Telena M. Turner

Dr. Rebecca Dierking and Dr. Cathy Hajo

COPLACDigital: A Burning Idea: Challenging and Censoring Books

Spring 2019 Project Contract

 

  1. Statement of Purpose
  1. Contract Purpose – The purpose of this contract shall be to identify and describe expectations for the final project website of UVa-Wise student Telena Marie Turner for Fall 2019 COPLACDigital course, A Burning Idea: Challenging and Censoring Books.
  2. Final Project Purpose – The final project of the course shall be to create a website that seeks to educate a general public audience on the censorship movement against Clyde Edgerton’s The Floatplane Notebooks in Carroll County Public Schools in Carroll County, VA in 1992. The website shall also explore dimensions of literary censorship with the intention of providing necessary context for the Carroll County case and the course.
  3. Website Description – The website shall fulfill the purposes of the project and course by providing information in five general categories, though the names assigned to the categories and sections in this contract may not be the names assigned to the information on the final website. All information on the site will be cited using in-text links and footnotes at the end of pages as necessary. Pictures and other media will be described and cited near the photograph or other piece of media.
    1. Homepage – This category will contain a menu, either a top bar menu or pictoral menu, for the major sections of content utilizing links or shapes. This page will also welcome viewers to the website and explain the general purpose of the site.
    2. Context – This category will provide information that explores the driving geographical, political, and historical forces behind the Carroll County case.
      1. Geographical –This section will feature statistical information about Carroll County, VA and the county’s education system.
      2. Political – This section will explore the importance of Appalachian culture and values in the Carroll County case, as well as give general geographical information about the Appalachian region.
        1. In discussing the Appalachian Mountains, the section will seek to provide a general overview of the physical geography and cultural trends of the Appalachian region and will briefly discuss how these elements are often communicated through Appalachian literature.
    3. The Floatplane Notebooks – The section will provide general information on Clyde Edgerton’s The Floatplane Notebooks. Specifically, this section will overview the plot and themes in the novel and will provide general information about the novel’s author, Clyde Edgerton.
      1. Themes – This section will provide a general summary of the novel and overview the major themes of the novel in order to increase viewers understanding of the work itself and to contextualize the significance of the novel in regard to Appalachian literature and culture. This section will also detail awards and public reactions to the novel.
      2. About the Author – This section will provide information on Clyde Edgerton and his literary career. This section will also briefly discuss his other works and public reactions to those works.
    4. The Case – The largest category, this section will detail the events of the Carroll County case. The main page of the section will feature a timeline of the major events in the case, and the subsequent pages will examine three different perspectives of the case.
      1. The School Administration – This site will detail the Carroll County High School’s and the Carroll County School Board’s responses to the challenge and will feature documents such as letters, school board records, public complaint forms, news articles, and/or other documents that detail the county’s processes in handling the challenge.
      2. The Challengers – This section will overview the challengers of the novel, both the community members who filed the first complaint against the book and the educator who defended the book. The section will explore the reasons for the challenge and the responses of the challengers.
      3. The Community – This section will look at public attention brought to the case through local media outlets and other sources. This section will also contain the reactions of individuals affected by the case, such as the students of the school and the author of the book.
      4. The Researcher – This section will summarize the major sections and draw in the information presented in the subpages to connect to provide an analysis of the different viewpoints of the case and some deeper conclusions that can be potentially reached as a result of examining the case, context, and ideas behind literary censorship.
    5. The Project – This category will provide information about the construction of the website, the author of the site, and COPLAC.
      1. About the Website – This section will explain the website in greater detail than the homepage and will offer tips to viewers on how to get the most from the site. This section will also contain a copy of the final contract for the project.
      2. About the Creator– This section will contain information about the creator of the website, Telena Marie Turner. This section will briefly detail the college, major, and professional interests of the author and will contain a personal, short reflection on the process of going through the course, developing the site, and on going forward with lessons learned from the experiences of both.
      3. About the Project – This section will contain general information about COPLAC, such as the mission of the organization. In addition, this section will overview the course and its purpose. Specifically, this section will provide links to the course website and to the COPLAC website to allow viewers to engage in independent exploration.
  1. Use of Tools
  1. Digital and Online Applications
    1. WordPress – The project website will be constructed using WordPress. The site will have four different categories of information that are each displayed on different pages and subpages as necessary to the organization of the site.
      1. Theme – The site will utilize the Evolve or Landscape WordPress themes because both allow the customization of font elements such as color and size. Both themes also allow for the creation of different menu types that will aid in the creation of an effective and interactive navigation menu.
      2. Plug-ins – The site will also make use of several different WordPress plug-ins, such as the PDF Embedder by Dan Lester, MetaSlider by Team Updraft, Responsive Lightbox & Gallery by dFactory, TinyMCE Advanced by Adrew Ozz, and/or the Feature a Page Widget by Mark Root-Wiley (MRWweb). The plug-ins will allow for the smooth implementation of various forms of media within the site, which will create a more engaging and interactive website. The plug-ins also provide access to more customization options to enhance the final layout of the website.
    2. Timeline JS – The main page of the Case category will feature a timeline JS of the major dates in the progression of the case. This will be a visual, interactive tool that gives viewers the option to gain a general, chronological understanding of the case before exploring more specific elements of the censorship case through the three different subsections of critical perspectives.
    3. Creative Commons – After the pages are finished, the site will have a creative commons license to share with viewers how to use and attribute information found on the webpage.
    4. Hypothesis – Featuring Hypothesis on the website will allow viewers to have the option to add notes the pages as they interact with the content and elements of the site.
    5. Youtube – This will be used to store any personal video footage that is collected and used on the website.
    6. SoundCloud – This application will be used to store any personal audio recordings that are collected and featured on pages of the website.
    7. Canva – Canva will be used to create custom graphic designs for the site, such as page headers and logos.
    8. Other – The above listed are the most significant digital tools that will be featured on the site, but I may also use other tools in the development and final version of the site such as social media platforms, word processing programs, email and other messaging programs, search engines, and other presentation tools.
  2. Digital Images & Illustrations
    1. Personal Photographs – The site will feature personal photographs of Carroll County and surrounding areas, as well as personal photographs of the buildings and areas around UVa-Wise (as applicable to the content of the individual pages). The website may also feature images of the cover or pages of the novel, the subjects involved with the case, pictures that match themes in the novel, pictures that show personal progress on the website or project, or other images.
    2. The photographs will be taken with an iPhone 6s or digital camera, and they will be edited or cropped with software available through the Apple photos app or editing options available through WordPress. All photographs will be given proper attribution on the page they are featured on in the site.
    3. Internet Images – The site will also feature images from Wikimedia Commons or Creative Commons, such as images of Carroll County, UVa-Wise, the Appalachian Mountains, the novel cover for the Floatplane Notebooks, and other similar kinds of images, that are available for use on the site according to their licenses.
  3. Audio and Video Sources
    1. Personal Video and Recordings – Sections of the project website will feature video and/or audio recordings from interviewed sources. The video and/or audio will be recorded using an iPhone 6s and trimmed according to the applications available through the UVa-Wise library or Apple video editing software available on the iPhone 6s.
      1. Video and audio recordings of interviewees will be stored on Youtube or SoundCloud, as appropriate to medium, and will only be used with the consent of the interviewee.
    2. Internet and Other Media Recordings – The site will also feature videos obtained through local media or other sources. I will obtain the necessary permission before using materials of this kind on the website.

