In addition to teacher certification programs, what other programs have a demonstrated impact?
Because education is inherently interdisciplinary, many of our programs complement one another, and this creates exciting ways for faculty to work together. For example, faculty in our Recreational Therapy program have been working in Kinesiology—merging areas of health and wellness with sport performance, rehabilitation, and the like. These types of programs work with unique populations in the local community. Similarly, our School Psychology and Counseling programs are working to meet a desperate need for mental health professionals in schools and community agencies. Given the increased degree of stressors that everyone is facing right now, we need as much help as we can get in these areas. Also, I think our Educational Leadership program has a decided impact on area school districts—certainly the very notion of what it means to “lead” a K-12 school has changed dramatically in recent years and I’m enthused by how our faculty are engaging with those changes in the classes they teach.
Beyond current program offerings, what unique programs are you interested in developing in the School of Education and Human Development (SEHD)?
My sense is that we have a unique opportunity to develop a program and research alignment in the area of educational neuroscience. We currently have faculty in areas such as special education and early childhood education who draw from neuroscience for their research. We also have faculty in school psychology who engage in brain-based research. Mix with this the fact that our MMC campus houses an fMRI machine and we have a real opportunity to develop and build an area of research that might engage collaborations with colleagues in Psychology and even Physics in interesting and important ways.
Beyond schools what community partners are you connecting with?
Since taking on the dean position, I’ve begun to work very deliberately with the Early Learning Coalition (ELC) here in South Florida. I like to put a focus on “educators” instead of just focusing on “teachers” and our work with the ELC certainly allows us to work with all types of folks who are invested in education, both formally and informally. We also house the Bob Moses Research Center here in SEHD and this connects us with folks in Miami-Dade and Broward counties in the interest of improving math literacy. Also, I’ve worked with our foundations office to establish the Ziff Education Scholars—this is a way for us to utilize an important gift from a donor to support student work at the undergraduate and graduate levels.
Beyond your work as Dean, how else do you connect with the field of education?
Well, my training is actually in educational research and philosophy of education. As part of that, I’m lucky enough to hold the Frost Professorship in Education and Human Development. I use this position to investigate how we study education—what methods and practices have we historically used?—and the implications of studying education in particular ways. We can’t always use student test scores as a proxy for learning. The Frost Professorship has afforded me the opportunity to connect with an international array of scholars who are invested in educational research. In fact, this winter I plan to bring a cohort of educational researchers to campus as a working group devoted to researching education in innovative and impactful ways. I couldn’t do that without my Frost Professorship. I try to keep going with my scholarship because it’s important to me as a faculty member—and I need to try and keep up with our engaged faculty here in SEHD!
What interesting places have you traveled in your role as Dean?
Well, this past winter I went to Helsinki, Finland to participate in a research conference. It was really helpful to learn how the Finnish schools incorporate the arts and the environment in their daily curriculum. In August, I will travel to Brazil to deliver a keynote to an educational research conference. While there, I’m going to use part of the time to meet with my administrative counterparts in area universities. I’m curious as to how these different countries engage university-community partnerships and how we might learn from their work.