SM调教所 Boulder's Ed Talks

Watch SM调教所 Boulder's Ed Talks: The Legacy and Future of Civil Rights

View Ed Talks Spring听2023听and Q&A

Watch the full event recording with a live Q&A with the speakers.听Originally live on April 18, 2023.

From Silence To Advocacy

Tania Hogan, Executive Director of the BUENO Center for Multicultural Education

Tania Hogan (ella/she/her/hers) shares her experience as an emergent bilingual student in the US school system and the challenges they faced while learning English. Her journey inspired them to become a bilingual teacher and advocate for bilingual education, with a focus on sustaining language and culture. The talk highlights the importance of creating opportunities for bilingual students and shares a pivotal moment where Hogan found her voice and spoke up against being silenced, an experience that led to her research and mindset around resilient and transformational resistance in pursuit of equitable educational experiences.

Race Relations, Refugee Issues, and Rurality

Emily Gleason, Faculty Director of the Teacher Leadership program and Senior Instructor

This talk centers on a constellation of local issues that took place in small-town Vermont related to struggles for educational equity for all students. Emily Gleason (she/her/hers) shares her own perspectives on being at the center of the 鈥渃ontroversy鈥� related to refugee resettlement and race relations in one town. The talk explores what it means to think about rights, race and racism, and the rural context in a nation divided down lines of race, class, and geography. Gleason explores issues of whiteness, privilege, economic inequalities and rights while also underscoring the need to critically examine one鈥檚 own positionality and power in the process of educating for equity for all.

Chicanismo and the Classroom

Jas贸n Romero, Jr., Founder and Co-Director of Aquetza and Director of the Chicano & Latino History Project

This talk by Jas贸n Romero, Jr. (he/him/his) will explore the impact of the Chicano Movement on Colorado's educational landscape on institutions and individuals. Through the use of testimonio, historical storytelling, and spoken word, the speaker will explore how Chicanismo has served as a catalyst for personal and social transformation that has guided their work inside and outside of the classroom. The talk highlights the importance of embracing the complex identities and histories of our communities, even if it means disrupting our current way of seeing the world.

The Landmark School Desegregation Case You Have Not Heard About

Rub茅n Donato, Professor and Bob & Judy Charles Endowed Chair, and Judge Martin Gonzales, Retired 12th Judicial District Judge

Certain movements have become iconic symbols of civil rights movements 鈥� Brown v. Board of Education in 1954 and the fight to end segregated schooling evoke images of young people like Ruby Bridges and The Little Rock Nine tearing down racial barriers. Struggles against school segregation are memorialized in textbooks and curricula, but Mexican Americans have a long-standing but lesser-known history in the struggle against school segregation. Forgotten for over a century, the Maestas v. Shone case is one of the earliest known successful challenges by Mexican Americans to end school segregation in the United States, and the 1913 lawsuit took place in Colorado鈥檚 San Luis Valley, a region with deep Hispano/a roots. Short musical performance by Dr. Antonio Esquibel.

Watch SM调教所 Boulder's Ed Talks: Modding New Social Realities in Our Virtual and Everyday Worlds

View Ed Talks Fall 2022听and Q&A livstream

Watch the full event recording with a live Q&A with the speakers.听Originally live on Nov. 30, 2022.

Becoming Designers of Justice: Creating Radically New Futures Through Play

Arturo Cortez (he / they),听assistant professor and faculty director and founder of The Learning To Transform (LiTT) Video Gaming Lab

We鈥檝e Built and Belong Here: Hacking as Transformative Learning

Ashieda McKoy (she / they), PhD student in Teacher Learning, Research, and Practice

Respawning and Firewalling: How to Learn About People

Jadyn Nguyen (he / him / his), program manager, Youth Empowerment Broadcasting Organization

To respawn is the chance to 鈥榯ry again鈥� and reapproach your relationships. A firewall looks like the natural barriers we put up to protect ourselves. In this talk you鈥檒l learn how the results of accomplished projects don't just happen through sheer hard work; it鈥檚 through intentional relationships where we create magic.

