Finally, at the tender age of nineteen I found the one teacher who changed the way I looked at my writing. After years of schooling in three different countries and two different school systems, I finally found the one teacher which made a difference in my life. It was the fourth country, second semester at college and my last required writing course where I found my savior: Professor Bair Van Dam. This might sound a bit odd, but anyone who has had her at The American University in Washington D.C., knows what I mean. The coldness that most people feel upon entering their first class of the semester, I did not encounter. The uncomfortable feeling of not knowing your neighbor in class, I did not encounter. The strictness and demanding ways of a college professor, I definitely encountered. It was her strictness and her constant plea for bettering yourself that I treasured. Being a student, whose first language is not English, always made it hard for me to feel secure about my writing and to feel as if I could write anything that would be worth reading. As the assignments started piling on, I never thought I could do it. How could anyone possibly write a five to seven page research paper within a week—including research time? How could anyone possibly revise five people’s five page papers at the same time as writing a ten page research paper? Professor Van Dam believed we could—and she was the only one for a good part of the first half of the semester. But never the less, the drafts started coming along and the revisions started coming along too! There were many times where I just felt that I could not do it. I would go to see her at office hours and she would be there for me in a strict but encouraging manner. In class she would stand up, hand us papers, write on the board, let us watch movies, have a discussion with all the students facing each other, and on occasion have us go outside in groups for a few minutes in order to discuss our ideas. She was able, in a very successful manner, to use many of the multiple intelligence factors. She was able to reach out to students who were linguistic learners because she had us work day in and day out with writing—demonstrating our writing talents. She also touched upon our interpersonal and intrapersonal intelligence. She made us learn how to talk to each other about our work and give good advice about a touchy topic. At the same time as the other people were telling us how we could improve our writing, we were learning how to read ourselves and our strengths and weaknesses in our writing. My whole life I had always had this difficulty at expressing myself and overcoming my lack of grammar classes. Never having had these classes, she realized my weaknesses and did not let me overlook them, but work on them. Instead of just telling me about my weaknesses in a side note on one of my papers, she decided to call me into her office and specifically tell me what I should work on. In order for her to make sure that I would work on these weaknesses, she printed out worksheets for me to work on. As my draft kept coming in she worked with me on these problems and soon enough she didn’t have to point my weaknesses out. As I would proofread my work, I started catching my mistakes. Until all hours of the night I would stay up just re reading all the drafts and making sure that I did not leave anything out or over look any of my reoccurring errors which I was infamous for. A semester and school year later, it is to her that I tip my hat and thank for the ability to write anything, even this short essay.
-- Jessica Bartolozzi, American University