UIC College of Education - University of Illinois at ChicagoWhy UIC?
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Keep up with all the news, events, people and emerging research at UIC’s College of Education.
Professor
Pamela A. Quiroz
Professor
Dr. Pamela Anne Quiroz is Associate Professor of Policy Studies & Sociology at the University of Illinois at Chicago. She received her PhD in Sociology at the University of Chicago in 1993. Her research interests are sociology of education, inequality, children and youth, identity and social trust. She is the author of Adoption in a Color-Blind Society (2007, Rowman and Littlefield, Joe Feagin's series Toward a Multiracial Society). Her current scholarship is a research action ethnography involving the recent Supreme Court decision on race-conscious assignment in K-12 public school systems.
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Associate Dean for Academic Affairs, Executive Director, Council on Teacher Education
Cynthia Shanahan
Associate Dean for Academic Affairs, Executive Director, Council on Teacher Education
Dr. Cynthia Shanahan is the Associate Dean for Academic Affairs, the Executive Director of the Council on Teacher Education, and a professor in the Literacy, Language, and Culture Program. She coordinates faculty and program development and the activities of all certification programs in education across five colleges. She is the liaison to the Illinois State Board of Education (ISBE). Her research interests include disciplinary literacy, adolescent literacy, conceptual change, and the reading of multiple texts. Shanahan is a member of Reading and Evidenced-Based Argumentation in Disciplinary Instruction (READI), an Institution for Education Sciences Reading for Understanding Grant that studies 6th to 12th grade development of argumentation in literature, history and science. She also is co-chair of the Assessment Committee for the Chicago Teacher Preparation Program (CTPP), a Teacher Quality Grant for the Department of Education.
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Associate Professor
Ben Superfine
Associate Professor
Dr. Ben Superfine is an Assistant Professor in the College of Education at the University of Illinois at Chicago. Superfine received his JD and PhD in Education Foundations and Policy from the University of Michigan. Before joining UIC, Superfine practiced law at Dow Lohnes PLLC. Superfine's research interests have focused on the intersection of education law and policy, school finance reform law and policy, standards-based reform and accountability policies, and the role of science in the educational policy process. His research is interdisciplinary and addresses educational issues through the lenses of law, history, and social science. Superfine's work has been published in various educational and legal journals, including the American Educational Research Journal, American Journal of Education, Cardozo Law Review, Educational Policy, and Teachers College Record. Superfine's book, The Courts and Standards-based Reform, was published by Oxford University Press.
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Assistant Dean for Programs and Technology
Kathleen Sheridan
Assistant Dean for Programs and Technology
Dr. Kathleen M. Sheridan is an associate professor and assistant dean of technology and programs. Dr. Sheridan received her PhD in Child and Family Studies from the University of Wisconsin-Madison and her MA from Washington University in St. Louis. Her research interests include online learning and course development in higher education. Sheridan has been published in leading academic journals, delivered keynote speeches, and has presented her work at workshops and at national and international conferences. She can be contacted at ksherid9@uic.edu.
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Professor
Everett V. Smith
Professor
Dr. Everett Smith specializes in psychometrics, specifically Rasch measurement. His research interests and expertise include test and rating scale design and analysis for the measurement of latent constructs, testing model robustness, and, in general, applications of Rasch measurement in the social, behavioral, health, rehabilitation, and medical sciences for both criterion and norm-reference assessments. Among these applications include studies of dimensionality, DIF, cross-cultural equivalence, equating, item banking, rating scale optimization and standard setting. Smith is the co-editor of Introduction to Rasch Measurement: Theory, Models, and Applications (2004), Rasch Measurement: Advanced and Specialized Applications (2007), and Criterion-Reference Testing: Practice Analysis to Score Reporting Using Rasch Measurement Models (2009). He serves as the associate editor for the Journal of Applied Measurement, and is on the editorial boards of Educational and Psychological Measurement and the Journal of Nursing Measurement.
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Department Chair
Mark A. Smylie
Department Chair
Dr. Mark Smylie is a professor of Education and Chair of the Department of Educational Policy Studies. His research interests include educational leadership, organizational change and urban school improvement, and the development of teachers and the teaching occupation. He is the author of numerous articles and books on these and related subjects. Smylie has served as a Director of the Consortium on Chicago School Research at the University of Chicago and as executive officer of the National Society for the Study of Education. He is the recipient of National Academy of Education and Spencer Foundation fellowships. Smylie began his career in education as a high school history teacher. He has continued his connections with education policy and practice by consulting regularly with national, state, and local education agencies and professional organizations, and working with school systems in the Chicago area and across the country.
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Professor
Danny Martin
Professor
Dr. Danny Bernard Martin is an associate professor of Education and Mathematics. His research has focused on understanding mathematical and racial identity development among African-American learners in middle school, high school, and community college contexts. He is author of Mathematics Success and Failure Among African American Youth (Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, 2000) and editor of Mathematics Teaching, Learning, and Liberation in the Lives of Black Children (Routledge, 2009).
