Ed. Magazine, Summer 2009

the magazine of the harvard graduate School of education Summer 2009 | vol. lii, no. 3

Arts Education in the United States How deep will the cuts be in this economy?

Ed. The Not-Retiring Retirees

One Student’s Second Chance

A Former Dean (and Santa) Says Goodbye

Also

1Ed. • Harvard GraduatE ScHool of Education • SummEr 2009

PullinG Back tHE covEr

The arts, unlike other content areas, have always needed a campaign to justify their inclusion into the curriculum, says Natalie Bortoli, Ed.M.’03. It was this idea of a campaign that lead her, while she was a student at the Ed School, to create this series of propaganda posters, “not only to capture the variety of arguments made for the arts over time,” she says, “but to inspire continued thinking among fellow artists and educators about how we will campaign for the arts moving forward.”

Now vice president of education at the Chicago Children’s Museum, which was founded 25 years ago as a response to arts cut backs in Chicago Public Schools, Bortoli says “the post-ers were a response to a study of the history of arts education, and the various ways the arts have been justified in the school curriculum throughout American history. This included everything from the notion that an education in the arts would create more adept industrial craftsmen to the Progressive argument that the arts helped to produce stronger individuals by creating a society of free thinkers. Later justification argued that arts learning leads to better scores in other subject areas.”

Poster Campaign

Ed. The Magazine of The harvard graduaTe School of educaTion | SuMMer 2009 | vol. lii, no. 3

features

departments 3 Dean’s Perspective

4 Letters

6 The Appian Way

38 In the Media

46 Alumni News and Notes

52 Recess

On the Chopping Block, AgainMusic, painting, theater, literary magazines — even during the best of times, these are often the first to go in public schools when bud-gets get tight. With today’s economy worse than ever, are students having to say goodbye completely to their beloved arts?

Hanna Rodriguez-Farrar’s family, immigrants from the Philippines, were living the American Dream before they lost it all. With a lot of hard work, and a little boost from a winning lottery ticket, the family got back on track — and this current doctoral student began to realize the importance of higher education.

When it comes to aging in America, we are at a key moment in history, writes Professor Sara Lawrence-Lightfoot, Ed.D.’72, in her new book, The Third Chapter. It’s a time when we are “neither young nor old.” The result? More and more potential retirees are forgoing a life of leisure and instead continuing to work, learn new skills, and even go back to school.

As Luck Would Have It

The Third Chapter: An Excerpt

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As he gets set to retire from the Ed School after nearly 40 years, former dean and current professor Jerry Murphy, Ed.D.’73, talks about the nuances of administrative leadership, playing Santa Claus every year, and where his next adventure will take him.

Reflections of a Retiring Former Misfit

Ed. • Harvard GraduatE ScHool of Education • SummEr 20092 3Ed. • Harvard GraduatE ScHool of Education • SummEr 2009

Dear Friends:

Around the time that Barack Obama was being sworn in as our 44th president, music maverick Quincy Jones was lobbying the newly elected administration to create a cabinet-level national ministry of culture and the arts, similar to those already in existence in more than two dozen countries. This idea is not new — Jones has been talking about the need for at least a decade. With the Obama administration’s talk about reinvesting in arts education, including creating an artists corps that would work in low-income schools, Jones, no doubt, felt the time was right to make a move.

Today, although still pushing hard for his idea, Jones also acknowledges that with the current economic woes, this may take awhile longer. Every educator reading this magazine knows all too well that when budgets get tight, one of the first things to go is the arts. This, too, isn’t new. So the question becomes: is it going to be even harder for public schools across the country to fund their in-house music and painting classes, student literary magazines, and theater programs? What author Mary Tamer found was bleak, with urban and suburban schools facing the biggest budget cuts since the mid-1980s. As I read this issue’s cover story, what I found particularly distressing is that the fallback for many resource-poor schools — offsite arts organizations that bring their services to the classroom — was also in trouble: the Associated Press predicted that this year alone, about 10,000 arts organizations could fold.

Does this mean the end of arts in most public schools, or will many programs be shells of their former selves? Federal aid to education totals about $115 billion under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, which President Obama signed into law in February. Advocates hope that some of these funds will be designated for the arts. I am encouraged to see many of the talented students in our Arts in Education Program, as well as many of our alumni, already preparing for the challenges ahead. As Chris-tine Jee, Ed.M.’09, says in the story, “We can have this crisis, and focus on everyone cutting the arts, or we can think creatively of new ways to incorporate them.”

Sincerely,

Kathleen McCartneyMarch 2009

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Edith aronson, a.B.’84, Ed.m.’97

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P. lindsay chase-lansdale, a.B.’74

m. christine devita

david Gergen, l.l.B.’67, kSGf’84

John Hobbs, a.B.’60, mBa’65

ira krinsky, Ed.d.’79

arturo madrid

richard melvoin, a.B.’73

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Patti Saris, a.B.’73, J.d.’76

Steve Seleznow, Ed.m.’89, Ed.d.’94

dacia toll

david vitale, a.B.’68

Susan Wallach

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Sarah alturki

kenneth Bartels, a.B.’73, mBa’76

donald Burton, mBa’89

Jamie El-Erian

John Hobbs, a.B.’60, mBa’65

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John mcarthur, mBa’59, dBa’63

ronay menschel

albert merck, a.B.’47

John nichols Jr., a.B.’53, mBa‘55

Susan noyes

Patti Saris, a.B.’73, J.d.’76

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online with people from other coun-tries, generations, and cultures, gaining first-hand access to anecdotal history that would otherwise be, in all prob-ability, inaccessible. Or as mentioned in the text of the article, creating a large, universal circle that would include the disadvantaged and immigrant students with just, literally, the tips of fingers and a keyboard. I will go back and reread the article many, many times, internal-ize it all, and then go on my perpetual campaign to bring the world to each student. A beautiful read.SHaron couto, via tHE WEBSitE

Finally, an article about the potentially positive aspects of social networking sites for teens. I get so tired of adults as-suming the worst about technology and teens. Every parent discussion on the topic attempts to scare us into believing that the positive attributes of technol-ogy are few and far between. Connect-ing with people via writing is a great skill to have. Who says my 15-year-old daughter shouldn’t hone that skill in her spare time? Additionally, the focus on low-income teens in the study was great information for me, as I work for a foundation that provides scholarships to low-income teens at independent high schools around the United States.JEnnifEr ScHaufflEr, Ed.m.’95,

via tHE WEBSitE

I’ve never doubted that social network-ing sites and other “cloud apps” could be used by participants in a positive way. What I find disturbing is that discussion and criticism of these tools rarely goes further than user-to-user privacy. Yes, you can you can set your keg party pho-to album to “private” in Facebook. What I question is the wisdom of subjecting us and our children to the data mining and analysis that these companies are employing. A great deal of information is being collected about us, and we have no say in how it can be used.dEan, via tHE WEBSitE

We’re Impartial“Music to My Ears” (winter 2009) page 14, line 3: “Disinterest”? Please tell me that I am not the only person on earth who still believes there is distinction between “disinterest” and “uninterest.” Gary BlauvElt, m.a.t.’63

Go Gardner!Professor Howard Gardner has impacted more students than he will ever realize (“15 Minutes Has Turned into 25 Years,” fall 2008). I was overwhelmed when I first learned of his theory of MI 14 years ago, at age 42. I am now a teacher. My sole goal is to impress adolescents with the fact that they are smart. I have students tell me that my class, with an MI-Howard Gardner fo-cus, is the first time that they feel smart. It’s overwhelming to hear.katHy kEEnE

My children attend New City School in St. Louis, Mo., which was one of the first schools to really turn the multiple intelligence theory into a 20-plus-year practice. Though I will agree that Howard Gardner’s contributions are broader than MI, I think that he is being awfully hum-ble based on the impact that the theory

has had. … I know that Howard doesn’t want to be an “MI rock star,” but I think that there is still much to be learned and much to be done with this work. So I will just say thank you Howard, we truly appreciate what you have given us!cHEryl milton roBErtS

Rural Fresh AirI found the article “Boon, Not Boon-dock” in the recent edition of Ed. (fall 2008) to be a true breath of fresh air for those of us interested in rural education. Much like an individual profiled in the article, I am also “from the hollers” of Appalachia and have seen our education systems to be too heavily influenced by trends that are intended for urban and suburban schools. As pointed out in the article, rural schools share a unique set of concerns and issues that have been overlooked for decades. Frankly, it is refreshing to read that others in the education community are beginning to see that techniques and approaches that have been effective in Boston are a bad fit for rural West Virginia. conrad lucaS ii, Ed.m.’05

Perla PraiseHow circular this world is! I met Perla (“One on One,” winter 2009) in 1974 in Tunis, Tuni-sia, where, as a foreign service officer with the U.S. Information Agency, I was serving as cul-

tural affairs officer. Perla had a grant to coach tennis to aspiring Tunisians. I encouraged her to apply for the Foreign Service, which she did and where she served for a few years before moving on to her current career. I’m glad I spotted the smarts, talent, imagination, and a sassy sense of humor.William StEPHEnS Jr., via tHE WEBSitE

Teaching TeachersUpon receiving my winter issue of Ed., I was delighted to notice an article on middle school readers (“In the Middle,” winter 2009). Unfortunately, although a well-written overview, it was a disap-pointment. In quoting case studies and describing some of the current scene with readers at the middle school, the writer neglects any mention of the real reason for the problem, i.e., the teach-ing of reading to grades 1–5. Contrary to current belief, these students do not read well now. Mention is not made of the inadequate training of teach-ers who, for years, have just taught decoding skills but not comprehension skills. Curing the problem with literacy coaches and short-term pilot programs

as encouraged by colleges of education and others will only serve as a Band-aid. Training institutions need to accept their responsibilities to train and prepare teachers of reading instead of seeking more useless dissertation and study topics. Teachers at all levels and of all subjects need to be readers themselves. JackiE Ziff, Ed.m.’57

Long DaysClearly the quality of teaching and learning is key to the success of ELT schools (“Time Hasn’t Been on Their Side,” winter 2009). Teachers must have rich professional development to engage, challenge, and provide students with 21st century skills. Perhaps, then, professional development needs to be re-envisioned and expanded beyond current teacher collaboration within buildings. Quality online learning for teachers, for example, offers the flex-ibility to be incorporated within the ELT day or completed at other times convenient for teachers.BESS kaPEtaniS, via tHE WEBSitE

