Diversity, Equity, Inclusion & Justice - Featured SOE Research

Cesar Chavez, The Write Institute, 2001 - "the end of all knowledge should surely be service to others" University at Albany School of Education

Kelly Wissman - The Freedom Dreaming for Educational Justice project begins from the premise that in order to change inequitable schooling systems, we must first imagine a better reality. With support from a UAlbany StAR grant, this public engagement project draws on the anti-racist scholarship of Bettina L. Love and concepts of freedom dreaming and the Black imaginary within the work of Robin D. G. Kelley. This project brings together K-12 educators, UAlbany students, authors, artists, faculty, K-12 students, and the broader community to create education freedom dreams to be exhibited in online and public spaces, as well as preserved in a living archive for ongoing research. UAlbany School of Education ReSearch for Equity

Teniell Trolian - This study examines whether students’ employment experiences during college are associated with increased interactions with diverse peers, and whether these relationships differ for students from differing racial/ethnic backgrounds. Results suggest that working on-campus during college was positively associated with increased interactions with diverse peers for both the full student sample and for several racial/ethnic subsamples. Additionally, working off-campus was positively associated with increased interactions with diverse peers for one racial/ethnic subsample. UAlbany School of Education ReSearch for Equity

Erin Ruth Baker - Child development in the context of abject poverty differs in many ways from "typical" child development reported in many studies that have relied on convenience samples. Moreover, much research interprets such differences as evidence of deficient development for children in poverty and other contexts. This project is focused on interpreting such differences as being sensitive to environmental differences, and focuses on various domains across child development, including cognition (moral reasoning, perspective taking, information processing) and behavior (aggressive forms and functions, prosociality, exclusion). UAlbany School of Education ReSearch for Equity

Teniell Trolian - In a longitudinal study following 3 cohorts of students from entry into college through the end of their 4th year, we examined how students’ positive and negative diversity interactions were related to 2 different outcomes: need for cognition and critical thinking skills. The results indicated that negative diversity interactions were strongly related to both outcomes, and that was the case for students of color and their white peers. Positive diversity interactions, on the other hand, were related to students’ need for cognition but not their critical thinking skills, and these interactions disproportionately benefitted white students. We conclude by considering the implications for understanding students’ cognitive development and implementing policies and practices that can facilitate positive outcomes on college campuses. UAlbany School of Education ReSearch for Equity

Tianlin Wang - How much do young children internalize the stories that are read to them? How will children interpret the gender roles in stories that read to them? Is their understanding of gender roles malleable through story reading? We are interested in addressing these questions by reading stories to children and asking them to engage in play sessions afterwards to answer questions related to gender roles. UAlbany School of Education ReSearch for Equity

Teniell Trolian - Results revealed that frequently communicating with a faculty member by e-mail or in person, experiencing equitable and fair treatment by faculty members, and being satisfied with access to faculty members outside of class were positively associated with positive perceptions of the climate for diversity; while engaging in creative work with a faculty member, engaging in research activities with a faculty member, working with faculty members on activities other than coursework, talking with a faculty member outside of class about issues and concepts derived from a course, and knowing a professor well enough to ask for a recommendation letter were negatively associated with positive perceptions of the climate for diversity. UAlbany School of Education ReSearch for Equity

Julie Learned - With colleagues at Boston Univ. and Texas State Univ., I am working on an ongoing project to review two decades of qualitative research on reading intervention classes in secondary schools. Our findings call attention to some of the consequences of intervention placement policies and practices for adolescents and amplify the need to reconceptualize adolescent literacy instruction to center youth’s identities, histories, and capacities as literacy knowers and doers. Our project's implications center on equity and justice for adolescent literacy learning. We have a recently published article in Teachers College Record, as well as other manuscripts under review. UAlbany School of Education ReSearch for Equity

Kristen Wilcox - This mixed method study will seek to illuminate occupational stress, job satisfaction, and performance adaptation disparities of leaders and educators working in districts and schools serving different subpopulations of students (i.e. ethnically, linguistically, and socioeconomically) and in different types of communities (i.e. urban, suburban, rural) across New York state. We also seek to discover disparities among educators of different genders and those educators working in different content area classrooms and with students requiring specialized instruction such as students with disabilities and English language learners. UAlbany School of Education ReSearch for Equity

Tammy Ellis-Robinson - The Disability Champions Project initiated with Ketrina Hazell is a three pronged mentoring project designed to support young people with disabilities as they transition from K-12 schooling to post-secondary settings including higher education, work, and community. A specific focus of the project is building community relationships based on the development of mentoring networks and an inclusive approach that addresses multiple marginalizing identities including disability, race, language, orientation, religion and gender as they affect experience. The project has been developed collaboratively among individuals with disabilities, K-12 educators, community service, faith-based, family and university stakeholders. It includes a video series, a face to face program, and family information, support, advocacy and guidance. UAlbany School of Education ReSearch for Equity