Betsy Dennis (Frank)

Mr Burnett and a tutor my mother hired the summer before I had Mr. Burnett's class taught me how to write. I still remember a paper that I wrote in which I received a C+. I didn't put a period at end of citation in references list. I have never forgotten that and as a result I am a stickler on format. I have published articles, book chapters, and a book. I am retired college professor and still teaching one course. One thing my students say is that I am tough, but fair. My teaching evaluations are always excellent. One can be a caring teacher and have high standards. Almost signed this post as if I was doing a Discussion Board for my students. :). 

Gary D Hermann

Betsy:   Nice to hear that some colleges still have standards, but a lot don't, with grade inflation the norm.  

Mr. Burnett helped me a great deal as well.  He was well-known for his standards.    I recall that, on his first day, Mr. Burnett passed out his "rules" and said that, if you violated even one of them, you would receive an F.  When he returned everyone's first graded assignment, nearly everyone received an F, which I found hilarious because we had a bunch of people in the class who were National Merit Finalists and Semi-Finalists and probably hadn't received anything less than a B in their life. .I remember that several of my classmates cried when they received their grades.   Needless-to-say, Mr. Burnett knew how to grab their attention!   He was one of my most important teachers and certainly helped me lay the groundwork for success in college and law school (and I'm sure that I started out as one of his worst students).

Lesley Dormen

Apropos (ish) of this fascinating discussion, I recommend Celeste Ng's new novel, Little Fires Everywhere, set in Shaker Heights, where she grew up.

She was interviewed this morning by Scott Simon on NPR.  

Betsy Dennis (Frank)

I just pre-ordered from Amazon!

Joseph G Blake

Mr Burnett again. God bless him. A while back we probably rediscovered most of them.

I was once congratulated on how well I wrote a simple sentence. I gave all the credit to him.

Now remember no passive voice, do not use very and do not begin a sentence with I which I have violated twice here.

Betsy Dennis (Frank)

My dissertation advisor reinforced no passive voice. 

Dana Shepard (Treister)

I can share this anecdotal insight into my/our SHHS (AP) English training:  I was always a "B" student at Shaker, albeit a National Merit finalist...  During my first 3 gloriously intellectually stimulating years at Washington University, I still was stuck in that B/3 category. 

After Michael and I married at the end of my junior year and moved to Chicago, I transferred to Loyola (either U of C or Northwestern would have required me to do 2 more years in order to graduate - 5 YEARS total - who ever heard of such nonsense in the 1960s?!)  Loyola -not a bad school, and walking distance from our first Chicago apt -- would allow me to graduate after one year there, accepting all my Wash U credits.  The only hitch was that Loyola, a Jesuit institution, also required 15 hrs of Philosophy - a discipline which was incomprehensible to me...

Amazingly EVEN to me, after one summer and one academic year at Loyola - newly-married, living in a strange city with no family or friends nearby, taking mostly subjects of little or no interest to me -- my ENTIRE 4-yr GPA went UP significantly!  Why?  BECAUSE I could WRITE (aka "bluff") so effectively, thanks to what I learned at Shaker, and further honed at Wash U.

Neil T Glazer

Posted on the chalk board: Mr. Burnett's rules for writing!

1. You can not use the word "I" more than once. 

2. No "ly" words.

3. You can not use the word "was".

4. No trite expressions. "Gee Whiz" "Golly" "That was great".

5. No foreign expressions (ie) "quid pro quo".

6. All words spelled correctly.

First assignment, a three paragraph description of your summer vacation. 

How many of us earned an "A" first time around. My bet is.....none of us....but as the year went on we became better writers thanks to a teacher with high standards and a master at his craft.

Paige Fields (Hoebel)

The book is on pre-order from iBooks.  Supposed to be released on 9/12/17.  Thanks for the recommendation!

Betsy Dennis (Frank)

Amazon has it also. 

Gary D Hermann

Neil:   Thanks for posting Mr. Burnett's rules.    After re-reading them, it is clear to me that some of those rules are not absolute.  Otherwise, most lawyers wouldn't be able to write law briefs or publlish articles in law journals, since latin words like quid pro quo, res ipsa loquitur, etc. have to be used in certain situations.     Also, though a lot of his rules are good to follow generally, I'm not sure how, as a practical matter, it is possible not to use the word "was" or words ending in "ly", even though it does make sense to limit the use of those.     And, of course, there are some situations, including writing messages like this one, where it is pretty hard to avoid using the word "I" more than once.   