Interesting idea. If you want public school teachers to do this, it is going to mean two things: first, money; second, very clear parameters around extended duties. I teach all day and go home to being a parent of school-aged children that need my help with their homework. How can I help my own kids at night if kids I teach during the day are call-ing me? How are we supposed to have time to get our kids to the doctor’s or dentist’s or their commitments if we’re teaching so long? katriona, via tHE WEBSitE

I think expanding the hours that students spend in school is not very creative and does not address many other issues that play roles in the suc-cess of students. I would like to know

if anyone has studied when a person’s brain becomes completely functional in the morning and at what point in the evening does it slow down? In my high school, we started at 8:25 a.m. and had a 20-minute break at 10 a.m. We did that because they found that starting too early was not helping anything because people are still waking up.cornEll WoodSon, via tHE WEBSitE

During the Australian summer holidays I read Malcolm Gladwell’s Outliers: The Story of Success. It resonated well with what I have observed having worked as a teacher for 30 years across various socioeconomic environments. Gener-ally, Gladwell maintains that students from high socioeconomic groups are given more out-of-school opportuni-ties. Gladwell calls this “concerted cultivation and intense scheduling.” It made me reflect on the absurdity of our “one-size-fits-all” approach to education. If education is meant to be an equal-izer, and it should have this potential, why are we not providing opportunities within education systems for students from poorer homes to access extra time? maria lEavEr, via tHE WEBSitE

Tweet Success?This is one of the most intriguing ar-ticles (“Thanks for the Add. Now Help Me with My Homework,” winter 2009) I’ve read about online social network-ing. As a retired high school teacher now in the “world” of social media, I have spent countless hours thinking of how I could have used this phenom-enon in my classroom; perhaps a new pen pal, where kids could correspond

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How does the parenting process of low-income immigrant parents, many undocumented and all with limited resources, shape how their babies learn? When Hirokazu Yoshikawa first started thinking about this question, he was living and working in New York City. At the time, research in this area was spotty, limited primarily to how older first- and second-generation children learned. So Yoshikawa and his colleagues at New York University did what they had to do: They went into maternity wards in the city and started recruiting families for a long-term project that would follow parents and their babies until the ba-bies were toddlers. Four years later, Yoshikawa, now a professor at the Harvard Graduate School of Education, is back in New York as a visiting scholar with the Russell Sage Foundation, where he is working on a book using the data he collected. This past winter he spoke to Ed. about home visits, major findings, and why he decided to write a book.

How many families were involved in the study?We started with 310 Mexican, Dominican, and [U.S.-born] African American families. An additional 60 or so Chinese families were included but followed [only] six months due to high rates of sending [the babies] back to China, though we did go to China to observe the kinds of settings where infants and toddlers such as those in our sample were being raised.

You said it was hard to keep tabs on this mobile group. How many of the original families are still with you? Yes, low-income, immigrant families in New York are an extremely difficult group of families to track. Of the 310, about 200 remain with us at four years.

Did you notice similarities in how they parented?They are very similar in their goals for their children’s school success. For example, they all state that they want their chil-dren to do well academically and in school.

Any major differences?Our groups do differ on other conceptualizations of goals for children’s development, such as emphases on definitions of good behavior. More emphasis in the Latino groups on being calm, or tranquilo; more among African Americans on leader-ship and avoiding negative peer influences. There are also some emerging differences in their social network support, their rela-tionships and involvement with ethnic enclave neighborhoods, and their household budgeting.

What about the children?We found at 24 months that Dominican and Mexican chil-dren’s vocabularies were significantly different in size, but this

was entirely accounted for by the Dominican children’s greater exposure to English and therefore their larger English vocabu-laries. The Spanish vocabularies were the same size.

You suspected that the Mexican families were showing the highest level of hardship, perhaps because they had the highest level of undocumented status. How did this affect parenting?I cannot assess citizenship status directly due to confidentiality issues. However, in assessing aspects of social exclusion that might be associated with citizenship, such as the use of finan-cial services like formal banking instead of informal methods, we find that these differentiate our groups and are related to parents’ levels of hardship, their psychological distress, and their children’s early development.

The newborns you started with are now four years old. How much time did you spend with each family? The entire sample of about 200 families gets two or three home visits every year. That includes a bunch of structured interview questions, direct child assessments, and videotape of the par-ent and child in a variety of tasks.

You also followed a smaller group more closely.An in-depth, longitudinal qualitative study was conducted with a randomly selected subgroup of 25 families. These families got between eight and 10 visits over a period of two years, with a combination of ethnographic participant observation and semistructured interviews. Each of those visits typically lasted a couple hours. All families also receive birthday cards, holiday cards, etc., in between visits in order to keep them involved.

Did you only observe them at home?In the ethnography, we accompanied them to places like parks, relatives’ homes, WIC offices, restaurants, beauty salons, viveros — bodegas where chickens and other sources of food are purchased — and childcare settings.

Has it helped to be back in New York where the study started?Yes. Visiting more of the neighborhoods, for example, gives me a richer sense of the texture of the daily lives of our families.

Why write a book instead of a journal article?The combination of rich ethnographic data and our survey, assessment, and other results make the overall story of these families — including histories of immigration of different groups to New York, their varied strategies to make ends meet, their accounts of their towns and villages of origin, the daily in-teractions of children with adults, siblings, and others in their lives — difficult to publish in journal article form.

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Name: Hirokazu Yoshikawa TiTle: professor of educationFoCus: early learning and development in low-income immigrant families

“They are very similar in their goals for their children’s school success.”

Home Visits and BabiesBy Lory Hough


the appian way

StudEnt imPact

There was always a pause when students walked into the Department of Foreign Relations at Tbilisi State University in Georgia, a former republic of the Soviet Union, and asked to speak to the director. At 26, Tea Gergedava looked like just another student, not a high-ranking administrator running an elite department in the country’s oldest university. It wasn’t long before they knew they had found an ally in Gergedava — as a recent graduate, she “knew their slang” and could share her personal experience with the classes they were considering. Now, after a year at Harvard, Gergedava is set to return to her home-land to give back. “When you are living in a peaceful prosperous state, you have only a vague understanding of what it means to be a respon-sible citizen, but if you are living in tiny Georgia, squeezed between the Russian Federation and Turkey, and your country’s territory is being bombed and villages annihilated, you realize that it’s time to pay your share of the citizenship in any way you can.”

5 REASonS TO Know...

1 Despite her country’s troubles, including separatist conflicts, corrup-tion, and last summer’s brief war with Russia, she remains optimistic. “I’ve seen crowds ready to sacrifice anything they could to make Georgia

work as an independent, democratic state.”

Although technically on leave from her job for a year, she continues to oversee her university’s involvement in a European-wide student exchange program called Erasmus.

This is her third master’s degree. The others, both from Tbilisi State, were in social sciences and American studies. She has also studied in Turkey, Austria, and India. During her year studying in Istanbul, she became fluent in Turkish. At Harvard, she kept up with the language by attending weekly university- sponsored “language tables.” “It gave me a chance to meet others I

might not otherwise meet and practice my Turkish. It’s a beautiful language — very emotional and melodic.”

Asked what she plans to bring back to young Georgians, she says, “I have experiences that I can share and stories to tell. I can also prove to them that there is no goal too distant.”

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My transition from “A” to “B” is somewhat of an interesting story. My life prior to enrolling at Harvard was great. I had a steady career path as an up-and-coming manager at a higher education marketing and consulting firm while simultaneous-ly completing an MBA program. My wife and I, along with our 150-pound Great Dane, lived in a nice Cape Cod-style house in the beautiful state of Iowa. This has all changed in the last five months.

My new life now consists of attending the Harvard Gradu-ate School of Education to study higher education policy, living in a 12x12-foot dorm in Cambridge, and carrying out a long-distance marriage.

My decision to upend my life stems from a bit of a quarter-life crisis (at 28 I’m far too young for a mid-life crisis). In many ways, my work as a higher education consultant should have been fulfilling. If I did my job correctly, colleges and universi-ties would be equipped with solid data and recommendations that would allow them to make wiser decisions. The colleges would thus improve, and all parties — students, faculty, staff, and alumni — would theoretically be more satisfied. However, I wasn’t sure my work was making a difference in the world. I felt there was more fulfilling work worth doing that would have a greater impact.

I felt that if I could just tweak my current career in higher education enough to project me on to a different career path, I could be satisfied. After all, education, at its core, is about helping people reach their full potentials. If I could change my role within education, my career could offer the opportunity to make a difference by creating real and lasting societal change. This idealism is what led me to change career trajectories. It is what has convinced me that these goals are worth nine months of dorm living, cafeteria meals, and a webcam marriage.

I had become familiar with the Ed School through my con-sulting work. My former company was hired by the school to conduct a research study examining why students chose to en-roll. In interviewing students, I saw a diverse group of individu-als with interests ranging from early childhood development to education administration and policymaking. Each group of students I met was just as passionate about their potential role in education as the next. Most importantly, though, I saw a community of students that shared a common belief — the belief in the power of education to solve most societal prob-lems and the power of their individual contributions to make this happen.

Being introduced to this community confirmed that there was more I could be doing with my life and the Ed School was the place where I could shape a career that would have a larger and more direct impact in higher education. It was with these points that I made the case to my wife that it was a good idea to leave my job, quit my MBA program, and move a thousand miles away for the better part of one year. Much to my surprise, she was very supportive of my idea. Her support came from her understanding of how important it was to me to engage in a career of work worth doing. She understands how passion-ate I am about making an impact, and we both know that an education from the Ed School will provide me the opportuni-ties to fulfill these aspirations. Plus, as she likes to joke, there is an unwritten marital vow that says if your spouse is admitted to Harvard, you let him or her go.

Admittedly, I do not know exactly where my life will lead me after graduation. My eyes have been opened to a variety of opportunities to make an impact in higher education. HGSE’s focus on operating at the nexus of practice, policy, and research serves as an excellent example of how effective one can be in any of these three areas. The big question I am currently wres-tling with is where my talents and abilities best fit within this spectrum. Whether my career leads me into a role as a higher education practitioner, researcher, or perhaps even as a policy-maker, I am confident the knowledge and skills I have acquired at the Ed School will serve me well in any of these endeavors.

— Denton DeSotel is an Ed.M. candidate in the Higher Educa-tion Program from Cedar Rapids, Iowa. Upon graduation he plans to leave the dorm and return to eastern Iowa.

