Instructor: Brian Turano
Permanent URI for this collectionhttps://hdl.handle.net/10125/37422
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Item type: Item , Instructor interview for Place-Based WAC/WID writing instruction in Tropical Plant and Soil Sciences, clip 18 of 18(2015) Place-based WAC/WID Hui; Turano, Brian; Henry, Jim; Bost, DawneBrief excerpt from interview: Yes, as a matter of fact the local students are more rooted in the Hawaii perspective . . . I think it's true [that mainland students often achieve a more global perspective] . . . [At the same time] when discussing geothermal, mainland students might not realize that for some Native Hawaiians, when you're talking geothermal, you're messing with Pele.Item type: Item , Instructor interview for Place-Based WAC/WID writing instruction in Tropical Plant and Soil Sciences, clip 17 of 18(2015) Place-based WAC/WID Hui; Turano, Brian; Henry, Jim; Bost, DawneBrief excerpt from interview: Yes, occasionally they do. One student is from Philadelphia, another from Oregon . . . So they do bring their own home-grown perspectives as well . . . the writing doesn't accentuate [comparing and contrasting with home] as much, but the class discussions do . . .Item type: Item , Instructor interview for Place-Based WAC/WID writing instruction in Tropical Plant and Soil Sciences, clip 16 of 18(2015) Place-based WAC/WID Hui; Turano, Brian; Henry, Jim; Bost, DawneBrief excerpt from interview: I developed it myself. After taking the workshop with you. Overall, it's ok. You always wanna re-tweak it. But students will say, 'I corrected all my grammatical mistakes, shouldn't I get 100?' And the answer is, 'No, I've set it up so that if it's exceptional, you get a 10. But I've also set it up so that if you hand it in and do a decent job, you're gonna get an 8. If you don't address a problem, you're gonna get a 7' . . .Item type: Item , Instructor interview for Place-Based WAC/WID writing instruction in Tropical Plant and Soil Sciences, clip 15 of 18(2015) Place-based WAC/WID Hui; Turano, Brian; Henry, Jim; Bost, DawneBrief excerpt from interview: This semester [the course filled]. Last semester it didn't. It's hard to get the word out. I put up posters, but students never see them. But when I sent out my query to the sustainability working group, it filled. As we know, there's no way of searching the catalog, there's no list of sustainability-related courses.Item type: Item , Instructor interview for Place-Based WAC/WID writing instruction in Tropical Plant and Soil Sciences, clip 14 of 18(2015) Place-based WAC/WID Hui; Turano, Brian; Henry, Jim; Bost, DawneBrief excerpt from interview: Something that I bring up is that often the strongest opponents of renewable energy projects are environmentalists . . . It's a strange coming together of things . . . So I say to my class, how do we address this? You're trying to set up a wind farm so that we don't burn fossil fuels, or putting wells 3,000 or 5,000 miles in the ocean and risking spills, how do we come to terms with this, when you’re fighting environmentalists who are trying to stop renewable energy projects? I don't have any hard and fast answers, but it's good for discussion.Item type: Item , Instructor interview for Place-Based WAC/WID writing instruction in Tropical Plant and Soil Sciences, clip 13 of 18(2015) Place-based WAC/WID Hui; Turano, Brian; Henry, Jim; Bost, DawneBrief excerpt from interview: I think it is. I don't think students are aware of the array of courses that have some relevance to sustainability. This course is also at a level where you don’t have a lot of prerequisite knowledge. It's a survey class; it gives them a flavor of all topics related to renewable energy, sustainability, and the environment. It's also Writing Intensive, which some have to get for their degree program. In many [STEM] courses, too, you have just volumes of information that you have to push at them, and little time for interaction.Item type: Item , Instructor interview for Place-Based WAC/WID writing instruction in Tropical Plant and Soil Sciences, clip 12 of 18(2015) Place-based WAC/WID Hui; Turano, Brian; Henry, Jim; Bost, DawneBrief excerpt from interview: Maybe 20% local folks and the rest from probably the outside--students from across campus.Item type: Item , Instructor interview for Place-Based WAC/WID writing instruction in Tropical Plant and Soil Sciences, clip 11 of 18(2015) Place-based WAC/WID Hui; Turano, Brian; Henry, Jim; Bost, DawneBrief excerpt from interview: The local students will usually bring up the local perspective in class—and I'll bring it up, too—some of the issues are contentious. Say, geothermal power. Some in the Hawaiian community are against it, some are for it. Siting wind farms is a problem, but that's also national and global . . . a 'not in my back yard' kind of thing . . . So in class, we have a local perspective, a national perspective, and international students bring the international perspective. Our island environment has some unique challenges that are brought to bear. And often we talk about importation of our food. Our food has to travel 2,000 miles to get here. And we get 90% of our food from the mainland. And most of our energy is imported in the form of petroleum. And that's an acute awareness that this class arrives at by the end of it.Item type: Item , Instructor interview for Place-Based WAC/WID writing instruction in Tropical Plant and Soil Sciences, clip 10 of 18(2015) Place-based WAC/WID Hui; Turano, Brian; Henry, Jim; Bost, DawneBrief excerpt from interview: I think it does happen occasionally [that a student's participation influences writing stance]. I had one student who in his paper expressed skepticism about climate change, which