Education Department Past News and Events:

Senior Lecturer in Education and Director of Elementary Education Polly Ulichny was invited to speak to the professional development school for secondary teachers, Scuola Superiore per l'Istruzione Secondaria, and teachers of English in Bologna, Italy last month. Her presentation, Educating Esmeralda Mukabee Chen: Realities and Possibilities of Educating Immigrants in the US, provided an overview of educational practices and policies regarding immigrants in the US to compare with policies being developed at the national level in Italy to address the recent influx of immigrants from diverse cultures and language backgrounds.

STUDENTS MAKING NEWS:

The Office of the Dean of the College announced that Alison Cohen '09 has been named a Udall Scholar. The Morris K. Udall Scholarship is a $5,000 award for sophomores and juniors with excellent academic records and demonstrated interest in careers in the environment. Alison Cohen is a double concentrator in Community Health with an emphasis on environmental health justice and Education Studies. <more>

The spring issue of the Newsweek magazine Current features undergraduate and triple-concentrator, Johnny Lin '08, in a cover story entitled, “The College Vanguard, 9 Students on the Edge of Greatness.” Johnny Lin has spent the past three years with a side project that is more like a full-time job: organizing Strait Talk, an annual transnational conference that brings Taiwanese, Chinese and American students together to discuss and debate the political status of Taiwan and devise a roadmap for resolution of a cross-strait conflict. <more>

The Education Department congratulates Irene Castillon (currently studying abroad in Italy) for being awarded a Rockefeller Brothers Fund Foundation for Aspiring Teachers of Color Fellowship. Irene is one of 25 students from across the country to be awarded this fellowship for the upcoming year and one of three candidates from Brown University to win this Fellowship. <more>

Professor Jin Li recently received a 4-year grant the Spencer Foundation for $583,515, entitled European American and Chinese Immigrant Children’s Learning Beliefs and Related Socialization at Home. The purpose of the study is follow 100 middle-class European American and 100 middle-class as well as 100 (300 in total) low-income Chinese immigrant preschoolers and their families for three years to document how they develop learning beliefs.

April 23 - 25, Spencer Foundation Chicago, IL
Senior Lecturer in Education and Director of Elementary Education Polly Ulichny participated in an invitational conference co-sponsored by the Spencer Foundation and the University of Pennsylvania in Chicago. The conference; Beginning the Conversation: A Conference for Urban Teacher Educators, brings together 25 educators from urban teacher preparation programs around the country to share their acquired wisdom and address the struggles that continue to face urban TE programs in preparing new teachers with the tools necessary to provide children of color in high poverty urban areas with the education they deserve.

In a new study appearing in the September issue of the International Journal of Behavioral Development, Assistant Professor Amy Marks and Professor Cynthia Garcia Coll demonstrate the importance of developing ethnic identities for children of immigrants.  This study, conducted in three local immigrant groups, also has important implications for understanding interethnic group social preferences during the middle childhood years.  Read more.

Ed Concentrators Elected to RI Alpha of Phi Beta Kappa!
Two of our junior Education Studies concentrators - Alison Cohen and Jessica Goldberg - have been elected to the Rhode Island Alpha of Phi Beta Kappa: an honor we would like to acknowledge here on our website. Election to Phi Beta Kappa is a high honor.

Department Chair and the Director of Urban Education Policy Program, Kenneth K. Wong, along with Francis X. Shen, Dorothea Anagnostopoulos, and Stacey Rutledge, have co-authored THE EDUCATION MAYOR. Their book takes a critical look at mayoral control of urban school districts, beginning with Boston's schools in 1992 and examining more than 100 school districts in 40 states. Click here for additional information.


Professor Kenneth K. Wong is the recipient of the 2007 Deil Wright Best Paper Award on federalism and intergovernmental relations given by the American Political Science Association for his research paper, "Accountability and Innovation: New Directions in Education Policy and Management." The award was presented to Professor Wong at the Annual Meeting of the American Political Science Association on September 1, 2007 in Chicago.

UNDERGRADUATES interested in applying to TEACH FOR AMERICA or similar programs should know that the EDUCATION DEPARTMENT offers courses where they can learn about American schools and schooling.  The courses listed on the page linked here will be offered in the Spring 2008 and Fall 2008 semesters and have no pre-requisites. <click here to view the course list>

Strategies for Improving Economic Mobility of Workers
Chicago Federal Reserve Bank
Professor John H. Tyler was asked to prepare and present a paper on "Correctional Programs in the Era of Mass Incarceration: What Do We Know About 'What Works'? for a conference on Strategies for Improving Economic Mobility of Workers organized by the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago. The resulting paper for this November 15-16 conference, written with Brown economics PhD student Jillian Berk, examines the research evidence on the effectiveness of correctional rehabilitative programs and includes discussions of Tyler's own research on this topic. Information on the conference can be found here.