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Associate Professor
Shelby Cosner
Associate Professor
Dr. Cosner's research focuses on the development of organizational capacity within schools. She is particularly interested in the ways in which school leaders support the development of human and social resources; two important dimensions of school capacity. From such a perspective, she has examined the the development of trust in schools. She is currently investigating the development of evidence-based (data-based) teacher collaboration. Her recent work appears in such peer-reviewed journals as Educational Administration Quarterly, the Journal of School Leadership, Urban Education, and Educational Management Administration & Leadership. Forthcoming publications will appear in Leadership and Policy in Schools.
Dr. Cosner is a former school- and district-level leader. She teaches a variety of leadership, school organization, and qualitative research methods courses for doctoral students in the Urban Education Leadership Ed.D. and Policy Studies in Urban Education Ph.D. programs.Cosner received UICs Council for Excellence in Teaching and Learning Award in 2009.Read More...
Clinical Full Professor and Director of the MEd in Special Education
Michelle B. Parker-Katz
Clinical Full Professor and Director of the MEd in Special Education
Dr. Michelle Parker-Katz is clinical professor of Special Education and Teacher Education.Her research interests include teacher learning, especially early career urban teachers, with a focus on how teachers develop academic knowledge and learn to teach it to a range of students with disabilities; how collaborative work in teaching can support such learning; the role of literacy in supporting access to all students' learning; ways to assist teachers in use of evidence-based practices to promote academic and social learning and improvement of postsecondary opportunities for students with disabilities.
Her research is funded through federal grants from the Institute for Education Sciences and National Science Foundation.Her work is widely published in peer-reviewed journals.Parker-Katz coordinates personnel preparation master's programs in Special Education and has several grants from the U.S. Office of Special Education Programs that support that, as well. She also does clinical instruction for UIC students in Chicago Public Schools.
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Associate Professor
James R. Gavelek
Associate Professor
Dr. James Gavelek's scholarly interests focus on the role of language and other embodied semiotic processes in understanding the development of mind. He is especially interested in the implications of an integrated and embodied semiotics for rethinking teaching, learning and the school curriculum. Gavelek serves on the editorial boards of Reading Research Quarterly and the Yearbook of the National Reading Conference. He is the coordinator of the Ph.D. program in Literacy, Language, and Culture.
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Associate Professor
Marie Tejero Hughes
Associate Professor
Dr. Tejero Hughes is an associate professor of Special Education. She teaches graduate courses in reading and writing that are designed to assist general and special education teachers working in urban communities meet the needs of students struggling with literacy across the curriculum. Her areas of expertise include comprehension strategies for students with learning disabilities, reading instruction for culturally and linguistically diverse students, and Latino family engagement in special education. Tejero Hughes has numerous publications and presentations related to reading instruction, professional development of general and special education teachers, and Latino family involvement in their children’s education.
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Associate Dean for Programs and Evaluation, Associate Professor
Carole Mitchener
Associate Dean for Programs and Evaluation, Associate Professor
Dr. Carole P. Mitchener is the Associate Dean of Programs and Evaluation and associate professor of Curriculum & Instruction. Her scholarly interests include science education, teacher education and action research in urban contexts. Her publications have appeared in national and international journals (e.g. the Journal of Research in Science Teaching and Science Education), in monographs commissioned by the National Research Council on science teacher preparation, and in a professional handbook sponsored by the National Science Teachers Association on research in science teacher education. Her recent grant activity totals more than $2 million and includes three National Science Foundation grants on science teacher preparation, including a Noyce Urban Scholars program for beginning science teachers dedicated to working in the Chicago Public Schools.
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Assistant Professor
Yue Yin
Assistant Professor
Dr. Yue Yin particularly interested in classroom assessment and applied measurement. She has conducted research on performance assessment, concept mapping assessment, and formative assessment. In her research, she used learning theory as a foundation, measurement and statistics as tools, to examine ways of using assessments to improve students' learning. Her teaching interests include measurement and applied statistics.
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Professor
Taffy E. Raphael
Professor
Dr. Taffy E. Raphael is professor of Literacy Education. Raphael’s research interests include strategy instruction in comprehension and writing, and frameworks for literacy curriculum and instruction (e.g., Book Club Plus). She directed Partnership READ (2002-2011), a school-university partnership to improve literacy instruction through professional development, which was recognized with the American Association of Colleges of Teacher Education’s 2006 Best Practices Award for Effective Partnerships.
She has published several books, and more than 100 articles and chapters. She received International Reading Association’s Outstanding Teacher Educator in Reading Award in 1997, the 2007 University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign Distinguished Alumni Award, and the 2008 National Reading Conference Oscar Causey Award for Lifetime Contributions to Literacy Research. She has been a Fellow of the National Council of Research in Language and Literacy since 1996, and member of the Reading Hall of Fame since 2002. She served on the Board of Directors of International Reading Association (2007-2010).
