Rouge Forum 2012

The Rouge Forum 2012 will be held at Miami University in Oxford, Ohio. The University’s picturesque campus is located 50 minutes northwest of Cincinnati. The conference will be held June 22-24, 2012.

In addition to plenty of time for large group discussions, the Featured Speakers are:

SUSAN OHANIAN
Susan Ohanian will be a Keynote Speaker at the Rouge Forum 2012. Susan’s advocacy work keeps at its core her 20 years as a teacher. Her more than 300 essays on education issues have appeared in periodicals ranging from Phi Delta Kappan cover stories to The Atlantic, Nation, USA Today, Washington Monthly, Extra! (Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting), and numerous education journals. One of her 26 book on education policy and practice introduced the word Standardisto.

Although currently censored at the NCTE online discussion site, Susan’s website received NCTE’s George Orwell Award for Distinguished Contributions to Honest and Clarity in Public Language. She has delivered the annual MacClement Lecture for Excellence in Education, Queens University, Ontario, Canada, the Helen Oakes lecture at Temple University, and the Biber Lecture, Bank Street College, New York.

Susan notes that although she’s been a featured speaker at both the International Symposium for the Educational Welfare in Seoul, Korea, and British Columbia Teachers’ Federation events, her talk to the Progressive Caucus of the AFT was closed down by angry hoots from the audience.

Susan started a website to protest the passage of NCLB. She had hoped to shut it down by now, but things keep getting worse, so she persists.

MICHAEL PRYSNER
Mike Prysner is the co-founder of March Forward!, an organization of active-duty members of the US military and veterans of the Iraq and Afghanistan conflict that encourages current active duty service personnel to resist deployment to Iraq and Afghanistan. He is a US army veteran that served in Iraq. His rank was corporal and duties in Iraq included ground surveillance, home raids and the interrogation of prisoners. These experiences led him to take a radical anti-war stand. In March of 2008 he testified in the Winter Soldier organized by Iraq Veterans Against the War. Later that year Michael ran a write-in campaign for the US House of Representatives for Florida’s 22nd congressional district (Boca Raton). He is a member of A.N.S.W.E.R. and the Party for Socialism and Liberation. In the recent Occupy movements, he has been active and arrested participating in direct actions.

PAUL STREET
Paul Street is a journalist, author, historian, and political commentator who has authored six books, including The Empire’s New Clothes: Barack Obama in the Real World of Power (Paradigm, 2010). Street has a doctorate in U.S. History at Binghamton University and has taught at numerous colleges and universities in and around Chicago. He was the Director of Research and Vice President for Research and Planning at The Chicago Urban League from 2000 to 2005. Street has published a numerous articles, essays, reviews, and editorials in numerous outlets, including ZNet, Z Magazine, CounterPunch, Black Agenda Report, The Chicago Tribune, Journal of American Ethnic History, Journal of Social History, Mid-America, Critical Sociology, Chicago History,Review of Education, Pedagogy, and Cultural Studies, Studies in History and Politics, History of Education Quarterly, Monthly Review, Iowa City Press-Citizen, In These Times, Economic and Political Weekly (Mumbai, India), Tinabantu: Journal of African National Affairs (Cape Town, South Africa), Synthesis/Regeneration, International Socialist Review, Dissent, Capital City Times (Madison, WI), Black Commentator, Tom’s Dispatch, History News Network, MRZine, Dissident Voice, and Monthly Review.

New issue of Workplace: A Journal for Academic Labor — Belonging and Non-Belonging: Costs and Consequences in Academic Lives

Dear Workplace and Critical Education Supporters,

Workplace: A Journal for Academic Labor has just published its latest issue
at http://ojs.library.ubc.ca/index.php/workplace/issue/current

We are extremely pleased to announce the launch of Workplace Issue #19,
“Belonging and Non-Belonging: Costs and Consequences in Academic Lives.”
This special issue represents powerful narrative analyses of academic
lives– narratives that are sophisticated and sensitive, gut-wrenching and
heart-rendering. “Belonging and Non-Belonging” was guest edited by Michelle
McGinn and features a rich array of collaborative articles by Michelle,
Nancy E. Fenton, Annabelle L. Grundy, Michael Manley-Casimira, and Carmen
Shields.

We invite you to review the Table of Contents here and then visit our ojs
to review the articles and items of interest.