A TO B: WHy i Got into Education

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The Dorm and a Webcam marriage

By Denton DeSotel, Ed.M.’09

the appian way

It’s called many things. Time out. Time off. Year off. Deferred year. And perhaps most commonly, gap year. But in many ways, the phrases are misleading, especially for the teenag-ers enrolled in Thinking Beyond Borders, a new program cocreated by former Peace Corps volunteer Robin Pendoley, Ed.M.’03, that allows students taking off the year between high school and college to travel the world and explore international development through service projects. In Bua, a small village in Ecuador, the students hand-dug a well for a community center and built ecological toilets for local schools. In Kunming, a city of 5 million in China, they taught English at three schools. And in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam, they worked with the Waste Collectors Union sifting through trash in an effort to learn about recycling and then hosted a student environmental conference with more than 60 local university students.

The 35-week program officially started last September in Costa Rica with 16 students and three staff members. Centered around eight development issues, including clean water, public health, and sustainable agriculture, the program’s purpose is similar to other gap year programs: It allows students time to find their direction and, in some cases, develop maturity and independence, before jumping into college or the work world.

“So much of our education system is about reaching the next milestone: winter vacation, the end of the semester, graduation,” says Liz Kuenstner, a current participant, while in Vietnam. “I spent all of high school working towards The Next Big Thing — college — without any real consciousness of the larger picture and what I was ultimately working towards. I certainly don’t know what that is now, but taking this year with Thinking Beyond Borders has challenged me to reflect on what I want to pursue.”

Because students travel throughout Asia, South America, Africa, and North America, the program uniquely allows stu-dents to reflect globally.

“It’s hard to keep the magnitude of what we’re doing in per-spective,” says Pendoley in an e-mail while the group is in Chi-na, the fourth country on the itinerary. “Each day we venture out into a culture that we are just beginning to understand, the students engage readings that challenge their understanding of themselves and the world around them, and we sit in dialogue

trying to make sense of it all. Just over two months in, students have begun to question their deepest assumptions about how the world works, what causes poverty and oppression, and what role they can play in an effort to effect change.”

By the time they had reached their sixth country, Vietnam, Pendoley says it was clear that each student was struggling with these questions.

“Their assumptions are clearly being challenged and they have begun to see themselves in new ways,” he says. “Some are expressing for the first time that their ethnicity, nationality, and economic class might be significant social and political identi-fiers for them. Service work has provided an understanding of the challenges of development work, the fragility of well-intentioned idealism, and the need for expertise and careful planning when providing services to those in need. At the same time, many are expressing an understanding of the universality of some human experiences.”

For student Renee Slajda, this has meant adding more ques-tions to the ones she initially had in September. “What makes the program exciting is exactly what makes it feel overwhelm-ing at times: There’s just so much to it,” she says during their month in Vietnam. “One question begets five more.”

Living with host families proved to be a challenge for many, as did living without cell phones — a deliberate policy set by the staff. “The cell phone rule is primarily about ensuring that students see the program staff as their primary support people, rather than family and friends thousands of miles away,” says Pendoley. (Students can access e-mail.)

As the group moved on to their next country, Thailand (In-dia had to be canceled due to the Mumbai attacks), Pendoley talked about having his computer stolen in Peru, the logistical challenges of traveling on buses, boats, and planes and though small villages, and the need to grow their financial aid. (About a quarter of the students receive aid.) But, he added, every challenge is worth it. “It’s rare to go to bed these days without feeling excitement for the possibilities in the day to come.”

Go to www.thinkingbeyondborders.org to learn more about the program, and to read stories written by the students during the trip.

No Gap in This Year By Lory Hough


Photos (from top left, clockwise): Renee Slajda and host siblings in Bua, Ecuador; Katie Robson, Lily Bullitt, and Katie Cromack at waste collection site in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam; students cleaning up a river in Bua, Ecuador; Ian Chmar and community leader Pati Saju blacksmithing in Huay Hee, Thailand; Liz Kuenstner journaling on the Inca Trail, Peru; Robin Pendoley and Tsa’chila com-munity leader in Bua, Ecuador; and Emily Ausubel teaching in a school in Kunming, China.

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the appian way

second Time around By Lory Hough

WHAT THEY KEEP

One of the small white squares shows a teacher, her embroidered arm writing on a blackboard. Abolitionist Harriet Tubman is in the top right square, drawn in marker. Some of the other squares, 25 in all, show an ice cream cone, the words “Seneca Falls,” and a tiny one-room schoolhouse. Lecturer Sally Schwager, Ed.M.’76, C.A.S.’78, Ed.D.’82, knows the images well — she has been looking at the squares, which are part of a quilt that hangs in her office, for more than two decades now. Made, in secret, by the students in one of the American History: New Scholarship on Women programs that she ran from 1986 through 1998 at the Harvard Graduate School of Educa-tion, the quilt was a thank-you gift from the students, middle and high school teachers who were attending the intensive four-week summer program, which was sponsored by the National Endowment for the Humanities. The idea for the quilt started during a class trip to a quilting show in Lowell, Mass., a former mill town about 30 miles north of Cambridge. The students had learned about the importance of needlepoint and quilting in women’s lives, particularly during the abolitionist, suffrage, and temperance movements, and the legitimate historical documentation that these handiworks have provided over the years. Looking at a family quilt and admiring the group compo-nent of the piece that still allowed for individual expression, one of the students suggested to the others that they make a quilt and give it to the staff. Already armed with massive amounts of reading to do each night, the students, living in the Chronkhite dorm, had no idea how they could possibly take on another project. Spurred by Nancy Sizer, a student in the class and herself a master quilter, the students decided to give it a shot. “They would meet during lunch breaks and at night, and one person would read the homework assignment while the others worked on the quilt,” Schwager says. “They said they really felt like 19th-century quilters.”

What They Keep is an occasional feature that looks at something found in a faculty member’s office and the story behind it.

that teaching and learning is, to a great extent, working with the experience and prior knowledge of the learners — and of the teachers — the opportunity to work with the fellows will give me access to a very different range of experiences than I normally have in the courses I teach at the Ed School.”

Reimers says that as a result of his interaction with the fel-lows and the new program, he has revamped his curriculum for master’s students. “I have redesigned my seminar on educa-tion, policy, and inequality in Latin America this semester to include a section that engages the students in doing case studies of leaders who have succeeded at creating educational opportunities for disadvantaged children,” he says. “This has

been inspired by my interaction with the fellows and with the participants in the education think tank.”

Asked how they will know if the fledgling program is a suc-cess, Moss Kanter says, “When the fellows create projects that are viewed as making a meaningful difference in society and the fellows attribute their success to their time at Harvard. And when other colleges and universities offer rigorous, serious educational programs for people at later stages in life, in their own ways.”

Visit www.advancedleadership.harvard.edu to learn more about the Harvard Advanced Leadership Initiative.

Experience matters. That was the message this past February when the first crop of fellows in Harvard University’s newly created Advanced Leadership Initiative arrived on campus. While many their age would be retiring or nearing retirement, these baby boomer lawyers, doctors, military officers, and business executives were here to jumpstart the next phase of their lives: first as students and then as leaders focused on social problems, including education.

“I’m too young to die on the golf course,” jokes fel-low Hans-Ulrich Maerki, a former executive with IBM.

Conceived initially at the Harvard Business School by Professor Rosabeth Moss Kanter and her colleagues, the initiative is a now a collaboration between five of the uni-versity’s graduate schools — education, business, law, public policy, and public health. Fellows like Maerki are spending nine months (February through October) taking classes across the university, mentoring students, leading study groups, meeting with faculty advisors, and attending working dinners where aspects of leadership are discussed and debated. They are all here, says Senior Lecturer James Honan, Ed.M.’85, Ed.D.’89, to figure out how best to harness their existing expertise as they move into new careers in public service.

“Given that these fellows have spent their careers primar-ily in the for-profit world, the question becomes, how do you make a transition to a new operating environment? How do you take the leadership skills you already have and ask what’s new or different?” says Honan, who serves as a faculty leader on the project along with Professor Fernando Reimers, Ed.M.’84, Ed.D.’88.

Initially, in an effort to help answer these questions and to develop the “social purpose plan” that each fellow will present when the program ends, four fellows interested in education turned to Ed School students for advice. During the first of several meetings organized by Reimers, for example, a dozen students spent nearly two hours one afternoon brainstorming ideas about fellow Shelly London’s interest in youth violence and ethics. London, a former corporate communications expert, was toying with the question made famous in 1991 by Rodney King, “Can we all get along?” and hoped the students could help her better understand what educational research was being done in this area.

“What or where can I go with this? Where can I make the biggest impact?” she said. “Everyone wants to be a social entre-preneur, but then you have to ask, would I be more effective if I

got in with someone already doing this kind of work?”

After hearing a range of advice — do a literature search, focus on family, start small — London, who was busy taking notes, concluded, “My life was much easier when I was in the corporate world.”

Throughout the program, fellows also have a chance to ana-lyze issues and problems on deeper levels by getting involved with case-based “think tank” seminars, including one led by Reimers that is looking at education reform in Brazil, among other “cutting-edge education challenges and solutions,” he says.

It’s this ability to dig deep that sets the new initiative apart from other short-term programs aimed at experienced profes-sionals. “This program is much more than taking existing courses; it has its own educational offerings and experiences,” says Moss Kanter. “It is also an honor to be selected. Fellows form a peer group and are expected to mentor students based on the fellows’ extensive, successful careers.”

The program is also unique for the faculty members in-volved, says Reimers. Students are not typical — besides being older, few have professional experience in the public service area in which they are focusing. (With education, several served on the boards of education-related projects and one fel-low, Vivian Lowery Derryck, did some Africa-based education work with the U.S. Agency for International Development.)

“Learning is about developing new understandings based in re-examining our knowledge and experience in light of new ideas and exchange with others,” Reimers says. “Since I believe

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New DirectionShari Tishman, Ed.D.’91, was named the new director of Project Zero. Tishman replaced Steve Seidel, Ed.M.’89, Ed.D.’95, who will continue as a senior research director and steering committee member. Tishman was a senior research associate.

To learn more about these briefs, go to www.gse.harvard.edu/ news_events.

Distinguished DeanFrom a record number of nominees, the Society for Research in Child Development awarded Dean Kathleen McCartney with the Distinguished Contributions to Education in Child Development Award. The nonprofit pro-fessional association was started in 1933.

long standingIn March, Professor emeritus Charles Willie was given the Lifetime Achievement Award by the American Association of Blacks in Higher Education. Willie, a sociologist, joined the Harvard faculty in 1974.

upgradeThis past winter, a number of faculty were promoted: Vanessa Fong from assistant to associate professor, Nancy Hill from visiting associate professor to tenured full professor, and Bridget Terry Long from associate to tenured full professor. Lecturer Lee Teitel, Ed.D.’88, became director of the School Lead-ership Program. Mark Moore, a professor at the Harvard Kennedy School, also became professor at the Ed School. Lewis “Harry” Spence, former commissioner for the Mas-sachusetts Department of Social Services, was appointed professor of practice.

