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Heidi Bostic howard_fuller Maya_Smart Gabriel-Velez Cynthia-ellwood Robert-Lowe

Fireside Chat on Equity and Excellence in Education

Sponsored by the College of Education, Institute for the Transformation of Learning, and the Hartman Literacy Center

RECORDED ON FEBRUARY 23, 2023 

Moderator:

  • Dr. Heidi Bostic, dean, Helen Way Klingler College of Arts and Sciences and the College of Education, Marquette University

Presenters:

  • Dr. Howard Fuller, Grad ’85, distinguished professor emeritus, College of Education, Marquette University
  • Maya Payne Smart, parent educator, literacy advocate, and the author of Reading for Our Lives: A Literacy Action Plan from Birth to Six
  • Dr. Gabriel Velez, assistant professor and developmental psychologist in the Department of Educational Policy and Leadership (EDPL) in the College of Education at Marquette University
  • Dr. Cynthia Ellwood, associate clinical professor in the Department of Educational Policy and Leadership (EDPL) and the coordinator of the Marquette University Educational Leadership Program
  • Dr. Robert Lowe, professor emeritus, College of Education, Marquette University

Hear from education leaders about closing the opportunity and achievement gap for students and guiding them to success in their educational career and beyond. Learn how Marquette is developing future educators who uphold the values of academic excellence, social justice, ethics, service, and cura personalis (care for the whole person), and how we are partnering with renowned educational voices and community leaders to elevate equity and excellence.

More about this session

Dr. Heidi Bostic is dean of the Helen Way Klingler College of Arts and Sciences and the College of Education. She is committed to fostering interdisciplinary innovation; promoting the success of faculty, staff and students; and advocating for diversity and inclusion.

Since joining the Marquette community in May 2020, Bostic has co-chaired the University Economic Planning Work Group on Administrative Structures, secured significant donor support for the college, engaged in strategic visioning, and supported research, public-facing work and high-impact student opportunities. She has been inducted as an honorary member into the Jesuit honor society Alpha Sigma Nu and Phi Beta Kappa Zeta of Wisconsin chapter. She has developed and taught interdisciplinary courses, including a section of the Marquette Core Curriculum culminating course on the Service of Faith and Promotion of Justice. During 2021–22 she co-chaired Marquette’s Ignatian Year.

Howard Fuller’s career includes many years in both public service positions and the field of education. He founded the Institute for the Transformation of Learning at Marquette University in 1995. In June of 2020, Dr. Fuller retired from Marquette University where he is now a distinguished professor emeritus.

Immediately before his appointment at Marquette University, Dr. Fuller served as the superintendent of Milwaukee Public Schools June 1991 - June 1995. Dr. Fuller became nationally known for his unending support for fundamental educational reform.

His prior positions included: director of the Milwaukee County Department of Health and Human Services 1988 -1991; dean of general education at the Milwaukee Area Technical College 1986 - 1988; secretary of the Wisconsin Department of Employment Relations 1983 - 1986; and associate director of the Educational Opportunity Program at Marquette University 1979 - 1983. He was also a senior fellow with the Annenberg Institute for School Reform at Brown University 1995 - 1997.

Dr. Fuller received his bachelor's degree in sociology from Carroll College in Waukesha, Wis., in 1962; master's degree in social administration from Western Reserve University in Cleveland, Ohio, in 1964, and his doctorate degree in sociological foundations of education from Marquette University, Milwaukee,  in 1986.

He has received numerous awards and recognition over the years, including four honorary doctorate degrees: Doctorate of Humane Letters from Carroll College in 1987; Doctorate of Laws from Marian College, Fond Du Lac, Wisconsin in 1992; Doctorate of Business and Economics from Milwaukee School of Engineering in 1995. Doctorate of Humane Letters from Edgewood College, Edgewood College, Madison Wis. He was also honored as the distinguished alumnus of the Jack, Joseph, and Morton Mandel School of Applied Social Sciences Case Western Reserve University in 2020.

He serves on the board of Dr. Howard Fuller Collegiate Academy and Wisconsin Independent Charter School Advocates. He is also a member of the Charter School Hall of Fame of the National Alliance for Public Charter Schools; the Athletic Hall of Fame at North Division High School and Carroll University; and the Wisconsin Basketball Coaches Association Hall of Fame.

His memoir, No Struggle No Progress was published in 2014.

