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Welcome to our e-newsletter
Minds in Motion
August is back to school month at Free Minds! For us this means scrubbing off the whiteboard, compiling syllabi, and most of all, offering a warm and hearty welcome to our new class of 2013!
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Fall Semester Explores Questions of Citizenship
On Monday, August 13, Free Minds held its orientation for the incoming class of 2012-13. Twenty-three excited students assembled for the first time in the M Station classroom where they will read, analyze, and converse together two nights a week for the next nine months. Though the tasks at hand during orientation were largely logistical (register for the class, read through course policies), the larger aim was beginning the year with the entire class on the same page.
Each year, Free Minds faculty selects a theme which ties together the different units of the class. The curriculum this fall coheres around the question, What are the rights and responsibilities of citizens? Looking through this lens, students will read The Great Gatsby and The Merchant of Venice. They will get an in-depth look at this year's presidential election, and they will try their hand at writing creative nonfiction, striving to connect their personal stories to movements and issues in the larger world.
"You all wear many hats in your lives," Project Director Vivé Griffith told students on Monday evening. "You are parents, siblings, friends, partners. But when you're in this room, your primary role is as a thinker." With two full semesters ahead, the journey is just beginning for this newly forged community of thinkers. |
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2012-13 Free Minds Faculty
Free Minds features a unique classroom environment, with faculty from UT and ACC coming together to team-teach an interdiscplinary humanities course. We are thrilled to welcome the five faculty members who will lead students through this year.
David Edwards, Professor of Government at UT, will teach government, paying careful attention to issues of voting and citizenship.
Vivé Griffith, Free Minds Project Director and Assistant Professor of Creative Writing at ACC, will focus her teaching on creative nonfiction.
Patty Hatcher, Associate Professor in the Department of Philosophy, Religion, and Humanities at ACC, returns to offer a unit exploring Shakespeare's The Merchant of Venice from several disciplinary vantage points.
Domino Renee Perez, Associate Professor at UT in the Department of English, will return to teach the literature unit for the third time; Professor Perez will build students' skills in close reading and textual analysis.
Laine Perez, a PhD candidate at UT in the Department of English, will return as our writing consultant this year to help prepare Free Minds students for the world of college writing. (You can read more about Laine's experience teaching in Free Minds in this month's Final Word.) |
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Workshop Reading Sept. 4!
Friends of Free Minds: please join us on the evening of Tuesday, September 4th for a special reading,
featuring the original works of
2012 Summer Writing Workshop participants.
Wednesday, 9/4/12 at 6:00 pm
Strange Brew Coffee House
5326 Manchaca Road
All are welcome! |
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Remembering Andrea Greiner
 The Free Minds community was saddened to learn about the death of Andrea Greiner, Class of 2011, in a pedestrian accident in California; we share our deepest condolences with her family. Andrea brought humor and fun tales of her many careers--carpenter's assistant, cupcake baker, taxi driver, ski instructor, portrait artist, rafting guide--to the classroom, where she was a valued classmate and friend.
On Saturday, August 25, Free Minds staff, faculty, and graduates gathered at the Community Engagement Center to celebrate Andrea's life. Her sister and niece joined us. People shared their stories of the young woman who cycled to class, got goose bumps from the art at the Blanton Museum, and was often wrapped in her favorite red shawl.
When she was a student, Andrea submitted a piece in response to the Tim O'Brien book, The Things They Carried, writing that in capturing the stories of men's lives during the Vietnam War, O'Brien kept those men alive. "With people reading these stories," she wrote, "they live through and in them." She would have understood that sharing stories from her life offers a way of keeping her spirit with us. And we will continue to do so. |
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Special Thanks
As we begin a new academic year at Free Minds, we are particularly appreciative of our three major project partners, who foster and sustain the program in so many ways. Special thanks go to:
Division of Diversity and Community Engagement at The University of Texas at Austin
Austin Community College
and
Foundation Communities
If you are interested in volunteering with or supporting Free Minds, you can find more information on our website.
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YOUTUBE: Stacey Kennedy, Free Minds '12, and her son Richmond talk about their journey from homelessness to college.
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Minds in Motion
Archive
July 2012
An Open House, a Summer Writing Workshop, and interviews galore!
June 2012
We remember Earl Shorris and pay homage to the bold idea that started it all.
May 2012
This month we celebrate the outstanding Free Minds Class of 2012!
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The Final Word
Free Minds Instructor Laine Perez on Overcoming Writing Roadblocks
 When Amelia approached me and asked me to write this month's Final Word, I immediately thought, what a great opportunity! I can write a couple paragraphs no problem, and it will be great to talk a little about the writing instruction in Free Minds. And yet, I still waited to the last moment to write this piece. You see, even after years of teaching writing I, like most people, still see writing as a daunting task. The blank page brings out all of our insecurities. Sometimes it's hard to know where to start. Sometimes, once the essay is started, it's hard to know how to finish. Sometimes a fear of grammar stops us. Sometimes it's a fear of imperfection.
What I try to do in the writing classes is help Free Minds students develop the tools they need to overcome some of these writing roadblocks. For example, later in the semester, we'll be talking about outlining or mapping prior to writing a paper. Students who have trouble starting or ending a paper may find these skills to be great tools.
One of my favorite things about working with the Free Minds students last fall was seeing them grow as writers and thinkers, developing the abilities they needed to begin to consider writing as a friend rather than a foe. However, I also had the great pleasure of witnessing the growth of a community of writers who were able to encourage and help one another. This year, I look forward to working with each of the Free Minds students to help them achieve their writing goals. But even more than that, I look forward to once again being part of a truly unique intellectual community. And to the Free Minds Class of 2013, I wish you a good semester, and I can't wait to get to know all of you!
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A program of the UT Division of Diversity and Community Engagement, in partnership with the UT Humanities Institute, Austin Community College, and Foundation Communities, Free Minds offers a two-semester college course in the humanities for Central Texas adults who want to fulfill their intellectual potential and begin a new chapter in their lives.
Free Minds Project
Community Engagement Center
1009 East 11th Street, #218
Austin TX 78702
Project Director: Vivé Griffith Program Coordinator: Amelia Pace-Borah Ph: 512-232-6093 F: 512-236-1729
www.utexas.edu/diversity/ddce/freeminds |
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