Thanks for the continuing interest in Workplace,

Stephen Petrina & E. Wayne Ross, co-Editors
Workplace: A Journal for Academic Labor
Institute for Critical Education Studies
https://blogs.ubc.ca/ices/

Workplace: A Journal for Academic Labor
No 19 (2012): Belonging and non-Belonging: Costs and Consequences in Academic Lives
Table of Contents
http://ojs.library.ubc.ca/index.php/workplace/issue/view/182237

Articles
——–
Belonging and non-Belonging: Costs and Consequences in Academic Lives
Michelle K. McGinn

Contextualizing Academic Lives
Michael Manley-Casimir, Nancy E. Fenton, Michelle K. McGinn, Carmen
Shields

All the World’s a Stage: Players on the Academic Landscape
Michelle K. McGinn, Annabelle L. Grundy, Carmen Shields, Michael
Manley-Casimir, Nancy E. Fenton

Confronting the Myths and Norms of Academic Engagement
Carmen Shields, Michael Manley-Casimir, Nancy E. Fenton, Michelle K.
McGinn

Exploring Emotional Experiences of Belonging
Nancy E. Fenton, Carmen Shields, Michelle McGinn, Michael Manley-Casimir

Required Payment: Extracting a Pound of Flesh
Carmen Shields, Nancy E. Fenton, Michelle K. McGinn, Michael
Manley-Casimir

Fitting Procrustes’ Bed: A Shifting Reality
Michelle K. McGinn, Michael Manley-Casimir, Nancy E. Fenton, Carmen
Shields

The Erosion of Academic Troth: Disengaging from the Ties that Bind
Carmen Shields, Michelle K. McGinn, Michael Manley-Casimir, Nancy E.
Fenton

Rouge Forum @ AERA [Videos]

To Know is Not Enough:
Rouge Forum @ AERA

Friday April 13, 2012
Vancouver, BC
Videos on the ICESchannel at YouTube (or click on links below)

The Rouge Forum @ AERA brought together world-renowned scholars, teachers, community organizers, and other activists to discuss these questions and others related to activist scholarship, social change, academic freedom, and work in the corporate university as part of this one-day interactive conference at the Robson Square Campus of University of British Columbia in downtown Vancouver.

Introduction to the Rouge Fourm @ AERA 2012
E. Wayne Ross, University of British Columbia

Session I: What might happen when teachers and other academics connect reason to power and power to resistance?
Patrick Shannon, Penn State University
Ken Saltman, DePaul University
E. Wayne Ross on Canada Border Services Agency’s prohibition of Abraham DeLeon from Canada / the Rouge Forum
Antonia Darder, Loyola Marymount University (unable to attend)
Abraham DeLeon, University of Texas, San Antonio (turned away at border)
Natalia Jaramillo, University of Auckland (unable to attend)
Discussion I
Discussion II
Sandra Mathison comments on recent labour dispute in British Columbia between the BCTF and government

Introduction to the Rouge Forum @ AERA 2012 Afternoon Session
E. Wayne Ross, University of British Columbia

Session II: How can academic work (in universities and other learning environments) support local and global resistance to global capitalism?
Peter McLaren, UCLA
Gustavo Fischman, Arizona State University
Jill Pickney Pastrana, University of Wisconsin, Eau Claire
Ken Saltman, DePaul University
Rebecca Martusewicz, Eastern Michigan University (unable to attend)
Discussion I
Discussion II

Special Session – Great Schools Project
David Chudnovsky
Discussion I
Discussion II

Session III: How do we respond to the obstacles and threats faced as activist scholars?
Stephen Petrina, University of British Columbia
Nancye E. McCrary, University of Kentucky
Brad Porfilio, Lewis University
Elizabeth Heilman, Michigan State University (unable to attend)

ICES at Community Events

ICES at at May Day rally Vancouver (1 May 2012)
ICES at Occupy Wall Street (16 April 2012)
ICES at BCFed & BCTF rally Vancouver (7 March 2012)
ICES at BCFed & BCTF rally Victoria (6 March 2012)
ICES at BC Secondary Students’ Walk-Out (2 March 2012)
ICES at Occupy Vancouver (October-November 2011)

Digest of articles about “testing season” from FairTest

Bringing Real Reform to Schools — a letter from a Connecticut teacher
http://www.ctpost.com/news/article/Bringing-real-reform-to-schools-3532712.php

State Officials Throw Out Another Pearson Test Question
http://www.nytimes.com/schoolbook/2012/05/02/state-officials-throw-out-another-pearson-test-question/

Pearson Defends its Tests
http://www.nytimes.com/schoolbook/2012/05/04/pearson-says-its-tests-are-valid-and-reliable/

No Accountability for Test-Makers
http://www.miamiherald.com/2012/05/04/2783911/whos-accountable-for-the-fcat.html

Beware Corporations Lobbying, Then Profiting from Education Reform
http://www.tcpalm.com/news/2012/may/07/sandra-reinhard-beware-corporations-lobbying/

Guess When This Warning About Testing Was Written
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/answer-sheet/post/guess-when-this-warning-about-testing-was-written/2012/05/06/gIQAQqEX6T_blog.html

Move to Outsource Teacher Licensing Process Draws Protest
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/05/07/education/new-procedure-for-teaching-license-draws-protest.html?ref=education

CFP for book on e-learning

Via Dr Petar Jandric, Senior Lecturer at the Polytechnic of Zagreb, Croatia:

We would like to invite you to submit proposal for book chapter for the forthcoming book “E-learning“. The book will be published jointly by The University of Zagreb, Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences and The Polytechnic of Zagreb.