Maya Payne Smart is a parent educator, literacy advocate, and the author of Reading for Our Lives: A Literacy Action Plan from Birth to Six (Avery/Penguin Random House). Her website, MayaSmart.com, publishes new book lists, literacy activities, and other free family resources weekly to help parents play their dual roles as first teachers and educational advocates. She holds a master’s degree in journalism from the Medill School at Northwestern University and a bachelor’s in social studies with honors from Harvard University. She serves as affiliated faculty in Educational Policy and Leadership in the College of Education at Marquette University.

Gabriel Velez, Ph.D., is an assistant professor and developmental psychologist in the Department of Educational Policy and Leadership (EDPL) in the College of Education at Marquette University. He also serves as the Faculty Director of the Black and Latino/a Ecosystem and Support Transition (BLEST) Hub at Marquette, and the chair of the Faculty Research team for the Center for Peacemaking. Dr. Velez studies identity development in adolescents, particularly in relation to civic development, human rights, and peace, including young people’s understandings and responses to peace education and restorative practices in their schools.

Dr. Velez has published extensively on youth and restorative justice and peace education, including co-editing Restorative Justice: Promoting Peace and Wellbeing as part of the Springer Peace Psychology Book Series and a current book in development entitled Making Meaning of Justice and Peace: A Developmental Lens to Restorative Justice and Peace Education with Cambridge University Press. He is the 2022 recipient of Division 48 of the APA’s Ed Cairns Early Career Award. He received a bachelor's degree in history and literature from Harvard University, and master's and doctorate degrees from the University of Chicago in comparative human development. 

Cynthia Ellwood is an associate clinical professor in the Department of Educational Policy and Leadership (EDPL) and the coordinator of the Marquette University Educational Leadership Program. Having served the children and families of the Milwaukee Public Schools as a teacher, chief academic officer, principal, and regional superintendent for 29 years, she is now devoted to preparing educators from all school sectors for the demanding and meaningful work of school and district leadership. Her research and teaching focus on leading systemic transformation for equity. She is currently collaborating with EDPL colleague Dr. Sharon Chubbuck on a University of Chicago book, A Fight Worth Having: One School’s Unflinching Struggle for Racial Justice (anticipated 2024). The project received funding from the Spencer Foundation.

Ellwood earned a bachelor's degree in communications, a master's degree in American History, and in education, and a doctorate degree in the social sciences of education, all from Stanford University. She was a founding editor of Rethinking Schools: An Urban Educational Journal. She served as co-Principal I\investigator of a six-year $15 million grant from the National Science Foundation focused on advancing equity and opportunity in K-12 mathematics and science, among many other funded projects. For her leadership, she was awarded the Norman H. Gill Award for Individual Excellence, named a Master Urban Principal and Wallace Foundation Fellow, and featured in "Principals Who Make a Difference" on Milwaukee Public Television. She collaborates pro bono on multiple equity leadership initiatives with the Milwaukee Public Schools.

Robert Lowe is a historian of education who began his career as a faculty member at Miles College, a historically Black institution in Fairfield, Ala. He subsequently worked for nearly a decade in Marquette University’s Educational Opportunity Program and spent the last 20 years of his career as a professor in the Department of Educational Policy and Leadership at Marquette. His research has focused on matters of race, class, and educational equity in historical perspective. He is co-author of the award-winning Public Schools in Hard Times: The Great Depression and Recent Years (Harvard University Press) and co-editor of Rethinking Schools: An Agenda for Change (The New Press). His scholarly articles have been published in the Harvard Educational Review, American Journal of Education, Educational Researcher, Teachers College Record, Educational Theory, History of Education Quarterly, and Journal of Social History, many in collaboration with Harvey Kantor. Other writing by Lowe has been published in Education Week, Rethinking Schools, Dissent, Monthly Review, and Race Traitor. He was a founding editor of Rethinking Schools, an editor of Educational Foundations, and has served on the editorial boards of the American Educational Research Journal, History of Education Quarterly, and Educational Theory.

Lowe has an bachelor's degree in history from the University of California-Berkeley, an EdM from Harvard University, a master's degree in history from Stanford University, and a doctorate degree in the history of American education from Stanford. Dr. Lowe’s honors include the Distinguished Book in Education Award, the John P. Raynor Award for Teaching Excellence, the Outstanding Service Award from the students of the Educational Opportunity Program, the Marquette Faculty All-Star Award, a National Academy of Education/Spencer Post-Doctoral Fellowship, and others.

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