About+Me

About Me
My name is Jennifer Robertson, but most people call me Jenny. I was born in Ohio, and went to school just east of Cleveland near Lake Erie. After high school, I joined the Buckeyes at Ohio State in Columbus, OH, where I majored in English and Women's Studies. In the summer between my junior and senior years at OSU, I had the incredible opportunity to study abroad in Bath, England, living in 18th century buildings and listening to the Three Tenors sing at an outdoor concert on a hot July night. Of course, under these circumstances, I was powerless to resist the romance of Pavarotti and fireworks, and fell in love with the man who would later become my husband. Needless to say, best summer ever.

After I finished my dual degrees at OSU, I took a year to get my master's degree in London, England from Goldsmiths College. I focused my master's program in Cultural Studies on media representations of war, and issues of embodiment and visibility. My master's dissertation examined the different ways in which the media portrayed the war in Iraq and the public response to those representations, especially in online communities such as MySpace and Facebook. Living in England was one of the greatest experiences of my life, and I hope that one day I'll be able to go back. But for now, I'm more than happy to supplement my time in North Carolina with plenty of //Doctor Who// reruns and BBC America.

While I may not have taken the most direct route to teaching, I have long been a vocal advocate for progressive public education, due in some part to my family's rich teaching heritage and to my love of learning and reading. My father has taught at all grade levels as a music teacher and band director, and I have several relatives who are principals and teachers around the country. Education has always been a priority in my family, and I am proud to continue that legacy with my students as well.

More information about my teaching philosophy can be found here:

Some of the theories that inform my classroom, pedagogy, and choice of texts/learning materials:

@http://www.theory.org.uk/

Critical Pedagogy on the Web

Centre for Cultural Studies - Goldsmiths College

Gardner's Multiple Intelligences

Service Learning

Multicultural Classrooms