Spring 2023 Newsletter

Dear Readers,

The Ed.D. Newsletter is designed for current and prospective students, as well as our alumni. It will keep you up to date on Webster University's Doctor of Education program. This includes news from our doctoral students, conference presentations and publications, professional development opportunities, updates to the program, and more. It is scheduled to be published twice a year in the Fall and Spring semesters, and it is available online at the Ed.D. website. Please note that some content is adapted from Webster Today announcements. Enjoy reading, and please join us in congratulating our newly hooded Doctors of Education in this issue!

Content

Program Updates

We have three new doctoral students joining us in Fall 2023 as second year students, since they all have Ed.S. degrees. The three new students are Joseph Clay, Robert Nesbitt, and Trish Iaiennaro. Welcome!

Another piece of exciting news is that we are applying to join the Carnegie Project on Education Doctorate (CPED) as an institutional member this year (we were an explorer member in 2022). CPED (https://www.cpedinitiative.org) is a consortium with 130+ members with Ed.D. programs. We look forward to more collaborations and learning exchanges with the CPED members in the future.

We would also like to congratulate our graduating doctoral students from the Ed.D. program who successfully presented their dissertation research in Spring 2023. The graduates are featured below!

Graduating Doctoral students

We would like to congratulate the Ed.D. candidates who have passed oral defense and obtained their doctorates! We share in the celebration of your determination, hard work, and dedication to your research throughout the program. Congratulations on your accomplishments and the best of luck in all future endeavors!


Ashley Elizabeth Quinn Spencer 

Dissertation Title: Disrupting Oppression: A Case Study of Equity-Centered Collaboration for Emergent Multilinguals 

Ashley's Dissertation Chair is Dr. Yin Lam Lee-Johnson


Katherine Scott O’Connor 

Dissertation Title: Shades of Beige: An Autoethnography on My Biracial Ontological Sense of Self 

Katherine's Dissertation Chair is Dr. Yin Lam Lee-Johnson

 

Chavon Courtney Curry 

Dissertation Title: Leading Through Trauma: An Exploration of Social-Emotional Leadership Practices that Optimize Effectiveness in PK-12 Urban School Leaders 

Chavon's Dissertation Chair is Dr. Ginny Altrogge 

 

Ruby Lee Parks 

Dissertation Title: Advisors Who Make a Difference: How Excellent Academic Advising Relationships Influence Academic Identity Development 

Ruby's Dissertation Chair is Dr. Ginny Altrogge 

 

Amy Sharvette Pouncy  

Dissertation Title: A Seat at the Table: A Multiple Case Study on the Career Paths and Experiences of African American Women Chief Learning Officers 

Amy's Dissertation Chair is Dr. Kevin Gitonga 


Trezette Fonsha Joy-Stafford-Dixon  

Dissertation Title: A Fork in the Road to Graduation: Understanding the African American Undergraduates’ Decision on Whether to Participate in Academic Internships 

Trezette's Dissertation Chair is Dr. Kevin Gitonga 

 

John Link 

Dissertation Title: Graduating in the Age of COVID-19: A Phenomenological Study on Career Readiness Among 

Undergraduate Students and Recent College Graduates 

John's Dissertation Chair is Dr. Cartelia Lucas 

 

Kimberly McGrath 

Dissertation Title: Ten Stages in Sixteen Weeks: The New Crossroads of Transformation in Study Abroad 

Kim's Dissertation Co-Chairs are Drs. Aleksandra Jancikova and Basiyr Rodney. 


Shawn Benjamin Vlad

Dissertation Title: Gender and the Liminal: The Art of Fly Fishing

Shawn’s Dissertation Chair is Dr. Kevin Gitonga


Jonathon Lee Singler  

Dissertation Title: Human Agency: An Impact Case Study of University Chess Educator Curriculum  

Jonathon’s Dissertation Chair is Dr. Kevin Gitonga


Images from Ed.D. Graduation & Hooding Ceremony, May 13, 2023 

interview with Ed.d. Candidate: Kerri Fair

Ed.D. Candidate in the Doctor of Education program, Kerri Fair, recently accepted a full-time faculty position at Washington University, St Louis. The position title is Lecturer in the Department of Education. Fair will begin her new position in the Fall. Fair was accepted into Webster University’s Doctor of Education (Ed.D.) program in Fall 2020. Her emphasis area is Transformative Learning in the Global Community. Fair’s dissertation highlights teacher burnout among middle-aged and mid-career teachers via a phenomenographical methodology that documents her participants’ lived experiences using Photo Elicitation. Fair is preparing for her final oral defense in end of May. Fair has been an adjunct professor in the Department of Teacher Education for six years. During that time, Fair taught methods courses in literacy and behavior management, and also co-taught field experience seminars and supervised education students.


