We Kept Our Towns Going

We Kept Our Towns Going
Author: Phyllis Michael Wong
Publisher: MSU Press
Total Pages: 316
Release: 2022-03-01
Genre: History
ISBN: 1628954523

WITH A FOREWORD BY LISA M. FINE, MICHIGAN STATE UNIVERSITY—Michigan’s Upper Peninsula is known for its natural beauty and severe winters, as well as the mines and forests where men labored to feed industrial factories elsewhere in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. But there were factories in the Upper Peninsula, too, and women who worked in them. Phyllis Michael Wong tells the stories of the Gossard Girls, women who sewed corsets and bras at factories in Ishpeming and Gwinn from the early twentieth century to the 1970s. As the Upper Peninsula’s mines became increasingly exhausted and its stands of timber further depleted, the Gossard Girls’ income sustained both their families and the local economy. During this time the workers showed their political and economic strength, including a successful four-month strike in the 1940s that capped an eight-year struggle to unionize. Drawing on dozens of interviews with the surviving workers and their families, this book highlights the daily challenges and joys of these mostly first- and second-generation immigrant women. It also illuminates the way the Gossard Girls navigated shifting ideas of what single and married women could and should do as workers and citizens. From cutting cloth and distributing materials to getting paid and having fun, Wong gives us a rare ground-level view of piecework in a clothing factory from the women on the sewing room floor.

A Dream Called Home

A Dream Called Home
Author: Reyna Grande
Publisher: Washington Square Press
Total Pages: 336
Release: 2019-07-02
Genre: Biography & Autobiography
ISBN: 1501171437

“Here is a life story so unbelievable, it could only be true.” —Sandra Cisneros, bestselling author of The House on Mango Street From bestselling author of the remarkable memoir The Distance Between Us comes an inspiring account of one woman’s quest to find her place in America as a first-generation Latina university student and aspiring writer determined to build a new life for her family one fearless word at a time. As an immigrant in an unfamiliar country, with an indifferent mother and abusive father, Reyna had few resources at her disposal. Taking refuge in words, Reyna’s love of reading and writing propels her to rise above until she achieves the impossible and is accepted to the University of California, Santa Cruz. Although her acceptance is a triumph, the actual experience of American college life is intimidating and unfamiliar for someone like Reyna, who is now estranged from her family and support system. Again, she finds solace in words, holding fast to her vision of becoming a writer, only to discover she knows nothing about what it takes to make a career out of a dream. Through it all, Reyna is determined to make the impossible possible, going from undocumented immigrant of little means to “a fierce, smart, shimmering light of a writer” (Cheryl Strayed, author of Wild); a National Book Critics Circle Award Finalist whose “power is growing with every book” (Luis Alberto Urrea, Pultizer Prize finalist); and a proud mother of two beautiful children who will never have to know the pain of poverty and neglect. Told in Reyna’s exquisite, heartfelt prose, A Dream Called Home demonstrates how, by daring to pursue her dreams, Reyna was able to build the one thing she had always longed for: a home that would endure.

The College Dropout Scandal

The College Dropout Scandal
Author: David Kirp
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Total Pages: 185
Release: 2019-07-01
Genre: Education
ISBN: 019086222X

Higher education today faces a host of challenges, from quality to cost. But too little attention gets paid to a startling fact: four out of ten students -- that's more than ten percent of the entire population - -who start college drop out. The situation is particularly dire for black and Latino students, those from poor families, and those who are first in their families to attend college. In The College Dropout Scandal, David Kirp outlines the scale of the problem and shows that it's fixable - -we already have the tools to boost graduation rates and shrink the achievement gap. Many college administrators know what has to be done, but many of them are not doing the job - -the dropout rate hasn't decreased for decades. It's not elite schools like Harvard or Williams who are setting the example, but places like City University of New York and Long Beach State, which are doing the hard work to assure that more students have a better education and a diploma. As in his New York Times columns, Kirp relies on vivid, on-the-ground reporting, conversations with campus leaders, faculty and students, as well as cogent overviews of cutting-edge research to identify the institutional reforms--like using big data to quickly identify at-risk students and get them the support they need -- and the behavioral strategies -- from nudges to mindset changes - -that have been proven to work. Through engaging stories that shine a light on an underappreciated problem in colleges today, David Kirp's hopeful book will prompt colleges to make student success a top priority and push more students across the finish line, keeping their hopes of achieving the American Dream alive.

Tomorrow's Professor

Tomorrow's Professor
Author: Richard M. Reis
Publisher: John Wiley & Sons
Total Pages: 355
Release: 2012-03-16
Genre: Technology & Engineering
ISBN: 1118387120

Tomorrow's Professor is designed to help you prepare for, find, and succeed at academic careers in science and engineering. It looks at the full range of North American four-year academic institutions while featuring 30 vignettes and more than 50 individual stories that bring to life the principles and strategies outlined in the book. Tailored for today's graduate students, postdocs, and beginning professors, Tomorrow's Professor: Presents a no-holds-barred look at the academic enterprise Describes a powerful preparation strategy to make you competitive for academic positions while maintaining your options for worthwhile careers in government and industry Explains how to get the offer you want and start-up package you need to help ensure success in your first critical years on the job Provides essential insights from experienced faculty on how to develop a rewarding academic career and a quality of life that is both balanced and fulfilling NEW Bonus material is available for free download at http://booksupport.wiley.com At a time when anxiety about academic career opportunities for Ph.D.s in these field is at an all-time high, Tomorrow's Professor provides a much-needed practical approach to career development.

