Course Syllabus

First Year Seminar: Latino Storytelling (FYSO:100 – 03)

Latinx Living Learning Community

Meier 106 | Wednesday and Friday 12:15 – 1:30 PM

 

Dr. Miguel Montalva Barba (He/Him/His)

Office: Meier 335E

Email: mmontalvabarba@salemstate.edu

Zoom ID: 426 736 0520

Office Phone: (978) 542-2521

 

 

Online Office Hours:

Tuesdays (Online) 10:00 am – 12:00 pm | Thursdays 10:00 am – 12:00 pm (online or in-person) | Or by appointment.

Course Content: In this Living Learning Community, students will have the opportunity to honor the contributions, achievements, and lived experiences of the Latinx people that impacted their life. Through stories, we share passions, fears, sadness, hardships, and joys, and we find meaning and purpose that help us understand ourselves better and find commonality with others. Stories convey the culture, history, and values that unite people. The professor will concentrate their efforts to help students develop critical and creative thinking skills essential to flourish in college while building community. This Living Learning Community (LLC) is reserved for students who identify as Hispanic/Latinx and live on campus.

 

FIRST-YEAR LEARNING COMMUNITY: This seminar is part of the Latinx LIVING-LEARNING community for Latinx students who will be living on campus. Stories convey the culture, history, and values that unite people. Through stories, we share passions, fears, sadness, hardships, and joys, and we find meaning and purpose that help us understand ourselves better and find commonality with others. In this seminar you will have the opportunity to honor the contributions, achievements, and lived experiences of a Latinx person that impacted your life. You will learn about StoryCorps, an independently funded nonprofit organization that has as its mission to preserve and share humanity’s stories to build connections between people and create a more just and compassionate world. Throughout the semester we will explore what makes these stories so powerful, will understand all the nuances involved, and using their free App, you will create your own StoryCorps production. This will not only be your final project for the class, but most importantly, your own contribution to history and society. Your story of inspiration will be archived in the Library of Congress and forever preserved. We do this to remind one another of our shared humanity, to strengthen and build the connections between people, to learn the value of listening, and to weave into the fabric of our culture the understanding that everyone’s story matters. At the same time, we are creating an invaluable archive for future generations.  

 

Course Description: This course will introduce students to the experience of academic exploration that is at the heart of a liberal arts education. Through study of one or more compelling questions or topics in a small seminar setting, students will practice creative and critical thinking and will learn to express themselves effectively and appropriately in a college setting. They will develop relationships and practices that allow them to effectively utilize college resources and become members of a community of learners. The specific topic of the seminar will be developed by individual faculty and will be announced in advance. First year seminars are required for the first-year students and transfer students with fewer than 15 credits.

 

 

First Year Seminar Course Goals:

1. The first year seminar (FYS) will actively encourage students to develop their own academic interests and learn how to pursue them through critical thinking about one or more compelling questions or issues.

 

2. The FYS will aid students in developing their ability to express themselves and their ideas effectively and appropriately in a college setting.

 

3. The FYS will help students begin to develop relationships and practices that will support their success in college.

 

First Year Seminar Instructional Objectives: Upon successful completion of the course, students will have:

 

1. practiced developing compelling questions based on their individual interests related to the course’s subject;
2. gathered evidence from relevant sources;
3. made clear their methods and assumptions;
4. supported a position using their sources;
5. participated in discussions of the course’s subject;
6. produced at least one product that showcases some aspect of their inquiry in the class through written, oral, or creative means;
7. developed an understanding of the value of drafting and revising ideas by presenting at least one draft and then a revised version of a product showcasing some aspect of their inquiry in the class;
8. become knowledgeable about various persons, opportunities, activities, offices and services that are available through the university and aid in student success (some examples may include the following: student services, MAP-Works, tutor services, campus-wide clubs and associations, Health Services, career services, and campus activities);
9. learned about the overall academic structure and opportunities in the SSU Core and the resources available to them (some examples include: advising, learning commons, academic resources such as the Writing Center or Math Lab);
10. demonstrated familiarity with the general purposes of liberal education (as framed by the “essential learning outcomes” identified by the American Association of Colleges and Universities LEAP outcomes) and the categories of the General Education curriculum at Salem State.