Rockefeller Brothers Fund Fellowship for Aspiring Teachers of Color
Our own Polly Ulichny, Lecturer and Director of Elementary Teacher Education, is the Brown liaison for the program in which scholarship awards are given to juniors who plan to go to graduate school in a teacher education program. Three candidates were sent from Brown... <continue>

New Faculty Joins the Education Department
Deborah Rivas Drake, Assistant Professor of Education
Dr. Rivas Drake’s expertise is an important addition to the undergraduate concentration, the Master of Arts in Teaching program, and also our Master’s in Urban Education Policy program.
Tracy Steffes, Assistant Professor of Education
Steffes is a most welcome addition to our undergraduate concentration in the history/policy track, as well as to our Master’s in Urban Education Policy program. <more about our new faculty>

Two books based on research carried out by Shirley Brice Heath in England over the past five years were launched on May 10. The first, Made for each Other: Arts and Sciences in Creative Learning, reports a longitudinal study of a secondary school partnership in the arts and sciences. This launch took place in Kent, England with the collaboration of the participating school, Brockhill Secondary, and Creative Partnerships, Kent. The second launch took place in Doncaster, Yorkshire. This book, The Art of Engagement, reports the longitudinal work of a community art center with young people whose behavior excludes them from schools in England. The research was initiated by Heath and carried out in its final year with an international research team that included a Brown University graduate, Bianca Nunes. Work by this international research team continues in various sites in Europe, Latin America, the Philippines, and the United States. An undergraduate research team of Brown and Mount Holyoke students will report their findings at a conference to be held on the Brown campus in September 2008. While in England, Heath was guest lecturer for the Science Learning Program at Kings College, University of London, where she holds a Research Professorship.

Education Department Faculty Engaged in International Research

 

 

Associate Professor John Tyler's research on prison-based education, conducted with Jeffrey Kling, Senior Fellow at the Brookings Institution, will appear in a Sage Publications volume, Barriers to Reentry? The Labor Market Prospects of Released Prisoners in Postindustrial America. The Tyler/Kling chapter in this volume is titled "Prison-Based Education and Reentry Into the Mainstream Labor Market." A working paper version of this work can be found here.

The Education Department is excited at the opportunity to play a central role in Brown’s response to the report out of the Steering Committee on Slavery and Justice.
A key portion of President Simmons’ response to the Committee report is the establishment of a tuition waiver program for master’s students in the department. Beginning in the 2008-09 Academic Year, the University will offer free tuition each year to up to ten admitted students who, after receipt of a Master’s Degree in Urban Education Policy or a Master of Arts in Teaching, serve urban public schools in Providence and surrounding areas for a minimum of three years. As the program gets under way and proves helpful, additional resources may be allocated for this purpose.

 

For accountability, put mayor in charge of schools
Research by Kenneth Wong, professor of education, is cited in this opinion piece that argues for the mayor of Baltimore to assume control of the city school system. The op-ed was written by Keiffer J. Mitchell Jr., a Baltimore city councilor and mayoral candidate and was published on May 1, 2007 . <click here for the full article>

Also from Professor Wong, a recently published Sunday Op Ed in Newsday, in New York: Roosevelt's reason to hope, The schools are a fiscal mess under the state's rescue plan, but the students are making gains.

 

 

Terrence Gong is one of four students in Brown's Class of 2007 who will receive this year's Joslin Award. Named for the late Judge Alfred Joslin '35, the award is given to graduating seniors "who have made significant contributions to the University through their leadership and service." Terrence is a double concentrator in Education Studies and Economics. Congratulations to him!

Education Studies concentrator Zachary Townsend '09 has been recognized by two departments for his work this year. Townsend, a junior who is concentrating in Education Studies, Applied Math-Economics, and Public Policy was honored by the history and economics departments for separate projects. The Undergraduate History Journal published "Early Scholarship Awards at Brown University" a paper that Townsend wrote for Prof. Luther Spoehr's course: American Higher Education in Historical Context. The paper explores the changing concept of scholarships from merit-based to need-based awards in the mid 19th century. Townsend was also awarded the Samuel C. Lamport Award for Excellence in Economics for his honors thesis "Essays in International Financial Economics: Microfinance, FDI and Asset Bubbles." Our congratulations go out to Zac for recognition on these diverse endeavors.

Professor Wong, Director of Urban Education Policy Program, is very pleased to announce the establishment of the Ruth J. Simmons Fellowships in Urban Education Policy. The fellowships are supported through the generosity of the Oak Brook Bank Charitable Trust in Oak Brook, Illinois. UEP students who are awarded this Fellowship are expected to work in the greater Chicago area upon their graduation. This Fellowship encourages the UEP program to actively recruit prospective students from the greater Chicago area. The first recipient of this prestigious fellowship will be competitively selected from the pool of 2007 applicants.

Assistant Professor of Education, Political Science, and Public Policy Martin West was recently cited in The New York Times article; Students Gain Only Marginally on Test of U.S. History, by Sam Dillon, regarding his recent study in which he used federal data to show that during 2003-4, first and sixth-grade teachers spent 23 fewer minutes a week on history than during 1999-2000.

