In Faculty Words: From Desire to Educated Ability to Promote Inclusivity

Simulation of Visual Challenges

Faculty Development. A phrase I've long considered rather odd and incongruous. Maybe it's because I've been emotionally damaged by the words of one of my ID professors in grad school. He told me that faculty (in his world) hate the term "faculty development" because they are already developed. They don't need to develop anymore. They are possibly open to training, but not development. Another reputable ed psych and edtech professor who upon learning that I was going to tread the path of a practitioner (and not join the hallowed halls of academia) after finishing doctoral studies, wished me good luck in convincing faculty that someone could teach "better" than they did. So you see, I'm somewhat scarred. (Note: I still have faith in working with faculty, just that on some days I feel these words haunt me.)

But faith in the desire of faculty to want to improve their teaching surged when I read the following goals of some of our participants in the Institute on Inclusive Teaching 2015:

"I want to advance from the desire for inclusivity toward the educated ability to promote it, in any setting."

"I find that my own process of “de-colonizing” my mind and examining my various privileged identities has a direct bearing on my working relationship with students and faculty, through my increasing openness to and understanding of perspectives radically different from my own." 

Ultimately, I want to explore and expand upon my existing conceptualizations of diversity within my discipline so as to develop a more cohesive framework for integrating inclusivity across my instructional approaches, course content, and pedagogical content.

I witness failures from students who are struggling because they do not have the time to study. They have to work to pay tuition and they are too tired when they arrive in class to learn, let alone do their homework. In other words, those who succeed are those who have both the means and the will to study. Students also come from diverse school districts with more or less well developed language programs. Their ability to perform in my class depends also on their previous high school experience. Those who graduated from a demanding high school program passed my class with flying colors. I sympathize with my weaker students who have many odds stacked against them.

In my opinion, the diverse classroom should be accessible to everyone and anyone, but this is not the case. The greatest challenge in the XYZ courses has been 1) how to make our online content meaningfully accessible to visually impaired students, whether it is in the web-based workbook or the grammar exercises in our LMS, and 2) how to develop other types of comparable course content for them. Two out of the three visually impaired students I have taught have been unsuccessful in our courses due to these structural and curricular shortcomings.

As a public institution, it’s vital for VCU to maintain connections to its surrounding communities, especially disadvantaged ones. I think this starts with recruiting and supporting economically disadvantaged and historically underrepresented students. I don’t know how to do this on my own, but I want to do what I can to make it happen, and for me this begins in the classroom.

Amazing. Dedicated. Caring. Teachers who want to do better. Teachers who spent 5 days from 9 to 4 to learn how to improve their teaching. Not one or two. But 15 of them. Thank you for these unassuming courageous warriors in the educational arena.

There's a Place for Us

[I revised this piece quite a bit and it is published at EdContexts: http://edcontexts.org/diversity/theres-a-place-for-us/]

In late 1999, I relocated to the USA and have had much adventure navigating cross-cultural zones of change. As a Singaporean Chinese, I am often perceived as someone from the Republic of China, which is not a problem or a bad thing at all. It is when I am expected to exhibit behaviors that go along with that misperception that things get awkward and challenging. What follows are little snippets of the faux pas some people have committed in an attempt to relate to me. These illustrations highlight the fact that there is substantial work to be done in the area of education and awareness about dealing with difference.

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American White Male Prof: The opening ceremony of the Beijing Olympics was wonderful. Those Chinese girls didn't smile at all while performing. (Looks at Yin to explain why.)
Yin: *scratches head*

[Note: This is a faux pas that tends to happen because most people see me as Chinese, but I am a Singaporean. My grandparents migrated to Malaya and then to Singapore.]

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American White Male: You speak such good English compared to other Chinese. How is that so?
Yin: ???

[Note: Again, this is a social blunder that happens because most people see me as a Chinese from China, but I am a Singaporean. And there is a presumption that Chinese internationals don’t speak or write good English. This is an overgeneralization. I’m always amused more than offended to see the shock on people’s faces when they read my writing or hear me speak.]

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American White Male: So do you eat dog meat or cat meat?

[Note: This is a bad joke. The perception and assumption that I'm Chinese is associated with the idea that Chinese people eat strange stuff like monkey brains or dog meat. This is an overgeneralization.]

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International Female Faculty Client. I interacted with her substantially at our Center's training sessions. I presented her my business card and offered to work with her. She subsequently chose to work with another Female designer (who is also White).