Fair was interviewed by the Director of Doctor of Education (Ed.D.) program, Dr. Yin Lam Lee-Johnson and Ed.D. Research Assistant, Mary Rose Reynolds, on May 10, 2023. At the interview, Fair was asked about her job search process as a doctoral candidate, features of the Ed.D. program which benefited her job search, what she would be carrying into her new position, and her sharing of tips with fellow colleagues and peers in the Ed.D. program. According to Fair, “working to submit a proposal to AERA for presentation, working to co-write an article, all of these things that I had been prompted in the program to try to do because it would support me later when I got to this point. I participated in all of those things, and then I sat down with a mentor who is in the same field, and just asked some questions.”

The transition from a doctoral student to a faculty position seems daunting, but the many features of the doctoral program assisted students with the knowledge, skills, and experience required for such transition. For example, the doctoral apprenticeship course, peer mentorship program, LinkedIn career networking initiative, and the publication and presentation opportunities that have been interwoven into a rigorous curriculum with the cohort and doctoral faculty. Several doctoral candidates mentioned that they met with hiring committee members from various institutions at the American Educational Research Association (AERA) convention. The Ed.D. program’s recent joining as an explorer member in the Carnegie Project on Education Doctorate (CPED) was critical as students were offered numerous academic socialization opportunities, e.g., publishing in the CPED journal, presenting at a CPED conference, and presenting as panelists at a webinar. Doctoral students were offered job search and interview advice by doctoral faculty. 

“Kerri Fair has proven to be an exemplary role model for our new and current doctoral students. Her creativity in conducting research, passion in leading and serving as a transformative educator, collaborative spirit as a researcher, and experiences in the field of education attributed towards her success.” said Dr. Lee-Johnson. 

The interview has been published in the Ed.D. LinkedIn Group: Ed.D. LinkedIn and here.

This interview report will be published in Webster Today as well.

Upcoming Book

Affirming the Rights of Emergent Bilingual and Multilingual Children and Families: Interweaving Research and Practice through the Reggio Emilia Approach

https://www.routledge.com/Affirming-the-Rights-of-Emergent-Bilingual-and-Multilingual-Children-and/Fyfe-Lee-Johnson-Reyes-Yu/p/book/9781032267340#

Accepted Publication

Lee-Johnson, Y.L., Fair, K., O’Connor, K., Rodney, T., Ono, J., Dixon, T. (in press). Reflexivity for Restorying the Ontological and Epistemological Truths in Qualitative Research. Special Issue: Reimagining Research Methods Coursework for the Preparation of Scholar-Practitioners. Impacting Education: Journal on Transforming Professional Practice (CPED Journal). 

AERA Conference presentations


The American Educational Research Association (AERA) is a top-tier peer-reviewed conference that sets the industry standards for educational research. All submissions underwent rigorous peer review. According to the acceptance email, 11,000+ proposals were submitted to this year’s annual convention, and thus only highly qualified proposals were accepted. The Doctor of Education (Ed.D.) program has five accepted proposals, which attests to the academic rigor of the program.

 

The Doctor of Education (Ed.D.) program’s Director, Dr. Yin Lam Lee-Johnson; recent graduate, Dr. Katherine O’Connor; doctoral candidates, Kerri Fair and Tamara Rodney; as well as research collaborators, Dr. Juana M. Reyes from Lewis University and Dr. Nahid Nader-Hashemi, International Consultant in Early Childhood Education, presented at the American Educational Research Association (AERA) Annual Convention in Chicago, IL, April 13-16, 2023. This year’s opening lecture was given by scholar, Cornel West. This year’s AERA president, Dr. Rich Milner, was invited to Webster’s School of Education Conference in 2017 as a keynote speaker. 