Prep the FroshSeveral Ed School faculty members discussed education in America at the recent Institute of Politics 18th biennial Program for Newly Elected Members of Congress held at the Harvard Kennedy School. Although members of the Ed School faculty have participated in prior years, this was the first time that a session focused explicitly on education.

in Good CompanySiury Pulgar, Ed.M.’09, is in good company these days. Pulgar, who was featured in the winter 2009 issue of Ed., was recently named one of 10 citizens of the year by El Nacional, one of the major newspapers in Venezuela.

Other honorees included U.S. President Barack Obama and Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula Da Silva. Pulgar received the honor for her 10,000 Book Challenge, which is helping to rebuild a library in her hometown.

Need Tweets?You can now keep up with all the exciting news coming out of

the Ed School by following the school on twitter.com/hgse. To follow events being tweeted live, go to www.twitter.com/hgse_live.

He measured upProfessor Daniel Koretz’s new book, Measuring Up: What Educational Testing Really Tells Us, received the 2009 Outstanding Book Award from the American Association of Colleges for Teacher Education.

Name that ChairIn February, Professors Catherine Snow and Daniel Koretz were named to endowed chairs. Snow became the Patricia Albjerg Graham Professor and Koretz was named Henry Lee Shattuck Professor, the chair that was vacated by Snow.

G.i.V.e.s. BackThey painted murals, built storage units, and helped restore a green-house. In February, 50 Ed School students spent the day at the John Marshall Elementary School in Dorchester, a neighborhood in Boston, as part of the newly created Graduate Students in Various Efforts of Service (G.I.V.E.S.) program run by the Office of Student Affairs.

the appian way

Fifteen years after the first charter school opened in Boston, a research team led by Professor Tom Kane released a highly publicized study that shows that charter schools outperform other public schools in the city, including pilot schools.

“Fifteen years ago, the charter school movement in Mas-sachusetts was launched to see if new models could lead to gains in student achievement,” says Kane, faculty director of the school’s Center for Education Policy Research. “The results of this study suggest that charter schools in Boston are making a significant difference.”

“Unfortunately, the results for pilot schools are more ambig-uous and deserve further study,” the report states. Results were positive for English language arts in elementary school, but not math. In middle school, the study found that pilot school students “may actually lose ground relative to traditional public school students.”

Until now, despite standardized test scores and school rankings, there had been little agreement over whether charter or pilot schools in the city actually produced better results or whether one (or both) should be expanded. Part of the skepticism, the authors write, comes from the fact that families volunteer to attend both types of schools and because of the belief that these schools “shed” low-performing stu-dents and keep only the best. Developed in the early 1990s, both charter and pilot schools are similar in their goals — to improve student progress and help close the achievement gap. Both operate with a high degree of flexibility when it comes to curricula, budgets, and staffing. However, pilot schools, which were started by Boston Public Schools and the Boston Teachers Union, remain part of the local school district and are con-tinuing to grow — seven new schools are slated to open this September; charter schools have independent advisory boards, are mostly nonunion, and report directly to the state. Some cities like Boston are nearing the local cap on the number allowed, despite long waiting lists.

Using data from the state, Kane, Jon Fullerton, Sarah Co-hodes, and the team were able to follow individual students over a four-year period. They looked at their achievement prior to entering a charter, pilot, or regular public school, as well as their achievement in one of those schools. This allowed them to “compare charter and pilot students to traditional public school students who had similar academic achievement and other traits during an earlier school year.” Since students in Boston are assigned to schools based on a lottery, the researchers also compared the outcome of those students who got into a charter or pilot school to those who applied but did not get in. This made the study unique, says Kane.

“At the time of admission, the only difference between appli-cants who were offered admission and those who were not was a coin flip,” he says. “The fact that there are large differences in subsequent performance suggests that the charter schools were indeed having an impact. The next step is to identify what’s working in charter schools that can be transferred back into the traditional public schools to improve student achievement.”

The authors stress that this report was not intended to un-cover how charter and pilot schools could change test scores, or which approach is most valuable, particularly in individual schools. They also state that many factors can impact a school’s success, not just the fact that one is a “charter” or a “pilot”: student/teacher ratio or the use of tutors, for example.

A couple of weeks after the report was released, Massachu-setts Governor Deval Patrick, who has resisted expanding char-ter schools in favor of proposed “readiness schools,” reversed course and proposed raising the cap on how much a school district could spend on charter schools, from 9 to 12 percent. His proposal also requires new charter schools to enroll more special education, low-income, and limited English students.

To read the full study, visit www.gse.harvard.edu/ ~pfpie/pdf/InformingTheDebate_Final.pdf.

Do Boston Charters Perform Better?By Lory Hough

New Feature: Now it’s Your TurnIn this interactive feature, HGSE faculty members will offer their thoughts on current issues in edu-cation and invite a response from the Usable Knowledge community. Visit www.uknow.gse.harvard.edu to jump into the conversation.

Charter School Test Scores

Pilot School Test Scores

Percentile test scores of Boston pilot and charter middle schools compared with students in traditional public schools.

http://www.twitter.com/hgse_live

http://www.gse.harvard.edu/

http://www.uknow.gse.harvard.edu


On the ChOpping BlOCk, AgAin

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BY marY Tamer

illusTraTioNs BY Tim Walker


“Sputnik was the wake-up call to America as a society but also to American education,” says Seidel. “Science in schools was pushed to the forefront, and the notion that we might not be up to par [vis-à-vis] the Soviet Union brought intense scru-tiny. More funding was put toward science in education. As a society, we agree on the central role of science and technol-ogy on building a powerful nation. The arts, and, in truth, the humanities, take a back seat to math, science, and technology, and while we have a focus on literacy, history, and the humani-ties broadly, and while they have a secure place in the curricu-lum, the arts are seen as peripheral.”

Still, more than 50 years after Sputnik — and despite boundless research and anecdotal evidence on the value of the arts as part of a child’s comprehensive educational experience, not to mention art simply for art’s sake — why is it still the first to go when budgets head south?

“People generally think that the arts are nice and cultur-ally significant and all that, but most people don’t have much of a vision of why the arts are really important in people’s personal, civic, and professional lives,” says Professor David Perkins, a founding member of Project Zero. “From my point

of view, engagement with art and the creating of art are op-portunities for students to learn to think in one or another medium. … After all, thinking in one or another medium is what we have to do every day as we engage the complexities of contemporary life.”

And as we ponder the important passage of information from one generation to the next.

“Human beings have done some bad things, but they have done some remarkable things as well, especially in the arts. We remember civilizations much more for their arts than anything else,” says Professor Howard Gardner, a fellow Project Zero founder. “Moving to the more cognitive issues, I am not a per-son who believes we should teach art to raise math scores. … The arts give young people the chance to express things they may otherwise not express.”

For the majority of Americans who believed there was in-deed a correlation between the arts and math scores, Gardner’s wife, Ellen Winner, a professor of psychology at Boston Col-lege, along with Lois Hetland, Ed.M.’92, Ed.D.’00, an associate professor of art education at the Massachusetts College of Art, changed those perceptions with a study conducted for Project

As someone who has been immersed in arts educa-tion for more than 20 years, Steve Seidel, Ed.M.’89, Ed.D.’95, has seen it all.

When he arrived at South Boston High School in 1981 as part of an artist-in-residence program, the school curriculum included music, visual arts, a poetry magazine, and theater — which Seidel taught — allowing students to partake in a full range of offerings. In the wake of Boston’s painful desegregation process in 1974, monies were made available to fund such projects in schools where racial ten-sions had not only simmered, but boiled over. South Boston High School had already seen its fair share of trouble, and the artist-in-residence program was viewed as a positive step and a creative outlet to bring all students of all races together.

To Seidel’s delight, the program met with success. His theater program thrived, and he felt that he was able to reach students who may not have been reached otherwise. Boston-bred actor Paul Guilfoyle (currently on CSI) even got in on the act, visiting class on a day when a student who could barely achieve focus performed an improvisation that, as Seidel explains, “just exploded.”

“We had our mouths open,” says Seidel, now director of the Arts in Education (AIE) Program and former director of Har-vard’s Project Zero, a 41-year-old program focused on learning and creativity in the arts. “He was great, and when it was over, he was so excited. Paul and I talked about it afterward, about whether we could get this student to that place again. Paul said, ‘It doesn’t matter, because he’s already tasted it.’ Years later, I ran into this former student on Brattle Street at the Harvard Extension School, where he was taking writing classes. He told me then that it was the theater class at South Boston High School that led him to writing.”

Seidel knew he had similarly reached other students, but by the time he departed eight years later after funding was cut, South Boston High School was left with one visual arts teacher for an urban school comprising about 900 students.

“Providing powerful learning experiences for large groups of people is an enormously difficult task, and we don’t have the resources to do it,” says Seidel. “I don’t accept the premise that most of the education we’re attempting is adequately resourced to address the task, and arts education is one of the many com-promises. Who suffers? What does it mean to a child who can’t have art? Who can’t have music?”

Unfortunately, many school systems around the nation may soon find out exactly what it means. With urban and suburban districts facing the deepest budget cuts they’ve seen since the recession of the mid-1980s — and a milder recession in the early 2000s — the prospects for comprehensive arts education in most K–12 public schools appear bleak, and even schools with minimal programs may lose what they considered to be

bare bones to begin with. According to a January article in Education Week, 31 states face budget shortfalls of $30 billion or more, and the nation’s governors have acknowledged that education will have to bear its fair share. Some states have already imposed midyear cuts, including California, which was expected to shed $1 billion from its $42 billion education bud-get. Fiscal year 2010 could see New York state lose $700 million in education funding, while Ohio’s state budget could lose as much as 25 percent across the board.

For schools that have already lost traditional in-house arts programs and have come to rely on the services provided by outside partnering art institutions and organizations, advocates are fearful of their fates as well, with predictions, as reported by the Associated Press in early February, that as many as 10,000 arts organizations could disappear in 2009.

“What concerns me about this downturn is that everyone is feeling the pain,” says Richard Bell, a member of the AIE advisory board and the executive director of Young Audiences, the nation’s largest arts education program, serving 7 million children in 700 programs across 26 states. “This is the worst economic situation I’ve seen in my 37 years with Young Audi-ences, and even though it hasn’t hit us yet, we are definitely going to be affected. I don’t see a clear strategy or path for us to emphasize how to ameliorate this condition.”