 

Required Texts:

• Luiselli, Valeria. Tell Me How it Ends: An Essay in 40 Questions. Coffee House Press. 
• Diaz, Jaquira. Ordinary Girls: A Memoir. Algonquin Books. 
• Priester, Thomas. Foundations of Academic Success: Words of Wisdom. Free online textbook (https://milnepublishing.geneseo.edu/foundations-of-academic-success/)
• Readings on Canvas

 

Materials:

• Composition Notebook

 

Attendance: Attendance will be taken at every class meeting. Attendance and participation are two different things. You can be present, while not participating.

 

Final Examination: There will not be a final examination, but we will have a final project.

 

Course Requirements:

Participation

• Film Assignments
• In-class participation
• Assignments

Community Building Interviews

Tell Me How It Ends

My College Experience Journal

StoryCorps

• Interview Questions
• Interview/Conversation
• Final Product

 

Grade Breakdown:

 

Participation 15%

Community Building Interviews 15% (Due on 9/27)

Tell Me How It Ends 15%

My College Experience Journal 15% (at least 15 entries)

StoryCorps 25 % ·      Interview Questions (20%) ·      Final Product (80%)

Ordinary Girls 15%

Total 100%

 

GRADING SCALE

A	100%	to 94.0%
A-	< 94.0%	to 90.0%
B+	< 90.0%	to 87.0%
B	< 87.0%	to 84.0%
B-	< 84.0%	to 80.0%
C+	< 80.0%	to 77.0%
C	< 77.0%	to 74.0%
C-	< 74.0%	to 70.0%
D+	< 70.0%	to 67.0%
D	< 67.0%	to 64.0%
D-	< 64.0%	to 61.0%
F	< 61.0%	to 0.0%

 

 

Late Work: I do accept late work. If you are having an emergency or difficulties with submitting a particular assignment, email me before it is due.

 

CLASS POLICIES / RULES

• Attendance is mandatory. I will take attendance every class time. On your third absence, your final grade will be lowered half a letter grade, and on your sixth absence, you will fail the course.
• Perpetual lateness will impact your participation grade. (3 late arrivals = 1 absence).
• Class participation is required.
• TURN OFF/SILENCE ALL CELL PHONES, when in class.
• No Laptops or Tablets are allowed in in-person class.
• You may not record me at any point. I do not consent. 
• Discussions are part of course, and everyone is required to participate; I will not tolerate any student that does not respect their classmates, classroom, guest lecturers, or the professor. I expect students to behave and express their ideas respectfully and thoughtfully.
• Plagiarism will not be accepted in this class. If a student is caught plagiarizing, no credit will be given for that assignment. On your second plagiarism offense, you will fail the course. We will follow university procedures on plagiarism.
• Late assignments will not be accepted.

ACADEMIC INTEGRITY: Salem State University assumes that all students come to the University with serious educational intent and expects them to be mature, responsible individuals who will exhibit high standards of honesty and personal conduct in their academic life. All members of the Salem State University academic community have a responsibility to ensure that scholastic honesty and academic integrity are safeguarded and maintained. Cheating and plagiarism are unfair, demoralizing, and demeaning to all of us. Cheating, plagiarism, and collusion in dishonest activities are serious acts that erode the University’s educational role and cheapen and diminish the learning experience not only for the perpetrators but also for the entire community. It is expected that Salem State University students will understand and subscribe to the ideal of academic integrity and that they will be willing to bear individual responsibility for their work. Materials (written or otherwise) submitted to fulfill academic requirements must represent a student’s efforts.

ACADEMIC DISHONESTY POLICY: The fundamental purpose of this policy is to emphasize that any act of academic dishonesty attempted by any Salem State University student is unacceptable and will not be tolerated. Charges of academic dishonesty are reviewed through a process that allows for student learning and impartial review. Performing, aiding or inciting any of the actions listed below, in courses or other situations involving academic credit, constitutes an offense subject to disciplinary action.

TYPES OF ACADEMIC DISHONESTY: Cheating is the intentional use or attempted use of deceit, trickery, artifice, fraud, and/or violation of rules and/or misrepresentation of one’s academic work in any academic exercise, regardless of the delivery method of the course.

The methods of cheating are varied and well-known, and include but are not limited to the following:

• Copying from others during an examination.
• Sharing answers for a take-home examination.
• Using notes or other resources not authorized by the instructor.
• Taking an examination for another student.
• Tampering with an examination after it has been corrected, then returning it for more credit than deserved.
• Submitting substantial portions of the same academic work for credit in more than one course, without consulting the second instructor (and the first instructor if the courses are concurrent at Salem State University).
• Allowing others to do the research and writing of an assigned paper (for example, using the services of an online paper service).
• Falsifying data or results from research or fieldwork.
• Obtaining the answers to, or a copy of, an examination prior to its administration.
• Submitting a purchased or downloaded paper or other works written by another person, including those obtained through an online paper service.

