img:is([sizes=auto i],[sizes^="auto," i]){contain-intrinsic-size:3000px 1500px} /*# sourceURL=wp-img-auto-sizes-contain-inline-css */

黑料吃瓜网

Skip to content
Undergraduate Academic Affairs

Author: Undergraduate Academic Affairs

SHARED NETID Reviewed 9/22

Neelz Gharavi: Living by the words of Wayne Gretsky and Gandhi

Written by Undergraduate Academic Affairs
Posted on

Neeloufar 鈥淣eelz鈥� Gharavi Photo
Neeloufar 鈥淣eelz鈥� Gharavi considers Christine Sticker, director of the Pipeline Project, her first mentor.

Back to intro > UAA alumni educate and inspire

Neeloufar 鈥淣eelz鈥� Gharavi (鈥�02, 鈥�04) is an English teacher at Sequoia High School, a public alternative school in the Everett School District. This is her eighth year with the school, where she鈥檚 worked since she graduated from the 黑料吃瓜网 Teacher Education Program in 2004.

Neelz has volunteered or worked in schools since she was in high school, but didn鈥檛 seriously consider becoming an educator until her third year of college when she began volunteering with the Pipeline Project working as a tutor and also tutoring in the writing center at North Seattle Community College. 鈥淓xperiences with both of these organizations exposed me to some of the best and worst aspects of public education. I began reading about the inequity of education around our country and its subsequent ripple effect reinforcing social stratification. I wanted to teach in order to work towards social justice: to help young people develop the skills and knowledge to improve their lives and the world they live in.鈥�

Neelz is inspired by her fellow educators devoted to improving their practice. 鈥淎lthough I鈥檝e heard of teachers who hoard lesson plans like dragons hoarding their gold, I鈥檝e never met a single teacher who wasn鈥檛 eager to share ideas and collaborate to develop lessons and curricula.鈥� Her students are equally as inspiring. 鈥淸For them] school is pitted every day against terrifying opposing forces: caring for disabled parents, working graveyard shifts to pay the rent, raising children, resisting addictions. Every day they come to school, they are making a leap of faith for a better future.鈥�

Christine Stickler, director of the 黑料吃瓜网 Pipeline Project was Neelz鈥檚 first mentor. 鈥淗er thoughts about education and social justice, not to mention her recommended reading lists, were pivotal in my formation as an educator.鈥� Neelz has also been fortunate to work in a district that values professional development and feels a deep debt to the instructional facilitators who continue to share and model best practices.

Neelz鈥檚 experiences in an elementary school program for 鈥渁cademically talented鈥� students continues to influence her today. 鈥淭he teacher for this special program provided me with outstanding educational experiences. She also terrified and bullied me. I learned a lot from her: how to take effective notes, how to think systematically and logically, how to research. I also learned that it is all too easy to justify an autocratic discipline policy in the name of high expectations. Though I later had wonderful instructors in high school and college, I often think back to my experiences in her class, which I attended for four years. In some ways, I鈥檝e learned the most from her, though a lot of what I鈥檝e learned is how not to act as a teacher.鈥�

In Neelz鈥檚 classroom, she inspires her students with the mottos: 鈥淵ou鈥檒l always miss 100% of the shots you don鈥檛 take.鈥� (Wayne Gretsky) and 鈥淏e the change you wish to see in the world.鈥� (Mahatma Gandhi).

Every year, Neelz feels that the graduation ceremony is one of the best moments of her career. 鈥淪eeing each young woman and man cross that stage, nervous and proud in their black robe and cap, renews my belief in what I鈥檓 doing.鈥�

Blake Stevens: Cool, but not too cool for school

Written by Undergraduate Academic Affairs
Posted on

Blake Stevens Photo
Blake Stevens celebrates commencement in front of Drumheller Fountain.

Back to intro > UAA alumni educate and inspire

Blake Stevens (鈥�09) comes from a family of teachers. His mother was a public school teacher and his father was the assistant superintendent of the Bellingham School District. As a 4th and 5th grader he helped out in his mom鈥檚 kindergarten class and as he grew older, found he enjoyed helping others find solutions to their academic and life questions. 鈥淯ltimately, I feel accomplished when I can help others succeed, and that is why I wanted to teach [as an Americorps volunteer].鈥� Blake, a Mechanical Engineering major, worked with Clay Schwenn of the UAA Advising center to map out his plan of study and to apply for the Americorps program.