[Note: This is not an indictment of the faculty decision. She has her reasons for her choices. I chose to include these next three examples because I want to highlight that sometimes, we may not be aware of our unconscious decisions. In Singapore, for instance, we were a colony of Britain and at times, the colonial mentality remains and is exhibited in some behaviors. Some Singaporeans consider Caucasians to be superior to Asians and look to them for solutions to their problems. It could work the other way too; people may be intimidated by the supposedly model minority, Asians.]

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Black Female Client contacts African colleague to work with her on accessibility issues after checking out our web bios. She was redirected to me.

[Note: People are comfortable with people who are more like them. It's human nature.]

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White Female Client was assigned to work with me. Emailed me subsequently to say she was going to switch and work with another Female designer (who also happened to be White).

[Note: Same rationale as above.]

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Invited to a large corporate firm for an interview which was then delayed for some time. At the meeting, interviewers made snide remarks about my being overqualified. I was subsequently not hired.

[Note: This happened quite frequently to me and my international friends who were selected for interviews to meet diversity requirements. Unfortunately, I think this is how people play games to beat bureaucracy.]

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Diversity. Accessibility. Inclusivity. These are buzzwords in higher education. We hear them so often, I wonder if they lose their meaning for those in privileged circumstances. I think I was desensitized until I worked on my dissertation and when I first got involved with a planning committee that does work related to these buzzwords.

It is one work project that keeps me going, even on days when I feel irrelevant and wonder what all my 30 years of specialized training in Instructional Design is for. It's the Institute on Inclusive Teaching (May 18-22, 2015). When I do anything, no matter how small, for the project, I feel that I'm making a difference, and I know that what I'm doing will have a ripple effect, through time. There are real problems to solve; awareness to create; educational sessions to design and facilitate. There is a reason why I'm there, in the committee. There's a reason for all those years of education.

When I'm with the committee, I work less at making people understand the implications of diversity. I don't have to negotiate so hard at the intersections. People in the committee have been misunderstood in some way by someone (unintentionally?), have lived experiences of these issues and thus know how important it is to be inclusive and to educate people to be inclusive. I am at home in such a diverse multicultural setting like Singapore.

"If you don't live it, it won't come out of your horn." - Charlie Parker, musician. 

Among my committee friends, I find myself. And in turn I can help others to find themselves and not feel lost.

The Institute focuses on issues of access and equity in education, core goals of education. We touch on issues of social justice, stereotype threats, solo status, inclusive learning design, international students' acculturative stress and facilitate the transfer of these knowledge to instructors' design of courses.

At the 2009 UNESCO World Conference on Higher Ed, the OECD Secretary-General said:

“The first priority is access and equity… the second priority area is efficiency and effectiveness [and] the third area is quality and relevance.” – Angel Gurria, OECD Secretary-General. 

Access and equity, these are two priority areas that make me get up in the morning to go to work. If I don't find myself fighting for these causes anymore, I think my work will have lost a significant bout of meaning.

If you are still wondering what I'm talking about, please visit the project site at http://rampages.us/inclusiveteaching/ 

If you are considering applying for this Institute, hurry up, we have very very few seats left.

2015 Institute on Inclusive Teaching 

Border-Crossing Research Update in Syracuse

Open House & Research Update, Syracuse University, May 8, 2014. Short subtitles are included.

A more detailed description of the slides in the video in GoogleDoc
A more detailed description of the slides in the video in PDF
[Right-click to open document in new tab on browser] 

Sometimes, a somewhat ordinary remark dwells longer than it probably should in my mind.

"You like research, right?" Said in the context of new job duties being articulated at my workplace. 

I like doing research, just as I would likely say I like designing, painting, writing, storytelling, and several other things. My "like-ness" level for each of them, however, is slightly different and the nature of each "like-ness" is unique. The commonality among each of them is that these processes allow me to search for, express and synthesize ideas. The process is far more valuable than the outcome.

For instance, in conducting this research study among some Deaf people, I found the language to articulate some of my own struggles as a multicultural person and border-crosser. Who is the "other"? When difference is made visible, how do we handle it? Deaf people taught me to look beyond their mode of communication to see the whole person. Whether a person signs, writes notes or uses an interpreter, an individual is shaped by multiple dimensions. I may specialize in instructional design largely through my formal education and work, but I'm more than that, the sum of many things. For a long time, my Deaf friends were not aware that I was a Ph.D. student -- largely due to my inadequate signing (?) and me not wanting to talk about it when I'm away from my desk, not writing my dissertation. I simply just wanted to be me, Yin, at those intersectional spaces.