SAVE THE DATE: June 14th and 15th 2007
Clio at the Table: A Conference on the Uses of History to Inform and Improve Education Policy
A national conference organized by the UEP Program, with generous financial support from The Spencer Foundation and the Annenberg Institute for School Reform
This conference examines connections between history and public policy in American eduation systems and builds on the work of Professor Carl Kaestle -- who retires this summer. Professor Kaestle has continually worked at the intersection of history and policy as a scholar of historical and contemporary educational issues.
The conference is to be held at the Brown University Faculty Club, One Magee Street, Providence. Registration is now open.

On April 26th, 2007, Professor Cynthia Garcia Coll spoke at the Mi País, Mi Fuerza, My Country, My Strength Conference, celebrating Minority Health Month and sponsored by Providence Housing Authority and the Office of Minority Health, RI Department of Health. Professor Coll shared her research on the experience of immigrants that demonstrates that assimilation is a risk factor for health, educational, and other socio-economic outcomes. Participants discussed the practical implications of these findings, explore immigrant assets, and determine ways in which immigrant families might preserve these assets and foster better outcomes for their families.

Education Outreach
As part of an effort to build stronger ties with local public education, this fall Brown University signed on to a formal partnership agreement with the Providence Public School District. The agreement outlines two sets of initiatives – one focused on the Providence Superintendent’s office and the other directed at Hope High School – that are currently being implemented. The projects (some listed on following pages) meet concrete, specific needs identified by the Superintendent’s office and Hope. As the University engages in further discussions with the Providence School District, we expect to develop and move forward on more education outreach initiatives that enrich the work of local schools while creating teaching, learning, and research opportunities for Brown students and faculty. <more>

The Brown Daily Herald featured the UEP Program's recent grant from the Office of the Vice President for Research through the annual Seed Fund Award. The funds will be used to study secondary school chemistry curricula in countries that consistently outperform the United States. Click here to read the full article.

Education Studies Graduate Rob Blair ’06 reports on his work in Columbia:
Since July of 2006, I've been on a Fulbright Fellowship in Bogotá, Colombia, researching conflict resolution in schools. I divide my time between three projects: observing and evaluating workshops for middle-schoolers identified as "hyper-aggressive;" designing a theater program to combat bullying; and providing conflict resolution resources to aspiring teachers in the country's Escuelas Normales (regular public schools with 2 years of pedagogy classes tacked on in 10th and 11th grade for aspiring teachers). All of these projects are related to a conflict resolution program sponsored by the National Ministry of Education called Citizenship Competencies, which my advisor here helped design. My job is to help disseminate that program. <Continue reading >

 

Johnny Lin (Education concentrator, 08') took a semester leave from Brown to work in international development with the Bogota, Colombia-based Escuela Nueva Foundation ( www.escuelanueva.org), where he worked on a variety of research, fundraising, management, and curriculum development issues. Escuela Nueva is an integrated educational initiative aimed at children in rural and marginalized urban areas, and at refugee children. The model is designed to improve not only student academic achievement, but also crucial skills and attitudes in collaboration, leadership, and conflict resolution.

 

Brown To Support High School Science Education with NIH Grant
Rhode Island’s high school biology teachers will get intensive training in cutting-edge topics in genetics and neuroscience through a new professional development program created at Brown University. Brown’s program is funded though a new $636,131 grant from the National Center for Research Resources, a part of the National Institutes of Health.

Project ARISE is a cross-disciplinary collaboration that is a hallmark at Brown. The program was created by faculty and staff in three departments: Stein, a lecturer in the Department of Neuroscience; Lawrence Wakeford, director of science education in the Department of Education; and Jennifer Aizenman, a scientist who is currently a curriculum design specialist in the Office of Summer and Continuing Studies. The program will also include graduate students in the Department of Molecular Biology, Cell Biology and Biochemistry, who’ll deliver instruction to high school teachers and assist them in their classrooms. <click here for the full article>

Professor Jin Li and Professor Cynthia Garcia Coll presented at the Society for Research in Child Development's biennial meeting from March 29th - April 1st.
The Society is a multidisciplinary, not-for-profit, professional association with a membership of researchers, practitioners, and human development professionals from over 50 countries. The purpose of the Society is to promote research in the field of human development, to foster the exchange of information among scientists and other professionals of various disciplines, and to encourage applications of research findings.
Professor Li presented with undergraduate student Jennifer Resch, and Professor Garcia Coll presented with undergraduates Luis Medina, Laura Gerace, Matthew Soursourian and two graduate students, Flavia Perea and Amy Marks. <Click here to view a list of each Professor's presentations>

The Urban Education Policy Program, in collaboration with Brown’s Chemistry Department, has been awarded institutional Research Seed funds to initiate a cross-national comparative study on chemistry curricula.  Specifically, it will focus on analyzing the comparative rigor of the curricula in preparing high school students for university study from the nations which the United States is consistently compared to academically.  Generous funding has been granted from Brown’s Office of the Vice President for Research.