Free Will as an Open Scientific Problem

Free Will as an Open Scientific Problem
Author: Mark Balaguer
Publisher: MIT Press
Total Pages: 213
Release: 2012-01-13
Genre: Philosophy
ISBN: 0262266156

An argument that the problem of free will boils down to an open scientific question about the causal histories of certain kinds of neural events. In this largely antimetaphysical treatment of free will and determinism, Mark Balaguer argues that the philosophical problem of free will boils down to an open scientific question about the causal histories of certain kinds of neural events. In the course of his argument, Balaguer provides a naturalistic defense of the libertarian view of free will. The metaphysical component of the problem of free will, Balaguer argues, essentially boils down to the question of whether humans possess libertarian free will. Furthermore, he argues that, contrary to the traditional wisdom, the libertarian question reduces to a question about indeterminacy—in particular, to a straightforward empirical question about whether certain neural events in our heads are causally undetermined in a certain specific way; in other words, Balaguer argues that the right kind of indeterminacy would bring with it all of the other requirements for libertarian free will. Finally, he argues that because there is no good evidence as to whether or not the relevant neural events are undetermined in the way that's required, the question of whether human beings possess libertarian free will is a wide-open empirical question.

The California Idea and American Higher Education

The California Idea and American Higher Education
Author: John Aubrey Douglass
Publisher: Stanford University Press
Total Pages: 618
Release: 2007-01-03
Genre: Education
ISBN: 1503617106

Throughout the twentieth century, public universities were established across the United States at a dizzying pace, transforming the scope and purpose of American higher education. Leading the way was California, with its internationally renowned network of public colleges and universities. This book is the first comprehensive history of California's pioneering efforts to create an expansive and high-quality system of public higher education. The author traces the social, political, and economic forces that established and funded an innovative, uniquely tiered, and geographically dispersed network of public campuses in California. This influential model for higher education, "The California Idea," created an organizational structure that combined the promise of broad access to public higher education with a desire to develop institutions of high academic quality. Following the story from early statehood through to the politics and economic forces that eventually resulted in the 1960 California Master Plan for Higher Education, The California Idea and American Higher Education offers a carefully crafted history of public higher education.

An Invisible Giant

An Invisible Giant
Author: Donald R. Gerth
Publisher: San Francisco : Jossey-Bass
Total Pages: 274
Release: 1971
Genre: Education
ISBN:

Hans Burkhardt

Hans Burkhardt
Author: Hans Gustav Burkhardt
Publisher:
Total Pages: 156
Release: 2008
Genre: Art
ISBN:

"Hans Burkhardt was born in Basel, Switzerland in 1904. In 1924, after years of Dickensian poverty, he immigrated to New York City. Working in a furniture factory during the day, he took art classes at night. One of his teachers was Armenian immigrant Arshile Gorky, who became Burkhardt's mentor, friend and occasional collaborator. Burkhardt moved to Los Angeles in 1937 and exhibited widely until his death in 1994. Burkhardt's work ranged from lyrical naturalism to early cubist explorations to quasi-surrealist distortions to intense expressionism. In painting, drawing and printmaking, he addressed the visual delights of everyday life and the horrors of war, the truths of love and the lies of government. The diverse formal and emotional territories of his work are united by Burkhardt's humanistic vision and astonishing technical skills. He created images of sumptuous beauty and searing commentaries on the social and political issues of the time. In doing so, he made a unique and lasting contribution to 20th century art. Burkhardt used art to analyze form, to protest social inequities, and to explore the mysteries of life. He also used art as a potent teaching tool, working on the faculty at California State University, Northridge (CSUN) from 1963 to 1973, and continuing to offer weekly workshops on campus until 1990. In the 1970s and 1980s, Burkhardt made a series of gifts to the university. Now totaling almost 1,000 pieces, the CSUN Hans Burkhardt Foundation Collection is a stunning assemblage of the master artist's oeuvre. This book serves as a catalogue to the Fall 2008 exhibition of selected Burkhardt works from the CSUN Collection, and as an introduction to that collection for future students and scholars. The exhibition was organized by Betty Ann Brown, Professor of Art History in CSUN's Department of Art. Brown also edited this volume, which includes her essay, as well as contributions by Peter Selz, University of California, Berkeley Professor Emeritus of Art History; Margarita Nieto, Professor in CSUN's Department of Chicano/a Studies; and Jack Rutberg, founder and owner of Jack Rutberg Fine Arts Gallery."--Provided by publisher