Contributors >> Hatch [Kramer], Victoria D. ('03)

Biographical statement (April 2009)

Victoria ("Tori") Hatch Kramer graduated from Lehigh University in 2000 with a double major in English and Political Science. After graduation, she first moved to Vail, CO, and enjoyed two years in a Sales & Marketing department. In 2002, she moved to New York City where she joined the sales team at Ralph Lauren and helped launch their Lauren label sleepwear. While four years in sales had been a valuable learning experience, Tori always seemed to know that she would one day become a teacher. In 2004, she moved to Annapolis where she became a 9th and 10th grade English teacher at St. Mary's High School. Even though her first year of teaching was above and beyond the most challenging year of work she had ever experienced, she had finally found what she knew she was meant to do. In 2006, Tori moved back to New York City and got married to Mark Kramer (brother Matt Kramer and father John Kramer are both graduates of Lehigh University). She joined the English Department at Convent of the Sacred Heart where she taught 8th, 11th, and 12th grade English – as well as a brief stint as a 5th grade English teacher, as she filled in for a teacher out on maternity leave. Recently, Tori moved to London where her husband's job had relocated them, and she is expecting her first child in September 2009.

Reflection

Looking back on my experience in Reel American History, I realize how naïve my classmates and I all were. At the time we did not recognize the power of the Internet nor did we entertain the possibility the impact our work could have as few of us thought of the course in the future tense. As pioneers of the course, our job was to realize Professor Gallagher's vision – creating a website that would critically and analytically examine films that depicted historical moments, always asking the guiding question: is film the proper medium to convey to a larger audience an historical moment? More than that, though, Gallagher always saw our investigation as having a long-term impact; in building the website, posting all of our work online for anyone to see, he hoped that high school teachers and/or college professors would be able to use what we had begun to spark conversation and examination of the same nature within their own classrooms, across the nation. None of us could have ever guessed at the power and the longevity this course has maintained (nor could any of us see ourselves ten years out of college period, but I digress). The course, at first glance, had little to do with English. What I realize now, however, is that it did not have to do with just English – rather, it was a course that encompassed all the humanities courses as it demanded us, as students, to examine closely the connection between history, media, the written word, and the way in which the masses receive their information. It was a fascinating project and one that we all, at one time or another, doubted would gain any recognition or appreciation. Clearly, we were all wrong!

The course, at the time, was the most demanding and time-consuming class I had ever taken at Lehigh. Looking back now, I realize so much of that time for me was spent on trying to familiarize myself better with the technology aspect of the course. Casually "surfing the net," sending emails, and writing essays in Word was the extent of my "expertise" of the computer. Creating a web page was what "computer nerds" did, and computer nerds were smart, and I was neither as far as I was concerned. Now, compared to my parents maybe I'm a computer wiz, but even today I still struggle with the many facets of the "web world," but I am nonetheless dependent on it as a resource and as a means for communication (although I still refuse to join Facebook, but, again, I digress). In addition to the technology component, however, the expectations for familiarizing – no, memorizing – every second of your movie was equally as demanding on our time. Regardless, the process, albeit tedious, was still necessary and crucial in being able to present our movie and our analysis in a knowledgeable and informed manner. I felt then, as I do now, that I indeed became the "expert" on my film and that knowledge base was imperative in order for me to critically examine the movie and the history behind it.

Choosing the movie And the Band Played On was an easy task. It had been something that I had stumbled on one night in high school, on a weekend where we had been given access to HBO as a promotional attempt by the network to get my family to add them to their channels. I became hooked, my family did not, and I cannot imagine living without HBO today (although I'm now forced to, living abroad) while my parents still have barely heard of the cable channel. I am a product of a small, sheltered life where my conservative parents always put education and travel as our number one priority. Blessed with a top-rate education, I felt a certain level of responsibility to expose myself to social issues that concerned our nation and the world. A child of the 80's, AIDS was understandably one of the most misunderstood and feared subject matters, and as I grew up and the years wore on, the subject very slowly began to gain more positive rather than negative media attention, and as it did the fear began to dissipate. Various celebrities who became positive with the syndrome helped put a non-threatening face on the disease. Magic Johnson, Elisabeth Glaser, even Pedro Zamora from the MTV hit The Real World – they all made the disease seem more accessible and not an isolated "gay disease." What drew me to the movie was how difficult it was for the doctors to find funding in order to search for a cure. Additionally, as shocking was that the movie itself was not one that any big, Hollywood corporation nor any regular network wanted to produce, which is why HBO became involved as a progressive cable channel willing to take a risk on a movie that exposed such a taboo subject matter.

I am still actively interested in social and global issues. I created a 12th grade English elective titled "Social Awareness and Advocacy in Literature," where we focused on global conflicts and as a class discussed various ways in which we, as privileged students and teacher, could become involved and choose to actively make a difference in the world. The impact of my work on the Reel American History website came back full circle a year ago when a nurse in graduate school in Iowa contacted me via email saying she had come across my analysis of the movie And the Band Played On. She was asking my permission to use my final write up on the movie and the AIDS epidemic as evidence in her own research as she felt it was very relevant to the course's objectives. I was shocked, I was flattered, but mostly I was in awe of the far-reaching power that this small yet, at the time, all-consuming project managed to achieve. I used the website in my own class, showing my students that there is more than just one way to examine issues and their relevance in today's society. It is human nature to be curious about cultures, conflicts, and struggles that are beyond our own understanding – this website, this course, manages to bridge the gap semester after semester between the complacent masses who, without thinking critically, too often rely on movies, on Hollywood, to portray the historical truths and the trusting, often naïve film makers who rely on the intelligence and intellectual curiosity of their audience to drive forward progress and ultimately change. I was honored to be one of the first members of this incredible project, and I am humbled to be among even better, even more inquisitive students who have followed after my time in their own quest to influence change in the world – all through Reel American History.