EXPERTS ADVISORY
University of Michigan experts are available to comment on critical topics facing schools this academic year. Their areas of expertise include student mental health, concussions, school safety, AI in the classroom, recovery from learning loss, teacher retention, Black girls’ schooling experiences, school meal funding, immigration, and college campus speech and protest.
Literacy, challenges and opportunities for schools, educators and students
Elizabeth Birr Moje is the dean of the Marsal Family School of Education and the George Herbert Mead Collegiate Professor of Education. Her research examines young people’s culture, identity and literacy learning in and out of school in Detroit, where she leads Marsal Education’s participation in the Marygrove Learning Community, a Detroit P-20 Partnership. Moje also directs the Michigan Education Teaching School on the Marygrove campus.
Moje can comment on adolescent literacy, effective teaching and the science of reading. Her research covers teacher preparation, shortages, edtech, education justice and student wellness.
Contact: [email protected]
Jean Mrachko is the associate director of Michigan Alternate Route to Certification, an accelerated certification-only teacher preparation program at the Marsal Family School of Education.
Contact: [email protected]
Chris Torres, associate professor of educational policy and leadership at the Marsal Family School of Education, can discuss how state policies and the K-12 school budget might affect teacher recruitment and retention, and how and why districts might be differentially impacted by new policies.
Contact: [email protected]
Samantha Keppler, the NBD Bancorp Assistant Professor of Technology and Operations at the Ross School of Business, is an expert in education operations. Her recent projects examine how districts purchase supplies (and the million-dollar price tag when teachers take time to get supplies on their own), how they implement cell phone bans (trade-offs between lockers, pouches or off-versus-away rules), and how they are training teachers on AI tools (it shouldn’t be to speed up or automate work).
“Michigan now has an instructional time cell phone ban, and this year districts need to make a plan: Buy cell phone lockers, pouches or simply adopt ‘off and away’ rules,” she said. “Running the numbers, lockers are going to be feasible only in small schools. Pouches relieve the teacher burden of constant phone monitoring at low cost, and would be what I would recommend—especially for middle schools.”
Contact: [email protected]
Teaching practice
Deborah Loewenberg Ball is the Jessie Jean Storey-Fry Distinguished University Professor of Education at the Marsal Family School of Education, research professor at the U-M Institute for Research and director of TeachingWorks. She researches elementary math teaching as a tool to build student agency and combat educational inequity. Amid national debates and new state legislation on PK-12 math instruction, she can comment on math education controversies, effective teaching practices and teacher preparation.
Contact: [email protected]
Angela Calabrese Barton is the Alvin Demar Loving Sr. Collegiate Professor of Education and chair of educational studies at the Marsal Family School of Education. She studies how science and engineering learning can better engage young people in schools, after-school programs and community settings. Her research examines how educators, youth, families and community partners can work together to design STEM learning experiences that are meaningful, relevant and connected to issues that matter in students’ and families’ lives.
Calabrese Barton can discuss how educators and schools can expand meaningful STEM learning opportunities for young people, particularly those historically marginalized in education and society.
Contact: [email protected]
Alaina Neal-Jackson is a clinical assistant professor at the Marsal Family School of Education. Her research focuses on Black girls’ schooling experiences, school discipline and the school-to-prison pipeline, restorative justice in education and the policies and practices that shape educational equity. She is also the co-founder of The REACH Center, a school-based restorative justice center.
“The reality is that if we do not address the challenges educators face in translating restorative justice into everyday practice, we will see school communities wanting to turn to the next thing,” she said. “But what comes after restorative justice and the commitments it represents? Are they commitments that encourage us to consider the conditions that give rise to harm, to prioritize respect for students’ humanity and to work toward healing above all? If we believe these commitments are worth preserving, our focus must shift to working more intentionally to support educators to fully embrace restorative practices within their pedagogy and everyday interactions with youth.”
Contact: [email protected]
Higher ed
Demetri Morgan is an associate professor of education in the Center for the Study of Postsecondary and Higher Education at the Marsal Family School of Education. He co-directs the Center for Strategic & Inclusive Governance. His research examines how governance and student political engagement shape institutional change in higher education.
Morgan can help reporters connect back-to-school stories to the larger questions colleges face about campus speech, protest, institutional purpose and public trust. He can speak to how governing boards and campus leaders can respond to conflict without losing sight of learning, academic freedom and their responsibilities to students and the public.
Contact: [email protected]
Instructional practices with technology
Liz Kolb, clinical professor of education technologies at the Marsal Family School of Education, can address how teachers can continue using what they learned during remote and hybrid learning to teach online.
Contact: [email protected]
Rebecca Quintana is an associate professor of education practice at the Marsal Family School of Education. Her research explores how emerging technologies shape learning design and instructional practices. She can discuss educational applications of generative AI, learning experience design, online learning and immersive learning environments.
Contact: [email protected]
Adjustments for children
Pamela Davis-Kean is a professor of psychology at the College of Literature, Science, and the Arts and director of the Survey Research Center at the Institute for Social Research. She has examined the various pathways that the socioeconomic status of parents relates to the cognitive achievement outcomes (particularly mathematics) of their children. To help students navigate the pandemic’s impact on lower achievement scores, she recommends starting mentoring programs and creating individualized education plans for each student.
Contact: [email protected]
Sandra Graham-Bermann, professor emerita of psychology at the College of Literature, Science, and the Arts, can discuss how parents can help their children cope with stress/time management as they return to school.
“Kids come back to school carrying a variety of experiences, some wonderful and some that might be related to living in an unstable household with some kind of trauma,” she said. “Teachers would do well to understand children’s behavior from a trauma-focused lens to best assist those that need help.”