Reclaiming Peace Through Joy, Curiosity and Imagination

Cory Montalvo (he / him / his), CEO, Youth Empowerment Broadcasting Organization

What can our childhood habits and routines tell us about healing and wellbeing? How might we reinvigorate our youthful selves in order to manifest peace in our adult lives? In this talk, Cory Montalvo tells the story of how reconnecting with his love for comic books and video games helped him cultivate self-love and reimagine his career in education.

An Educator in the Metaverse

Mariel Reyes-Galvez, 鈥淭he Motherboard鈥�, Youth Empowerment Broadcasting Organization

Watch past SM调教所 Boulder's Ed Talks

View virtual听Ed Talks 2022听and Panel Q&A

Watch the full event recording with a live Q&A with the speakers.听Originally live on April 14, 2022.

Speaking Against Institutional Abuse

A. Susan Jurow (she, her, hers), professor of Learning Sciences and Human Development

This talk invites the audience to learn about the immediate and ongoing consequences of institutional violence. Jurow draws on her own experiences to illuminate what many have suffered, but few talk about publicly. She describes how institutional violence changed her and how she understands our ethical responsibilities to each other.

How Schools can End Gendered Violence

Liz Meyer (she, her, hers), associate professor of Educational Foundations, Policy and Practice

This talk will ask listeners to reflect on what they learned about gender and sexuality in school. Issues such as bullying, anti-gay jokes, and sexual harassment are linked to intimate partner violence, gay-bashing, and murders of trans women. These are all forms of gendered violence. This talk argues that in order to reduce gendered violence, educators must be able to teach about gender and sexual diversity in K-12 schools. As such, we need policymakers and leaders with courage to build more inclusive cultures at school.

The Double-Edged Sword of Story: Literary Censorship in Schools

Wendy Glenn (she, her, hers), professor of Literacy Studies

This talk explores the dual nature of story and how its potential to change lives can be used to both celebrate and condemn literature in school spaces. Together, we鈥檒l explore the reasons that some adults work so actively to limit young people鈥檚 access to story, what is lost as a result of these efforts, and why keeping stories in the hands of kids matters to them and to our world.

听Lifting as We Climb: Embracing Chicanisma in a White University

Johanna B. Maes (she, her, hers), director of Master's in Higher Education and Senior Instructor

This talk invites participants to experience the educational journeys of yesterday and today鈥檚 first-generation Chicana/o students at a predominately white institution, noting their legacy and political courage needed to not only survive but thrive. This talk also recognizes how the more things change in our world for these populations, the more they remain the same in higher education.

Courage to Learn: The Unexpected Physicist

Valerie Otero (she, her, hers), professor of STEM Education

From math-loving metal head in high school to decorated SM调教所 Boulder physics education professor, Otero鈥檚 story and passion aim to inspire more inclusive STEM futures for historically marginalized students. This talk explores the hurdles she has jumped in the name of revolutionizing STEM education, and programs like the nationally celebrated Learning Assistant and Peer Physics Programs that she co-founded to support more diverse, accessible, and revolutionized STEM teaching and learning.

View virtual听Ed Talks 2021 and Panel Q&A

Watch the full event recording with a live Q&A with the speakers.听Originally live on Dec. 2, 2021.

Lifting the Veil: The Truth About Teaching

Robyn Tomiko (she, her, hers), PhD student in educational foundations, policy and practice

Robyn shares the truth about teaching that no one talks about. In her time as a middle school English teacher, she learned that teaching English was only a fraction of the actual job she was doing. Robyn lifts the veil from the hidden truths in the profession, in the hopes of eliminating the harm that can come from staying silent.

