Learning Connections Summer 2022
This is the latest online edition of Learning Connections, a magazine for alumni and friends of the UW–Madison School of Education. The Summer 2022 issue centers on “Rising to the Challenge.” The nation is divided on a range of topics and ongoing divisions are making it difficult to solve problems. In this environment, School of Education faculty, staff, and alumni are rising to the challenge — and above the political noise — to demonstrate how quality education can play a vital role in helping people better understand each other and work together to reimagine a better future. This issue also highlights important and innovative work being done across the arts, health, and education. A pdf of the print edition is available here.
‘The Political Classroom’
Diana Hess explains why helping young people deliberate, engage, and learn about sometimes controversial political topics is vital to a healthy democracy.
Message from the School
Marianne Spoon, the School of Education’s associate dean for communications and advancement, reflects on the past year and how the School of Education is “Rising to the Challenge.”
Rising to the Challenge
The online simulation PurpleState, developed by UW-Madison’s Jeremy Stoddard and colleagues, teaches students about the inner workings of political messaging and 21st century media, and gives them a better understanding of political polarization.
Rising to the Challenge
Engaging classroom discussion fuels learning. But quality discourse doesn’t just happen. The Discussion Project is a professional development series that gives instructors vital skills to improve quality classroom discussion and learning.
Rising to the Challenge
Politics can be divisive, confusing, and challenging to approach. The Teaching About the 2022 Elections Conference will help educators find ways to ensure their students can discuss sensitive and important topics with care, knowledge, and facts.
Rising to the Challenge
Alum Noah Sobe, who earned his PhD in 2005 from the Department of Curriculum and Instruction, is helping the United Nations shape the future of education.
Voices
We are tremendously proud of all our students — more than 600 of them — who graduated from School of Education programs this spring. We reached out to a few of our graduating students, from those who earned bachelor’s degrees to PhDs, to learn more about their favorite memories, advice for incoming students, and future plans.
Building a ‘Counter-monument’
UW–Madison’s Faisal Abdu’Allah shares his desire for artists of color to create new monuments that represent and celebrate their own experiences.
U.S. News rankings
For the ninth straight year the School of Education is ranked among the top 5 in the nation. The School is also the only one in the nation to have a top-10 ranking in all nine education specialty areas — including the No. 1 Educational Psychology program.
News and notes
Spring 2022 School of Education graduate Sofia Garcia Garbuno explains the significant positive influence the MSAN Network has had on their education experience, noting a “feeling of empowerment.”
News and notes
UW–Madison’s Clifton Conrad and Todd Lundberg are co-authors of a new book that pushes readers to reimagine what a college education could be by placing collaborative learning — and teaching students how to become shared problem solvers — at its core.
News and notes roundup
Travis Wright, an associate professor with the Department of Counseling Psychology, is the new faculty director of UW–Madison’s Morgridge Center for Public Service, which moved its administrative home from the School of Education to the Division for Teaching and Learning.
Media mentions
Faculty, staff, students, and alumni from across the School of Education are routinely quoted or make their voices heard in newspapers, magazines, and online news media outlets.
Innovation
School of Education researchers teamed with the New England conservation nonprofit Mass Audubon to produce the free, online learning game iPlan, which lets students re-imagine land use based on real science.
Class Notes
Check out what School of Education alumni from across the globe have been up to.
Innovation
A new certificate program aims to meet a growing need for Spanish-language bilingual educators in Wisconsin and beyond.
Innovation
Sadhana Puntambekar is the lead author on a paper that was recognized by the Journal of Research in Science Teaching (JRST) as one of its Research Worth Reading awards — which are given papers deemed to have the most significant impact for science educators and practitioners.
Innovation
David Kaplan received a three-year, $897,000 grant from the Institute for Education Sciences to work on the development of probabilistic forecasting approaches to model trends toward the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals.
Spotlight
A team of Black women doctoral students from the School of Education is playing a leading role in a major new study examining how racial stress within higher education relates to health outcomes for Black women in academia.
Spotlight
Andreas Kazamias is among the world’s leading experts in comparative humanistic education. To honor and celebrate his remarkable career and life journey, three anonymous donors created a graduate student scholarship in his honor.
Spotlight
After more than two years of the pandemic highlighting the harsh reality of health inequity in Wisconsin and across the United States, the first graduates of the School of Education’s new program aimed at bolstering health education and combating inequity are entering the workforce.
Keep in touch!
If you have questions or comments about Learning Connections, email Todd Finkelmeyer at todd.finkelmeyer@wisc.edu, or call
608-890-1430.
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