23 The Power of Transformative Revision
Rebecca Fremo
One afternoon in May of 2016, I chatted with two memory care residents at Ecumen Prairie Hill, a “Writing and Nonprofits” community partner. I was there for the Spring Art Show, featuring the works of elderly artists: this was one group’s final project. Of all the class projects, theirs was most fraught with complications. The residents were often asleep by the time the students arrived at Prairie Hill to interview them; the Resident Director and I had different expectations regarding the students’ time commitments. The two students met regularly with me all semester to strategize.
But that day, looking around the dining room at the beaming artists sipping punch with their families, I knew that our community partnership had paid off.
“I grew up with nine brothers and sisters at my house!” my new tablemate told me yet again.
“I’ll bet breakfast time must have been wild,” I responded. I tried to offer a new response each time she told me about her siblings. That’s because each of my responses elicited a different example—a different story—from her. This woman, like my students, could communicate in engaging ways when I responded to her with care and compassion. And in doing so, I was embodying an important part of our Mission: respecting and affirming the dignity of all people. In fact, the Writing and Nonprofits course itself nurtures students as they pursue lives of service and encourages [them] to work toward a just and peaceful world.
I’ve offered multiple examples of how I develop new courses, illustrating that I strive to balance educational tradition with innovation. And it should be clear that in focusing on identity issues in all of my courses, I foster the development of values as an integral part of intellectual growth. Frankly, I could write brief narrative snapshots to represent each part of the Gustavus Mission Statement. Click.
I hope I’ve already made my case.
But I began by invoking a motif—using reality TV shows to illustrate how forms of revision shape my work. Good essays always bring us full circle. So here’s one last nod to that motif, and a last example of the power of transformative revision.
It’s no secret that I want us to revise our conversations about identity at Gustavus. In particular, I reject talk about “all ESL students”—as if we could lump them together— as well as the claim that such students are a “challenge” to be “addressed.” In our current political climate, this is a dangerous assertion—and one that simply isn’t true. We should focus instead on ways to welcome and support multilingual students, who we should redefine as assets that enrich our community. Now, you might think this is nothing more than a thesaurus-driven version of TLC’s “What Not to Wear”—change the linguistic clothes, change the reality.
Think again.
In revising our language—just in shifting from the use of “ESL” to “multilingual,” even—we make a broader discussion of how to support all students possible. We acknowledge multilingual students as a diverse group: some students have been speaking English all their lives (as well as one or two other languages), and some first learned English as children, perhaps even in refugee camps. Some just moved to the U.S. a few years ago. Some were born here. Revised language makes a space for international students and the Dreamers, emphasizing multiplicity. Revision matters. Language matters. Because if we are to help our students attain their full potential as persons, to develop in them a capacity and passion for lifelong learning, and to prepare them for fulfilling lives of leadership and service in society, then maybe we need an Extreme Makeover to helps us create a Gustavus that does, in fact, represent this diverse “society” in the first place, constituted by and through many individuals searching for ways to re- invent themselves.