facing a dilemma

[Laurie Cubbison <lcubbiso@RUNET.EDU>]

My trouble as a writing teacher in this situation is that the terrorist
attack presents both the best and worst possible topic in my curriculum.
I am teaching 102 this semester, with my curriculum focusing on
argument,  public discourse and one's own hometown. We are starting our
second major project of the semester, which involves the collection and
rhetorical analysis of editorials, columns, and letters to the editor on
a particular issue that appears in their hometown newspapers, which most
of them read online. Around half of my students' hometowns are in the DC
metropolitan area, and many of them had friends and relatives who work
at the pentagon. Many others are from the area surrounding the Norfolk
naval base. While last semester this project led to a wide variety of
topics for my students, this semester the terrorist attacks and the
resulting opinions about what to do dominate the Virginia newspapers.  I
decided to tell them that if they could find enough editorials on other
topics to make the project doable, they could use them, but frankly, at
the moment other topics are hard to find.

In short, I'm finding it very difficult not to use what is happening in
my class, given my already existing curriculum. I understand the reasons
people are giving for not asking students to write about what has
happened, and I agree with many of those reasons. So I feel caught in a
dilemma.

laurie

--
Laurie Cubbison
Assistant Professor Of English
Radford University