Week 1 Module: Wednesday August 26

Hi everyone! It’s nice to “e-meet” you, and I’m excited for this journey we’re about to embark on together. In this document you’ll find a bit of introduction, a summary of what this first week of the semester will look like, and some assignments for you to complete.

This week we will have a live class Zoom on Wednesday, 8/26 from 8:30–9:30AM. For almost every other week this semester, we will be having a live class Zoom once a week at this time on Mondays.

Here is the link to our Zoom class, password: Writing! In general, please try to be 5 minutes early should any technical difficulties arise.

If you are unable to attend the class Zoom, please contact me as soon as you can. You can complete the course without attending the Zooms, but you’ll need to watch the recording (which will be emailed to you) and complete a Missed Meeting form within 48 hours.

By participating in Zoom classes, please know that you consent to being recorded (for class/ professor use ONLY). If you do not consent to being recorded, please let me know ASAP.

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Here’s what you need to do this week:

1. Take the intro survey. This survey will help me get to know you a bit, put names to faces (so-to-speak), and account for any access or technical needs. The fact that we aren’t meeting in person this semester is a challenge, as I’m sure all of you are well aware. I will probably repeat this a million times, but I know that some people learn better face-to-face, and we will have to take special care to keep our classroom space feeling “human” even on these digital platforms. My hope is that this survey begins that process. Click here to access, and please have this filled out by Sunday, 8/30 5PM.
2. Read the Syllabus. Even more than a face-to-face class, the syllabus is hugely important to read in entirety, read again, and come back to often. Understanding the way this course works from the get-go will have a really big and positive effect on your ability to do well in this course. Read the syllabus here.
3. Read our first reading assignment, Maggie Dickinson’s “The Making of Space, Race, and Place,” about the history of the graffiti subcultures in our wonderful NYC, and the subsequent criminalization of those subcultures by the NY business class and ruling elites. You can find this piece linked here. It’s really fantastic but pretty long, so I recommend getting started right away.
4. When you are finished with the Dickinson piece, write me a 3-5 paragraph summary and response. Please type your response in Google Docs, double-spaced and in 12pt font, and email it to me at glickeng120@gmail.com by Sunday 8/30 at 5PM. This response is longer than what I will usually require you to write within a week. However, I like to get a sense of your writing style, and what we’re all collectively working with, early on. This assignment won’t be graded, so anything you turn in will get full credit. All the same, please try your best. For the summary, please consider: What is Dickinson’s main argument here? What issue or situation is this article responding to? Why is this issue important at this particular time, and why is it important today? What evidence is used in the article? For the response, consider: What new questions or challenges does this article bring up for you? What is your personal response/ feeling to the arguments made? Did you feel agreement or disagreement with any points made, and what is the basis for that feeling?

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MODULE 1

This first week will be like a slow build-up to the work of the actual course. It is important to me to get all of us (myself included) introduced and situated on our various tech platforms before we jump in for real.

First, a little about your professor…

Hi! My name is Phoebe Glick, but you can call me Phoebe, or Prof. Glick, I really don’t mind! I am an adjunct lecturer at two campuses at CUNY: both Baruch College and Hunter College. In my experience working with Baruch students, you all are super motivated, funny, brilliant, and conscientious. I’m happy to work with you! Besides being a writing professor, I am a poet and researcher. I believe that writing can project positive social change. Other interests of mine include astrology (I’m a Leo), weird esoteric poetry, crafting, and nerdy stuff like Marvel movies. I appreciate a really good meme. This is a picture of me and a cat who is NOT my cat, although you might meet my actual cat over Zoom sometime. Her name is Maude, after one of my favorite film characters.

I’m telling you all this in hopes that you’ll share with me your interests and what makes you unique as well. I love teaching this course because it is one of the unique times at Baruch where we have a hugely varied representation of interests, majors, strengths, and identities in one classroom space. It is also a space where free discussion of important social issues is encouraged and essential to the classroom. My hope for you this semester is that you will gain practice and confidence in writing, composing an essay, and forming a coherent argument. If you have any negative associations with writing, especially academic writing, I hope to challenge those.

Web Platforms

This is probably not the last time I’ll say this, but I’m not a tech person. I’m a poet! We barely understand the internet! However, I’ve done my best to scale down the amount of tech we’ll use to make it as simple and clear as possible. That said, we’ll be using a couple different platforms.

Blogs @ Baruch (WordPress)

Blogs @ Baruch is where you’re at right now. This course site is hosted on a website that uses the WordPress website building platform. Our course website will be updated each week with the weekly module, the syllabus, readings, assignments, and course info.

Instructions

1. Login to blogs.baruch.cuny.edu with you email username and password (email me if you can’t get in).
2. Click on “My Profile and then “Edit.”
3. Double check that the Display Name is the name you want to be called in the course.
4. Add some writing to your “Academic Interests” section.
5. Save the changes and then add a Profile Photo (click “Change Profile Photo” and follow the instructions).

Next week, we’ll dive into how to write Blog posts and Comments, which will be a huge factor in this course.

Google Docs and Drive

I assume most of you are already familiar with Google software, but here is a primer just in case. Google Docs is a word processing platform, like Microsoft Word, that runs exclusively through a browser and internet connection (you can type up drafts offline, however). Multiple users can edit a document at the same time, and documents are saved as you go along.

Google Drive is the cloud storage space for all Google software. You can right click (or control click) folders to “Share” them with peers and me. It’s easy to produce a Share “link,” copy and paste that link, and send it by email.

Please be familiar with these ways of using Google Docs and Drive, and be aware of how to “Share” files with your classmates and me.

Here’s a helpful video for getting started: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P7555XLfHgs

Here’s a follow-up with more information about the “Share” feature: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=npArx4_3fmw

Slack

Slack is a communication platform not unlike texting for businesses. Slacks are organized into “groups” which have their own pages, such as the group for our course. Discussion topics are organized by “channels.” You can select how or if you want to receive notifications (which will pop up on your phone like text messages) in each channel, and leave or join channels.

Because we won’t be meeting in person, we will use Slack to communicate with each other in an informal, human way. We will have a channel open for general questions for the class, for deadline reminders, for communicating with your classmates and asking for help/ feedback, and for random other stuff. You can also send direct messages to individual people in the class.

Here’s a video how-to: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m2JuAa6-ors

In the interest of not-barraging you with tasks this week, we’ll hold off on getting our class Slack up and running until Module 2.

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That’s all for now! As the week progresses, please make a note of any questions you have, or wherever you get confused. In these beginning stages of the semester, you can email me with questions anytime, and I will get back to you within 24 hours. Our next class Zoom meeting is Monday, 8/31, 8:30-9:30AM. Looking forward to it, and looking forward to hearing how you fared in our first week of the fully online Fall 2020 semester!