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Professor
Maria Varelas
Professor
Dr. Maria Varelas is professor of Science Education and an Honors College Faculty Affiliate. She is the co-editor of the Learning section of Science Education, and the Higher Education editor of the ISTA journal The Spectrum. She has co-led, with colleagues from various departments, multi-year NSF grants totaling more than $6 million, spanning topics that include teacher preparation, development of science content courses for elementary education majors, graduate students in science, mathematics, and engineering fields involved in K to 12 classrooms, and integrated science-literacy enactments (ISLE project) in elementary Chicago Public School classrooms. Since 1993, Varelas has been teaching in UIC’s elementary education programs and Curriculum Studies doctoral program, and has received 5 teaching awards of 3 different types. Her research focuses on classroom-based learning and teaching of science in urban schools and has been mostly co-authored with teachers and graduate students. Varelas is widely published and recognized as a University of Illinois Scholar. She been recently elected to the Leadership Team of NARST: A worldwide organization for improving science teaching and learning through research, serving as a member of its Executive Board.
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Assistant Professor
P. Zitlali Morales
Assistant Professor
My research interests include the education of English language learners, including primary language instruction and bilingual education, language ideologies, learner identity, and education policy.
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Associate Professor
David Omotoso Stovall
Associate Professor
Dr. David Omotoso Stovall is associate professor of Educational Policy Studies and African-American Studies. His research interests include 1. Critical Race Theory 2.School-Community Relationships 3.Youth Culture and 4.The relationship between housing and K to 12 school systems. Since his arrival at UIC, Stovall has been working with youth, community organizations and schools in Chicago, New York City and the San Francisco Bay Area. Furthering his attempt to connect K to 12 and university spaces, Stovall also serves as a volunteer social studies teacher at the Lawndale Little Village School of Social Justice.
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Clinical Assistant professor
Daniel Miltner
Clinical Assistant professor
Dr. Dan Miltner is a clinical assistant professor in Mathematics Education, with a joint appointment between the College of Ed and Mathematics Department. He works with and advises undergraduates in elementary mathematics for teachers courses and observes student teachers at the high school level. He works with practicing teachers who are working toward their middle school math endorsement and master's degrees. Miltner is interested in the various ways students solve problems.
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Professor
George Karabatsos
Professor
Dr. George Karabatsos is a Professor of Educational Psychology. His research deals with the development and application of statistical models; to improve data analysis for regression and prediction, for causal analysis of educational and other interventions; and for the measurement of examinee performance. His work has been published in a number of peer-reviewed journals, and he has been Principal Investigator for research supported by grants from the National Science Foundation, The Spencer Foundation, and the National Institutes for Health. Karabatsos also serves as an associate editor for the journal Psychometrika.
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Professor
William Teale
Professor
Dr. William H. Teale is a professor in the Literacy, Language & Culture Program. His current U.S. Department of Education-funded, school-based projects focus on the development of scientifically based literacy programs and practices in preschool classrooms. Details of these projects can be found at http://www.uic.edu/educ/erf/. He teaches courses on early literacy and children's/young adult literature at the master's and doctoral levels. Author of more than 100 publications, Teale is a member of the Reading Hall of Fame, and is currently serving on the Board of Directors of the International Reading Association.
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Clinical Full Professor and Director of Elementary Education
Eleni Katsarou
Clinical Full Professor and Director of Elementary Education
Dr. Eleni Katsarou is clinical professor of Curriculum & Instruction and Director of the BA in Urban Education Program. She teaches teacher candidates in the Elementary Education concentration, and works closely with senior candidates as they conduct their student teaching in urban public school sites. Katsarou's research interests include teacher education in urban contexts, critical perspectives in teacher education, and social justice enactments in schools and communities. Her work centers on collaborations with teachers and leaders of schools as they jointly attempt to understand what constitutes caring and ethical teaching. The partnerships she has formed for nearly 15 years have given rise to the ways in which professional communities among school, community and university people are developed in pursuing common understandings about urban teaching.
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Associate Professor
Joshua Radinsky
Associate Professor
Dr. Joshua Radinsky's research applies cultural-historical activity theory to the study of teaching and learning with data visualizations, with a focus on historical and social inquiry. His research methods are design-based, using the process of designing and adapting learning environments -- curriculum, instruction, software, data inscriptions -- as a window through which to analyze how people learn, individually and socially.This research informs, and is informed by, professional development and teacher education in the social sciences, and studies of the social contexts of schooling in big cities like Chicago.
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Associate Professor
Lisa Cushing
Associate Professor
Dr. Lisa Cushing's research and teaching interests focus on increasing the quality of life for individuals with significant disabilities through the improvement of educational, social and behavioral outcomes in inclusive settings. Her current scholarly interests include: the inclusion of students in middle and high school settings, differentiated instruction such as peer mediated supports, individuals with low incidence disabilities including those identified with Autism Spectrum Disorder, transition from school, and positive behavioral interventions and support.
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Distinguished Professor of Psychology and Education
Susan Goldman
Distinguished Professor of Psychology and Education
Dr. Susan Goldman's research interests are in learning and assessment in subject matter domains such as literacy, mathematics, history and science. She also is interested in roles for technologies in supporting assessment, instruction, and learning; digital literacy assessment; multiple source comprehension; technology supports for learning; educational change and teacher learning; and discourse analytic methodologies.
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