Instructor: Priyam Das
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Item type: Item , Instructor interview for Place-Based WAC/WID writing instruction in Urban and Regional Planning, clip 15 of 15(2015) Place-based WAC/WID Hui; Das, Priyam; Henry, Jim; Bost, DawneBrief excerpt from interview: It's led by one of our graduate students who graduated a couple of semesters ago. He and a group of people are trying to convert that into a complete streets project; They have community meetings with charettes, and I encourage these students to attend, especially if they are interested in getting involved in real projects. and in the past a few have gotten involved in these student-led activist projects.Item type: Item , Instructor interview for Place-Based WAC/WID writing instruction in Urban and Regional Planning, clip 14 of 15(2015) Place-based WAC/WID Hui; Das, Priyam; Henry, Jim; Bost, DawneBrief excerpt from interview: When it comes to presenting the memo, they [reticent students] seem to be ok . . . And they don’t hesitate to point out—well, trash not taken out—and they speak with pictures, they'll have a lot of photos . . . And when I introduce the memo I emphasize not just the negatives . . . In my presentation about the memo, I begin with 'what works,' and I have them go look at the community website and really look at what the community has been doing . . . I have them go look at the community website and really look at what the community has been doing, I emphasize that they have to do their homework--not suggesting in their recommendations something that has already been done.Item type: Item , Instructor interview for Place-Based WAC/WID writing instruction in Urban and Regional Planning, clip 13 of 15(2015) Place-based WAC/WID Hui; Das, Priyam; Henry, Jim; Bost, DawneBrief excerpt from interview: I do give them samples from previous classes, so they have something to go with in terms of how to lay it out, and the structure; I also do a presentation on the memo itself: the components, the audience that they're supposed to speak to, in the memo, and take them through that whole process. I also provide them with land use maps of Mo'ili'ili, because within Planning, it's defined as the McCully-Mo'ili'ili district, and it's hard to tell where one stops and the other begins; they also have a land use map that tells the residential vs commercial spine, along King Street. The public spaces. So they start to get into that planning mode. So when they go out with their recorders and they're annotating the maps, they have that driving their observations to some extent.Item type: Item , Instructor interview for Place-Based WAC/WID writing instruction in Urban and Regional Planning, clip 12 of 15(2015) Place-based WAC/WID Hui; Das, Priyam; Henry, Jim; Bost, DawneBrief excerpt from interview: I've had students who had friends in the Moʻiliʻili neighborhood, and they'll talk at length with specific people, because they can communicate more easily with them.Item type: Item , Instructor interview for Place-Based WAC/WID writing instruction in Urban and Regional Planning, clip 11 of 15(2015) Place-based WAC/WID Hui; Das, Priyam; Henry, Jim; Bost, DawneBrief excerpt from interview: They have no specific groups of people that they must talk to . . . Usually their observations are half a day during the week or during the weekend . . . They'll talk to people who come to use the parks, why they come there, what would keep them away, and homelessness always comes up . . . I have some guiding questions they should be exploring . . . Sometimes they talk with people who are a big part of the community, especially the elderly, but also with commuters—which is important for us, as Planners, we need to understand who are the people who aren't really interested in hanging out in Moʻiliʻili, and why--what do they think of the neighborhood? It's important for students to understand that aspect as well . . . So we've had interesting stories about what goes on in the neighborhood.Item type: Item , Instructor interview for Place-Based WAC/WID writing instruction in Urban and Regional Planning, clip 10 of 15(2015) Place-based WAC/WID Hui; Das, Priyam; Henry, Jim; Bost, DawneBrief excerpt from interview: In terms of the observations and writing about them, [this course taught elsewhere] would be the same . . . the questions that I would suggest—like who the people are—maybe I would fine-tune those, depending upon the context . . . The issues are the same but the nuances, in terms of what you need to observe or how you go about observing those things might be a little different in India vs here . . . Everyone has a stake in Planning, which is the fun of it . . . The issues concern everyone of us . . . We're worried about our schools, our social services, we're worried about how our neighborhoods look, how they look, aesthetically, how they function, so I think most planning issues are very easy to relate to, and that helps, too.Item type: Item , Instructor interview for Place-Based WAC/WID writing instruction in Urban and Regional Planning, clip 9 of 15(2015) Place-based WAC/WID Hui; Das, Priyam; Henry, Jim; Bost, DawneBrief excerpt from interview: They are able to understand the issues and then can contextualize them . . . also helps them engage with the writing, so they're not just doing the writing for the sake of writing . . . Especially if it's the neighborhood they belong to, and they feel passionately about the place, it helps with the writing process—they go out and seek more information . . . haven't taught something that is non-place-based.Item type: Item , Instructor interview for Place-Based WAC/WID writing instruction in Urban and Regional Planning, clip 8 of 15(2015) Place-based WAC/WID Hui; Das, Priyam; Henry, Jim; Bost, DawneBrief excerpt from interview: No, this is the only undergraduate course that I've taught.Item type: Item , Instructor interview for Place-Based WAC/WID writing instruction in Urban and Regional Planning, clip 7 of 15(2015) Place-based WAC/WID Hui; Das, Priyam; Henry, Jim; Bost, DawneBrief excerpt from interview: People get interested in urban planning issues and they apply to our Master's program.Item type: Item , Instructor interview for Place-Based WAC/WID writing instruction in Urban and Regional Planning, clip 6 of 