Meet the DEI Team

Miriam Patrick

1. What is your name?
   Miriam
2. What do you teach?
   This year I teach Latin 1 and English Language Learners.
3. What draws you to this work in Classics and with the DEI?
   I think I owe a lot of my desire to do this work to my parents, both of whom are teachers, and how they raised my siblings and I. I joke that I get the content (Latin) from my dad and the context from my mother who taught elementary school, but they both instilled in us to look at the world with compassion. I would add that my own experience of growing up in a largely homogenous private school where Iw as often a target has pushed me as an educator to do what I can to ensure my students to not endure the same.
4. Who is your favourite writer in Latin and why?
   Silius Italicus... He gets a bad rep for writing a very long "bad" poem, but it is a great piece often overlooked or ignored that is filled with wonderful imagery with Carthage at its heart.
5. What is an issue/topic you'd love to see more of at institute/conferences?
   Teaching with compassion and including our students in the conversation.
6. What is your favourite free time activity?
   Sipping a hot cup of coffee in the morning while reading or journaling with my dogs and cats... or... video games!
7. Do you have social media to share with other Classicists?
   @mmonstrorum on Instagram and Twitter.
8. Is there something you feel each individual teacher can do towards this work with DEI?
   Teach compelling and comprehensible material with compassion.
9. What is your favourite animal?
   The octopus and vultures
10. Is there a current concern that you are hoping we as a community of teachers and Classicists can come together on and work towards a new goal/understanding?
    I would like to see us focus less on the things Rome, Roman history, Latin, etc. have to offer society, government, etc. and more on what we can do as individuals who love Latin to inspire our students to their own passions. A key step to this, in my opinion, is challenging the perceived "norms" about what we do: teaching, Classics, research, etc.