Invited Panelist

Director of Ed.D., Dr. Yin Lam Lee-Johnson, was invited by the Federal Anti-Racism Secretariat of the Canadian Government to speak as a panelist at the International Day for the Elimination of Racial Discrimination (IDERD) Forum on March 30, 2023 via Zoom.

 

The Forum featured government and civil society speakers from Canada, the United States, and Mexico, including Gabriela Ramos, Assistant Director-General for the Social and Human Sciences of UNESCO; Desirée Cormier-Smith, Special Representative for Racial Equity and Justice, US Department of State; Senator María Celeste Sánchez Sugía, Senado de la Republica, Mexico; Claudia Olivia Morales Reza, Presidenta del Consejo Nacional para Prevenir la Discriminación (CONAPRED), Mexico, just to name a few. All presentations were simultaneously interpreted into English, French, and Spanish. In early 2023, the North American Partnership for Equity and Racial Justice was established by the government of the United States, Canada, and Mexico (https://www.state.gov/declaration-on-the-north-american-partnership-for-equity-and-racial-justice-2/). The IDERD Forum was organized in light of the partnership to combat systemic racism.

 

At this Forum, Lee-Johnson gave an overview of the recent heated debates on Critical Race Theory (CRT), explained what it is and what it is not. She also discussed the impact of such debates, especially the politicized narratives, on teacher education in higher education and on practice in K-12 schools. Lee-Johnson cited the recent development of anti-CRT and anti-DEI legislations in the USA at the Forum and urged participants to join forces to counter the backlash. 

Invited Podcast Episode

Real-Talk Dialogue: Intersectionality - "CEO Action for Diversity & Inclusion"

May 2023

Webster Ed.D. Director Dr. Nicole Lee-Johnson was an invited speaker on the Real-Talk Dialogue (RTD) Podcast on Intersectionality. The episode, entitled, "CEO Action for Diversity & Inclusion," features Dr. Lee-Johnson, as well as Anti-Bigotry Convening Fellow at Boston University, Reyma McCoy Hyten, and expert in ethnic studies and anti-racism on college campuses, Dr. Nolan Cabrera, University of Arizona.  The discussion highlights definitions of intersectionality, examples of microaggressions in the workplace, and suggestions on approaches to DEI from the perspective of organizational leaders. Listen below!

invited CPED Webinar April 19

Transforming Ed.D. with Equity-centered Scholarship and Practice: Dissertation Showcase

Webster’s Doctor of Education (Ed.D.) Director, Graduate, and Doctoral Candidates were invited to present at a Carnegie Project on the Education Doctorate (CPED) webinar, upon having a successful presentation at the CPED convening 2022. The webinar on April 19, 2023, entitled “Transforming Ed.D. with Equity-Centered Scholarship and Practice: A Dissertation Showcase”, featured an overview of the history of the program, ethos and mission, review of equity-centeredness, and it showcased dissertation projects that foregrounded equity-centeredness. More information at Webster Today.

Trezette Dixon

Trezette Dixon has completed her Ed.D. in Transformative Learning in a Global Community at Webster University. Her doctoral research is a qualitative study examining how the experiences of African American undergraduate students at a predominately white institution (PWI) influence their decision on whether to participate in an academic internship. She also holds an M.Ed. in Adult Education and B.A. in Communication. Dixon leads the Webster University School of Communications Internship Program as its director. Dixon has served students at Webster University for 18 years while providing leadership in career development, employer partnerships, and event management as the Career Planning & Development Center’s assistant director for Employer Relations. She is a certified Global Career Development Facilitator. Dixon is a member of the Academic Education Research Association, the National Society of Experiential Education, the National Association of Colleges and Employers, the Midwest Association of Colleges and Employers, and the Gateway Career Services Association. 