Past DUG Speaker event :
Friday, March 2nd: Music with Mr. Browne: An exploration of music with 5th graders.
As music is fading from the standard curriculum of public school students in New York, Graham Browne '08 decided to take matters into his own hands. He integrated a music composition and appreciation curriculum into the daily classroom activity of a 5th grade classroom in New York City as part of the Urban Education Semester. Through the course of the semester, music writing, singing, and appreciation lessons were well absorbed by students of largely immigrant families. His 20-minute video offered a view into that classroom, its demographics, and the major successes and drawbacks of his project.

Assistant Professor Martin West recently received a grant of $150,000 from the Smith Richardson Foundation to conduct research on the effects of class size on students' cognitive and non-cognitive skills. The project, joint with Thomas Dee of Swarthmore College, will use data from the National Educational Longitudinal Study of 1988 and Tennessee's Project STAR to provide new evidence on the effectiveness and cost-effectiveness of class-size reductions in U.S. public schools.

Martin West presented a paper on “Testing, Teaching, and Learning: The Effects of Test-based Accountability on Student Achievement and Instructional Time” at a conference sponsored by the Fordham Foundation. The conference was entitled “Beyond the Basics: Are Reading, Math, and Science Sufficient for a 21st Century Education,” in Washington DC.

Also from Assistant Professor West:
Assistant Professor Martin West has been named the deputy leader of the Citizen’s Review Group established by Governor-elect Charlie Crist of Florida to conduct fact-finding concerning the performance of the Department of Education and the Agency for Persons with Disabilities.

Professor Bil Johnson presented at the 4th Annual International Conference on Teacher Education and Social Justice, January 12-14, 2007 in Chicago, Illinois. His workshop was entitled “Starting the Dialogue about Race and Social Justice”.

The Urban Education Policy Program Director’s, Kenneth Wong, new book: Successful Schools and Educational Accountability provides an integrative roadmap of current theory and evidence-based practices on leadership and school change to position current and future school leaders to succeed in meeting educational accountability expectations.  The book clarifies the importance of aligning standards with curriculum, instruction, and assessment, and provides extensive discussion on different types of student assessment.

Education Outreach
In early October, over seventy local high school students were treated to a lecture by Brown neuroscientist John Donoghue and a tour of the University’s new Sidney E. Frank Hall for Life Sciences. Students from five Providence public schools – Hope, PAIS, E-Cubed, Classical, and Cooley Health, Science, and Technology Academy – joined students from the MET School, Moses Brown, Lincoln, and Wheeler at this special event which was planned to coincide with the dedication of the new $95 million dollar state-of-the-art research facility. <more>

The Advanced Studies Fellowship at Brown, a postdoctoral fellowship program that Professor Carl Kaestle directed from 2002 to 2005, has resulted in a book of essays by the ten fellows, entitled To Educate a Nation: Federal and National Strategies of School Reform. Co-edited by Kaestle and Alyssa Lodewick, Assistant Director of the ASF Program, the book will be published in fall, 2008 by University Press of Kansas, a leading publisher of works on federalism.

Chris Amirault, Adjunct Assistant Professor and Executive Director of the Brown/Fox Point Early Childhood Education Center has been a facilitator for the National Association for the Education of Young Children's Diversity and Equity Forum for three years and ran the annual meeting there this year once again in Atlanta, in early November. He presented on two topics; First steps toward supporting diversity entitled, "Supporting Diversity and Equity in your EC Center: Some First (and second, and third...) Steps" and "The 411 on Assessment: A Team-Based Course for Real-World Assessment"
focussing on equity in center-based programs and assessment in early childhood. Chris was also recently named to the board of the RI Association for Infant Mental Health.

Professor Kenneth Wong has been elected for a three-year term to the Academic Priorities Committee in a campus-wide election. The Academic Priorities Committee, chaired by the Provost, is responsible for making recommendations to the President concerning the general direction of academic programs. The committee is composed of six faculty members and six senior academic administrators.

Professor Wong was also featured in a recent Washington Post article on the City of New York’s takeover of Evander Childs High School. He discussed how New York City is seen as a model for increased mayoral control of school systems. <Read the full article>

Professor Bil Johnson presented at the Coalition of Essential Schools Fall Forum, Nov. 2nd through the 4th in Chicago. The session was entitled: "Attaining Critical Mass: Preparing and Retaining New Teachers for the Long Haul." For over twenty years, CES has led educators and policymakers nationally to transform public education.

On Thursday, November 2nd Professor John Tyler gave a talk at the Fall 2006 Colloquia of the Population Studies and Training Center at Brown on "Is the GED an Effective Route to Postsecondary Education? Evidence from Texas"

 

 

On October 13th, Brown's Urban Education Policy Program (UEP) sponsored the "Education Reform Forum: Developing a Roadmap of Collaboration in Providence", which was hosted by Mayor David N. Cicilline, Superintendent Donnie Evans and Providence Teachers Union (PTU) President Steven Smith.  Panelists, regional mayors & superintendents, and conference attendees gathered to share their insights on new directions and innovative strategies regarding financial reform, labor-management relations, and effective school improvement practices. For the Brown Daily Herald’s coverage of the event, click here.