in the class as a whole certainly none would voice that skepticism.Item type: Item , Instructor interview for Place-Based WAC/WID writing instruction in Tropical Plant and Soil Sciences, clip 9 of 18(2015) Place-based WAC/WID Hui; Turano, Brian; Henry, Jim; Bost, DawneBrief excerpt from interview: When it relates back to their own lives and their own living situations, it does have a larger impact, because it's more tangible, more real for them, so they can write with even more passion. They have a buy-in, they have a stake in the game, an excitement about the topic, a willingness to go above and beyond what I assign them, a lot deeper research—these are one-week turnaround time, and the requirement is one page. I often get two to four pages, sometimes five, so these students are obviously excited and passionate about the topic.Item type: Item , Instructor interview for Place-Based WAC/WID writing instruction in Tropical Plant and Soil Sciences, clip 8 of 18(2015) Place-based WAC/WID Hui; Turano, Brian; Henry, Jim; Bost, DawneBrief excerpt from interview: No. Not so far.Item type: Item , Instructor interview for Place-Based WAC/WID writing instruction in Tropical Plant and Soil Sciences, clip 7 of 18(2015) Place-based WAC/WID Hui; Turano, Brian; Henry, Jim; Bost, DawneBrief excerpt from interview: No. I taught a grant-writing course, but no comparisons …Item type: Item , Instructor interview for Place-Based WAC/WID writing instruction in Tropical Plant and Soil Sciences, clip 6 of 18(2015) Place-based WAC/WID Hui; Turano, Brian; Henry, Jim; Bost, DawneBrief excerpt from interview: Our metrics are often course grades, the quality of the work that's handed in, the Café [student evaluation] results . . . The last writing assignment I give my students is 'Has the class affected your behavior in some way? and if so, explain it.' And those are wonderful re-affirming essays that I get back. Without doubt, every student says something like 'I learned so much. This is a wonderful class, I wish there were more classes like this.' So when I read those, I see that it is having direct impact on students . . . Being Writing Intensive helps them check off a box in their [general education] requirements, and now it's a 300-level class, so that gives an added advantage . . . and they really enjoy the topics, and they might not like the writing, every week, but in the five years I've taught it, the quality of the student work dramatically improves over the course of the semester.Item type: Item , Instructor interview for Place-Based WAC/WID writing instruction in Tropical Plant and Soil Sciences, clip 5 of 18(2015) Place-based WAC/WID Hui; Turano, Brian; Henry, Jim; Bost, DawneBrief excerpt from interview: There's always a lot of discussion, and I find the students are more than willing to talk. Once they get past initial fears, the class is opening and accepting, and they want to voice their opinions. We have no trouble getting lots of discussion in our class . . . If your classroom is accepting and you really encourage their opinions, students are more than ready, which then generates more discussion throughout. When we do an in-class reaction to a short article, and they have to write about it first, the quality of the discussion can be better.Item type: Item , Instructor interview for Place-Based WAC/WID writing instruction in Tropical Plant and Soil Sciences, clip 4 of 18(2015) Place-based WAC/WID Hui; Turano, Brian; Henry, Jim; Bost, DawneBrief excerpt from interview: when they have to actually sit down and write about it, i think it really helps order these things in their mind and cleary go through things logically. It comes out as well reasoned opinion by actually have to go through the writing exercise. after hearing about it in class, and talking about it, they figure out what they know about it when they have to sit down and write about it.Item type: Item , Instructor interview for Place-Based WAC/WID writing instruction in Tropical Plant and Soil Sciences, clip 3 of 18(2015) Place-based WAC/WID Hui; Turano, Brian; Henry, Jim; Bost, DawneBrief excerpt from interview: I often use in-class reaction papers, to an article or a paper on a topic, say climate change. Or recently, on these huge data centers and how much energy they are drawing, and it's usually dirty. Most students hadn't even heard of that—they're putting things in a cloud, but they're actually adding to a problem . . . They read the article, write in class, then give it to a peer for feedback, then hand them in to me, so that I can check it off that they did it . . . The more formal writing assignments, they have a week to do. They will research a topic, get some primary literature, summarize it, and answer a question I've given them.Item type: Item , Instructor interview for Place-Based WAC/WID writing instruction in Tropical Plant and Soil Sciences, clip 2 of 18(2015) Place-based WAC/WID Hui; Turano, Brian; Henry, Jim; Bost, DawneBrief excerpt from interview: if they can relate to where they live and their own experience, it makes it more real for them and it heightens their ability to take home a lesson where they have to relate their own existence and how these policies and impacts will environmentally affect them.Item type: Item , Instructor interview for Place-Based WAC/WID writing instruction in Tropical Plant and Soil Sciences, clip 1 of 18(2015) Place-based WAC/WID Hui; Turano, Brian; Henry, Jim; Bost, DawneBrief excerpt from interview: group project: develop a renewable project for a community or entity . . . what would work best in that community . . . fabricating a plan they can propose to the community. some have contacted folks in the community . . . local students bring their perspective: my neighborhood.