With partnering arts organizations like Bell’s bracing for a multiyear effect — and the impact of President Barack Obama’s $787 billion state stimulus package on K–12 schools still yet to be seen — arts educators from every discipline admit that while they are used to the earth shifting beneath their feet, they now face a virtual earthquake of change.

“I’ll be very honest; we’re not just seeing the clouds on the horizon, we’re in the storm,” says Amanda Lichtenstein, Ed.M.’05, a poet and consultant at Urban Gateways Center for Arts Edu-cation, an organization that brings visual, literary, media, and performing arts experiences to children in and around Chicago.

“It’s the single discipline that’s always on the chopping block, and the arts, like sports, get cast aside with budget cuts,” says Jessica Hoffmann Davis, Ed.M.’86, Ed.D.’91, founder of the AIE Program and author of Why Our Schools Need the Arts and Framing Education as Art. “So once again, we are going to cut arts in education. Alert the media!”

A HISToRY oF CHALLEnGESeidel and others trace some of the earliest reductions in K–12 arts funding back to October 4, 1957, when the Soviet Union launched Sputnik I, the 180-pound, beach ball-shaped satellite whose 98-minute orbit around the Earth launched more than the U.S.-U.S.S.R. race into space.

21Ed. • Harvard GraduatE ScHool of Education • SummEr 2009

As director of visual and performing arts at Boston Latin School for the past 10 years, Paul Pitts has grown a vi-brant program, which serves more than 1,100 of the 2,400 students who have tested into the nation’s oldest, and

Boston’s largest, public school.Come fall, it may also be one of the city’s hardest hit by the

nation’s economic crisis. The school, which includes grades 7 through 12, is slated to lose 16 percent — or $2 million — from its projected FY09 budget of $12.2 million. In all, more than a dozen teachers are expected to lose their jobs, including six of the eight arts faculty.

Included among the proposed visual and performing arts losses are eight orchestras and bands; a number of chorus, choir, and a cappella groups; the theater program; and Advanced Placement visual arts classes. In addition, the school’s longstand-ing eighth-grade Connections program, which links the arts and academic subjects in partnership with neighboring Boston museums, is also slated to end.

For Pitts, a talented musician and maestro with a musical son in the ninth grade, the cuts will decimate a program that he says serves as a lifeline to students who cite the arts as a needed respite from the rigors of their other academic subjects. The arts also serve as a community builder, he says.

“My son wants to go somewhere else, but the question is where would he go?” says Pitts, a graduate of Boston Latin’s class of 1973. “One of my goals in coming back to Boston Latin was to bring the arts up to the level of its academics. Today, we have students who compete at the city, state, and national level, and the arts have become part of who we are.”

Boston Latin junior and string player Benjamin Hill could not agree more, which is why he sprang into action in January upon realizing the full implication of the proposed cuts. Within hours of creating a new Facebook group, “Save our BLS Education,” Hill had more than 800 supporters signed on, a number that grew to 1,700 within a few days. Since then, rallies have been held at key politi-cal events in Boston, and Hill and other engaged students have had face-to-face meetings with a number of city officials, includ-ing Mayor Thomas Menino and Superintendent Carol Johnson.

As Hill explains, the performing arts wing at Boston Latin “is a sanctuary for some students. It helps us out.”

“You become part of a community,” says Kathleen Pierre, a senior who participates in the school’s theater program. “After I graduate, I look forward to coming back and seeing everything we’ve built and how it will move forward, to see how others have grown in the ways I’ve grown through acting. … Life would be very dull without the arts wing.”

Boston Latin School Headmaster Lynne Mooney Teta, Ed.M.’95, says the arts programs at the school also allows students to de-velop a broader appreciation of the world around them, as well as their role in it.

“The loss of these programs would impact the fundamental mission of our institution,” she says, which is “to develop stu-dents for academic excellence, responsible and engaged citizen-ship, and a rewarding life.”

And as Pitts says, “The arts help us to be human. That’s why we study them.”

— MT

Zero in 2007. Winner and Hetland refuted what 80 percent of Americans considered education gospel, namely that learn-ing a musical instrument could translate into greater talent in math and science. However, the two researchers acknowledged in a 2007 Boston Globe story that while “students involved in the arts do better in school and on their SATs than those who are not involved … correlation isn’t causation, and an analysis we did several years ago showed no evidence that arts training actually causes scores to rise.”

However, Hetland says grades should not be our focus. “Grades are supposed to be an indicator that students are

getting what they should be getting,” she says. “When the standardized tests begin to test thinking, I’ll care about the test scores … but it’s not what we want to be doing for kids. We don’t want to open up their heads, dump information in there, and then ask them to recite it. We want them to be good, productive citizens, to know how to solve problems creatively,

and to collaborate in innovative ways. We want them to know how to make mistakes … and fix them. We want people who are reflective and know how to use words, and we want people to know how to evaluate quality.”

As famed conductor Leonard Bernstein once said, “Music … can name the unnamable and communicate the unknow-able.” In 1984, he told The New York Times that his initiation into the love of learning, and of learning how to learn, “was revealed to me by my [Boston Latin School] masters as a matter of interdisciplinary cognition, that is, learning to know something by its relation to something else.”

That definition, say educators and advocates, is exactly the balance that arts education provides to students who have the benefit of its lessons, but if that “something else” is taken away from today’s children, especially those with limited exposure who may not be motivated by math or science, how do we reach them?

“There is the argument one can make that the arts are es-sentially a very powerful form of communication that allows people to express what one cannot do easily,” says Seidel. “When people become effective in the arts, they can communicate profound perspectives and analyses of human conditions.”

Seidel cites a passage from Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave in which Douglass recalls the im-pact of hearing fellow slaves singing in the middle of the night. Their mournful lyrics served to illustrate the soul-destroying quality of their bondage. Douglass later escaped to freedom, taught himself to read and write, and, against his personal safety, published his autobiography.

“When you really learn to express yourself,” says Seidel, “you are given your full humanity.”

CREATIVE SoLUTIonSAs the economic climate worsens, Seidel and others tout the resilience of the arts and those who work creatively to keep it in classrooms and community centers.

“We can look at some of the losses but we also need to fo-cus on new innovations and new processes,” says Seidel. “It’s a time for entrepreneurial initiative, but that’s not new for people in this field.”

Lichtenstein sees some silver linings at Urban Gateways.“We’re feeling the economic impact, but at the same time

that we’re feeling it and it’s devastating, there’s also this really powerful momentum being built around this crisis,” she says. “It has been a really incredible opportunity to build new coali-tions, to have different kinds of conversations with people. We’re bringing in principals, we’re bringing in parents, reach-ing out to other arts groups … so while I feel like we’re definite-ly feeling the cuts and we’re seeing it in schools and suffering is happening with museums and cultural institutions in Chicago, at the same time there’s a lot of energy and excitement about national conversations around the arts.”

Included among those national conversations is the pro-posed addition of a White House–level secretary of the arts and culture, a post that music producer Quincy Jones and oth-ers have publicly asked President Barack Obama to consider. And in February, Kennedy Center President Michael Kaiser announced Arts in Crisis: A Kennedy Center Initiative to help fellow arts organizations persevere the economic storm. In the first three and a half weeks of its launch, Kaiser reported that 250 arts organizations contacted the Kennedy Center for its pro bono help, which will include a new arts in education program, slated to pilot in the Lafayette, La., schools next year, that aims to reshape the current, episodic nature of children’s arts education.

“We’ve created an approach that uses the resources of the Kennedy Center, the local schools, and local arts organizations to create a tailored program for K–8,” says Kaiser, author of The Art of the Turnaround: Creating and Maintaining Healthy Arts Organizations. “So many schools do programs but they’re not tailored … and we’re trying to say, ‘Let’s take what the orga-nizations have, what the schools have, and what the Kennedy Center has and see what collectively we can do.’”

Current Harvard Graduate School of Education master’s students enrolled in the AIE Program also see the opportuni-ties along with the challenges. One example is integrating arts into other subject areas.

“Arts and other content don’t need to be mutually exclusive at all,” says Christine Jee, Ed.M.’09 a public school teacher in Lawrence, Mass., a city north of Boston with a large Spanish-speaking population. “We can have this crisis, and focus on everyone cutting the arts, or we can think creatively of new ways to incorporate them.”

“Sometimes it’s just getting arts in the door,” says Elena Figueroa, Ed.M.’09, an elementary school teacher in Framing-ham, Mass., where 60 percent of students qualify for free or reduced-price lunch. “You can integrate into the classroom if you do it with integrity.”

Both Jee and Figueroa have done exactly that, using grant money for special arts-based class projects or for first-time trips to museums. This fall, Santina Protopapa, Ed.M.’09, will return to Cleveland’s Progressive Arts Alliance, the nonprofit she founded in 2002 to bring meaningful arts experiences to children in a community where 100 percent of students qualify for free lunch. Despite a “skeletal” staff and an annual budget of $270,000 that serves 1,500 children a week, Protopapa says she is “trying to scale it up in Cleveland so that every child will have an art experience every day.”

What will help during this economic crisis, she says, is Ohio’s new cigarette tax, with 30 percent of revenue earmarked for the arts.

“All the artists are telling people to ‘smoke one for the arts!’” she says, jokingly.

“I foster celebration rather than justification, and hopeful-ness rather than despair,” says Davis. “Maybe folks dare to cut the arts because they know they will not go away. It’s very inspiring to see those who work on a shoestring budget and when that funding dries up, they still work.”

As agents of social change, says Davis, it is, after all, what artists do.

— Mary Tamer is a freelance writer and frequent contributor to Ed. Her last piece profiled illustrator Jeff Hopkins, Ed.M.’05. The illustrator, Tim Walker, is a visual arts teacher in a Plymouth, Mass. middle school. Ed.

Ed. • Harvard GraduatE ScHool of Education • SummEr 200920

an excerpt from the new book by Professor sara lawrence-lightfoot, ed.D.’72

For years it was referred to as the “golden years,” the time in one’s life just before and just after retirement when, it was assumed, you would slow down and quietly enjoy the spoils of your hard word. But for many, these golden years are anything but golden. As Professor Sara Lawrence-Lightfoot points out in her new book, The Third Chapter: Passion, Risk, and Adventure in the 25 Years After 50, these years “do not shimmer with excitement and adven-ture: they grow rusty with routine. They mark the beginning of a slow decline toward death.” It is a time, she says, for circling the wagons.

