This summer, I had the pleasure of teaching English 1110: Writing and Information Literacy to OPEEP’s degree cohort! Our 8-week semester was focused on building and developing students’ writing skills as well as introducing foundational concepts of information literacy and accessibility practices. Students created an archival collage, focusing on multimodal archival objects of their choosing. Students read Claudia Rankine’s Citizen to further develop their research topics and thesis statements. Students then expanded their research questions by creating a Worknet, a visual diagram that explores historical and linguistic frameworks for their primary and secondary sources. Finally, students created a Welcome Guide that introduced their research to a larger audience. Their final project included a project proposal, a welcome letter to their research community, an annotated list of ideas and sources, and a creative adaptation of their archival objects.
Our semester was filled with lively discussions, humor, and at times, stress. Students rose to the challenge of a condensed summer semester, and their final projects reflected their hard work and diligence (most essays were written by hand!). Teaching at ORW was the highlight of my summer, and it was a joy to spend time with the degree cohort. Our conversations spanned a wide range of topics—from reading Essex Hemphill & Danez Smith’s poetry, to close reading Little Simz’ “Woman” music video, each student brought their lived experiences and perspectives to the discussion, and it was a pleasure to work alongside students to build on their writing and interpretation skills! I am so excited to hear more from the cohort once they begin their (full-time!) fall semester.
This drawing was created by OPEEP student Vonda as part of her final project.