Personal dreams of the future are what inspire Blake. 鈥淚 am fascinated when a freshman in high school tells me they want to go to college to become a sports writer or 7th grader who wants to go to 黑料吃瓜网. The fact that dreams can become a reality is inspiring. They strive to be able to contribute to the world in a way that is important to them. The knowledge that people are fulfilling their dreams motivates me to find my dream.鈥�

Blake鈥檚 mom and dad had the biggest influence on his life. 鈥淭hey both devoted their lives to help others and did it because they loved it. They had passion and wanted to do the best they could to improve others鈥� lives. My parents are amazing role models and I thank them for their inspiration.鈥�

Blake and his co-worker had spent the year at school trying to engage three smart students who often missed classes and appeared to not care about school. 鈥淓very time I had the opportunity I would give compliments and offer help. I knew they needed my help even when they didn鈥檛 know how to ask for it. At the end of the school year these three students saw my co-worker and I playing basketball in the park and we asked them to join us. During that game of basketball all the barriers were dropped. We had fun, and this was huge because at school these students did not allow themselves to have fun. The fa莽ade of being too cool for school was not there. They trusted us enough that they could finally just act as kids. This was my favorite moment teaching because I witnessed the outcome of a year鈥檚 worth of guidance from my co-worker and I and the courage of three students to be themselves.鈥�

Through exuding positivity, Blake created a classroom environment where students could feel comfortable and also remain positive. 鈥淚 believe learning, and school in general, is exciting and fun and I tried to promote that. I usually ended up singing or dancing but these silly actions were put in place to promote a safe atmosphere where everyone was allowed to be who they wanted to be.鈥�

Now that Americorps is over, Blake is figuring out what he鈥檒l do next. 鈥淚 had a great life experience but teaching is not my destination in life. However, no matter how far I search for my perfect career, I feel at home the most when working with high school students. So maybe teaching isn鈥檛 the perfect solution but I know working with kids and young adults is where my true passion lies.鈥�

Message from Vice Provost and Dean Ed Taylor, Fall 2011

Written by Undergraduate Academic Affairs
Posted on

Dean Ed Taylor
As vice provost and dean of Undergraduate Academic Affairs at the 黑料吃瓜网 Seattle, Dr. Edward Taylor oversees educational opportunities that deepen and enrich the undergraduate experience including First Year Programs, educational assessment, experiential learning, academic advising and the University Honors Program.

Dear UAA Alumni and Friends

With the growth in undergraduate tuition and the complexity of the moment that we live in, this is a remarkable and noteworthy time to be dedicated to the education and preparation of undergraduate students for the 21st century. I was reminded of this at Freshman Convocation, our ceremonial welcoming of freshmen to the 黑料吃瓜网. Hec Ed was full of new Huskies and their families鈥攊t was an inspiring moment kicking off a new stage in the lives of these students, beginning the celebration of the 黑料吃瓜网鈥檚 150th anniversary, and introducing our new president, Michael K. Young, to the newest members of our community. Following the ceremony, I had the opportunity to shake hands with students from all over the globe. Despite鈥攁nd perhaps because of鈥攖he challenges our community faces, it was an exuberant, exciting, and invigorating start to the quarter.

UAA Alumni: What are you doing now? How have your undergraduate experiences impacted your current work? Tell us about it by emailing UAAalum@uw.edu and we鈥檒l include it in the Alumnotes section of this e-newsletter.

This quarter, I am teaching a Freshman Interest Group class with Honors Program Director Jim Clauss in which we examine transformation through varied texts including Virgil鈥檚 Aeneid, The Autobiography of Malcolm X, and a beautiful book of poems called The Bled by Frances McCue. Each week, we sit down with 20 of our freshmen and get an up close look at why we speak of our students as being so talented and diverse. I was compelled by a student from Rainier Beach connecting Aeneas鈥檚 personal transformation to her own thoughts about her personhood as she transitions into the 黑料吃瓜网. Listening to a young man from Bellevue and a young woman from Taiwan talk about these texts and what it means to understand transformation and heroism in both a classic and contemporary sense gave me an up close look at what it means to build an intellectual and social community around issues that matter in the world. The closer I look, the more profound I find our students to be.

