Research

Soon after starting her doctoral dissertation fieldwork at the University of Washington, Deborah Silvis (PhD ‘18) visited a family to observe their use of digital media.

The family's 12-year-old daughter had her heart set on getting a dog, and her mother suggested she research which breed she wanted. Her daughter jumped into the task, spending hours on her laptop, watching videos to learn more about various breeds.

After growing up alongside a family member with autism, Katy Bateman (PhD ‘17) was inspired to become a champion for inclusion in education.

Throughout her life, Bateman was intrigued by the therapies and education services that were used to help her cousin learn.

“She had limited language when she was younger and we worked a lot on her language,” Bateman said. “As I got older, I saw her language progress into speaking full sentences. She now has a part-time job and she loves it. Seeing her language start to click made me think, ‘How can I do this for other kids, too?’”

The University of Washington College of Education’s work to expand access to high-quality early learning opportunities across the country is being strengthened with a $10 million grant from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.

Over the next four years, the grant will support the College in generating tools and methods needed to launch sustainable high-quality practices in pre-kindergarten programs, particularly among low-income communities.

Children who read and write at home — whether for assignments or just for fun — are building long-term study and executive function skills, according to a paper from the University of Washington.

And while home literacy activities have already been associated with higher test scores, the new study shows these activities also provide students with tools for lifetime success.

Afnan Boutrid believes in the power of education to unite and heal. It's a belief reinforced in one of the world's most conflicted regions.

In 2013, Boutrid started a three-month research experience at Hand in Hand, a bilingual and binational school in Jerusalem that’s one of the few schools serving both Israeli and Palestinian students.

Despite the region’s deep social divisions, she observed Israeli and Palestinian students, teachers and administrators learning and working together.

School districts across the nation are turning to research to transform their central offices in ways that support better teaching and learning for all students.

Yet putting that research into practice is no easy task, even when districts bring in high-quality outside help says the University of Washington’s Meredith Honig, associate professor of education policy, organizations and leadership and executive director of the District Leadership Design Lab.

Teens from marginalized communities often contend with strong cultural messages and under-resourced schools that discourage them from pursuing STEM learning. How can programs that embed science, computational and design skills inside other activities—like participating in science events at outdoor music festivals—build student interest, develop their skills and shift their perceptions of what science is and can be for them?

How can schools move from being a source of inequity and harm to a source of community resurgence?

Intrigued by this question, Meixi (PhD ‘19) found that building relationships between communities and schools is the key to unlocking new ways of teaching, learning and knowing.

Originally from Singapore, Meixi spent childhood years at an indigenous hill tribe school in northern Thailand, which is where she saw the deep need to explore diverse methods of teaching and learning.

Most schools offer parents specific ways to help out: Join the PTA, chaperone a field trip, grade papers for a teacher or assist on a classroom art project.

Those volunteer opportunities, however, not only reinforce the top-down power structure of schools, but also cater to mostly white, privileged families, maintaining the institutionalized racism that marginalizes low-income families and families of color, said Ann Ishimaru, assistant professor of education at the University of Washington.

Despite the growing awareness of socio-ecological challenges facing humans in the 21st century, science learning still mostly takes place inside the classroom, disconnected from the natural world.