Election 2024: Anyone Else Ready for this to be Over?

I care about politics. I do. But I’m also ready for Christmas Break. Curling up with a book, or VR mini golf, without email nearby, without ads, and WITHOUT ELECTION COVERAGE. I don’t need to know when Donald Trump farts or what Kamala orders…

Schools and Mental Health Crisis – Circle Groups Might Help

I didn’t hear it often, but when I did, it broke me a little: this giant of a middle schooler was crying, overcome with rage and worry. He had been acting out, as usual, earlier that day in a different class period. Juan, we’ll…

Great Reads: The Urge

In my Comp 2 classes, I have started letting my students select a reader and one of my classes picked a great one. (This originally evolved from an issue/worry with Florida’s Governor Ron Desantis’s new restrictions on classroom topics, but in the end, it…

Departures and Leaps

After teaching writing classes for more than 11 years with Dallas College, I have resigned from my full-time position to light out for other endeavors. It’s a family move, but I also love adventure and growing. At first, I wasn’t sure about Florida –…

Great Reads: In The Midst of Chaos, Calm

Want some thinking about how to find calmness in the middle of a chaotic day, week, month, summer, or life? (More about MY chaotic summer soon…) Try reading The Power of Now by Eckhart Tolle. I always feel a bit like a kid out…

April Fool’s Day Rules

Pranks and jokes are fun. They can lead people to laughter and high emotions. But there can be a right way to create the best pranks. For those who may not be aware, April Fool’s Day every April 1st is a tradition where people…

Of 2020, See What You Need to See

rainbow over sea

Horrible, Haarible I once knew a pastor, an amazing and life-changing gentleman, who occasionally showed his Boston roots with a hint of an accent. I will always remember the way he described the brutality of the civil war in El Salvador in the 1980s…

John Lewis is a Hero; John Lewis is My Hero

John Lewis smiling at his desk

Civil Rights leader and US Representative John Lewis recently passed away. People who do not think of John Lewis as a hero are missing something. Either they don’t know how tirelessly he fought for equality and justice, without throwing an insult or a punch….

Race: Voices that Matter, like Halstead’s and Hutcherson’s

People often ask me where to get started to learn more about race and the situation with institutional racism in the United States. These two articles are almost always discussed in my college writing classes for a number of reasons, but not because they…

Good Stories: Civility, even to the “Other”

In this political landscape where so many stories one could tell are traps for this side or that side, it’s refreshing to hear a positive story about politics. This week in Stafford, Virginia, a Muslim man who is running for congress got some hate…