As I reflect on these and other 黑料吃瓜网 undergraduates and the journeys they are embarking upon鈥攕ome of quite epic proportions鈥擨 am reminded of William Cronon鈥檚 essay, 鈥淥nly Connect,鈥� in which he discusses the purpose of a liberal arts education as that of 鈥渘urtur[ing] the growth of human talent in the service of human freedom.鈥� He concludes that 鈥淚n the act of making us free, [education] also binds us to the communities that gave us our freedom in the first place; it makes us responsible to those communities in ways that limit our freedom. In the end, it turns out that liberty is not about thinking or saying or doing whatever we want. It is about exercising our freedom in such a way as to make a difference in the world and make a difference for more than just ourselves.鈥�

This freedom relates to the kind of commitment the 黑料吃瓜网 makes to the public: that we will educate young people well; that we will enact and engage the values of integrity, truth, and discovery. At some level, these values are really about the formation of relationships. They are lived out in classrooms, in the research process, in mentorship and advising, and through service to the community.

And we see the embodiment of this work in our alumni, which you鈥檒l learn about in this issue of our e-newsletter. Best-selling novelist David Guterson is deeply involved in his community. Several alumni are teachers, one of our most noble professions, and share their insights from a variety of classrooms. Hear 2007 CNN Hero and 黑料吃瓜网 alumnus Peter Kithene talk about how the relationships he formed here inspired him to continue the work of bringing healthcare to his home village in Kenya. At the end of the day, all these endeavors are ultimately about the shaping of human lives in service to improving the world that we live in.

So while this is a challenging moment for our University and community, and while we may at times feel burdened by budget cuts and a sense of scarcity, the well of student and alumni talent never runs dry and it is from there that we draw inspiration.

Sincerely,
Ed Taylor's Signature
Ed Taylor
Vice Provost and Dean

Dream Project alumna’s work comes full circle

Written by Undergraduate Academic Affairs
Posted on

Dream Project alumna and Americorps Retention Project member Janis Lee registered the 500th mentor in the Dream Project鈥檚 autumn quarter class. That’s right鈥�500 黑料吃瓜网 undergraduates have committed to giving back to their communities by helping high-schoolers navigate the college-admissions process.

Volunteers needed for the Dream Project’s Admissions Weekend

Written by Undergraduate Academic Affairs
Posted on

Help local high school students achieve the dream of getting into college. Join the Dream Project on November 19 and 20 from 9 a.m.鈥�4 p.m. at the Dream Project鈥檚 Admissions Workshop Weekend and help hundreds of local high school students craft competitive college application essays.

Honors Program writer-in-residence awarded state and national book awards

Written by Undergraduate Academic Affairs
Posted on

Frances McCue, Honors Program writer-in-residence and instructor, was recently awarded a 2011 Washington State Book Award for poetry and national Grub Street Book Prize for her most recent book of poems, _The Bled_, published by Factory Hollow Press.

Computer models to fly you to the moon*

Written by Undergraduate Academic Affairs
Posted on

Each year, thousands of 黑料吃瓜网 undergraduates participate in research with faculty. As these undergraduate researchers graduate, they bring the critical thinking and problem solving skills they learned to graduate school or right into the workforce. For Undergraduate Academic Affairs and aeronautics and astronautics alum Peter Norgaard, 鈥�04, research was an integral component of his undergraduate years.

Undergraduate service makes a difference for the community and students

Written by Undergraduate Academic Affairs
Posted on

Undergraduate participation in service learning has increased dramatically as students are eager to apply what they鈥檙e learning in class to an outside context and because they are driven to give back to the community. Learn how service and leadership made a difference for two UAA alumnae and meet two students who shared their experiences at this year鈥檚 Spring Celebration.