How one student balances triple majors with work and home commitments

Graham, Laura, \u2707

English

DigitalCommons@Linfield

Linfield Magazine Volume 2 Number 3 Winter 2006 Article 5 Winter 2006 Finding Balance in Her Life Laura Graham '07 Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalcommons.linfield.edu/linfield_magazine Recommended Citation Graham, Laura '07 (2006) "Finding Balance in Her Life," Linfield Magazine: Vol. 2 : No. 3 , Article 5. Available at: https://digitalcommons.linfield.edu/linfield_magazine/vol2/iss3/5 This article is brought to you for free via open access, courtesy of DigitalCommons@Linfield. For more information, please contact digitalcommons@linfield.edu. Student Profile4   -   L I N F I E L D  M A G A Z I N E W I N T E R  2 0 0 6 -   5Cultivating the restlessyet disciplined intellectWe all know and relish the stereotype: a fussy, agingprofessor with yellowing note cards from which hedelivers the same dreary lectures year after year. Whenthe note cards were first composed is a mystery.Wherethe yellowing comes from is not, for time has bypassedthis stereotypical professor. The only thing currentabout him is the mirth of his students.  Happily, in 11 years as dean reviewing and evaluat-ing the work of every faculty member at LinfieldCollege, I never encountered yellowing note cards.Linfield faculty members are always changing something:their selection of readings, their delivery of material,their use of information technology, their selection ofclass projects, their deployment of small group discus-sions, their laboratory assignments, their field trips andeven their course venues – visiting hospitals, factories,explorer clubs and exotic cities throughout the world.Faculty members arriving at Linfield today, in the21st century, face a greater challenge than that faced bytheir predecessors. At the normal age of hiring, they cancontemplate a teaching career of some 35 years. Yet thehalf-life of information compiled in their Ph.D. disser-tations is less than seven years. That is, half of what theytook such care in mastering and wielding into a dis-ciplined thesis will be superseded in seven years orfewer. Simultaneously, faculty members must tap intothe restless idealism and energy of each rising genera-tion of students. To maintain standing with their intel-lectual peers as well as their students, today’s facultymembers have no choice but to be restless themselves;they must continuously learn as much as ever they didin graduate school.  A faculty of the caliber of Linfield’s craves continu-ous learning and intellectual renewal, and the institutionstrives to provide the support that makes it possible.Each year the college provides funds for projects such asthat of a young faculty member in the Department ofMathematics. Prof. Charles Dunn will travel to Europethis summer to make contacts with mathematicians inBasel, Switzerland; Berlin, Germany; and St.Petersburg, Russia, in preparation for a January Termcourse centered on the renowned 18th century Swissmathematician Leonhard Euler. It will be the firstJanuary Term travel course that the mathematicsdepartment has offered.In another current example, Prof. Robert Gardner, anew member of the Department of Sociology andAnthropology, spent this January in New Orleans andvicinity as part of a study of the sociological effects of theforced migration of Gulf Coast residents in the wake ofHurricanes Katrina and Rita. This project will lay thegroundwork for continuing research and for a JanuaryTerm course that Prof. Gardner plans to teach on locationnext year.  Beyond that, he notes, “I will be able to inte-grate my research and field experiences into every classthat I teach and bring real-world experiences of disaster,stories of human suffering and conflict, and victories ofcommunity and solidarity directly to my students.”Unfortunately, there are many more applicationsfrom faculty for such activities than there are funds tosupport them. To narrow the funding gap, Linfield isengaged in an effort to secure grants and to build a $1million endowment that will support faculty develop-ment efforts of all kinds. In a complementary effort, thecollege has launched a program to assist faculty inobtaining outside grant funds for research, fellowshipsand other development projects.Yellowing note cards would be a far greater travestytoday than for our stereotypical professor of yesteryear.Without faculty restoration and renewal, students willsuffer.  This is why it has been truly said that “facultydevelopment is student development.” Most importantof all, faculty restoration and renewal are key to keepingthe college itself vibrant and youthful, even as itapproaches the venerable age of 150.– Marvin HenbergInterim PresidentMiranda Miller’slife is like a puzzle shefits together seamlesslyeach day. Miller ’06 dartsaround town andcampus in her redFord Focus, pausingonly to refuel at adrive-through coffeestand. She wears go-anywhere, no-non-sense slacks and abutton-down blouse,her shoulder-lengthchestnut hair tiedback in a ponytail.Waiting for a class to begin, she addresses envelopesto her peer advisees, then flips open her laptop to typea note. A reminder is scrawled on her hand in ink; shehas run out of room in her planner. From the time her alarm rings at 6 a.m. until shelogs off at midnight, Miller balances a 3.9 GPA in threemajors — elementary education, business and masscommunication — plus a part-time law office job, stu-dent teaching and more. On weekends she gets aheadon assignments between chores on her family’sTillamook dairy farm.Miller had planned to study agricultural marketingat Oregon State University. Her plans changed in2000, when she served as Oregon Dairy Princess,promoting  milk and the dairy industry throughoutthe state. Her responsibilities included speaking toschool children.“I loved working with kids, but I had never thoughtabout a teaching degree,” Miller said. Interacting withhundreds of children during her reign led her to con-sider a career in education.She applied to Linfield after meeting DaveHaugeberg, a McMinnville attorney and a LinfieldCollege trustee, at an agricultural event in McMinnvillewhere she spoke. “She was very articulate, persuasive and overall acharming young woman,” said Haugeberg, who gaveMiller a part-time job at his law office. “I thought tomyself, ‘She has to go to Linfield.’”Faculty in the Departments of Business, ElementaryEducation and Mass Communication have been instru-mental in helping Miller chart her future.“Miranda has a great focus and motivation to achievecertain academic goals at Linfield,” said Edward Gans,assistant professor of mass communication. “We have beenable to work with her to integrate her interests into thecurriculum and the classroom, and hopefully, to help herrealize her goals.”As secretary of Kappa Delta Phi educational honorsociety, a former producer of Wildcat Productions, a LinfieldColloquium peer adviser, a 4-H leader and a member of theLinfield Bowling Club, Miller seems to have more energythan a roomful of kindergarteners on a rainy day. But shecredits her success to organization and discipline.“By the fifth grade I had learned about the workethic, doing things right the first time and multitasking,”Miller said. She’s no grind, however: Miller has an annual passto Disneyland, visiting regularly with her parents andyounger sister.This fall, Miller taught in the third-grade class ofWendy (Levig) Autencio ’88 at Memorial ElementarySchool in McMinnville.“I see Miranda being so excited about teaching, andit inspires me,” Autencio said. “She brings a high energyto the classroom that works well with the kids.”Although she loves teaching, Miller has not ruledout a job promoting the dairy industry when she grad-uates in May. “The industry has given me so much,” shesaid. “It has shaped where I am and who I am today, andI would just like to give back.”– Laura Graham ’07Finding balance in her lifeMiranda Miller reads a story to a third-grade class at Memorial Elementary School,where she student-taught in the fall with Wendy (Levig) Autencio ’88.A View from MelroseMiranda Miller ’06 with Kiwi, her firstHolstein dairy cow.  

Finding Balance in Her Life

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Finding Balance in Her Life

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