PLAGIARISM: Plagiarism is academic theft. It refers to the use of another’s ideas or words without proper attribution or credit. An author’s work is his/her property and should be respected by documentation. However, academic integrity requires that unsigned material must also be identified (for example, anonymous articles or web pages). Credit must be given in the following situations:

• For every direct quotation of any length.
• When work is paraphrased or summarized in whole or in part in your own words.
• For any information which is not common knowledge. (“Common knowledge” is defined as information that appears substantially the same in several general sources such as textbooks or encyclopedias.)
• For any material borrowed from another source, whether in print or electronic form (for instance, graphs, images, videos, diagrams, tables, and datasets).
• Plagiarism includes but is not limited to:
• Copying word for word from a source (printed, electronic, or oral) without properly citing or crediting the source.
• Paraphrasing without proper attribution.
• Submitting the same assignment to one or more courses
• Failing to properly cite or credit sources, whether the material is a direct quotation, paraphrase, or summary.
• Failing to identify direct quotations using quotation marks.
• Failing to acknowledge and properly cite information obtained through printed, electronic, or oral sources.
• Incorporating into one’s own work graphs, tables, drawings, photographs, diagrams, and other non-textual material from other sources without proper attribution.

Administrative Grades: In addition to the academic grades listed previously, two grades may be assigned administratively, W (Withdrawal) and F (Administrative F) grades are used in connection with the withdrawal from courses (see Withdrawal from Courses), The W grade carries no grade-point value, whereas the F* grade carries a point value of 0 and is used in exactly the same way as an academic F grade in calculating the grade-point average,

Change of Grade: Once a course grade (other than incomplete) has been assigned, it can be changed only by the instructor who originally assigned it, a change will be made only when the instructor considers it justified by the student's performance in the appropriate coursework.

If a student disagrees with a course grade assigned by the instructor, the student may request that the instructor re-evaluate the assigned course grade. However, a re-valuation of a grade does not ensure a grade mark-up. This request must be made within 4 months of the final day of the semester in which the original course grade was issued. The student must make the request directly to the instructor, in the form of an email, letter, or other time-stamped and retrievable communication. The instructor will change the grade only if the instructor considers it justified by the student's performance in the appropriate coursework. In such a case, the instructor must submit a grade change no later than one year following the closing day of the semester in which the original grade was issued.

After contacting and communicating with the instructor the student may opt to pursue the following mediation process, but only under the following circumstances;

1. The student has evidence that the course grade resulted from an incorrect or improper application of the Course Information Policy as demonstrated by the course syllabus
2. The student has evidence that his or her resulting score on a graded, objective exercise contributing toward the calculation of the final grade (as outlined in the course syllabus) was incorrectly calculated or that the calculation of the final grade (as outlined in the course syllabus) was incorrectly done
3. The student has evidence that the instructor has evaluated his or her work with prejudice or in an arbitrary, capricious manner

The student may pursue the mediation process only after first requesting (within four months of the final day of the semester in which the grade was issued) the instructor re-evaluates the assigned course grade and after receiving a reply from the instructor or if the instructor does not reply to the request within 4 weeks. After the student sends that request, after the Instructor replies (or does not reply for 4 weeks or more) the student may request mediation if he or she believes that one or more of the above three circumstances apply. In order to request mediation, the student must make the request for mediation in the form of an email, letter, or other time-stamped and retrievable communication to the chairperson of the department in which the course was taught. The student must in the request for mediation invoke one or more of the three circumstances listed here and include a copy of the original written request to the instructor for re-evaluation of the assigned course grade, The student must make the request for mediation within 4 weeks of receiving a response from the instructor to the original request to re-evaluate or—in the event that the instructor did not reply to that original request to re-evaluate, within 8 weeks of the original request to re-evaluate. At the chairperson's discretion, the mediation may occur or be referred back to the instructor. If mediation occurs, the outcome is not binding, because the original grade can only be changed by the instructor who originally assigned the grade.

Exceptions to the fore-mentioned timelines and procedures will be permitted only when there are clear and compelling extenuating circumstances, such as, but not limited to, military deployment of student or instructor; or, the death or sustained unavailability of the Instructor. In such instances, the Department Chairperson and Dean will collaborate on a means for resolution of the student request. Upon resolution of the grade change request, the Department Chairperson will file the correct forms with the Registrar's Office.