A Love Letter to Milwaukee: Bilingualism, Community, and Social Change

Mar铆a Ru铆z-Mart铆nez (she, her, hers), PhD candidate in equity, bilingualism & biliteracy

Communities joyfully activate what it means to be bilingual en lo cotidiano. In the everyday, whether experiencing a mural, a collective dance performance, a street protest, or a neighborhood carne asada, communities mobilize bilingualism for a better, more just collective future. This love letter to Milwaukee, Wisconsin, honors the community鈥檚 collective life-wide and life-deep experiences that helped shape who I am today. It shows how a community embodies bilingualism as a relational practice of imagination, liberation, and social change.

Getting Free: The Queer Imaginings of a Hopeful Romantic

Page Valentine Regan (they, them, theirs), PhD candidate in educational foundations, policy and practice

How do cultural messages surrounding gender and sexuality inhibit our capacity to engage in our inherent abundance? With our permission, when we have spaces for others to bear witness to our complex lived-experiences and we can safely engage with the sources of our own oppression, we are able to collectively become. In this talk, Page shares pieces of their own journey, some queer imaginings as a hopeful romantic in pursuit of liberation.

When Our Bodies Speak, Can We Listen?

Kachine Kulick (she, her, hers), PhD candidate in teacher, learning, research and practice

Storytelling rooted in radical honesty, discomfort, and vulnerability provides a portal to understand oneself in relation to the present and future. 听Kachine鈥檚 storytelling asks us to lean into deep, intuitive knowledge of the body in order to move towards a re-imagined, anti-racist future. She wonders if this way of listening and knowing can lead to decentering whiteness and create a culture that is transformative and liberating for all.

Harvesting our Collective Liberation: Indigenous Pathways for Equity and Justice

Brittni Laura Hernandez (she, her, ella), scholar in residence with A Queer Endeavor

In this talk, Brittni Laura Hernandez explores her relationship to the Mirasol chile pepper, to self, and to community as a practice of enacting liberation in education and beyond. She asks us to know ourselves deeply and to look towards indigneous, black, queer, and trans knowledge ways as sacred designs that inherently disrupt colonial patterns and offer instructions for sustainable, autonomous, liberated futures.

View virtual听Ed Talks 2021 and Panel Q&A

Watch the full event recording with a live Q&A with the speakers. At times lyrical, lighthearted, and deeply personal, Ed Talks are sure to leave you full of inspiration and hope. Join us as we explore what we need to know, understand, and听do听to create a more beautiful and just future together.

Shooting for the Stars: Playful Imaginings of the Not Yet Here

Jos茅 Ram贸n Liz谩rraga, assistant professor of Learning Sciences & Human Development

Often, educators lead young learners in imagining their future based on a career in a specific discipline. This talk will explore how youth develop present and future narratives-of-self that are both playful and rigorous in their enactment of disciplinary knowledge. By centering the playful imagination as a leading activity in learning and development, youth are able to imagine a听Not Yet Here听that is simultaneously fantastical while offering openings for equitable and just futures.

Keeping Language Arts On The Low: A Low-Key Rap Verse

Kalonji Nzinga, assistant professor of Learning Sciences & Human Development

In 1756 the Oxford English Dictionary defined slang as 鈥渢he language of the low and disreputable,鈥� later prohibiting its appearance in the volume. This represents a trend across Western language arts institutions of devaluing and suppressing the language and the arts of those existing on the low (those in the lower classes, the Global South and the undercommons) dismissing their intellectual contributions as primitive. What happens to the futures of language arts education when RAP, the Rhythm And Poetry of those on the low, is seen as a linguistic archetype?

Transforming Learning in an Era of Disinformation and 鈥淔ake News鈥�

Joe Polman, associate dean for research and professor of Learning Sciences & Human Development

Making sense of news and applying it to life is challenging. Some politicians and organizations deliberately promulgate disinformation and accuse journalists of 鈥渇ake news.鈥� Relatedly, public trust in traditional expertise, for instance about science, is eroding. What is an educator to do? I will share a project-based approach in which youth research issues they care about, then craft 鈥渋nfographics鈥� for online publication and to inform publics. Example topics include environmental and health issues affecting people students know. This fosters critical learning for engagement in future civic life.

