TC Today - Teachers College Columbia University

The ETHNOGRAPHER
Linking Appalachia and Academia
Inspired by Maxine Greene, Gail Russell is pursuing an academic career
while staying true to her roots
In sixth grade, Gail Russell decided she wanted to be
a teacher. It was a lofty goal for a girl growing up in
Ronda, North Carolina—a town so small, it lacked a
traffic light—and whose parents didn’t graduate from high
school. But education was always fiercely important to
Russell, and her parents were supportive. She received her
bachelor’s degree from Appalachian State University (where
she was granted a teaching fellowship) and taught high
school English for seven years in the Appalachian region.
But there is education and then there is academia—and
when Russell began a doctoral program at UNC Greensboro
and then transferred to TC in the fall of 2010, her parents
had mixed feelings.
“Because of my roots, there’s a tension for me in moving
towards the academic discourse and becoming a scholar,”
says Russell.
Russell first became interested in TC as an undergraduate
at Appalachian State after she read Dialectic of Freedom by
Maxine Greene, TC’s great philosopher. Greene’s educational
ideals inspired her to pursue the world of academia—in part
because those ideas are so much about everyday life.
“It gave me the emotional support that I needed to do my
work. I realized that I didn’t have to choose between ‘becoming
an intellectual’ and being a daughter to my family.”
People who grow up in an
educated discourse take for
granted a lot of the things that
were harder for students who
are coming in from any kind of
outsider perspective.
Indeed Russell is proud of her parents, whose work ethic
she credits for inspiring her to create her own education
consulting company, Education Success Unlimited LLC. As
a consultant, Russell draws on her experience as a teacher
and uses ethnography skills to devise content-based literacy
practices. Her mission statement is that “every student
can succeed in formal school contexts.”
“People who grow up in an educated discourse take for
granted a lot of the things that were harder for students who
are coming in from any kind of outsider perspective,” says
Russell, “And I was definitely an outsider.”
Russell is currently pursuing a Ph.D. in English Education,
and this past fall she took Greene’s course, “Education and
the Aesthetic Experience,” which she describes as a dream
come true. Like Greene, Russell has a passion for art, and
views it as the first medium that gave her access to the
world of ideas. She began regularly meeting with Greene,
and they have developed a close relationship outside of
the classroom.
Russell is now involved in an effort to commission a statue
of Greene to be installed on TC’s campus. She would like
the initiative to be student-led and feels confident that
fund-raising for it will be an easy task, given Greene’s
stature at TC.
“I feel a responsibility to recognize her work, if for no
other reason than the fact we don’t have any other women
sculpted here at TC,” says Russell. “Maxine talks about not
wanting to be an icon, but she is an icon. I need Maxine to be
my icon so that I can do my work.”
— Penina Braffman
26 T C T O D A Y l s p r i n g 2 0 1 1
photograph by Deirdre Reznik