Thankfully, she writes, this is changing. A good chunk of the more than 75 million people — about a quarter of the U.S. population — between the ages of 50 and 75 are living longer and living healthier. And many are not ready just yet to fade away on the couch: They are learning new skills, going back to school, and, very often, finding ways to add value to society. They are in a new developmental stage, what Lawrence-Lightfoot calls the “third chapter.” In this, her ninth book, she redefines how we think about aging, summed up in a poem told to her by a 70-year-old female poet during one of her interviews:

After a long seeking I gave up on all mirrors Then feeling a way forward in the fog Without a lamp or even a candle And absent any guide at all, One starless night I stumbled Upon this place of water where Gleaming in its darkest deeps, My own two astonished eyes. Light.

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themselves — their capacities, strengths, and intelligence; their vulnerabili-ties, weaknesses, and challenges?

In addition to exploring the origins, processes, and trajectory of new learning, I also was interested in having people describe the context — his-torical, physical, relational, and cultural — in which the learning was embed-ded, and the ways in which the setting and timing shaped their engage-ment and mastery. How were they influenced by these external forces and events, those that were within and out of their control? Were there pivotal moments — of public achievement, personal crisis, serious illness, family realignments — that rocked their reality and inspired change in them?

I was also curious to see the imprint of the immediate context in the places where people were learning. I visited a sixty-three-year-old portrait painter in her studio, traced the history of her work chronicled in her large portfolio, and watched as she applied thin luminous layers of paint to a portrait in progress. I examined the Victorian cabinet of a seventy-year-old furniture maker and listened as his colleagues offered their tough critiques of his design. I toured the gorgeous studio of a seventy-year-old quilter and watched her lure novices into working on a collaborative public exhibit, in the process turning the privacy and asylum of her studio into a space for public art. I sat for hours on the bench beside a sixty-two-year-old jazz pia-nist as he practiced his scales and played me some of his new compositions, and I observed Roma, the fifty-seven-year-old laboratory scientist in her first year of teaching adolescents in an after-school program.

I sat in the audience of a fifty-two-year-old woman who had worked with a voice coach for two years to become a more fluent and compelling public speaker, watched the dress rehearsal of a play written by a sixty-three-year-old new playwright, and enjoyed the debut performance of a fifty-eight-year-old former schoolteacher at the conclusion of his first year of studying acting. I stood on the beach and watched a fifty-five-year-old woman biolo-gist take surfing lessons, bravely battling — rather than riding — the big waves, and stood at the finish line when a seventy-year-old man completed his first half-marathon, to raise money for cancer research. I followed in the footsteps of a seventy-year-old architect going on her first archaeological dig at the site of an African American meetinghouse that had been a stop on the route of the Underground Railroad, and watched a sixty-year-old former CEO working with activists and advocates from a nonprofit, to apply his business knowledge to their mission.

Each of these visits not only helped me visualize and document the set-tings in which learning was taking place, but also allowed me to observe

For two years, I traveled around the country interviewing forty men and women between the ages of fifty and seventy-five who saw themselves as “new learners,” who were eager to reflect on their experiences, question their motives, celebrate their achievements,

and tell their stories. I spoke to twenty-four women and sixteen men, from a variety of professions and careers, from diverse racial, ethnic, and religious backgrounds, and from a range of geographic regions around the coun-try. Although many had grown up in poor and working-class families, the women and men whom I interviewed were all well educated (with college and advanced degrees) and relatively affluent (living middle, upper-middle, and upper class lives). “I have known a generous abundance in my adult life,” said a former entrepreneur who had grown up in poverty and was now, at sixty, trying to master a pair of courses in quantum physics, “and that has allowed me the freedom to take the risks of creating a new reality for myself.” Most of the people I interviewed, then, did not to have to worry about paying the mortgage, keeping their health insurance, educating their children and grandchildren, or funding their retirements. They enjoyed a “privileged place” that allowed them the resources and emotional space to explore new adventures, imagine different scenarios, and make unlikely choices they might never have anticipated in their first two chapters of life.

Using what sociologists call a “snowball” sample (asking each intervie-wee to recommend others who might be interested in joining the project), I searched out people who were embarking on new learning adventures; who were eager to examine their motives and the goals and processes of their learning; and who wanted to be intentional in shaping their journeys. I was interested in exploring what these men and women meant by “learn-ing” and why it felt “new” to them. I asked them to trace in detail the initial impulses and motivations that led them to the learning experience, the barriers and breakthroughs they experienced, the path, pace, texture, and rhythms of their learning. I also wanted to know whether their learning was solitary and self-sustained, maybe even secretive (the stealth learner), or whether it was being supported by mentors, teachers, or coaches. What scaffolding was needed to support their efforts; whom did they go to for criticism, assessment, and feedback? Along the way, how did they stay motivated; how did they withstand the inevitable failures, setbacks, and criticism; and what did they mark as signs of progress and measures of achievement? Did the new learning become their life’s central preoccupa-tion, and in what ways did it impact their normal rhythms, routines, and relationships? Did the mastery of learning make them feel different about

25Ed. • Harvard GraduatE ScHool of Education • SummEr 2009Ed. • Harvard GraduatE ScHool of Education • SummEr 200924

ing for a story.” The former, she says, is a more passive, receptive stance in which the interviewer waits to absorb the information and does little to give it shape or form. The latter is a much more engaged, discerning posi-tion in which the interviewer searches for the story, seeks it out, and is cen-tral in its creation. She does not compose or direct the unfolding drama; she does not impose her own story, drowning out the narrator’s voice. But she is willing to enter into a dialogue that reveals part of her own journey, and she is aware of the part she plays as witness in shaping the story’s coher-ence and aesthetic. In this work, I employed Welty’s more activist, artistic approach of “listening for the story”: for its shape, intensity, rhythm, and texture; for its substance and content; for its metaphors and symbolism; for the light and shadows.

As I listened to the voices of Third Chapter learners, I played many roles. I was the empathic and attentive witness, putting myself in their shoes, trying to decode the environment as they saw it, resonating with their anxieties and fears, reckoning with their inhibitions, challenges, and successes. I was the eager cheerleader, offering applause, appreciation, and acclaim for their creativity, their grit, and their courage. I was the discerning connoisseur, developing a taste for the shape of their sentences, the cadence of their language, the arc of their stories. I was the artist, painting the landscape, drawing their portraits, sketching in the light and the shadows. I was the spider woman, weaving together their life remnants, unsnarling the tangled threads of their stories, casting a net to catch them if they should fall. I was the probing researcher, patiently gathering data, asking the impertinent questions, examining their interpretations with skepticism and deliberation. And I was the fellow traveler, walking beside them, watching their backs, admiring the vistas, avoiding the minefields, and bringing my own story to our dialogue. As a matter of fact, as I heard the narratives of these women and men, I felt myself deeply engaged in new learning as well — echoing and reflecting the curiosity, vulnerability, risk-taking, and passion of their journeys in my own. I looked into their eyes and saw my reflection, the refracted images of my face in the mirror: a sixty-two-year-old woman with “confessional moments” of my own.

— This excerpt is reprinted with permission from the author. Excerpted from The Third Chapter: Passion, Risk, and Adventure in the 25 Years After 50 by Sara Lawrence-Lightfoot. Copyright © 2009 by Sara Lawrence-Lightfoot. Published by arrangement with Farrar, Straus, and Giroux, LLC. All rights reserved.

those processes of mastery that people were not yet able to identify and articulate — the inchoate, often chaotic experience of newly emerging perspectives; the rawness of embryonic skills. My site visits allowed people to “show” me rather than “tell” me about what they were learning — for example, to witness the knowledge expressed through their bodies, rather than through thinking and language. And it helped me notice the almost imperceptible changes and tiny improvements in mastery of which people were often not aware. In the days and weeks following the interviews, people would often want to continue our conversation, fix a misstatement, embellish a point, or explain something further; they sent me e-mails and letters, published pieces and diary excerpts that they had written, photo-graphs they had taken of new work, or drawings that mapped the progress of their learning since we last spoke.

As I observed and witnessed the learning of these men and women, I listened carefully for the ways in which the storytellers composed their central narrative. I was attentive to the talk and the silence; to those moments of expressivity and restraint; to those places where they feared to tread; to those revelations that surprised them; to those memories long buried. These were emotional encounters, filled with tears and laughter, breakthroughs and breakdowns, curiosity and discovery. Even narratives that might have begun as intellectual excavations often found their gravity and expression in the af-fairs of the heart, blending emotion and cognition, feelings and intellect. Talk-ing about the present and the future almost always required journeys into the past. More than one person exclaimed, “This is like looking backward into the future.” As I listened, I always pressed for details, for nuance, for complex-ity; for the subtext, the hidden underside of things palpable and tangible.

In her wonderful autobiographical account One Writer’s Beginnings, my favorite storyteller, Eudora Welty, says about her craft, “What discoveries I’ve made in the course of writing stories all begin with the particular, never the general.” In the particular resides the general. Stories — well told, with detail and context — allow for texture, subtlety, and multiple interpreta-tions, and they help us to discover the universals among us. As I traced the narratives and delved for the particulars of person and place, I listened for the patterns, the themes, the collective voice. I worked to discover the idiosyncratic even as I probed for the similarities and commonalities — the places where people’s stories converged and overlapped, even when those people at first appeared to be so unalike.

Another important insight from Welty’s exposition on craft focuses on the subtle but critical distinction between “listening to a story” and “listen-


Ed.

How one student’s family

misfortune turned into

a second chance and a

focus on helping others

in higher education

BY lorY HouGH PHoToGraPHY BY FraNk CurraN

as Luck Would Have It


Erik Farrar, Rodriguez-Farrar’s husband, says it’s obvious to anyone who has ever met her family that his wife’s interest in education actually started with her parents. (He also jokes that his wife is in her 38th year of school.)

“It’s entirely in character and speaks to the powerful ser-vice bent in the Rodriguez family,” he says. “Both her parents, Mom especially, have always performed what in a different age would be called ‘good works.’”

Back in the Philippines, Alfeo and Aida were both college educated. Her father was an agricultural engineer; her mother a chemistry major who came first to the United States, by herself, to attend a one-year medical technician program in Minnesota. (One of her earliest memories of America is sitting on the airplane during her trip over, surrounded by members of the Minnesota Vikings football team.) When Rodriguez-Farrar’s father later got accepted to a graduate program at the University of Fargo in North Dakota, her mother sent him a plane ticket and $5 — exactly what she had when she moved to the States. “That’s all he had coming here to Fargo. Eventually they get married and, being good Catholics, they got pregnant with me,” Rodriguez-Farrar says. Her father dropped out of school and the fledgling family moved to a new city, Philadel-phia, where he took an entry-level job at an engineering firm.

