The Teacher as Social Activist

Teaching English, says Shirley Rausher, is about literature and composition. But, first and foremost, it is about community service.

Rausher has taught English since before many of her students were born -- for the past 16 years as an adjunct assistant professor at BMCC and, for several years prior to that. as a full-time faculty member at Brooklyn College and Kingsborough Community College. Throughout her academic career, she has actively taken part in a broad range of social causes -- from civil rights and anti-Vietnam War demonstrations in the 1960s to last November's Annapolis Peace Summit, which attempted to lay the groundwork for peace in the Middle East and drew representatives from more than 50 nations.

"A wonderful challenge"
"As I see it, community service is part and parcel of being a faculty member -- especially at a college like BMCC," she says. "This is the kind of student body I find most satisfying to work with -- diverse, multicultural, multilingual, and multi-age. Many of the students here have been underserved by earlier undergraduate experiences and are more intent on succeeding than their counterparts at other schools. All told, they pose a wonderful challenge for me." Rausher's activist inclinations also find expression in her participation in many BMCC committees "because I believe that governance is critically important and that even adjunct faculty should have a role in it."

In the classroom, Rausher encourages her students to bring a modern -- and global -- sensibility to their study of the classics, including the plays of Shakespeare and Ibsen. But her reading list also includes outstanding contemporary works, such as The Kite Runner, a coming-of-age story set in present-day Afghanistan. "It's not surprising that the students were especially turned on by The Kite Runner, which is so relevant to what's happening in the world today," she says. In the process of teaching and interacting with her students, she adds, "I know that I learn from them. I hope they learn something from me."

To be sure, Rausher adds, "our freedoms are being challenged today in ways similar to what we saw during the Vietnam War era. And we are seeing the effects of some misplaced values -- especially with regard to dealing with terrorism as it were a specific geographic entity with defined borders."

The quest for peace
These days, Rausher's main area of interest is the Middle East. "There were those who were dismissive of efforts to bring all the relevant parties together in Annapolis last year," she says. "The criticism I've heard is that this sort of thing has been tried before and it won't work. My view is that we don't have to be sure it will work -- we just have to try to make it work. The effort itself has value."

Having been born and raised in Canada "enables me to view American culture, trends and institutions with a certain objectivity," Rausher says. "Actually, I always felt that all of us our citizens of the world -- not just of our home countries -- but that has never been more true than today."

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