I Dream of Afrofutures

Stephanie Toliver, assistant professor of Literacy Studies

Harriet Tubman was an abolitionist who risked her life to ensure that hundreds of enslaved people were able to experience freedom. Her last words, 鈥淚 go to prepare a place for you,鈥� suggest that even on her deathbed, she was formulating a plan for future freedoms. She and so many other Black people dreamed the Black present into being. Considering this, Toliver honors the legacy of Black ancestry by presenting her dream of educational Afrofutures, a dream that uplifts Black youth, Black imaginations, and Black joy.

Creating a space for empathy as teachers

Ana Robles, current student teacher

Our experiences have shaped us, who we are. I am talking about the time you felt guilty, ashamed and embarrassed. The time where you found out that guilt is good and when it was no longer helpful. As a first generation, DACA, woman of color, I have been through a lot. Having high standards to the point that it turned into guilt. I soon realized that my experience has allowed me to be an example for others and most importantly to create a space for empathy for my students.听

Lead like an artist

Wisdom Amouzou, SM调教所 Boulder graduate and co-founder of Empower High School

Our children will inherit a world full of problems nearing the 11th hour. I believe they will need to create magic. To create magic, they need to lead like an artist.

Socially just curriculum: Now is the time for curriculum that de-centers whiteness

Alexis Gonzales, Recent SM调教所 Boulder graduate and first-year teacher

There are a lot of things that make this country, and specifically education in this country, that make me feel hopeless. But one of the things that is long overdue is looking straight at the curriculum we are teaching students and how we are teaching that curriculum. In the moment we are in right now we have the re-think our curriculum. If we aren鈥檛 rethinking what we are teaching in this moment in particular, then our students will never reach their full potential to be the leaders they can actually be. The curriculum we teach has and always will have implications on society. We can choose to keep teaching white-centered curricula, but it won鈥檛 get us very far. We can see this as the way the system was meant to be. We can question, critique, and redesign curriculum and in every single reading we teach, image we show, and lesson we plan 鈥� how are we centering or de-centering whiteness?

The unequal distribution of struggle

Brian Lightfoot, PhD candidate in the Educational Foundations, Policy and Practice

Everyone has felt the impacts of a triple crisis caused by COVID-19, the subsequent economic recession and the enduring repercussions of racism. However, the effects of the triple crisis have not landed on groups of people equally. This talk reflects on the collective and individual loss many people have experienced in 2020 while unpacking how privilege mediates outcomes. In doing so, it calls attention to persistent inequities students face inside and outside of school and envisions design elements to renovate systems in response to challenges highlighted by the triple crisis.

Teaching in an unfamiliar landscape: The work that matters most still matters now

Sarah M. Zerwin, SM调教所 Boulder alumna (EDU BA'95 and PhD'09) and Fairview High School teacher

I now teach in an unfamiliar landscape, characterized by an empty classroom, silent halls, and talking into the tiny lens of a webcam to connect with my students. I recognize none of this. But the important work toward humanizing and liberating classrooms must continue even so. Perhaps we can see more clearly the work we need to do because of the disruption of the pandemic. When we look back on 2020, what story will we tell of what we learned during this time?

It hurts to become: Leaning in to the discomfort of learning

Bethy Leonardi,听assistant research professor of Educational Foundations, Policy and Practice

Do we complicate our lens on what it means to learn, and especially what it means to learn about privilege, oppression, and justice? This type of learning and unlearning is disruptive and often discomforting as it interferes with what we know and challenges our senses of self. Bethy Leonardi will share personal stories of transformative learning and explore courage and humility as necessary for learning in this way.