Contact: [email protected]
Health and wellness
Matthew Boulton is the Pearl L. Kendrick Collegiate Professor of Global Health and professor of epidemiology and preventive medicine. His research interests are in global health, global vaccine equity, childhood vaccinations and vaccine preventable diseases, preventive medicine, and infectious disease epidemiology in low- and middle-income countries.
Contact: [email protected]
Rebecca Hasson is the Victor L. Katch Collegiate Professor of Kinesiology and director of the Childhood Disparities Research Lab at the School of Kinesiology. She can discuss ways to promote physical activity both inside and outside of the classroom.
Contact: [email protected]
Laura Gultekin, clinical assistant professor at the School of Nursing, has spent the past several years partnering with community agencies to improve the well-being of families experiencing homelessness.
Contact: [email protected]
Laura Richardson is a clinical associate professor of applied exercise science and movement science at the School of Kinesiology. Her expertise focuses on using behavior modification strategies and exercise to help treat a wide array of health conditions.
Contact: [email protected]
Steven Broglio, director of the Michigan Concussion Center and professor at the School of Kinesiology, currently serves as the president of the international Concussion in Sport Group. He can discuss concussion research and prevention and concussion in sports.
Contact: [email protected]
William Lopez, clinical associate professor of health behavior and health equity at the School of Public Health, specializes in the effects of immigration policies and the health impacts of law enforcement on individuals. This school year, he says, brings heightened concerns and fears as federal law enforcement forces increase deportations.
Contact: [email protected]
Kate Bauer is a professor of nutritional sciences at the School of Public Health and co-director of the Institute for Food, Nutrition & Health Policy. Her expertise touches on SNAP benefits, school meals and other nutritional aid for people struggling to afford food.
“As of last month, about 1 million children across the U.S. have lost access to SNAP. Nearly all of the children who have lost SNAP are eligible for the program; the problem is that the states are struggling to keep up with all the administrative changes and families are not able to reach their caseworkers, paperwork is getting lost, etc. so these families are dropped. Without SNAP, these kids may not automatically qualify for school meals and with fewer kids automatically qualifying, some school districts are not able to offer school meals for all through the Community Eligibility Provision.”
Here in Michigan, she pointed out, the state is continuing its support of Healthy School Meals for All again this coming year.
“This is a huge blessing for all families who now don’t have to put time and money into making sure their children can eat during the school day,” she said. “Food prices are also up from this time last year and many food pantries can’t keep up with the increased demand that they’re experiencing. Overall, families are really stressed and worried, and we’re not getting much clear guidance from the federal or state governments about what’s going to happen with food assistance over the next year.”
Contact: [email protected]
Anand Parekh is a board-certified internal medicine physician, chief health policy officer at the School of Public Health and former deputy health secretary for the U.S. Health and Human Services. He can speak to decreasing vaccination rates and an all-time high vaccine exemption rate for kindergartners as the U.S. experiences its worst year for measles cases in 35 years.
“The decision to skip vaccines appears to often be based on inaccurate information and puts millions of schoolchildren at risk of serious preventable illnesses,” he said. “It also endangers communities, especially the most vulnerable among us, the elderly and the very young. We are seeing vaccine-related policy decisions at the federal level that cause confusion and fear and seem to be more politically motivated than focused on preventing the spread of contagious disease. The political climate sadly is leading parents to make decisions that they may falsely believe are in the best interest of their children but are leading to sickness, death and suffering.
“While there can be valid reasons for exemptions to vaccines and there is respect for the right of parents to vaccinate or not, it cannot be said often enough that vaccines are safe and effective and the best bet at keeping a child healthy and strong. Not vaccinating is a gamble with their health and the public’s health, a gamble that more and more often is backfiring and senselessly, needlessly leading to serious illness and death. I hope parents will trust that the best way to keep their children healthy is to vaccinate.”
Contact: [email protected]
Emily Martin, professor of epidemiology at the School of Public Health, is co-director of the Michigan Center for Respiratory Virus Research and Response and the Michigan Public Health Integrated Center for Outbreak Analytics and Modeling. She can speak to contagious disease trends, vaccines, vaccine waiver requests, and what parents and schools need to know to best protect students, teachers and families.
Contact: [email protected]
Sara Adar, professor of epidemiology at the School of Public Health, and Meredith Pedde, assistant research scientist in epidemiology at the School of Public Health, have researched the benefits of replacing diesel-fuel-powered school buses with electric ones. They can share their findings and knowledge on differences in academic achievement and absenteeism between students who ride gas-powered buses vs. electric-powered vehicles. Their research revolves around an ongoing U.S. Environmental Protection Agency rebate program that randomly awards funding to school districts to replace old buses with cleaner models that produce less pollution.
Contact: [email protected] and [email protected]
School safety
Justin Heinze is an associate professor of health behavior and health equity at the School of Public Health and director of the School Safety section at the Institute for Firearm Injury Prevention. He is also principal investigator of the annual Healthy Minds Study and director of the National Center for School Safety. He can discuss a range of school safety and student mental health topics and can explain the recommendations in a recent national report on the impact of active shooter drills on student health and well-being.
Contact: [email protected]
Sarah Stilwell, research investigator at the Institute for Firearm Injury Prevention, can discuss aspects of student and school safety outside of firearm violence prevention.
Contact: [email protected]
Elyse Thulin, research assistant professor at the Institute for Firearm Injury Prevention, can discuss school safety, technology, confidential reporting systems, social media and school violence risks, bullying, suicide and mental health concerns.
Contact: [email protected]
Source: https://news.umich.edu/back-to-school-u-m-experts-can-discuss-a-range-of-topics-3/