Jennifer Ono

Jennifer Ono is an Ed.D. student and doctoral candidate at Webster University with an emphasis in Transformative Learning in the Global Community. Ono holds her MA in English Language Learning from Western Governors University and a BA from Eastern Illinois University. She has been an educator for 30+ years working with children and adults. Her educational research interests include the impact of a culturally responsive teaching curriculum, the best methods for supporting social justice in the elementary setting, and how to provide equity for children who speak non-identified languages. Ono works as a fourth-grade teacher in the Kirkwood R-7 School District and acted as co-lead for professional development around equity. She was one of the contributing authors in the international best-selling book, Growth. Additionally, in the spring of 2022, she was an invited plenary speaker for a special event at Webster University: Teaching at Crossroads. In collaboration with other Webster doctoral students and Dr. Lee-Johnson, Ono presented at the Fall 2022 Carnegie Project on the Education Doctorate Convention (CPED), bringing the panel discussion, “Transforming a Transdisciplinary Ed.D. with Equity-Centered Scholarship for Practice.”

Tamara K. Rodney
Tamara K. Rodney is an Ed.D. student and doctoral candidate at Webster University with an emphasis in Transformative Learning in the Global Community. Rodney has worked as a high school English teacher for 18+ years and as an adjunct faculty member at Webster University since 2011. Tamara holds her MA in TESL/Adult Education from Webster University and a Bachelor’s in English from Florida Atlantic University. Being the daughter of a Rastafarian father and the product of New York City’s public school system has shaped her ontological assumptions and drives her educational research interests. Interests that seek to promote epistemic liberation for black learners; while naming and discussing epistemology; whiteness; and ‘white epistemology.’  Rodney’s work examines the implications of unnamed whiteness and white epistemology on research and studies about the performance of students of color in academic spaces, whether those spaces are PWI (predominantly white institutions) or otherwise. In collaboration with other Webster doctoral students and Dr. Lee-Johnson, Rodney presented at the Fall 2022 Carnegie Project on the Education Doctorate Convention (CPED), as a member of the panel discussion, “Transforming a Transdisciplinary Ed.D. with Equity-Centered Scholarship for Practice.” Tamara’s most recent success is the acceptance of her submission for the newly piloted AERA initiative titled the Graduate Student Research-in-Progress Roundtable Series (RiP). During the 2023 AERA annual meeting Rodney presented and discussed her research in progress and found a space for academic scholarship where she could belong.

Call-for-Proposals

We encourage Ed.D. students to create proposals for books, chapters, articles, conferences, and presentations. Many authors, universities, and organizations are seeking researchers and scholars to contribute to their work and propose new topics of interest. Below are some opportunities to explore.

Call for Proposals: Resisting Divide & Conquer in Schools and society

Those in power have and continue to suppress truth, block access to democratic participation, and dismantle education and other sites of emancipatory possibility through the strength of divide and conquer mechanisms, pitting relatively disempowered groups against one another. In education, coordinated, strategic, and well- funded campaigns continue to stoke fear, othering, villainization, and dehumanization of minoritized groups, pushing false and problematic narratives, and stimy and regress any modicum of progress. Resisting Divide and Conquer in Schools and Society seeks to contextualize such divide and conquer efforts and efforts to resist them, with a lens toward intersectional educational and social justice. 

 

Readers of this text will develop a more conceptual, critical understanding of how ideological, historical, and contemporary divide and conquer stratagems have and continue to operate, understand strategies of resistance, and develop skills of inquiry and engagement against current and future divide and conquer iterations. 

 

This book will cater to those interested in teacher preparation, as well as cultural, social, and political studies. As such, the book will appeal to a wide audience (teachers, professors/academics, community organizers, and parents). All chapters will conclude with a consistent series of critical questions for classroom reflection and engagement. An Applications for Teaching Appendix will provide multiple teaching strategies (e.g., Socratic seminars, jigsaws, gallery walks, journal reflections, and lesson plan development) using the chapters in this book for a range of learners.

Potential Sections and Chapter Topics (representative sample): 


 

Section I: Ideological 

Section II: Historical 

Section III: Contemporary Examples in Classrooms in Schools 

Schedule: 

If you share a determination to advance critical thinking, sociopolitical understanding, and intersectional educational and social justice, I invite you to consider submitting a chapter proposal for Resisting Divide and Conquer in Schools and Society. Proposals are due by May 1, 2023, should be about 500 words, and contain an abstract and an outline of the chapter. If accepted, final submissions will be approximately 6,000 words in APA format. Please email me with any questions or clarifications. 