 

Disability Accommodation Letter: Disability Services (DS) is charged with the responsibility of determining accommodations for students with disabilities. Please contact that office NOW if you need to request accommodations. You are expected to discuss arrangements for accommodations (and provide a letter of determination from DS) me at least two weeks before the accommodation is needed, e.g., two weeks before an examination.

Salem State University is committed to non-discrimination of handicapped persons as specified in Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973. Students who qualify as handicapped under this section of this Act should notify the instructor at the beginning of the course so that reasonable modifications may be made when necessary.

 

Academic Policies: All students are expected to be familiar with the academic regulations, including those regarding Academic Integrity, for Salem State University as published in the college catalog. In addition, each student is responsible for completing all course requirements and for keeping up with all that goes on in the course (whether or not the student is present).

Salem State University is committed to providing equal access to the educational experience for all students in compliance with Section 504 of The Rehabilitation Act and The Americans with Disabilities Act and to providing all reasonable academic accommodations, aids and adjustments. Any student who has a documented disability requiring an accommodation, aid or adjustment should speak with the instructor immediately. Students with Disabilities who have not previously done so should provide documentation to and schedule an appointment with the Office for Students with Disabilities and obtain appropriate services.

In the event of a university declared a critical emergency, Salem State University reserves the right to alter this course plan. Students should refer to salemstate.edu for further information and updates. The course attendance policy stays in effect until there is a university declared critical emergency. In the event of an emergency, please refer to the alternative educational plans for this course located at/in Canvas. Students should review the plans and gather all required materials before an emergency is declared.

 

Covid-19 Pandemic Statement: Students must comply with the Covid-19 Health and Safety Protocols for the 2020-2021 Academic Year. This includes wearing masks in class and on campus in public spaces, practicing physical distancing where possible, including in-class, engaging in a daily symptom check, notifying Counseling and Health Services at 978-542-6413 if they have any symptoms associated with COVID-19, and not coming to campus or to an in-person class if they have any of the symptoms related to COVID-19 until cleared by the Student Life Wellness Area. Students who have documented disabilities that may prevent them from complying with these policies are required to contact the Disability Services office.

 

Assignment Descriptions

 

Course Schedule (Reading and Meeting Schedule)

This schedule may change depending on course progress and or at the instructor’s discretion.

 

 

Date	Reading Due	Assignments Due
9/03
9/08	Lopez, Alan Pelaez. The X in Latin is a Wound, Not a Trend. (https://www.colorbloq.org/article/the-x-in-latinx-is-a-wound-not-a-trend)
9/10	Rodriguez. Go North, Young Man. (Canvas)
9/15	Schalet, Amy. Interviews and Telling a Good Story. (Canvas)
9/17	Activity – Community Meal | T-Shirt Vote	Journal Check
9/22	The Student Experience (Priester) Practice, Practice, Practice (Priester)
9/24	Negrón-Muntaner, Frances. Celia’s Shoes. (Canvas)
9/27		Community Int. Due @ 10:00 PM
9/29	Why So Many Questions? (Priester)
10/01	These are the Best Years of Your Life (Priester) With a little help from my friends (Priester)
10/06	Check-in	Journal Check
10/08	Diaz, Jaquira. Ordinary Girls. Girl Hood & Part 1
10/13	Diaz, Jaquira. Ordinary Girls. Part 2
10/15	Activity – (Speaker) Presentation
10/20	Diaz, Jaquira. Ordinary Girls. Part 3
10/22	Diaz, Jaquira. Ordinary Girls. Part 4	Journal Check
10/25
10/27	No Class
10/29	Viva
11/03	Yosimar Reyes – Selections
11/05	http://yosimarreyes.com/poetry (Read both poems - My Revolutionary and Pride)	Journal Check in Class Attend Online Event in the Evening
11/10	http://yosimarreyes.com/writing (Read both short narratives - Summer and Spirit and Nation)
11/12	Great Questions (https://storycorps.org/participate/great-questions)
11/17	Tips for A Great Conversation	Interview Questions @ 10:00 PM
11/19	Activity – Group Activity
11/22	Luiseli, Valeria. Tell Me How It Ends.
11/24	No Class | Reading Day
12/01	Luiseli. Valeria. Tell Me How It Ends.
12/03	Luiseli. Valeria. Tell Me How It Ends.
12/08	StoryCorps
12/10	StoryCorps Share	Journals Due – In-Class StoryCorps Due @ 10:00 pm
12/14	Reading day
	Finals Week