Summer 2018

Dear COE Alumni and Friends.

Welcome to the summer issue of Premier. Our faculty, students, and alumni continually advance the college in so many ways. This past academic year, we have been engaged in several initiatives to continue to elevate teaching, research and community engagement, advancing UNI’s mission and strategic goals. In April, we launched the inaugural Carlton-Mellichamp Lecture Series and brought in Dr. Mark Weist from the University of South Carolina. Over the course of two days, he provided a lecture, “The promise of effective school behavioral health programs,” and professional development on implementation strategies in school behavioral health. A fireside chat was hosted to continue the dialogue with a broader audience of faculty, students, counselors, school psychologists, and teachers and administrators, and LEAs. Thank you for the generous donations from the Mellichamp family to launch this prestigious annual lecture series.

In addition, with a focus on teaching, the college also held for the second year, Teaching Connections which is a two-day professional development for faculty, students, in-service teachers and administrators. The invited speaker we brought in, Dr. Ann Lopez, president-elect of the National Association of Multicultural Education (NAME) and faculty member at the University of Toronto, engaged in a series of sessions on integrating diversity and equity issues in teaching and learning, pre-service teachers’ critical understanding of diversity and equity, and enhancing diversity in leading through collaborative action. Recently, this initiative has been funded, and in recognition of their generosity will be titled, Bill and Linda Tubbs Teaching Connections. Both of these funded initiatives provided an honorarium to the speaker, cover travel expenses, and resources used to deliver various lectures and workshops

As for community engagement, the college has partnered with Waterloo Community School Districts (WCSD) on a teacher education pipeline initiative, Teach Waterloo. Teach Waterloo, funded by the McElroy Trust, is an elementary teacher education program for para-educators currently working in WCSD.

These exemplar initiatives provide the scope of the work in the college coupled with our faculty procuring research grants, connecting research to practice for meaningful impact, and engaging in high quality teaching. Faculty have received impressive academic awards and accolades for their accomplishments. They are also deeply engaged in service within the college, university, and broadly at the local and national level. Collectively, we are committed to advancing academic excellence and inspiring our students to be socially aware, critical thinkers and global citizens who create and bring about positive change in the world.

Thank you for your continued support of the College of Education. As you review Premier, you’ll gain more insights about the college, activities, and our students. We look forward to a productive academic year.

Sincerely,

Gaëtane Jean-Marie, Ph.D.
Dean, UNI College of Education