Please find our Call for Chapters attached. You can also find it on our websites:

http://www.ffzg.unizg.hr/infoz/hr/index.php/knjiga-e-learning
http://www.tvz.hr/en/tvz-pocetna/poziv-za-poglavlja-u-knjizi/

We look forward to your contributions!

Kind Regards
Dr Petar Jandric, Senior Lecturer at the Polytechnic of Zagreb, Croatia
Prof Damir Boras, Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences, University of Zagreb, Croatia

New issue of Critical Education: Educating Future Generations of Community Gardeners

Critical Education
Volume 3 Number 3
Educating Future Generations of Community Gardeners
Shane Jesse Ralston
Penn State University, Hazleton

Abstract

In this paper, I formulate a Deweyan argument for school gardening that prepares students for a specific type of gardening activism: community gardening, or the political activity of collectively organizing, planting and tending gardens for the purposes of food security, education and community development. Though not identical, a related type of gardening activism, guerrilla gardening, or the political activity of reclaiming unused urban land, sometimes illegally, for purposes of cultivation and beautification, is also implicated. Historically, community gardening in the U.S. has been associated with relief projects during periods of economic downturn and crisis, urban blight and gentrification, as well as nationalism, nativism and racism. Despite these last few unfortunate associations, the American philosopher John Dewey detached school gardening from the nativist’s tool-kit, portraying it as a gateway to more enriching adult experiences, not as a technique for assimilating immigrant children to a distinctly American way of life. One of those experiences that school gardening can prepare children for is environmental political activism, particularly involvement in gardening movements. Dewey did not mention this collateral benefit. Nevertheless, an argument can be made that garden advocacy—or, more specifically, participation in politically-motivated gardening movements—is an acceptable interpretation, or elaboration, of what Dewey meant by “a civic turn” to school gardening.

Rouge Forum 2012—OCCUPY EDUCATION! Class Conscious Pedagogies and Social Change—Proposal deadline extended to May 1

Conference theme: OCCUPY EDUCATION! Class Conscious Pedagogies and Social Change

Proposals for papers, panels, performances, workshops, and other multimedia presentations should include title(s) and names and contact information for presenter(s). The new deadline for sending proposals is May 1. The Steering Committee will email acceptance notices by May 15.

Details for submitting a proposal can be found here.

Anarchist scholar refused entry to Canada to deliver paper at American Educational Research Association meeting

Abraham P. DeLeon, assistant professor in the College of Education and Human Development at the University of Texas, San Antonio was refused entry to Canada today. He was scheduled to deliver a papers at the American Educational Research Association meeting and the pre-conference meeting of the Rouge Forum @ AERA, both which are being held in Vancouver, BC this weekend.

DeLeon, who holds a PhD from the University of Connecticut, does research in the areas of cultural studies, anarchist theory, post-colonialism, and animal studies in educational theory. His articles that have appeared in The Social Studies, The Journal for Critical Education Policy Studies, Educational Studies, Equity & Excellence in Education, and Theory and Research in Social Education. He is associate editor of Critical Education, which is based at the University of British Columbia. He has also co-edited two books: Contemporary Anarchist Studies: An Introductory Anthology of Anarchy in the Academy (Routledge, 2009) and Critical Theories, Radical Pedagogies, and Social Education: Towards New Perspectives for Social Studies Education (Sense Publishers, 2010).

DeLeon was scheduled to deliver an AERA paper titled: “Lured by the Animal: Rethinking Nonhuman Animals in Educational Discourses” and he was also scheduled to speak at the pre-conference Rouge Forum @ AERA on “What might happen when teachers and other academics connect reason to power and power to resistance?”

Canada Border Services Agency refused to give a reasons for denying DeLeon entry to Canada. CBSA has also repeatedly denied entry to American educator Bill Ayers, a Distinguished Professor at the University of Illinois, Chicago. The CBSA’s actions raise serious concerns for Canadians and Americans who value free speech, open debate and academic freedom.