Also, didn't he have a rule limiting (or prohibiting) the use of the word "it" to start a sentence?

Joseph G Blake

Neil 

Thanks much for the summary and I would add no passive voice. "Mary made the cake" always sounds better than" the cake was made by Mary."  Simple and easy to understand.

NOTICE. My presenation for Cleveland on Sunday 9/24 about the development of Shaker Heights is nearly complete. Some of you cannot be there for various good reason including an inability to be two places at the same time. 

Some have asked me to send it to them. The format I have is all in powerpint- mostly pictutres and key points. There will be 90 plus slides. Not to scare you, most of them will have additional commments in the notes section of the slide which can be read as you progress. Many of the slides will discuss how certain architects shaped Shaker Heights and influence or carried the aesthtic standards that prevailed in the era before WW2. There will also be comments about the houses and in some instances the family that lived there. 

I want to say you will not be disappoined.

If you want me to email the presentation to you for your private perusal, I will. Please let me know what your email is because I do not think I can post it here or attach it to your email on here. 

We are hoping it will be filmed and then posted on line in due course for a wider audience. That is planned but not a certainty until it happens.

Thanks

Joe Blake

jblake9147@aol.com

David Lee Rosen

Hi Joe,

I was really hoping it would be put on line 😉

trackerdave@gmail.com 

Thanks 

James Reese

Dana Shepard (Treister)

Jue~

Please add me to the distribution list here in Chicago:  dstdance@ameritech.net

Thnx

Stuart Goldman

Hello Joe, whadda ya know...about Shaker Heights, that is.

I'd be grateful to receive your powerpoint presentation...stugoldman@stugoldman.com

Trust things are well with you and yours.

Stu Goldman

Gary D Hermann

Please e-mail it to me Joe.     My e-mail is Gary59716@gmail.com.

Thanks.

Jonathan Meyers

Joe, 

Please add me to the distribution list; my email address is jmeyersnv@yahoo.com.  Thank you.

Jackie A Liskay (Murray)

Joe

Please forward presentation. Excited to learn more about our amazing home town. Jacquelynmurray8@gmail.com

You are a wealth of information and thank you for all your research  on Shaker Heights.

Roger Schulman

Please add me, your info is great fun to read.  Roger.schulman@ca.rr.com

Amy Kopperman (Wertheim)

Please add me to your list: akwertheim@yahoo.com

William L Kahrl

Please add me to the list of recipients for your presentation on Shaker.  williamkahrl5@gmail.com.

Lawrence M Fields

A broken record...me too! Lfields333@gmail.com

Joseph G Blake

I have eleven of you so far and will send before Friday of next week.

Others are welcome to add your names or send me an email directly. jblake9147@aol.com

You will receive around 90 PP slides and each one will have a narrative in the notes section below.

I will also include a more formal evaluation with my conclusions about them. I had the pleasure of doing that 50 years ago in college. That thesis is on line at Cleveland Memories. Just google my name Joseph G Blake and the link comes up.

There will also be a sheet of additional sources for you to research if you are so inclined.

As I may have mentioned, 

My conclusions now are somewhat modified with the benefit of time but it still hard to be anything but amazied at what they achieved.

A few years ago George Divoky suggested a book called Crooked River Burning by Mark Weingartner. Its a work of both fiction and history. Its main characters live in Cleveland between 1948 and 1968. It has great profiles of major figures of the times. The fiction part is a bit predicatable- Shaker Heights girl who lives on South Park starts a relationship with blue collar type from the west side. You can imagine how that works out. 

Weingartner does make an impprtant point. The Vans were maybe the only ones who had a vision for what Cleveland would be like physically. They did and they managed to achieve a good bit of it. 

Afterwards (post 9/24) ask anything you like. If for some reason I overlook you send me a reminder. 

Thanks.

Betsy Dennis (Frank)

Please send to me as well: betsyfrank@msn.com   Thanks!