Valkyira Chronicles Paper

In October, I will be speaking at Rowan University at the "Alternate Worlds" conference. My paper will be about Valkyria Chronicles. Here is my proposal:

Valkyria Chronicles is a Playstation game released in 2008, and reissued in a remastered edition in 2016, by Sega. The game chronicles Squad 7, a militia in an alternative version of World War II Europe, as they fight back after their neutral, but resource heavy, country is under siege from both outside and within. Squad 7, “peasants and barbarians,” as an enemy calls them, is led by Welkin, a nature loving school teacher and his half sister Isara. Isara is a Darcsen, a group of people blamed for calamities in the world and discriminated against both by society and members of Squad 7 itself.

Valkyria Chronicles uses the tropes of World War II films, modern anime, and post 9-11 anxieties about dwindling resources and The Other to create a narrative that explores how we fight war, what we believe, and how ingrained prejudice is difficult to overcome. Each member of Squad 7 has “potentials” which randomly activate during battles. Some members are pacifists, who will occasionally refuse to fight. Some members are so prejudiced against Darcsen that they will trigger a “Darcsen Hater” potential that lowers their statistics when near Darcsen.

The game's plot explores these issues by combing war film tropes with the conventions of anime to create a narrative that reimagines the past while also examining our current world and the issues that modern life struggles with each day on the homefront and battlefield. Cut scenes explore these issues and examine a world fighting over limited resources, thousands year old prejudices, and both military and civilian life.

Valkyria Chronicles is critically acclaimed and received a remastered re-release in 2016. As Nadia Oxford argues in “I Can't Believe They're Not Jews! Valkyria Chronicles And Respectful Representation,” the game “pinpoint(s) Jewish culture, its history, and its struggles in a way that’s respectful, emotional, and non-cloying.” The game engages the past and brings it forward to the present to examine the modern world. Valkyria Chronicles is worth further examination.

My colleague Chris Gazzara will also be giving a paper at this conference. When the paper is drafted, I am going to create a podcast version for Giraffe Feels as well.

THATCamp Philadelphia: THATCamp Tips (Session Proposers/Moderators=William Patrick Wend/Chris Gazzara)

Chris and I proposed this session to discuss ways to move forward with THATCamp Community College. As you can see, session attendees had plenty of useful ideas.

  • Give some kind of credit to students for attending.

  • Can THATCamp be a part of career reorientation?

  • Budget planning needs to happen early.

  • What about service learning?

  • How about workshops for basics of retraining...Wikipedia, Wordpress, Google Drive, etc

  • “Six tools in an hour” workshop suggested.

  • Could there be connections made to career services in that regard too?

  • What can someone take from a workshop that can be immediately implemented in the classroom?

  • Could there be THATCamp sessions on project management?

  • A suggestion to put up a history of your THATCamp. We can definitely do that.

  • What about sponsorship?

  • Potential for some synchronization with our undergraduate research program here at RCBC and THATCamp.

  • What criteria is required for a workshop to “count” for something?

  • Workshops for students on how to use phones for notes/annotation? Active learning note taking strategies.

  • Possible workshop on whether _____ is useful in the classroom. Let attendees keep a scorecard.

  • A 30 minute summation workshop on previously done topics from our Center For Learning & Instruction.

THATCamp Community College 2015 Notes

Here are my notes from the day. We had a small group for THATCampCC, so instead of sessions we had a longer conversation where we bounced around discussing the proposals campers had made in the morning. We did something like that last year as well and I believe this might be something we continue in the future.

  • We began by discussing doing peer review outside the classroom.
    • Can we do meaningful peer review outside the classroom?
    • Building student bonds outside of class.
    • Students need to learn good criticism skills to be better peer reviewers.
    • Chris Gazzara suggested having students review a paper like they would a film or book.
    • Collaborate is a Blackboard tool for peer review.
    • VoiceThread is an app for leaving comments.
    • SHOULD statements important during peer review.
  • We then discussed prior formative non-stressful learning assessments.
    • Differences between scaffolding and expectations.
    • Can visuals help with assessing prior knowledge?
    • How women use Instagram to bypass the male gaze and invent safe spaces to present themselves.
    • How information literacy is taught at different schools in the room.
    • I discussed cutting down on secondary source requirements.
  • We then discussed annotating silent films, which led to a wide ranging discussion.

ThatCamp Community College: An Overview

Here I am setting up in the morning. Picture by Gina Yanuzzi.

Here I am setting up in the morning. Picture by Gina Yanuzzi.

My co-coordinators Chris Gazarra and Gina Yanuzzi did a lot of work the morning of the unconference getting everything set up as I riffed ideas from previous ThatCamps at them. Gina drew this to give directions to those who were coming in.

My co-coordinators Chris Gazarra and Gina Yanuzzi did a lot of work the morning of the unconference getting everything set up as I riffed ideas from previous ThatCamps at them. Gina drew this to give directions to those who were coming in.

After nearly a year of planning, the first ever ThatCamp Community College took place in the spring on our Mt Laurel campus here at BCC. We had a small group of about 10-12 at various times in the day (including a number of cancellations and no shows too), which led to very dense and productive sessions in the morning and then a rapid fire session to discuss proposed topics that did not receive enough votes.

Our morning sessions were about the key technological needs of community college students and how technology effects the form and logic of composition papers. I was so happy that our Dean in Liberal Arts, Nichole Bennett-Bealer, was able to sit in during the morning sessions for a bit.

After lunch we had one more session to discuss in rapid fire fashion some of the other session ideas that had been proposed in the morning. It was a small group, and mostly English and Literature faculty, so we could go into a detailed and deeper discussion.

I was so happy that our intern president David Spang was able to drop by for a little bit as well during the afternoon session. Dr. Spang has been extremely supportive since our first meeting back in August and I am grateful for his support and leadership here at BCC.

We will have information about next year's ThatCamp Community College later in the summer or early in the fall.