 

  1. Schedule of Deadlines
    1. General Schedule – To facilitate the completion of the inflexible and flexible deadlines, as described in the next two sections, I will devote a minimum of one hour and fifteen minutes each day to work on completing project objectives, thou I do anticipate that timely completion of the project will require more than the minimum allotted hours.
    2. Acknowledgement of Limitation – Because this is a single person project, I anticipate that I will have to make minor adjustments to the Flexible Deadlines section below and to the amount and kinds of content displayed in my final website. However, all general categories of information will be represented in the final version of the site.
    3. Permanent Deadlines – These are inflexible deadlines that will mark the major completion of the project website.
      1. April 9th- Rough Draft of Website Complete
      2. April 16th – Final Draft of Website Complete
    4. Flexible Deadlines – These are deadlines that outline what pieces of work should be completed throughout the week of the chosen date. These deadlines are designed to ensure that project progresses at a timely and proficient pace but are flexible in that the work assigned to the date may be completed at any time before the set deadline, and at latest, should be completed before the Monday of the next week listed.
      1. March 1st
        1. Draft About the Author Section of Project category
        2. Obtain and Begin Reading Clyde Edgerton’s The Floatplane Notebooks
        3. Acquire Contact Information for Marion Goldwasser
      2. March 8th
        1. Draft Early Navigation on website
        2. Identify Sources that Require Permission for Use on Website

 

  • Read to p. 100 in Clyde Edgerton’s The Floatplane Notebooks
  • March 15th (Spring Break Week)

 

        1. Travel to Hillsville, North Carolina and Carroll County to take photographs and video content for website
        2. Send Letter to Marion Goldwasser
        3. Email WHHV (local radio station) and Inquire About Archived Audio Clips
        4. Conduct Context Interview by email with Dr. Clark
        5. Draft and Post About COPLAC section of the Project category
        6. Draft Context category of Website, exempting initial context interview

 

  • Finish Clyde Edgerton’s The Floatplane Notebooks

 

        1. Identify Carroll County Alumni to Interview (Brief Statement Interview) and Draft Questions for Interview
      2. March 22nd
        1. Interview Selected Alumni
        2. Draft and Post The Administration section of Case category
        3. Draft and Post the Timeline JS for the Case category
        4. Draft and Post Themes section of The Floatplane Notebooks category
      3. March 29th
        1. Draft and Post About the Construction of the Website
        2. Draft and Post The Community section of Case category
        3. Draft and Post The Challengers section of Case category
      4. April 5th
        1. Draft and Post About the Author section of The Floatplane Notebooks category
        2. Draft and Post homepage
        3. Complete General Review in Preparation for Website Draft Due Date
      5. April 15th
        1. Complete Website Revisions
        2. Prepare for Final Website Submission and Presentation

 

  • This final deadline is adjusted due to anticipated conference travel during the represented week.