 

Dr. Dennis L. Rudnick 

General Editor 

Assistant Professor and Dean's Diversity Fellow

Department of Childhood Education and Family Studies

College of Education

Missouri State University

DennisRudnick@missouristate.edu

Call for Proposals: Education Sciences Call for Papers for A Special Issue: Culturally and Linguistically Diverse Classrooms: Cultivating Critical, Anti-oppressive, and Decolonial Spaces for Culturally and Linguistically Diverse Students in Teacher Education 

In the United States and around the world, there is a long history of discourses and practices that dehumanize culturally and linguistically diverse students (also known as multilingual, emergent bilingual, or language-minoritized students) in the classroom and beyond. For example, culturally and linguistically diverse students have long been labeled as “limited” or “nonstandard” English learners and segregated from their “native” English-speaking peers (e.g., the ‘push-in’ and ‘pull-out’ models). Despite the recent language-policy shifts and increasing access toward multilingual education, culturally and linguistically diverse students are continually subject to subtractive and assimilationist teaching practices and hostility (e.g., racial/ethnic, class, and religious) from their teachers and school leaders in the public schooling system. Teacher education, across disciplines, in different parts of the world, thus, must provide opportunities for language- and discipline-specific teachers to question and counter the hegemony of the English language, inequitable practices and policies, and its embedded power relations in ways that lead to more equitable and just action-oriented change. This work requires us to not only challenge deficit-saturated views of culturally and linguistically diverse students in classrooms, schools, and universities at the individual level but also examine the possibilities of culturally and linguistically sustaining curricula and pedagogy and working within and against educational policies that maintain dominant, oppressive discourses and practices of English learning and teaching at the structural level. We must also consider English learning and teaching and its coloniality at the global level, considering how intersecting global forces (e.g., colonialism, capitalism, neoliberalism, and White supremacy) have structured educational disparities, inequities, or injustices for culturally and linguistically diverse students. 

This Special Issue calls for research and practice that elicit critical, anti-oppressive, and decolonial conceptualization and embodiment of English learning and teaching with and for culturally and linguistically diverse students alongside diverse stakeholders (e.g., educators, teacher educators, community organizations, and policymakers). This Special Issue also warmly welcomes interdisciplinary and collaborative work in ways that center pragmatic challenges and possibilities in the design and implementation of research studies and collaborations in working with culturally and linguistically diverse students across disciplines and institutional boundaries. 

Potential topics for this Special Issue include but are not limited to: 

If you are interested, please send a proposal to Dr. Jihea Maddamsetti (jmaddams@odu.edu) by June 1, 2023. This proposal must include 1) a working title; 2) a 500-word abstract that describes empirically or conceptually based unpublished work; and 3) author(s)’s name, affiliation, contact information, and a 50-word biographical statement. 


Dr. Jihea Maddamsetti

Guest Editor 

Department of Teaching & Learning

Old Dominion University, Norfolk, VA

Email: jmaddams@odu.edu

Call for Proposals: Storying Leadership for Equity, diversity, and inclusion: Power dynamics and qualitative research for resilience, adversity, and authenticity


Call for Chapters for an Edited book on Storying Leadership

Storying Leadership for Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion: Power Dynamics and Qualitative Research for Resistance, Resilience, Adversity, and Authenticity

Edited By: Ambika G. Raj, Ph.D., Socorro Orozco Ed.D., & Christina Restrepo Nazar, Ph.D.                                       

Under Contract to be Published by: Taylor & Francis in the Routledge Research in Educational Leadership Series

 

We are soliciting chapter contributions on the topic of Storying Leadership that offers a unique perspective of Leadership through Storying. This work draws on the lived experiences of diverse, minoritized leaders highlighting the problems of practice that they encounter on a daily basis in professional spaces. The central objective of this book will be to showcase chapters where “leadership in place” (Wergin, 2007) is exemplified through the principles of storying. We seek chapters that take the approach that ‘storying’ is an empowering qualitative research methodology as it acknowledges the identities and reflexivity of both the researcher as well as the researched (Raj, 2019, Raj & Ulanoff, 2022). We seek chapters that address cultural-historicity and establish authenticity by centering participant identities and lived experiences represented as “unauthorized knowledge” (Phillips & Bunda, 2018). We seek chapters that center unique leadership through storying and those that will exemplify theorizing and establishing storying as a qualitative methodology.


