7/6 Discussion

1. The article “Changing preservice Teacher’s Attitudes/Beliefs About Diversity” investigates the motives behind racial bias and what is needed to reform the bias into awareness. M. Arthur Garmon is the author and a professor of early education and human development at Western Michigan University and uses past study’s results to introduce us to the issue of preservice teachers having discriminatory biases. He created his own study of one of his students, Leslie P., who becomes a great example of the development of the racially sensitive mindset that is crucial in teaching. Garmon bases his study around the question “what are the factors that appeared to be most critical in the development of her multicultural awareness and sensitivity?” Through 10 hours of recorded interviews, Garmon analyzes the conversations he had with Leslie in her senior year of college and categorized her reflections on diversity and multiculturalism throughout her life and how she developed a healthy perspective on the topic. The article is filled with large quotes from their conversations, between them, professor Garmon adds in his inferences and analysis of Leslie and her mindset. He continually mentions Leslies mindfulness and how she is more perceptive than any of his other students. Like most of her white classmates, Leslie came from a homogenous rural town where diversity was rarely discussed. Her interest to open her mind to the topic is what stood out so much to Garmon, although she had not grown up surrounded by multiple cultures she believed it was important to be engaged in all the different walks of life that surrounded her when she arrived at college. 

Leslie opened up about the prejudices that had formed in her childhood and the ignorance that the biased beliefs fed off of. Although, she affirms that this openness and mindfulness to ones own prejudiced views is a necessary step to forming the multicultural awareness that all people should work towards. She places a lot of the responsibility of this mindfulness on going to college, which was the first time Leslie had really become a part of a culture that included many varying cultures. This source will be especially helpful because it tells a true story of the development of an unbiased open mind; a crucial characteristic for anyone working in the education system. The article also addresses her commitment to social justice, this is a topic I feel very strongly about because I believe it should be a characteristic that is taught and encouraged in everyone, not just teachers. In past article summaries, and in my research plan I have addressed the issue that people have become selfish with their privilege, and how not only the education system but the whole world needs to turn their attention to the number of people forced into crime and poverty, not the number in their bank accounts.

1. While the article from Katherine Shwab does a great job of informing the reader about the perspective of open offices from a female it lacks in the topic of how to change it. It works as a great informative piece, and I noticed many solid and concise quotes that would make great additions to a paper or study regarding this issue, but to make this article a stronger argumentative piece I would include a possible solution. Typical cubicle office spaces seem to be uninviting; you are designated only a small square of space to do your work and you have walls surrounding you to help you not get distracted. It eliminates any feng shui that can improve an environments comfortability like the open office space is able to. Although, the open office plan clearly has problems of its own, and a large factor is how it eliminates all privacy that the cubicles offered. 

My suggested solution to these conflicting office arrangements would be to find a balance of the two. A main problem I saw repeatedly in the article was how there was no place to go in an open office to relieve stress or to make a private call. An open office that consisted of larger ‘mega-cubicles’ may be able to fix this issue, where some would be designated to teams of employees are meeting areas while others would be an open space that worked as a break room or collaborative space. This idea can also work like the casual-Fridays appeal, where the rooms are given designated days for their purpose, such as having a comfortable room with dimmed lights as a de-stress room two days a week. Not only does this address the issues women are facing, but it allows a person to choose how they want to spend each day. Forcing everyone into the same work conditions may seem like equality, but that’s not the answer to inequality; equity is.