Beruflich Dokumente
Kultur Dokumente
AT CHICAGO
English Department (M/C 162)
Room 2027, University Hall
601 S. Morgan Street
Chicago, Illinois 60607-7120
I am pleased to write this letter highly recommending Danielle Bauman-Epstein for a teaching
position at your school. Danielle and I have known each other since the fall of 2016, when she
was a student in my graduate-level “Language and Literacy” seminar. She was also enrolled in
my “Methods of Teaching English” course in the fall of 2017. In the most recent semester
(spring, 2018), Danielle was among the student teachers who attended a weekly seminar that I
directed.
These attributes were already in evidence when Danielle took my “Language and Literacy”
seminar. Even in this group of very smart graduate students, Danielle’s work was exceptional in
terms of its quality and sophistication. She went beyond what I expected in the extent to which
she was able to grasp the complex relationships among the many issues that arise in
conversations about language teaching. For instance, in our discussions and weekly response
papers, Danielle delved into questions about how "literacy" might be defined and deployed to
promote democracy, how our current conditions of political economy have influenced schooling,
and the extent to which (or whether) reading and writing can play a role in ameliorating poverty
and other forms of injustice. Her final seminar paper, especially, demonstrated the agility of
Danielle's thinking. In this paper Danielle explored (and learned a great deal about) the complex
history of charter schools, paying particular attention to the ideological/conceptual dissonance
between charter schools' progressive "grassroots" origins and the "school choice" movement. As
this collective work suggests, Danielle sees connections among complex ideas that others often
miss, and she is able to articulate how analytical frameworks drawn from educational, political,
and cultural theory can be usefully applied to discussions about teaching and learning.
By now I hope it's clear that I have great respect for Danielle's abilities and accomplishments as a
teacher, even at this early stage in her career. To what I’ve already said, let me just add that
Danielle has an exceptional understanding of the literature and writing skills that make up the
"content knowledge" of the English language arts. Moreover, on a personal level, Danielle is
friendly, adaptable, funny, and eager to learn—all qualities of a great colleague. Again, I
recommend her enthusiastically and without hesitation, and I invite you to contact me if you
would like to discuss your application further.
Sincerely,
Todd DeStigter
Associate Professor of English Education
tdestig@uic.edu
773.391.4981 (mobile)