I t started out well — very well. In his spare time, Alfeo liked to tinker and fix things around the house. He and Aida, now raising two more daughters, decided to invest in

rental properties in West Philadelphia that he would renovate. “He’d do the plumbing, the masonry, all of it,” Rodriguez-

Farrar says. Eventually they moved to the suburbs and started buying properties in Center City. And then — and here’s where the trouble started — they decided to venture into businesses, which was different from what they had been doing, which was fixing up apartments. At the time, her mom was working at a jewelry store. They tried to open their own shop. It went bust.

“They overinvested in a business that failed. They had to liquidate, sell the house in the ’burbs, and file for bankruptcy,” Rodriguez-Farrar says. “We ended up moving into a smaller apartment in the city that they owned.”

They also tried another business: a pizza shop.“They never did a restaurant before, and it’s not easy,”

Rodriguez-Farrar says, remembering long days and long nights with the whole family pitching in.

At the time, Rodriguez-Farrar’s sister Gracie was a senior in high school, Antoinette a freshman at nearby Drexel Uni-versity. Rodriguez-Farrar was going through her own struggles at Brown, what she calls the “sophomore slump.” “Sopho-more year is always hard,” she says, mentioning the number of young women, including herself, who battle with eating disorders during that year of college. She decided she needed a break from college. She also wanted to make sure her two sis-ters didn’t have to suffer because of the family’s financial woes, so she took a leave of absence, moved back home, and started working four different jobs: at a doctor’s office at night doing medical billing, an ice cream shop, Urban Outfitters, and the family’s pizza shop.

“I was always running around. I was doing 15 hours a day. If you talk to people now, they’d say I haven’t changed,” she says, laughing a full laugh that comes out often during the interview.

Despite the bleak situation, Rodriguez-Farrar was eventually able to see a silver lining: the experience of losing it all made her realize what she was missing — school. That summer she

Winning the lottery. It was, in a way, another example of the American Dream come true for doctoral candidate Hanna Rodriguez-Farrar’s parents. Immigrants from the Philip-pines who came to the United States with one-way tickets and $5 in their pockets, Alfeo and Aida Rodriguez had managed over the years to save money, buy a house in the suburbs of Philadel-phia, and raise three smart daughters.

And then they went broke. And so that winning ticket — not a

huge amount, just enough to get them over the hump — allowed their eldest daughter to pursue her American Dream: Hanna re-enrolled at Brown, the Ivy League university she had dropped out of her sophomore year, in part because of the bankruptcy.

Talking to Rodriguez-Farrar today, some 25 years later, it’s clear that this second chance had a big impact on the person she has become. It is also why, despite fo-

cusing on art history at Brown University (bachelor’s, master’s, and, as of 2009, a doctorate), she is now devoted to higher education and making sure that others have the same oppor-tunities that she has had.

“I had to give back to ‘it,’” she says, “this institution called higher education that has given me and my family so much.”

She says she always knew she was going to do higher education, “but when you’re 21, you have no idea what the machine is in the background. I was doing 17th century art history — it doesn’t get more obscure.”

Her initial plan was to go to grad school for art, get a job teaching, and then become a department head. “There was a ladder,” she says. But while studying Charles I and English needlepoint at Brown, in order to makes ends meet she was also doing some adjunct teaching and dabbling in alumni and fundraising work. That’s when the “curtain got pulled,” she says, and these “extracurriculars” suddenly became her main interest. “Wow. Doing a discipline seemed small in a way. Art history is interesting, but the machine of higher education is more interesting.”

It also seemed full of possibilities. “I read that the provost’s job is cool. And institutional

advancement, what is that? I cleaned dishes at Brown. How does that impact other students and the university?” she says, recalling how her mind started thinking of all the ways she could make a difference. As she talks, her hands are in constant motion.

She ended up leaving Brown after her master’s and got a job at Harvard Business School as a research associate. There she wrote case studies and hoped to learn about general management.

“That’s where things really started. My mind was thinking about managing the business of higher education. There are lessons to be learned everywhere and my time at the Busi-ness School allowed me to see lessons everywhere,” she says. “Studying Burger King, for example, allows you to see the con-nection to how you manage food services at a college. It made me wonder how do you lead a beast, an institution like Brown or Harvard?”

This led to her fascination with what she calls “the presiden-cy thing.” (Something she still toys with for herself someday.)

“It was just after Ruth Simmons became president of Brown. I was like, are you kidding me? An African American at an Ivy league?” she says. “I started thinking about the presi-dent as a public intellectual, someone who sticks a stake in the ground and says this is what an institution should be.”

In truth, university life fascinated Rodriguez-Farrar long be-fore she ever went to Brown or Harvard. Growing up near the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia, she walked around campus all the time and saw college students everywhere.

“College campuses are beautiful. They’re always about the mind. That caught on me,” she says. “My parents say they had no idea where that came from. They’re appreciative of it, but they just thought, ‘Well, you’re American. That’s what you do.’”

The Beginning

The Middle

“What drives a lot of people at GSE is knowing that same story and knowing that education gets you to the other side. Some people start on third base. I was in the dugout. It’s humbling to recognize your capital.”


for monks.’ That’s Hanna,” he says, “100 percent on the reactor at all times. Always something going on.” (She doesn’t disagree. Last summer, she admits, she even had seven different jobs at the Ed School.)

But as Miller says, this constant motion isn’t just about keeping busy: Rodriguez-Farrar really does want to make to make a difference in higher education.

“One of the things that I think I have come to understand about Hanna is that she gets passionate about ways that her work can actually change real conditions in settings she cares about,” he says. Since 2005 she has been a trustee on the Brown University Corporation and served as president of the alumni association. While a student at the Ed School, she served as a student representative during the last Harvard president search and as an editor on the Harvard Educational Review, not to mention the seven part-time jobs, including her current ones: as a research assistant and “go-to person” for Professor Tom Kane and his Center for Education Policy Research and as a project manager for Professor Bridget Terry Long.

Miller says, “She takes all these jobs not out of a drive toward overcommitment for its own sake, but because she gets energized about making a difference — keeping Brown world-class, doing what she can to promote high-quality training for her fellow doctoral students, and so on.”

Farrar again points to the influence of his wife’s parents. “Imagine going from 50 miles north of the equator to Fargo, North Dakota,” he says. “Through initiative and very hard work, Hanna’s parents built a successful life here. It took me two years after I met them to finally convince them that they should take one day off per week.”

A few years ago, after living with Rodriguez-Farrar and her husband as they renovated their 1864 Italianate in Providence, R.I., her parents moved to Orlando to be near her sister An-toinette, who works at Disney and is in an eMBA program at Kellogg. While in Florida, they both became students again.

“At 60, my mom went back to school and became a massage therapist and my dad became an elder care specialist,” Rodri-guez-Farrar says. “At one point, when he was in his 50s, when I was in grad school at Brown, he talked about going to law school. I told him he should do Kaplan to help with the LSAT. He signed up, near the University of Pennsylvania. One of the kids in his class said to him, ‘Oh, the trash can is over there.’

“I was outraged for him. I wanted to go down there and kick their you-know-whats, but he joked and said, ‘No, I’m here to take the test.’ My dad, by the end of the class, was tutoring the kids.”

Eventually her parents moved to San Francisco (where Gra-cie runs patemm, a successful infant changing pad company) to be closer to their grandchildren. Her father works in elder care and her mother uses massage on people with dementia and Alzheimer’s disease. Both have taken up guitar lessons.

“Their belief that it’s never too late to go back to school,” she says, “has given them a new lease on life. I’m so proud of them and like to think that I’ll do the same thing. It takes a lot of courage.”

As for her own next move, Rodriguez-Farrar says that’s still up in the air. In the spring, just as her Brown doctorate was approved, she turned in her final qualifying paper at the Ed School, which looks at higher education fundraising. In an ideal world, she says she will graduate in 2010. “If the stars align and my mom does enough rosaries.”

“People ask me, ‘And then what?’ Honestly, I don’t know. Something will present itself,” she says. “I went into this think-ing I was going to be a college president. I don’t know if that’s still true, but I do know that there are other ways to make a difference in higher education.”

And no lottery ticket is needed.

took classes at nearby Temple University. “By the end of July, my mom said, ‘I’m sending you back to Brown,’” she says. She went, moving into an off-campus apartment. It was then that she decided to switch majors from pre-med to art history.

“My parents were really good about it,” she says, remember-ing the conversation. “All they said was, ‘You need to find your own way. That must be the American way.’”

This ability to see silver linings and move beyond one’s own troubles is something Rodriguez-Farrar says she learned from them. Even after they filed for bankruptcy, her parents dusted themselves off and moved on.

“The thing with my parents is that it’s about faith. Things will work out, but sometimes you just need a little help. They really believe in that. Plus, they came from nothing so they thought, fine, we’ll start over,” she says. “My father had never failed before, but they had no time to wallow in it. These were two people who went through World War II in the Philippines. My dad was effectively an orphan, raised by siblings. My mom lived in the mountains, raised by an aunt. So losing the busi-ness, losing the house — it sucks, but we need to just not fail anymore. You have to move forward.”

She says she sees a similar ethos in others at the Ed School. “What drives a lot of people at GSE is knowing that same

story and knowing that education gets you to the other side,” she says. “Some people start on third base. I was in the dugout. It’s humbling to recognize your capital.”

Regardless of where she started, or the path she took to get here, now as a doctoral student, Rodriguez-Farrar is always moving at warped speed, or as Matt Miller,

Ed.M.’01, Ed.D.’06, assistant dean for academic affairs at the Ed School, says, “Hanna’s steady state is most people’s overdrive.” He adds, “I think we need a special 70-hour workweek to ac-commodate Hanna.”

Rodriguez-Farrar first started working with Miller when she became a doctoral research assistant. “She shared an interest in working on some survey research on doctoral student advising that a group of faculty and administrators had decided to com-mission,” Miller says. “It seems to me this is typical of Hanna — following her passions, her many, varied interests and pas-sions, and taking on new projects to satiate her seemingly unbounded curiosity and to keep her at just the right level of frenetic ‘flow.’” (Her friend and fellow doctoral student Angela Boatman, Ed.M.’08, says she was initially surprised to hear that Rodriguez-Farrar had studied art history. “But after knowing her and her unending curiosity for the world,” she says, “I am not surprised in the least.”)

Her husband, whom she met at Brown when he was the as-sistant water polo coach and she was checking IDs at the pool — he’s now the Harvard women’s and men’s water polo coach — says her high level of energy is pretty much 24/7.

“I think it was [science fiction writer Robert] Heinlein who said that in living life, one should ‘take big bites. Moderation is

32

Ed.

