To graduate from the reading specialist program, each one of us has to submit a masters project during the final spring of our coursework. Because I intend to finish in December of this year, my project is due this semester. In fact, it's due twelve days from now.
We were given a great deal of latitude as far as the specifics of our project. Everyone has to fill a certain number of pages (although a weary-looking Dr. Masullo told us she refused to read any more than 20) and cite a certain number of sources. Beyond that, we were given a list of suggestions and the instructions to clear any original ideas with Dr. Masullo before getting started. Projects are either accepted or not accepted - there are no grades given. This sounds scary, but we'll be given the opportunity to revise our projects if, heaven forbid, they're not up to snuff for graduation standards.
Dr. Masullo suggested early last semester, before we even really knew what she was talking about, that Jill and I collaborate on a masters project centered in some way around Heritage High School. This makes sense for a lot of reasons. Jill and I have both been dragging ourselves to Heritage twice a week, a bonding experience if there ever was one (although we usually don't go on the same days). We are required to submit some sort of report for the Zankel Fellowship near the end of the year, and while it doesn't need to anything formal, focusing our masters project on Heritage will preclude our having to do any additional work. I am almost always in favor of a course of action that involves this perk. In addition, if anyone pays attention to it our project could improve instruction at Heritage after we've submitted it to the principal. Even if no one at Heritage gives it a second glance, however, it's the sort of work that's going to look pretty good on a resume, and Dr. Masullo can hardly fail to mention such a practical, masterful application of our newly-acquired knowledge in any letters of recommendation she writes on our behalf. So all in all, it seemed like a pretty good idea.
The only problem with the proposal is that Courtney, my sidekick (if only in spirit sometimes when we're on different continents) and soulmate is the only person I've ever really worked well with. I can tolerate group work to an extent, but for major collaborative planning, it's Courtney or nothing. I like to do things my way. And Jill has proved to be...a challenge to work with. I came up with the idea for our project, reading comprehension, and then, after she failed to contribute any inspiration of her own, narrowed it down to the idea of focusing half the paper on comprehension in English/reading classrooms and half on comprehension across content areas like history and science. Later, I submitted our proposed outline to Dr. Masullo while Jill was in Boston with her boyfriend for the weekend. We split up the research end of it so that I was looking for English/reading articles and Jill took the content area portion, but after I'd found a promising stack of resourcnes, Jill said she was having trouble and so we switched and I took her section over and gave her what I'd found. At our last meeting, Jill (who is leaving for the Bahamas with her boyfriend tomorrow) threw up her hands and said that she had no idea what she was doing and that she would give me her written section and that I should transform it to my heart's content. Gracious.
Let me make it clear that I like Jill very much. She is not shirking her part of the paper or dropping the ball intentionally, she really just has no clue what she's doing. In many ways, I sort of feel sorry for her. I know it makes her feel guilty and uncomfortable that she's not pulling her weight. I also feel a little sorry for myself; this whole process would honestly be easier if I just did the whole thing, and I'm not really comfortable telling her what to do or criticizing her contributions. But it is what it is, and I'm going to just make the best of it and look forward to March 23rd, the day after we'll have submitted the damn thing.
As far as my end of it goes, I'm sort of embarrassed to admit that I'm really enjoying the process. I'm taking a study break at the moment. It's 2:00 in the morning and I'm alone in a study lounge (who studies during the first night of spring break?) very literally surrounded by articles and pages and pages of notes. I'm not tired in the least and although I keep telling myself to head upstairs and watch the Netflix DVD that arrived today, I can't really bring myself to stop reading, highlighting, organizing, synthesizing... So while staying home and working on a research paper for spring break isn't necessarily my idea of a good time, I have to say I'm not at all disappointed about the way things have fallen into place.
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