 

Adjunct Professor Jack Demick presented “Toward a New Look at Adoption and Foster Care” at the Child Psychiatry Grand Rounds at Brown Medical School/Bradley Hospital on Wednesday, October 11th. This presentation focused on 20 years of his empirical research aimed at promoting a more positive view of adoption and foster care for parents, teachers, and the lay public than has heretofore been the case. <more>

Carin Algava, Assistant Director, Teacher Education, has been accepted into the prestigious HERS Management Institute for Women in Higher Education for the 2006-2007 academic year.  This is an integrated series of five seminars offering women administrators and faculty professional leadership and management training, held at Wellesley College.  The curriculum will consist of Planning and Fiscal Mgt., Managing in Organizations, and Professional Development.


Ann D'Abrosca, Academic Department Administrator and Urban Education Policy Program Administrator, was one of two Brown representatives attending the Rhode Island Higher Education Training Consortium on Foundations of Management at Bryant University every Tuesday during the month of October. This five-session course was highly participative, interactive approach to exploring and experiencing the challenges of management. It is also an opportunity to network with other managers from other higher education institutions in the state.

Assistant Professor Martin West recently co-authored the research article Is Your Child’s School Effective? which examines the No Child Left Behind act and was published in the academic journal Education Next. The article was mentioned in The New York Times article As 2 Bushes Try to Fix Schools, Tools Differ on the subject of the school improvement program in Florida, published September 28, 2006.

 

Professor Larry Wakeford will be presenting at the annual meeting of the National Association of Biology Teachers in Albuquerque, NM on October 14th. His presentation is titled "Using Socratic Seminars in the Biology Classroom." Socratic seminars are question-driven, text-based discussions that are facilitated and structured. The session will demonstrate how to conduct them in biology classrooms.

On October 3rd, 6pm, Professor Cynthia Garcia Coll spoke as part of Raices Week, Our People, Our Workers, The Latino Impact on the U.S., presented by Sigma Lambda Upsilon/Señoritas Latinas Unidas Sorority. Her talk was entitled Latinos in Rhode Island, Promises and Challenges discussing the trends in Rhode Island's Latino community and the many challenges they face. <more>

On October 6th, 7th and 8th, Professor Bil Johnson presented at the Acme Coalition for Media Education Summit Conference in Burlington, VT. Topic: "Teach Critical Media Literacy? But I'm a (middle/high) school (English, Math, Science, Social Studies, Special Ed, etc.) teacher!"

On September 29, Professor Carl Kaestle gave a keynote luncheon address at a conference in Madison, Wisconsin on the topic of "Print Culture and Education in an Era of Rapid Change, 1880--1940". The conference was sponsored by the Center for the Study of Print Culture in Modern America, for which Kaestle was the founding advisory board chair when he taught at the Univeristy of Wisconsin.

His speech for this luncheon drew upon the volume he edited with Janice Radway of Duke University, Print in Motion: Publishing and Reading in the United States, 1880--1920 (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, forthcoming).

Jackie Delamatre '02, a former Education Studies concentrator, Truman Scholar, and Archambault Prize winner, writes about her recent work at the Guggenheim Museum: "For the past two years the Guggenheim has been conducting research on the impact of looking at and making art on students' ability to think critically. We found through our quasi-experimental study that students who regularly discussed and made art were far better than their peers at using several critical thinking strategies when looking at art AND text." <more>

 

Click here to read Professor Luther Spoehr's review of the book THE HOMEWORK MYTH: Why Our Kids Get Too Much Of a Bad Thing
by Alfie Kohn. The review was published in the September 10th issue of the Providence Journal.

Recent article in the BDH about BSHS: BSHS educates both Brown grad students and local high schoolers

For three and a half weeks each July, a handful of classrooms on Brown's campus transform into a mini-high school of sorts, hosting around 300 Providence-area students and providing the University's secondary school teaching candidates with hands-on classroom experience.

The experience is part of Brown Summer High School, which just completed its 38th year.

"It's rare that you have a program last as long as it's lasted and remain both viable and valuable," said Eileen Landay, an adjunct senior lecturer in the Department of Education who directed the program for 14 years until the summer of 2005. "Though it often goes under the radar of other students and faculty, it's been an important part of the University's relationship with the community."
<view the full article >

Kenneth Wong, UEP Director:
In his most recent publication, “The Political Dynamics of Mayoral Engagement in Public Education,” Professor Kenneth Wong, tackles the prevailing tradition of mayoral noninvolvement and details a growing number of mayors who are ready to face the challenge of improving public education. Click here to read the essay at the Harvard Educational Review’s website. Also, click here to listen to Professor Wong's radio appearance commenting on Mayoral Takeovers of Public Schools on KQED in San Francisco, originally aired on Friday, Sep 8th, 2006.

Professor John Tyler was one of three presenters at a September 15th conference at the University of Texas at Dallas (UTD) on the "dropout problem." The conference was jointly sponsored by UTD and the Dallas Federal Reserve. Prof. Tyler presented on findings from his various studies examining how GED holders fare in the labor market and in post-secondary education.

