Dr. Elba Birmingham-Pokorny listens to a student question.
Dr. Elba Birmingham-Pokorny began her talk today by stating that she had been an honors student herself during her undergraduate days at Portland State University. It was "a life changing experience," she said. She began her presentation by asking students questions: Do any of you have parents or family members who teach? Why do they do it? What are their rewards?
She said the rewards of teaching were not monetary. Instead the rewards came from influencing others positively, helping others, and providing direction. She confessed that she had a passion for learning and that her job was a vocation, one that started early in her life. Her first students, she said, were her teddy bears. She would line them up in her room when she was still a girl and teach them. She has wanted to be a teacher ever since and had "no regrets."
Teaching in SAU's English and Foreign Language department is demanding for several reasons. One reason is that she and other faculty must teach 4 to 5 classes a semester and, usually, each class is different. Like other SAU instructors she must spend 8 to 10 hours a week in her office. She said she knows when she will arrive at school but never knows when she'll leave. Another reason is that her department requires a senior project, a kind of mini-thesis. This year she has two students working on senior projects.
Teaching is not her only duty. Like many SAU faculty, Birmingham-Pokorny sponsors clubs and the Spanish honor society, Sigma Delta Pi. Unlike most SAU faculty, however, she is very involved in Study Abroad. She argued that teaching Spanish required more than classroom work. Many SAU Spanish students travel to Guatemala thanks to her. Dr. Birmingham-Pokorny, too, benefited from traveling to a foreign destination, St. Paul, MN, when she was only 16 years old. She reported seeing her first American football game there on a chilly fall day.
Here at SAU, she has tried to provide cultural experiences for students including Foreign Language Week, the Hispanic Heritage Festival, and the Day of the Dead (Dia de los Muertos). She and her colleagues search for nearby extramural cultural opportunities such as concerts, exhibits, and museums. The recent influx of Mexicans to Magnolia has also yielded new opportunities for SAU students with many of them acting as interns at Magnolia's Calhoun Adult Education Center.
She discussed faculty members' committee work and scholarship. She willingly participates in committee work. Currently she is on the search committee to fill the job of chair of the English and Foreign Language department. But, she said she much preferred teaching and scholarship, her "greatest strengths." She said she was passionate about scholarly work. Since 1989, she has edited the journal Diaspora. She also started an international conference, the Annual Afro-Hispanic Literature and Culture Conference. This year that group will meet in Cartagena, Colombia in December.
Scholarship and publishing go hand in hand. She sees writing as a way to "renovate our knowledge." She claimed that she and her students are lifelong learners. As evidence she cited that she had learned to understand and appreciate rap music. Teachers, she said, have to keep up with the culture around them, otherwise they will lose contact with their students.
The last duty of a faculty member, she said, was to recruit new students. Spanish, unlike algebra, is not a required course at SAU. So, she and her colleagues must always be on the lookout for potential majors. Departments that become nonproductive, meaning that they graduate too few students, stand the chance of being terminated by the state. To counter that, her department is now offering new courses designed to teach Spanish to majors from other departments.
Dr. Birmingham-Pokorny's work is exemplary. She stands out among her peers because of her commitment to teaching, scholarship, and service.
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