After reading chapter 10 of Merriam, Caffarella and
Baumgartner’s Learning in Adulthood, I
found myself pondering the complex make-up of community college students and
employees. It seems that the issues of race, class, gender are still prevalent
within the community college learning environment. I wonder what effect race, class and gender
based power struggles have on the classroom environment and on student –instructor
behavioral conflicts.
I was recently working with a colleague on developing
resources for faculty to use when dealing with inappropriate classroom
behavior. We quickly became aware that
some classroom behavioral situations stemmed from a lack of knowledge or
perhaps understanding of who community college students are, where they come
from (culturally and socioeconomically) and how this relates to the classroom.
This background knowledge on students
could aid the instructor (assuming the instructor has an understanding of their
own background/privilege and of course, an awareness of the forms and cycles of
oppression) in creating a positive learning environment for all students.
It would certainly be revealing to review classroom
conflicts to see how often issues of race, class and gender have been at the
root of the situation. I would guess
that a great deal of student-to-student conflicts and student-to-instructor
conflicts arose from these areas of oppression.
I also wonder if these conflict situations would be reduced
if the course material was more reflective of all members of the student body. This could be in the form of more diverse reading
assignments, videos or classroom/workplace examples that include people from all
backgrounds making the material more relevant to a broader student population
and deepening the learning experience.
We, as a nation, have progressed significantly from institutionalized segmentation and discrimination. After breaking down physical walls which overtly divided society by race, class and gender, we perhaps have not broken down the latent "walls" embedded withing our ideological system. For example, which segment of society has access to adequate computing resources?
ReplyDeleteI believe college's must accept the postmodern stance of questioning not only how education is provided but also question why it is provided in prevalent forms.
Michele, you have uncovered a need for administrators, instructors and students. Before true discourse can be effectively used, we must address societal issues of power, race, gender and class. A start is to acknowledge that this gap still exists.
James and Michelle have the same theory that I have. I do believe that the race, gender difference do still exist. It's sad pretty sad that Jane Fonda's feminist view have been essentially for not.
ReplyDeleteA subject matter that's important has to be in the media on a somewhat regular basis, to get the attention that it deserves. The "squeaky wheel" get's the oil has and always will hold true. You seldom get people to write a thank you or a kind word for a service. Yet if you have a bad encounter or poor service, you ask for the manager and complain.
I , like James, agree that college's must keep the questioning stance. The teams and/or committee's that are formed to assess the way modern community colleges run are a must. The collaborative effort of several make for an overall improvement. As new CC administrators it will be our job to facilitate and head these committee's.