Everyone in the Education Department would like to congratulate our very own Nancy Hoffman for receiving a writing fellowship from the Rhode Island State Council on the Arts. Nancy won the $1000 fellowship for her play Midnight Mass. The play takes place in an Irish pub where a bizarre incident involving the local church chalice inspires heated discussion about the pros and cons of both old religion and new.

 

**Click here to visit our Commencement 2006 page and view the slideshow**

The Department of Education and the Division of Engineering are pleased to announce the establishment of an Undergraduate Teacher Preparation Program (UTEP) for students concentrating in the engineering ScB or AB programs. For the past year and a half Janet Blume, professor of engineering, and Larry Wakeford, director of science education, have worked together to design the program. The first student, Diana Chien, will graduate in May with a degree in engineering and certification to teach physics, grades 7-12. Diana is currently doing her student teaching at Hope High School.

Economics Graduate Student Jillian Berk has been awarded a fellowship from the National Bureau for Economic Research for the Study of Nonprofit Institutions for the 2006-7 academic year. This NBER fellowship program is designed to encourage research on nonprofit institutions by graduate students in economics working closely with them through support of dissertation research on the same subject. Jillian will be analyzing non-profit organizations that manage prisons. Professor John Tyler is her Faculty Sponsor.

Professor Cynthia Garcia Coll was recently chosen to receive the 2006 Karen T. Romer Award for Undergraduate Advising and Mentoring.The prize is presented by the Office of the Dean of the College to faculty who have demonstrated commitment to students' academic and personal concerns beyond the formal requirements of teaching and advising. This prize was established by the family of Brown trustee Marty Granoff to honor faculty who have exceptional records as advisors.

 

Professor Jin Li was recently selected nationally as one of the three recipients for the Young Scholars Award from the Foundation for Child Development. This award is for a 2-year longitudinal study on how Chinese immigrant children develop learning beliefs and how they are socialized at home. The project will start in March, 2006 through February, 2008. The awarded amount is $163,570.

The Education Department wishes to congratulate Senior Education Studies concentrators, Rob Blair and Julian Leichty Both students have been awarded Fulbright Fellowships. Rob will be in Colombia researching education programs for violence prevention, and Julian will be in Taiwan as a teaching assistant in an elementary school, both for the upcoming year.

In July, the Tri-State Consortium, an organization that supports high performing public school districts in the New York metropolitan area, held a two-day conference at Brown exploring the degree to which existing high school math and science curricula prepare students for rigorous college level work. The conference brought Brown faculty together with educators from Consortium districts to discuss the knowledge and skills in math and science that Brown professors expect incoming first-year students to possess, and how high school educators might better align their curricula with these expectations. The conference was organized by John Starr, Executive Director of the Tri-State Consortium and Adjunct Lecturer in the Education Department at Brown, with Lamont Gordon, Director of Education Outreach.

Depending on your perspective, riding a bicycle from Providence to San Francisco may sound like heaven or hell. Either way it is not something to be undertaken lightly. Education Studies concentrator Margaret Heidrick tells us about an experience that many might imagine and few would dare. Along the way she makes some money for a very good cause. <more>

 

The Department congratulates Johnny Lin, the winner of this year’s Mimi Sherman Stearn’s Fellowship. A triple concentrator in Education Studies, Economics and International relations, Johnny will use the Stearn’s Fellowship to support his work this summer with Asocion Incluir, a Buenos-Aires based education non-governmental organization founded to combat the problem of youth disillusionment resulting from the Argentine economic crisis. Focusing on the poorest neighborhoods in the area, Johnny’s work this summer will support research that seeks to identify, understand, and disseminate working models of successful local mentoring programs.

 

Recently, at the annual American Education Research Association meetings in San Francisco, Shirley Brice Heath, a Science Advisor for the National-Science-Foundation-sponsored LIFE Center at Stanford and the University of Washington, took part in a panel addressing the global dimensions of shifting patterns of democracy in education.  The LIFE Center undertakes research that attempts to understand the conditions of learning termed "formal" and "informal" across cultural, socioeconomic, and regional settings.

In Bristol, England, April 19-21, Shirley Brice Heath, with David Perkins of Harvard University, gave keynotes for a conference centered on This Learning Life.  The goal of the small invitation-only conference was to consider the contributions to the economy of the Blair government's policies on "creative partnering" to build "creative industries."

 

Senior lecturer and ArtsLiteracy Project faculty director Eileen Landay was a panelist at a Brown Commencement Forum on Saturday, May 27. The forum, titled THE CREATIVE IMPULSE: HOW ARTS EDUCATION INSPIRES EACH GENERATION explored the importance of the arts in education, from elementary school through college, and the integral role the arts play in shaping our society. Chaired by Martin J. Granoff, chair of the Brown University Creative Arts Advisory Board and honorary degree recipient, 2006, the panel also included Richard Fishman, director of the Brown University Creative Arts Council and professor of visual art and Curt Columbus, artistic director at Trinity Repertory Company.