Sample Chapter Topics


1. Theorizing Storying

2. Storying as an Empowering Methodology

3. Cultural-Historical Identities

4. Storying Culturally Situated Leadership

5. Leading through Lived Experiences

6. Storying First Gen Leadership

7. Storying Problems of Practice

8. Empowering Leadership through Storying

 


Significant Priorities for Authors to Focus on:


Perspectives of Storying Leadership: We seek stories of leadership from the perspective of practicing leaders who are minoritized, maybe first generation leaders and in positions of power-dynamics. We encourage stories of spaces that address issues of diversity, equity, and marginalization that these leaders may encounter and how they re-negotiate these spaces.

 

Leadership by Doing or Leadership in Place: We seek stories of those leaders who emerge as a result of their practices, and their everyday work that necessitates their taking a leadership stance.

 

Unique Constructions of Leadership: We seek one of a kind reports of leadership research that (position both leadership and research); are re-negotiated within spaces that are culturally relevant, socially situated, and historically constructed; through storying, it may traverse the limits of textual interpretations.

 

Diverse and Minoritized Leader Researchers: We seek reports from diverse leader researchers and practitioners who are themselves reflected in the participants they interviewed, storied, and reported on.

 

For the Submission of the Proposal

 

Suggested length for final chapters: 4000 to 5000 words including references

 

Timeline

Chapter Abstracts and Bios due: April 22, 2023

Responses of acceptance to contributors: May 1, 2023

Completed Chapter First Drafts due to Editors: June 20, 2023

Chapters sent back to contributors with revision: July 20, 2023

Chapters for additional edits/changes due: August 20, 2023

All final chapters, images, copyrights due: November 20, 2023

Publishing date: Spring/Early Summer 2024


Dr. Ambika G. Raj                                                                                                                                                                       

Faculty, EdD in Educational Leadership
Division of Curriculum and Instruction
California State University, Los Angeles
Email: ambika.raj@calstatela.edu

Call for Proposal: American association for applied linguistics (AAAL) 2024 Conference


The Call for Proposals for the AAAL 2024 Conference in Houston, Texas opens on June 1, 2023!


The 2024 conference of the American Association for Applied Linguistics (AAAL) will be held in Houston, Texas, at the Hyatt Regency Houston, March 16-19, 2024. The theme of the conference is “Thinking Otherwise, Acting for Change.” We are increasingly witnessing not only rapid technological advancements involving AI but also unsettling challenges that threaten our environment, human rights, as well as social, economic, and emotional wellbeing. Under these circumstances, applied linguists’ concerted engagement with thinking and doing research differently has potential to make a positive difference in various social and institutional domains. The 2024 conference invites presenters to share innovative research toward a transformation of hope.

The annual conference of AAAL attracts diverse presenters both nationally and internationally to exchange comprehensive and stimulating discussions in the forms of one- or two-hour colloquia, paper, poster, and round-table sessions. It also offers thought-provoking plenary presentations, excellent book exhibits, and plentiful opportunities for networking.

Please click the button below to visit the Call for Proposals website, where additional information and instructions for how to submit are available for your review. We look forward to receiving your submissions and are excited to welcome you to Houston for AAAL 2024!


AAAL: American Association for Applied Linguistics 

2900 Delk Road, Suite 700, PMB 321

Marietta, GA 30067

ryuko.kubota@ubc.ca

Job Board - Spring 2023

Post-Doctoral Fellowships

Faculty & Adjunct Positions

Administrative Positions

Higher Education Diversity, Equity, & Inclusion (DEI) Positions

Images from Creative Commons: CC Search Portal (creativecommons.org)  

Contact Us

Feel free to reach out to Dr. Lee-Johnson, Director of the Ed.D. program, or Mary Rose Reynolds, Research Assistant, if you have any questions, comments, or concerns.

Ed.D. Director: Dr. Yin Lam Lee-Johnson

Webster University Ed.D. Director - Webster Groves Campus

314-246-7643

yleejohnson31@webster.edu 

Executive Editor of the Ed.D. Newsletter: Mary Rose Reynolds

SoE Research Assistant - Webster Groves Campus

314-856-8538

maryreynolds@webster.edu