by Jill M. Klefstad Ed.D. - Program Director, Early Childhood Education

 

Remember how you suggested that I document our progress in the Men’s group? Well, over spring break I ended up writing a little bit about this process. It is from my perspective.

We also had Aric Bieganek from MacPhail Center for Music in Minneapolis come to our meeting last night and he shared his top five reasons it is cool to be a male educator in the world of ECE. It was informative and wonderful for our men. He also showed how music can be integrated in ECE and one of the male students confessed that after my class last semester he bought a guitar at Goodwill with just three strings! But Joe is really excited to buy new strings and start playing. Aric certainly did wonders for him as he encouraged him to pursue that passion.

Also, four of the guys traveled to LaCrosse to the Leadership conference to share how they began the student organization for M.E.N. on campus. Looking forward to that leadership opportunity for them. I have attached a picture of the three men who presented, “How Student Organizations can Support and Retain Students” at the Student Development Conference at UW-LaCrosse yesterday. I don’t think that I could have been more proud of these young men. They wore their t-shirts and spoke about their experiences of being a man in a woman’s profession as well as the advantages of belonging to a group who supports them as educators.

And finally, our t-shirts came this week which supports our group. I have attached a photo of last night’s meeting and the t-shirts as well as my reflective article.

As always, I respect and appreciate your time.