 

The Education Department congratulates Education Studies concentrator Sarah Bowman on her selection – as a member of the Brown Woman’s Crew – for the 2006 NCAA Division I Women's Rowing Championships, which was held on the Mercer Lake in West Windsor, NJ May 26-28.

 

Professor Polly Ulichny's ED 228 WebCT course site was chosen as one of the 4 recipients of the 2nd annual Best of WebCT awards. Over 100 course websites were nominated. The selection committee reviewed each on the following criteria: the breadth of resources made available, variety in uses of WebCT tools, visual appearance, organization and ease of navigation, how well it is kept up to date, and the extent to which the site advances the goals of the course.

Professor Polly Ulichny and Professor Larry Wakeford were Showcase Presentors for the conference: Rethinking Technology in the PK-16 Classroom: The Power and the Limitations on May 1st at the Sheraton Airport Hotel in Warwick. They presented on a case study of e-folio (online portfolio) assessment in teacher education.

Professor Polly Ulichny spoke on Friday, April 28th at Press Play: Faculty Panel, Encouraging Students to Use Multimedia. Examples of multimedia assignments Brown faculty have developed and what students have created as a result were presented. Multimedia assignments hold great potential for enhancing student learning. Images, graphics, animation, video, and audio can be used to produce a powerful message and students who work on these projects gain valuable 21st century skills.

The Education Department congratulates Carin Algava as she ends her one year tenure as Chair of the President’s Staff Advisory Committee (SAC). For more on Carin and her busy year in SAC… <more>

Featured Education Faculty

Drinking coffee and reading the New York Times is not how Professor Eileen Landay plans to spend her retirement. The Education Department’s Senior Lecturer in English Teacher Education wants to remain, in her own words, “useful as long as possible.” We recount an award winning scholar’s very “useful” career. <more>

Professor Carl Kaestle is recognized as one of the leading education historians of our time. He has written on topics that range from literacy development in America to the history of urban school systems, and he is perhaps the nation’s preeminent scholar on the history of the federal role in U.S. public education. <more>

The ArtsLiteracy Project, based in the Education Department, was nationally recognized at the White House Jan. 25, 2006. The program received the 2005 Coming Up Taller Award, which recognizes outstanding community arts and humanities programs that celebrate the creativity of America’s youth. The project, which aims to explore and create innovative approaches to arts and literacy education, was awarded $10,000 for its achievements during a White House ceremony Jan. 25, 2006, at 2:30 p.m. Eileen Landay, project founder and clinical professor of English education, accepted the award, presented by First Lady Laura Bush. <see more about this in article from Brown's Office of Media Relations>

 

The Education Department congratulates Jake Golenor on his First Team All-Ivy selection in shot-put. Jake is an Education Studies concentrator and 2005-2006 is his second year as co-captain of the Brown Men’s Track and Field team.

 

The Education Department congratulates Education Studies Concentrator Priscilla Sung on being selected as a member of Phi Beta Kappa, the nations leading advocate for the liberal arts and sciences at the undergraduate level. The Society's distinctive emblem, a golden key, is widely recognized as a symbol of academic achievement.

 

Education Department in the Community: This year six new teachers at Hope High School in Providence are graduates of the Master of Arts in Teaching (MAT) program at Brown. View the article about the connection between Brown MAT students and Hope High School in a recent issue of Inside Brown.

 

If he had it to do all over again...
In a March 24th, 2006 New York Times article, "Worried About India's and China's Booms? So Are They," Pulitzer Prize winning author and columnist, Thomas L. Friedman, writes, "The more I cover foreign affairs, the more I wish I had studied education in college, because the more I travel, the more I find that the most heated debates in many countries are around education."

 

• Katherine Saviskas '06, Education Studies concentrator, is featured in the current Brown Daily Herald article; Senior hopes to outline shortcomings of U.'s writing requirement; Professors say lack of enforcement may shortchange students. Katherine has worked for six semesters as a Writing Fellow and is writing her honors thesis on Brown's academic writing support system in hopes that her efforts will start a "dialogue about writing at Brown," including discussions among departments. <more>
• Luther Spoehr, lecturer in education and vice chair of the College Curriculum Council, was interviewed for a recent BDH article discussing the University's grading system, entitled; Faculty weigh in on plus/minus debate <more>
• An interview with John Tyler, Department Chair was featured in a recent Brown Daily Herald article; National commission considers standardized testing at colleges; Commission comes after study finds low level of literacy among college graduates <more>

 

The Education Department congratulates Education Studies Concentrator Kelly Powell, senior co-captain of the women’s track team and member of the record-breaking women’s Distance Medley Relay team. Kelly’s team smashed the previous school record by 25 seconds – earning them All-East honors and ranking them ninth in the nation. The performance has earned the team a trip to the NCAA Division 1 Championship at the University of Arkansas this weekend and we wish them well.

