Equity

Examples of sustained instructional improvement across an entire school district are rare, but a five-year research-practice partnership between the University of Washington College of Education and a mid-sized urban district highlights the power of networked educators.

As a 6th grade math teacher in Highline School District, Raphael Munavu’s passion for social justice defines his approach to teaching math.

With every lesson, he strives to help students connect math to their own lives, enabling them to think critically about the world around them.

Two ongoing partnerships between Puget Sound area school districts and University of Washington College of Education researchers are being extended with support from two new grants from the Spencer Foundation.

As a novice teacher in a Denver elementary school, Nathan Hoston recalls his growing discomfort with how students were being referred to special education services.

“The first year," Hoston said, "the system seemed biased and subjective in a way that made me uncomfortable."

Hoston, who at the time was teaching kindergarten through second grade students with high-incidence disabilities, saw black boys disproportionately represented in special education services at his school and surrounding schools.

University of Washington Professor James A. Banks, known widely as “the father of multicultural education,” will present the UW Office of Minority Affairs & Diversity’s (OMA&D) 14th annual Samuel E. Kelly Distinguished Faculty Lecture on April 13 in Kane Hall Room 220.

Banks is the Kerry and Linda Killinger Endowed Chair in Diversity Studies and founding director of the Center for Multicultural Education in the UW College of Education.

Over 24 intense hours, teams of University of Washington education students drew upon design thinking processes to craft new ideas for better addressing the educational needs of immigrant and refugee youth and families.

While visiting two high schools on opposite sides of Chicago, Rhoan Garnett (PhD ‘18) experienced first-hand the detrimental effects of the college information gap.

Garnett, then assistant dean of admissions for Bowdoin College, started his day visiting a well-resourced school in north Chicago. He remembers students at the school being respectful and interested in speaking with him.

For African-American students, data, alongside societal attitudes and stereotypes, often present a negative picture: a wide academic achievement gap separating them from their white peers. Higher rates of discipline and absenteeism. Discrimination by other students, teachers and the larger community. And just last summer, a study indicated that black girls, from an early age, are perceived as more aggressive and sexual – less innocent – than white girls.

Anthony Craig, a Washington educator with expertise developing systems that foster equitable educational outcomes, has been named director of the University of Washington College of Education’s Leadership for Learning (EdD) program.

Craig, who will assume his duties on January 2, has served as a teacher, instructional coach, principal and, most recently, director of diversity, equity and outreach for Edmonds School District.