15(2015) Place-based WAC/WID Hui; Das, Priyam; Henry, Jim; Bost, DawneBrief excerpt from interview: I haven't changed this assignment in a while is because it has worked so well . . . that fear of writing, that they have to produce three pages, they get over it when they start collecting all the data . . . They feel like they have all this information--they've observed, they've talked to people . . . Now my problem is getting them to limit, to the three pages.Item type: Item , Instructor interview for Place-Based WAC/WID writing instruction in Urban and Regional Planning, clip 5 of 15(2015) Place-based WAC/WID Hui; Das, Priyam; Henry, Jim; Bost, DawneBrief excerpt from interview: The place-based assignments have really worked out well, and they've been received enthusiastically by the students . . . They were also excited that they could propose something, so that helped with the creativity . . . going out in the field and actually observing was helpful to them to understand all the issues that we as urban planners look at . . . it helps them understand that there are other issues that they have to take into account, like land use, zoning, which kind of drives what goes on in the neighborhood . . . People have different skills because of their disciplinary training--there are people from the sciences and peoples from arts & humanities . . . and having everyone go out into the field and observe things, and writing about them and then discuss them puts them all on the same playing fields . . . They're all observing, maybe in different ways, but they are still going out to the same place: for example, students from architecture vs. arts vs.engineering . . . so we have some really lively discussions . . . and that helps with the oral presentations.Item type: Item , Instructor interview for Place-Based WAC/WID writing instruction in Urban and Regional Planning, clip 4 of 15(2015) Place-based WAC/WID Hui; Das, Priyam; Henry, Jim; Bost, DawneBrief excerpt from interview: How do they go about gathering data, what counts as data, what's primary data, what's secondary data . . . understand simple things like citations and how to do them correctly, that they need to cite everything that is not their own . . . an annotated bibliography with at least 3 scholarly sources . . . make the distinction between scholarly sources and non-scholarly sources . . . the kinds of learning objectives I include for the final research paper.Item type: Item , Instructor interview for Place-Based WAC/WID writing instruction in Urban and Regional Planning, clip 3 of 15(2015) Place-based WAC/WID Hui; Das, Priyam; Henry, Jim; Bost, DawneBrief excerpt from interview: The class itself has strengthened my knowledge of different cultures that inhabit Hawaii. I wouldn't be able to tell you where the Chuuk islands were before, or I actually found out that one of friend's boyfriends was Chamorro, and I never even heard of that.I also learned the different traditions and rituals to respect and to expect to see in hospitals when I care for them . . . that's the population that I'll probably be treating a lot so it opened my eyes to more than just the Hawaiian, Japanese, and Chinese population and Caucasian population here, so I felt it was definitely worthwhile. My friend who is Chamorro also hung out with a lot of Chuukese people and he told me that they chewed betel nut juice a lot . . . and finding that out like they're going to have teeth problems foreseeing that, so if I'm interviewing someone who is Chuukese, or Chamorro, or Micronesian I know to check their teeth as well because that's an important aspect about betel juice . . . I never knew about that and that helps. I understand now, too, the high importance of the rankings of the community. In a Chuukese community there's someone that's an elder and they make the decisions.They make the health decisions for their community so even if I want to work one-on-one with this person who's ill, I need to work also with the elders so that way they give permission for this person to get treatment. Otherwise if I'm just working with the person who is just a community member and is sick and wants to get treatment--they won't be able to get it and . . . the reason why that is is the elder takes care of the community. They help pays for their bills. I mean everything is a community and it's kind of like a small society where the elder takes care of everyone. Money's pulled in from the community and they all help each other. It's amazing. It's their own little society.Item type: Item , Instructor interview for Place-Based WAC/WID writing instruction in Urban and Regional Planning, clip 2 of 15(2015) Place-based WAC/WID Hui; Das, Priyam; Henry, Jim; Bost, DawneBrief excerpt from interview: How to make the assignment interesting, because it is a General Education class that attracts students from all across campus . . . the nature of planning . . . Urban planning is a very context-based field . . . issues like transportation and housing, environmental issues, that are all interconnected and very complex . . . my own background, as an architect and landscape architect and planner, drives my motivation to design these types of assignments, because I am very focused on experiential learning.Item type: Item , Instructor interview for Place-Based WAC/WID writing instruction in Urban and Regional Planning, clip 1 of 15(2015) Place-based WAC/WID Hui; Das, Priyam; Henry, Jim; Bost, DawneBrief excerpt from interview: Whether it's transit-oriented development, the rail project, or converting waste to energy, like Hawaiʻi Power does, or studying B&Bs within the tourism industry . . . Some have conducted surveys—little ones—but to capture that data that is important . . . They've interviewed key people in different areas of expertise, within, say, transportation planning or housing, that they include in those papers . . . I have seen a tendency for students from a particular neighborhood topic a topic closely related to that neighborhood . . . So, they take a larger issue, but explore it based on their own neighborhood . . . everyone's closely tied to the place they come from . . . because the issues are similar everywhere . . . so the issues are cross-cutting but then we're bringing a different perspective into the classroom, which is always interesting.