One professional school dean's experience with strengthening the scholarly activities of his faculty illustrate the dean's advocacy role, which requires the ability to maintain working relationships with faculty while pressing for change. The evolution of the administrator's strategy for changing the faculty culture is chronicled, and issues…

An emeritus education professor ponders his career and passes on some advice to the younger generation. He urges teachers to acquire a broad education, obtain a solid professional education, discover who they are, avoid simplification, and try to make a difference. Teachers should have more say in their affairs, stand up for appropriate curricula,…

This article focuses on the variety of cultural meanings students articulate when asked about their experiences within the special context of a multiethnic California high school. The article presents excerpts from verbatim accounts in which four Black students, part of a three-year study, describe their worlds in their own words. (IAH)

The potential contribution of action research to professionalizing teaching is discussed and related to three types of collaboration which are distinguished by roles of participants, degree of institutional support, topics addressed, and type of focus. Also considered is the potential role of action research in encouraging reflective practice.…

Social work students' responses to their professor's in-class disclosure of homosexuality are examined. Topics addressed include student awareness of gay/lesbian issues, reactions to disclosure, effect on learning environment, recognition of homophobia and heterosexism, classroom power balance, relationship between personal and political actions,…

This personal narrative traces the background of instructional gaming from 1958 to 1995. The advantages and disadvantages of gaming as a disciplined activity are considered. The evolution of professional organizations, related academic activity, the game design process, and the need for consistent use of terms are addressed. Contains 57…

A Caucasian teacher reflects on her experiences over the years of being part of and then teaching within diverse student populations, explaining what it feels like to be white in a world so worried about, yet so often unfair to, people of color. (SM)

Colleagues of the late Virginia Carter Smith, former communications vice president of the Council for Advancement and Support of Education (CASE), comment on her special qualities and contributions to the organization and its administration. (MSE)

Parents of a 21-year-old son with Down's Syndrome address aspects of the cooperative partnership of school, home, and community, focusing on the dangers of labeling, the importance of communication, the need to express appreciation of the individual as he/she is, the value of full participation, and the importance of developing authentic…

A teacher at a small, rural Georgia high school discusses how she integrated folklore with creative writing and American literature. Students discussed and wrote about family and community traditions, organized a storytelling session based on ghost tales, and conducted a workshop in folklore and storytelling for seventh-grade language arts…

An American Indian faculty member at the University of California, Los Angeles, during the occupation of Alcatraz Island describes his college years without Native peers or professors, his own and his students' involvement in the occupation, details of the landing on the island, role of the media, and his struggles with the personal costs and…

Maintains that many contemporary artists of color are not included in major art history textbooks. Describes how the author's two children designed a study to identify and interview three ethnic artists who have made contributions to U.S. society. Presents excerpts from an interview with J. Eugene Grigsby, Jr. (CFR)

A journalist describes her experiences teaching writing skills at a week-long, high school arts and literary festival on the Crow Reservation and discusses how relating her own story stimulated interest and how a range of activities--walks, readings, discussions, observations and short writings on odd-shaped pieces of paper--lead to final…

Personal accounts describe the lives of 2 individuals with deaf-blindness, one an 87-year-old woman who was deaf from birth and became totally blind over a 50-year period and the other of a woman who became deaf-blind as a result of a fever at the age of 7. Managing activities of daily life and experiencing sensory hallucinations are among topics…

Interviews and biographical sketches of 16 minority students and teachers of German at 3 universities and 1 school district are reported. The process of acquiring the language and becoming familiar with a foreign culture unites these individuals of otherwise diverse ethnicity, background, and experience. (Author/LB)