reviews, Library Journal, Education Week, New Republic, and the Chicago Tribune.  A review in the New York Times is scheduled for this fall. 

Sandra McClennon is scheduled to provide a workshop on "Facilitated Communication" at the fall conference of the Autism Society of Michigan, to be held in Kalamazoo.

Chunsheng Zhang has been appointed to the Provisional Part-Time Graduate Faculty. 

Beverley Geltner is the chair of the NCA accreditation study for Lahser High School in Bloomfield Hills. 

Geltner has had two proposals accepted for the 1993 University Council for Educational Administration conference in Houston: "Collaborative Action Research: A Critical Component in the Preparation of Effective Leaders and Learners" and "Integrating Formative Portfolio Assessment, Reflective Practice and Cognitive Coaching into an Administrator Preparation Program."

Geltner's proposal "Shaping Global Citizens for a High Tech World: An Interdisciplinary Approach" has been accepted by the American Association of School Administrators for the 1994 conference in San Francisco.  Geltner will be presenting with Ceil Jensen, a teacher at Rochester Adams High School.

The International Journal of Educational Reform invited Geltner to submit the article "Education Reform, Tax Reform, School Finance Reform: Juggling the Reinvention of Michigan's Schools," which has just been completed.

Geltner's proposal for the fall MI Association of Secondary School Principals conference, "Developing a Rights and Responsibilities Handbook for a District (Discipline, Harassment, Complaint Process)" has been accepted.

Geltner has been appointed to the state advisory board of the Michigan Accreditation Program.

Roger Williams' proposal on "Controlling Performance Anxiety" has been accepted for presentation at the November meeting of the MI Association for Health, Physical Education, Recreation, and Dance in Traverse City.

Rosella Bannister recently participated in the National Advisory Panel for the Chemical Manufacturing Association in Washington, D.C.  She also attended meetings with Department of Labor and Department of Education personnel. 

This week Bannister is in Washington participating in the Consumer Literacy Advisory Group for the Consumer Federation of America.

UNDERGRADUATE STUDENT PRESENTATION ACCEPTED

Undergraduate Honors student Bindu Venkatram will be one of three presenters of   a workshop on "Kids Belong Together" at the fall conference of the Autism Society of Michigan in Kalamazoo.

FISH RESPONDS TO COE FOCUS ON "NEW AMERICAN STUDENT"

Barry Fish, Dean of EMU's College of Arts and Sciences, has made this statement in response to the COE focus on the "New American Student."

"Your focus on the 'New American Student' as the real #1 priority is exactly right, and the statistics you provide about them are a grim but important reminder of what many of us ivory tower dwellers so easily forget as we continue to pursue our own, sometimes narrow, areas of scholarship.  Although the creation of these new students is not the fault of higher education, we, as you imply, have a major responsibility for effectively dealing with them and improving their lot."

"Being concerned less with quantity and more with quality by, e.g. benchmarking, is an appropriate place for us to begin, and the 5 principles to which you subscribe are important commitments to the constituencies most directly involved in this enterprise. . . .  I believe the emphasis of the U.S. Department of Education's Office of Educational Research and Improvement on the importance of strong liberal arts programs and the involvement of arts and sciences faculty in improving teacher education are critical and, of course, perfectly consistent with the Renaissance Group's principles."

"I look forward to personally working with you in this effort, and will continue to encourage Arts and Sciences faculty to address the needs of our 'new American students' by what and by how they teach and through more involvement with the College of Education."

PLANNING AHEAD

September 22--COE Council meeting, 2:00 p.m., Gallery I.  Graduate School pizza party for new faculty, 12-1:30 p.m., Starkweather.

September 23--"Michigan Schools in the Middle--Teacher Preparation/Certification" conference at CMU.

September 24--"School to Work Transition" conference, University Club of MSU, East Lansing, 9:00-3:00.

September 30--Coffee with the Dean: 8:30, 110 Boone; 12:00, 214 Rackham; 3:30, 210 Warner.