T煤 eres mi otro yo: Education & the possibility of rehumanization

Enrique Lopez,听assistant professor of STEM Education

Some say that the education system is broken. What if education as a system of schooling is doing exactly what it was intended to do鈥攔eproduce social inequalities by keeping certain groups at social and economic positions? What would an alternative approach to education look like? This talk presents Professor Lopez鈥檚 work in a rehumanizing summer program for high school Chicana/o and Latina/o youth, known as Aquetza, that strives to stretch the imaginations and aspirations of socially stigmatized youth.

What happens when we listen

Dan Liston, professor of Teacher Learning, Research and Practice and Educational Foundations, Policy and Practice

This talk will explore the power of listening in learning 鈥� the teacher listening to the students, students and teachers listening to the texts, and listening to each other. Let鈥檚 listen to the challenges, discomfort, and beauty that can arise.

Claiming our humanity as educators

Kira Pasquesi, SM调教所 Boulder School of Education program director for the Leadership Studies Minor

Where is the humanity in education...for educators? What would it look and feel like to be seen and known by our students? Join in bearing witness to one teacher鈥檚 untold stories and experiences revealing (or not revealing) truths in the classroom. Together, let鈥檚 envision a future where educators navigate the complexities of vulnerability as we claim our collective humanity.

What Reality TV Taught Me about Everyday Assessment 鈥� Erin Marie Furtak

Erin Marie Furtak, associate dean of faculty and professor of math and science education

School administrators and policymakers are committed to supporting teachers in listening, attending, and responding to their students to support their learning 鈥� that is, engaging in everyday assessment. However, decades of research have illustrated that this type of assessment presents challenges for teachers. Surprisingly, models of how to conduct this type of assessment abound in some reality TV shows. We鈥檒l examine examples of how programs like Project Runway, Top Chef, and The Great British Baking Show illustrate features of ongoing assessment that provide key insights for classroom practice.

Trauma as Peril and Potential in Schools

Elizabeth Dutro, professor of literacy studies

Trauma has rapidly become a central concern in education. But听what counts as 鈥渢rauma,鈥� and who is most likely to be deemed traumatized? Children鈥檚 difficult experiences demand compassionate, nuanced, and responsive policies and pedagogies. Simultaneously, educators must be vigilant about how attention to trauma fuels damaging narratives about students and communities. Exploring the perils and promises of trauma, this talk argues that if we are going to use that term in relation to children鈥檚 lives and learning, we have to mindfully heed and navigate its consequences.

Kindergarten: Sitting, Listening, Standing, and Waiting

Mimi Engel,听associate professor of research and evaluation methodology

A study of how kindergarteners spend a typical day in a large urban school district indicates that almost all instructional time is focused on reading and mathematics, with little time devoted to other academic or social activities. Further, much of the kindergarten day 鈥� two and a half hours, on average 鈥� involves downtime, primarily transitions.We will discuss factors that result in extensive downtime and recommendations for providing kindergartners with more time for physical activity and a broader array of learning experiences.

Bilingualism Matters: Myths and Facts about Early Bilingual Development

Mileidis Gort, professor in education equity and cultural diversity

It has been estimated that more than half of the world's population is bilingual. For many, the bilingual journey begins in early childhood. In spite of its ubiquity, questions abound about the challenges and benefits of early bilingualism听and how to best support language acquisition in young children. Attitudes and 鈥榩rofessional recommendations鈥� against early bilingualism are often based on myths and misinterpretations, rather than findings from bilingual research. We will separate prevalent myths from scientific findings to answer common questions about early bilingual development.

Youth Activism and Social Change

Ben Kirshner, professor of education and faculty director of听SM调教所 Engage

Teenager," and its more clinical cousin, "adolescent," have become laden with meanings that disparage and stigmatize young people in their second decade of life. Common negative narratives are a problem not just because they are scientifically unsupported, but also because they are used to justify counterproductive policies and practices, especially when intersected with race, class, gender, and sexuality. What is the alternative? We need new narratives and new opportunities for young people to act as political agents who have a right to participate in decisions about policies and systems that affect their lives.

