Journey into the land of… high schoolers!

This year, CRDM’s Rhetoric Society of America (RSA) Student Chapter is undertaking a variety of outreach projects to increase awareness of rhetoric in our community. As a part of this project, this week, Ashley R. Kelly and I (Meagan Kittle Autry) volunteered at a local high school, Broughton, to speak to International Baccalaureate (IB) program twelfth grade students in a Theory of Knowledge class. The class was just finishing up their semester, so now was the perfect time for us to come in to introduce another way of looking at knowledge (and perhaps to encourage them to think about studying rhetoric as they set off for college in the fall!). We taught two separate classes, one each day, and let me tell you – teaching high school is exhausting! Each class had 40 students, and we were outside in a portable, a fairly small space for that number of students. For both of us, this was our first experience in a U.S. high school, though overall, it wasn’t that much different from our experience in Canada.

We covered basic concepts of rhetoric (what is it? where does it come from? how do we talk about it?) before moving on to a topic that they had covered in the semester: science. They had covered concepts of knowledge in science, so by bringing in the perspective of rhetoric of science, we connected to some ideas they had covered but also challenged them to think about science in new ways. We talked about expert and inexpert audiences, adapting arguments based on the different audiences, and the importance of science for the general public and for themselves as individuals. We based a lot of the discussion on our research into nuclear energy in both a local setting (with the Duke-Progress merger) and on a global scale (with the accident at Fukushima last March and Germany’s reaction to the disaster). The students were bright, talkative, and engaged – and sure knew way more about nuclear energy than I did in high school!

All in all, filling a 100 minute class to engage 40 adolescents the whole time was a challenging experience. But we left encouraged that the students were so engaged, and their teacher indicated that afterword, they expressed interest in the work we are doing and the CRDM program – they thought it was all pretty cool. Taking on this outreach opportunity was a really great experience, and we can’t wait to hear what other CRDMers are doing for it, too!

Originally posted on my blog, Meg’s Road to PhD.

Grad Students, Sledgehammers, and Deconstruction That Doesn’t Involve Derrida (for Once)

This week marked NC State’s Graduate Education Week, full of events like the Graduate Student Research Symposium on Monday and the Outstanding Graduate Teaching Assistant Awards on Thursday. Early Saturday morning, at the crack of 41 degrees, CRDMers pitched in to help with the Graduate Students’ Day of Service coordinated by the Wake County Habitat for Humanity Chapter.

No, I said Habitat for Humanity. Humanity.

The Wake County Habitat for Humanity ReStore Trailer o' Tools (it's Irish).

Much better. More than 32 students from at least a dozen different programs turned out to lend a hand at the deconstruction site. The house was already stripped down to the basement and a first floor, so we split into two groups: one to process the nails out of the boards in the back so they could be reused or sold, and one to pry up the existing floorboards while not falling through or off.

Grad students apply a mixed methodology of de-nailing boards that's part pneumatic nail gun, part OH GOD WHO GAVE A KNOWLEDGE WORKER A NAIL GUN!?

Habitat is one of my favorite volunteer opportunities so I was really excited to see it picked as this year’s Day of Service. Added bonus: the job site was a deconstruction job, so instead of a series of careful measurements and methodical detail work that go into building a house, we got to go HULK SMASH on hardwood floors and a hanging duct system. Double added bonus: I got to do a full day’s worth of deconstruction with nary a mention of Derrida. Instead, LUMBER! HAMMERS! PANERA BAGELS! HELPING PEOPLE!

What grad students lack in "right tool for the job" they more than make up for in enthusiasm.

The Habitat for Humanity ReStore runs deconstruction projects like this one throughout the year. According to their website,

From partial to full-scale projects that remove all building debris down to the foundation, Habitat offers competitively-priced deconstruction services as an alternative to traditional demolition. The donated house is a tax-deductible contribution.

Check out upcoming opportunities for your chance to help out. Take it from me–there’s nothing quite like a good demolition job to release the stresses that build up in grad school. “What’s that? My article manuscript had too many split infinitives? I’ll split YOUR infinitives! Take that, revise-and-resubmit-notification-that-I-projected-onto-a-rotting-crossbeam!”