Curriculum Guide for Teaching Community College English Teaching for Social Change
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Ruth Kiefson

This is one of my favorite pictures of me. It’s hanging on my refrigerator. But… it’s not how I look now.

This one is how I look now, showing off my henna hands at a wedding in India.

Welcome! I’m glad you found my site!

I work as an English professor at Roxbury Community College in the Boston area. Although I’ve taught many courses in the English Department, my calling is teaching Developmental Reading and Writing II, the course that prepares students for college-level English and their other college-level courses. On this website, you’ll find essays that reflect different aspects about what I’ve learned about the art of teaching this course in a community college. Also, you’ll find three complete curricula that are built around a core literary text.

Turning on young people to the world of ideas and a class analysis through reading and writing has been my life’s work. I see my students as comrades and have learned a lot through my experience about transcending the interpersonal barriers that professionalism erects. As you may have guessed, I’m also a life-long radical and activist.

I am married and I have four children and six grandchildren, all of whom have taught me to be tolerant, flexible, and compassionate.