I cross intersectional spaces or borderlands (Anzaldua, 1987) everyday and my research interest centers broadly on how people learn and interact at places of change, hybridity and/or liminality (van Gennep, 1908). The above video archives an event that provided me an opportunity to give back to the community in some way by sharing what I had learned from them. The intrigue in doing research is in making connections among ideas and people and being in the intersectional space of change. Whether I write or talk about it, I find joy in sharing what I learned with people.

So yes, I like research, because I like people, ideas and learning. Most of all, to combine elements in an interesting way. The same with drawing, writing, designing, learning something new... Each activity is just another medium I've found and learned to use to express my creativity.

The pursuit of purposeful creative expression (through synthesis) that will make an impact on lives is my true love.

Research into Practice: 'Cuse ASL

In mid February 2012, I founded 'Cuse ASL Club with an enthusiastic co-organizer, Corinne Sartori, a Hard-of-Hearing iSchool freshman. I can now say that I've happily passed the torch over to Corinne to lead the club as I prepare to finish off my graduate program. Milestones though, there were several:

•  Club launch poster I created with Corinne as model. I was in a hurry and needed someone to help realize my poster concept and Corinne was perfect! She signed "love it" - so apt for an intriguing poster! Corinne does such a great job creating our Event posts on Facebook, you should check them out.

•  Creating our Tumblr blog http://cuse-asl.tumblr.com/ and having our own Facebook page https://www.facebook.com/CuseASL
• Finally being able to locate students in SU who signed and were looking for sign partners :)
• Katelyn, our own member, teaching us to sign an English song, "Follow Me". It was really fun as we tried to figure out which signs were most conceptually accurate.

Katelyn Tamargo teaching members how to sign a song.

• Going to Chipotle for a club meeting and turning patron heads with our dancing hands!
• Antonio, Elaine, Jack, John V, Carlton, Chuck and other members of the local Deaf community who came to our meetings and taught us to sign! I made many new friends through 'Cuse ASL.
• Spreading the news about a great TV series "Switched at Birth" that had hearing and Deaf actors and getting a few members hooked! :)
• We were featured in the May/June 2012 Siracusa, a publication of the local Deaf community.

Founding 'Cuse ASL brought sunshine (and parallel challenges, of course) into my graduate life in Syracuse.  Being able to translate my current research study into practice: bringing different communities together in a shared -- what they call "third" space/hybrid space -- to learn from one another; wracking our brains to create weekly programs to do so, these were all immensely rewarding to me. I will miss all these when I leave. May 'Cuse ASL continue to flourish!

ASL Song Interpretation: Who Says

ASL Music Video: Who Says by Selena Gomez from Rosa Lee Timm on Vimeo.

What a cheerful song by Selena Gomez! It sends a great message about embracing yourself for all you are. Beautifully signed. Spread the cheer!

Deaf Meetings

Though my signing has improved, the flying hands at DC@PB by some people were too fast for me. I think being the only hearie, other than the little boy present, they were in THEIR world. No complaints because it helps me to understand what it is like for deaf people to be in a hearing world when we are the majority. I should be present at more meetings to improve my signing.

At DAC's picnic 6/4, there were a few more hearies who could sign very well. Everyone was welcoming to me but I think I'm mostly a curious presence, since I don't sign as well, :), but am there, hanging around B, my teacher or engaged with whoever would be patient with my signing.

It was very c-c-cold though and I left because I couldn't stand the cold anymore. B, I had to leave behind, with a nice guy who drove a Beemer. How strategically thoughtful of me. :)

One element to foster creative thinking

One thing I find some students tend to not do is to venture beyond their disciplines or universities to work with other people. One of the oft-studied components to foster creative thinking and outcomes is multiculturalism, sometimes variously studied under terms like heterogeneity, interdisciplinarity or multiple perspectives. My diss. chair herself recognized that I'm a bridge person and pointed that out to me: I cross cultures frequently and I live at the intersection of cultures. I am used to this; I come from Singapore, a melting pot of cultures. I'm comfortable in cross-cultural settings. I don't think about "difference" consciously although difference can manifest itself in our discourses in many ways, settings and relationships. I'm getting influenced by M, since she is an expert in institutional ethnography. :). So the point of mentioning this is that my background reveals much about my research inquiry and interests.

I hope to see more collaborations among students in our program with those of dissimilar backgrounds and that they would venture outside of our program/school to take courses. Just stop going to courses because "my friend is taking it." Stop keeping to your cliques. Work and talk to different people.

Perks of venturing outside one's comfort zone? I've made many connections through getting to know people outside my culture, program, school, university and by being involved in AERA. These lead to possible collaborations and divergent thinking.