Teaching in an unfamiliar landscape: The work that matters most still matters now

Sarah M. Zerwin,听SM调教所 Boulder alumna (BA'95 and PhD'09) and Fairview High School teacher

In Lak'ech: You Are My Other Me听

Magnolia Landa-Posas, Aquetza Summer Program co-director

Magnolia explores the importance of culture, vulnerability, deep listening and holding space for students and educators throughout our collective educational journeys. Discover the values and principles that guide the learning that takes place at the powerful Aquetza Summer Program through the interwoven stories of students and staff. By sharing the spirit and essence of the Aquetza Program, we aim to inspire Lak鈥檈ch, a Mayan principle of oneness..

Finding Our Collective Power as Students of Color Who Refuse to Conform听

Enihs Medrano,听Centaurus High School senior & Public Achievement coach

听With support from Charla Agnoletti, Program Director for Public Achievement, high school student Enihs Medrano explores听the change that young people can enact when they use personal experiences as the drive to make a difference for themselves and others. Enihs shares her personal journey within SM调教所 Boulder鈥檚 Public Achievement program at Centaurus High School and how it molded her desire to use her voice for social change. Her story is only one piece of a collective effort by a group of high school students who are working to diversify the AP and IB classes at their high school. 鈥淲hen young people of color refuse to accept the stereotypes placed on us by teachers, administration, white peers and white parents, we are able to access the education we deserve while changing the perception of students of color.鈥�

How Efficiency Sabotages Our Efforts at Inclusivity

Manuela Sifuentes,听SM调教所 Engage director of community partnerships

A (well)听translated website, interpreters at parent-teacher conferences, bilingual staff and teachers all contribute to making a school more welcoming for monolingual Spanish-speaking parents in schools. But experience has shown us it is not enough. What other language-access practices can we use to better integrate all parents?

How Teacher Churn Affects Students and Learning

Allison Atteberry, assistant听professor of education听

It is not uncommon for teachers to move within their schools, what鈥檚 known as teacher churn. What happens to kids and student achievement when teachers are new to their jobs, districts, grade level or even subject area?

It鈥檚 Not About Free Speech. It鈥檚 About Truth.

Michele Moses, professor of education听

It feels like every day there is a new higher education controversy reported in the media, whether it鈥檚 students blocking certain speakers or protests about free speech or hate speech. White nationalist speakers, for example, have promoted violent, discriminatory views on campus. When such incidents happen, university leaders need to respond, to act, to reaffirm the institution鈥檚 guiding values and educational mission. How should leaders handle the public airing of views and perspectives that may be wrong or untrue?

What Happened to Our Trust in Teachers?

Kathy Schultz, dean and听professor of education听

We live in a moment saturated with distrust鈥攐f people, motivations, actions, ideas听and institutions. It shapes our feelings about teachers, schools听and educational decisions and policies. At this time in the United States, there is also great dissatisfaction with education reform across the political spectrum. Distrust鈥攁nd the failure to recognize and address it鈥攑lays a significant role in the failure of school reform. The strategies our country has chosen to enact reform create distrust and in so doing undermine precisely the conditions that enable successful educational change.

What Is 鈥� and Isn鈥檛鈥� a Great School?

Kevin Welner, director of the National Education Policy Center and听professor of education听

In a time when public schools across the country are under attack, the National Education Policy Center based at SM调教所 Boulder听is recognizing high schools that use evidence-based approaches to close opportunity gaps. Learn about this Schools of Opportunity project and how our work is changing the conversation on education鈥攆rom testing to opportunities to learn.

What if Teacher Walkouts Are Just the Beginning?

Terrenda White, assistant听professor of education听

We are experiencing a teacher movement like we鈥檝e never seen before, with statewide walkouts, social media campaigns听and protests at state capitols in West Virginia, Oklahoma, Arizona听and Colorado. And this may only be the beginning. What can we learn from the recent demonstrations about how to support public schools and public school teachers?

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