 

Professor Cynthia Garcia Coll was contributing as a panelist at a recent conference; School Readiness: Closing Racial and Ethnic Gaps, Policymakers and Practitioners Conference on Wednesday, March 8th. <details>

 

In an interview with Rebecca Knight of the London-based Financial Times, UEP Program Director, Professor Ken Wong, comments on the implementation of “Podcast” technologies used to record and disseminate course lectures. <more>

 

WRNI-AM aired the "Not Your Classroom" series, a production of BSR radio featuring interviews with Rhode Island Scholars and Scientists on Sunday evenings in February. An interview the Education Department's Professor Jin Li aired on the 19th, focusing on her research on how our cultural beliefs about education shape achievement. <more>

 

Brown Student Athletes Develop Mentoring Program. Chazz Woodson, former star player for the Brown men’s lacrosse team, and some fellow Brown athletes are making moves on and off the playing field. “Makin’ Moves” is a tutoring and mentoring program for area public school students that was conceived, developed, and is now being staffed and managed by a group of Brown student athletes. The unique concept of “Makin’ Moves” is to provide mentors who have an awareness of the academic and personal needs of high school student-athletes of color as they grow, mature, and begin thinking about college. <More>

 

Education Department in the Community. This year six new teachers at Hope High School in Providence are graduates of the Master of Arts in Teaching (MAT) program at Brown and four current MAT students will be student teaching at Hope. Four of the eight newly hired teachers are from the MAT class of '05. In further developments at the high school located near Brown, MAT faculty members met several times during the summer with Hope administration and faculty leaders to discuss ways of establishing an ongoing professional development relationship between Hope High School and the teacher education faculty at Brown. One initiative from that planning is a series of professional development workshops in the coming year that will be led by Senior Lecturer Eileen Landay. The theme of the workshops is methods and practices through which literacy can be promoted across the curriculum at the high school.

 

Senior Lecturer Eileen Landay's article “Give Me More Proof: Othello in the Seventh Grade” was published in this month's volume of English Journal. This is the premier journal for secondary English teachers and is published by the National Council of Teachers of English.

 

Research findings of Professor John Tyler are cited in the NPR's Morning Edition story "Bush Education Cuts Jeopardize GED Programs." The story includes a brief interview with Professor Tyler regarding the relationship of GED and participation in the work force. <Listen to story>

 

 

Dr. Jack Demick to teach Human Development courses. Adjunct Professor of Education, Dr. Jack Demick, will be joining the faculty this year to teach three courses in the Human Development area of emphasis. This Fall Prof. Demick will teach ED126: Emotion, Cognition, and Education, and ED143: The Psychology of Race, Class, and Gender. In the Spring Prof. Demick will teach ED127: Adolescent Psychology.
<More on Prof. Demick>

 

Professor John Tyler will attend the spring meeting of the Economics of Education Program of the National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER) in Cambridge, MA on April 22nd. The Economics of Education Program was created to recognize the large and rapidly growing body of economic research on education. Tyler is a member of the NBER's Economics of Education Program, a group of scholars drawn from labor economics, public economics, macroeconomics and growth, industrial organization and contracts, development economics, and urban economics.

New Book Series...

Child Development in Cultural Context
Cynthia García Coll to be editor for a new book series from Oxford University Press! This series will bring together work on U.S.ethnic minority children and adolescents and work on children and adolescents from other cultures to examine child development in cultural context from

Cynthía Garcia Coll to be featured speaker at Multicultural Education: A Dialogue Revisited, an Education Symposium held at Roger Williams University on Friday, April 15 <Download Flyer>

 

How to Get from Viet Nam to New York in a Hurry. Education Department Helps Out.
What do you do if you are an exceptional student studying abroad in Viet Nam; you have to make a very important meeting in New York; and you need a little help with that very expensive airfare? You reach out for help. And if you are lucky, someone will recognize your value and your commitment, and offer to do what they can. This is exactly what happened for Juhyung Lee... <more>

 

Alumni Corner

Katherine Chon who graduated from Brown in 2002, is now the Co-Executive Director of the Polaris Project, a multicultural grassroots organization combating human trafficking and modern-day slavery.

"The Ed Department was a second home to me when I was at Brown and the warm support I received from the professors has had a significant role in my personal, educational, and professional development."
<more>

 

Kurt Wootton, Director of the ArtsLiteracy Project at Brown University, Jori Ketten, Project Coordinator and Patricia Sobral, Portuguese and Brazilian Studies Professor conducted a two day workshop at the Santo Amaro Senac campus on Arts Literacy held in São Paulo on October 13-14. <more>

 

 

Communicating Community...

Kurt Wootton & ArtsLiteracy Lead the Way!
Kurt Wootton, the Director of the ArtsLiteracy Project at Brown University has attracted nationwide attention from policy makers and educators for his recently published keynote speech entitled: ‘Community This’ and ‘Community That,’ given at the 2003 Arts Education Partnership (A.E.P.) Forum... <More>

 

 

Remembering 2005 Commencement...
Commencement 2005 has come and gone, but you can still enjoy the words and memories of the Education Department ceremony! Did you just miss that one slide, did that certain phrase speak to you... Visit our special commencement site to read transcripts and view the photos! <Commencement 2005>