The Now

The

“The thing with my parents is that it’s about faith. Things will work out, but sometimes you just need a little help. They really believe in that. Plus, they came from nothing so they thought, fine, we’ll start over.” Aida and Alfeo on

their wedding day, August 1963


REFLECTIONSRETIRING

Reflections of a retiring misfit

BY JerrY murPHY, eD.D.’73

In the time that I’ve been privileged to know Jerry as his teaching fellow, research assistant, and advisee, he was a mentor, an inspiration,

and, most important, a friend. Whether we were debating the contentious points of 12 O’Clock High or choosing which of his stuffed toys would

best convey a particular idea to the students, Jerry was bril l iant yet down to earth, fun and funny, kind

and compassionate. When some of my closest family were afflicted with il lness, Jerry was always there for me with astute advice, a generous heart,

and the most reassuring bear hugs around! — Robert Suntay, Ed.M.’01, Ed.D.’10

jOsHuA LAvINE

MARTHA sTEWART

with his wife

out fishing

in class

reading to students

MISFITof a

The f irst time I met Jerry, while he was still dean, he was spreading holiday cheer handing out candy canes

on campus — in a Santa su it! Later, as a teaching fellow for his leadership class, I saw him set students at

ease with his upbeat, playfu l accessibility by using Elvis songs, stuffed animals, role playing, and a genius

for acronyms and pithy encapsu lations to make key points “stick.” After each class, we’d debrief what had

worked well a nd not-so-well, a nd where each student seemed to be in their engagement and learning. Then

he would take the initiative to check in, asking how he cou ld support lea rning and improve the cou rse. — Metta McGarvey, Ed.D.’ 09F

Ed.

with President Johnson

Santa Jerry


orty years ago, shortly after Richard Nixon had been elected president, I was fired from a fabulous

job. With gleeful enthusiasm, one of Nixon’s apparat-chiks dismissed me as associate director of the White

House Fellows Program, with my position filled by a Republi-can loyalist. Jobless and broke, and certain that the ivory tower was not my calling, I applied late — and as a last resort — for a Harvard Graduate School of Education doctorate. I’ve been here ever since and am retiring this June.

I was uncertain about graduate school because of my his-tory as a misfit with formal schooling, which began when I was five years old. I dropped out of the first grade for six months because I loved to learn, but hated school. “It’s the law,” I explained to my parents. “Compulsory schooling begins at age six.” My parents were not exactly amused by my legal précis.

In high school, I was passionate about fishing but bored by the curriculum, and slid by academically. I was bright and curi-ous but certainly not aware and ambitious. Indeed, I planned to

join the Marine Corps, until my father insisted that I apply to Columbia University. Surprisingly, I was admit-ted but wasn’t ready for seri-ous academic work and continued to slide by

until a dean threatened to expel me from the marching band. I improved my grades but never got in gear at this challenging college far removed from my high school friends.

Because of this mismatch with formal schooling, I was eager to join the work force — and it turned out I loved working. I spent two wonderful years as a public school math teacher and then unexpectedly got the job of a lifetime — working for the federal government as part of the War on Poverty. During these heady days in Washington, my eyes were opened wide as I played a bit role in developing the Elementary and Secondary Education Act of 1965, and as I observed up close the remarkable work of several courageous leaders, among them, Frank Keppel and Harold Howe, iconic figures in the Ed School’s pantheon.

After a promotion, I was riding as high as a kite, naively unaware that my job was at risk with a new political party in power. I was devastated when I became roadkill — and clueless about what to do next. Returning to a university was not an op-tion, but my job search was floundering. So I listened carefully

when a Harvard professor friend called out of the blue and urged me to come to Cam-bridge. Filled with trepidation about being a misfit again, I became an Ed School student.

To my surprise, I discovered at Harvard a whole new side of myself — I was a halfway decent researcher. I also discovered that I knew a lot about practice and really liked writing about the everyday reality of how things actually worked. For the first time in my life, I was fully engaged as a student, and without knowing it, I had found a perma-nent home at Harvard.

Now, you might ask how these musings relate to my Harvard career. Well, I believe that my experiences helped prepare me to be a professor. I’ve tried to teach in a way that I wasn’t regularly taught — with a soft spot for smart students who don’t quite fit, and a belief that all students need to be heard and cared for. “Nobody cares how much you know,” John Wooden, the legend-ary University of California, Los Angeles basketball coach, reminded us, “until they know how much you care.” To this day, I carry his words in my wallet.

My experiences also helped prepare me to be dean. From my government role models, I learned about the nuances of administrative leadership and about its importance. I learned the need to be forthright and honest, and to welcome the heat while not seeking the limelight; to be both bold and humble, and wary of experts who profess a lock on the answers; and to engage wholeheartedly in principled politics in the pursuit of noble ends. As dean, I aspired to put these lessons into action.

I even think that my lifelong passion for fishing — and af-fection for those who ply the sea — have been helpful. They have made me deeply respectful of hard workers regardless of their jobs and more aware of the sophisticated craft knowledge required to make seemingly simple things happen.

Throughout my Harvard career, I have tried to live up to a definition of a professor I once heard — namely, someone who “thinks otherwise,” a perfect motto, it turns out, for a maturing misfit. Indeed, much of my research and administrative work has challenged the prevailing views of what was important, and what was possible. Sometimes, I’ve been ahead of the curve; often, behind the eight ball!

For example, I started writing about: the implementation of educational policy, when research at the time focused almost exclusively on the development of policy; the importance of qualitative methods, as a complement to quantitative methods that at the time ruled at the Ed School; the unheroic dimensions of leadership, when the focus was on the bigger-than-life hero who, like the Lone Ranger, rode into town with silver bullets.

As dean, I headed an institution that often thought other-wise. We started a new degree program in the arts at the very time that the public schools were slashing their budgets in the arts. We bucked the feasibility experts who said the Ed School could raise at most $30 million in a capital campaign. We set a goal of $60 million and, with the incredible leadership of generous friends, the Ed School raised $111 million, and we even urged our students to be troublemakers. To stir things up. To fight for their beliefs. To be troublemakers for education reform and social justice, like Nelson Mandela, whose given name in his native language is “troublemaker.”

For sure, one of the things I’ve loved most about the Ed School is that it has been a place where you can stretch your wings, challenge conventional wisdom, and think otherwise. But there are many things to love here, and for me the Ed School has been an unexpected gift of a lifetime.

I think of our marvelous students, impressive colleagues, and the school’s unsung heroes, our dedicated administrative staff. I think of the opportunity to engage in a treasured activ-ity — teaching the next generation of educators. I think of the freedom faculty have to pursue their ideas and use Harvard’s unparalleled bully pulpit to publicize their findings. I think of the rare privilege to have been dean and work my heart out for an institution that aspires to make a better world. And dare I add, where else could a dean play Santa Claus each December, visiting every office handing out candy canes?

I also think of the many special people who have brightened my life. Among them, my academic advisor as a student, David Cohen; my friend and mentor, [Professor] Pat Graham; my coauthor and sage advisor, [Adjunct Lecturer] Barry Jentz; and my incomparable assistant and confidante, Rose Downer. All of

them and many others — you know who you are — believed in me and made it possible for me to believe in myself. I am eternally grateful.

I’ve always thought of the Ed School as one of the best places in the world to get rich — not the richness that comes from making a banker-level bundle of bonuses, but the true richness of spirit that comes from being an educator in service to others. (As dean, I used to give this get-rich-here speech to stu-dents, and I knew I was “getting through” when a student with a wry smile told me, “I’ve now heard your pitch three times.”)

Now, for sure it’s easy to identify the flaws of this complex institution driven to make its mark. And it’s easy for me to recall my disappointments and mistakes — and times when, to paraphrase Lincoln, the better angels of my nature were not in full sway. But it’s hard to imagine a more exhilarating place to have spent a fulfilling career.

“To whom much is given,” says Luke 12:48, “much is expect-ed.” And in that spirit, about four years ago, I volunteered to relinquish tenure when I turned 70. I wanted to give back to the Ed School community, which has given so much to me, by mak-ing some room at the top for the next generation of younger scholars. In these perilous economic times, I sometimes think I had a screw loose when I decided to surrender a job for life. But I take solace — and pride — in doing what still seems to me to be a matter of duty. And who knows what opportunities lay ahead. After 40 years at Harvard, I’ve come to more fully appre-ciate E. B. White’s familiar words: “I arise in the morning torn between a desire to improve (or save) the world and a desire to enjoy (or savor) the world. That makes it hard to plan the day.”

I arise similarly torn, and I’m not yet sure what I’ll do next. (I’ve been told that I’m a “late bloomer,” but this is getting ridiculous!) I’m exploring several possibilities — teaching, writ-ing, administering, international work, and even going back to school for another degree. My continuing zest for learning certainly precludes fulltime retirement.

Whatever I do, I will be guided, as I’ve always been guided in my work life, by these words from Ecclesiastes: “Whatsoever thy hand findeth to do, do it with thy might.” Whatever I do, I will also try to remember White’s wise words and make time to savor the world. And whatever I do, I leave Harvard as I came: with some trepidation, but most of all, anticipating my next adventure — fired with enthusiasm!

— Professor Jerry Murphy served as associate dean of the Ed School from 1982 to 1991 before becoming dean in 1992. He stepped down from that position in 2001 and has since been teaching. This retiring misfit will officially be leaving this year.


answers. To that end, writing a book for me is a way of finding answers — it’s very therapeutic. It also helps to have a healthy bunch of kids and a great husband I can go to at the end of the workday.

Does it ever surprise you to observe strang-ers reading your books?I rarely see anyone reading my books. If I do, I go up and ask if the person likes the book. If they say yes, I tell them I wrote it and sign the book. If they say no, I sort of slink away quietly. … My mother told me she would know I’d “made” it when she saw my book stacked in Costco. I think [the day she did] might have been the happiest day of her life.

Do you feel you’re identified as a novelist for women? No, because 49 percent of my fan mail comes from men. They take away very different concepts from my books. I’d argue that a book like The Tenth Circle or Change of Heart is actually male-centric, too, since it explores fatherhood, prison, death row — things not commonly associated with chick lit.

How involved are you in the films made of your books?Not very. For the TV movies, I have been very lucky — I’ve been invited to the sets, and each time the director has asked me to rewrite a pivotal scene that isn’t quite working from the script, which is great fun. But ultimately, I don’t have any say in the script. On June 26, My Sister’s Keeper will screen in movie theatres with Cameron Diaz and Abigail Breslin. It’s beautifully shot and the acting is fantastic. However, I know that the director felt the need to

change the ending, even though I lob-bied very hard against that. My solace is in knowing that if people read the book after they see the movie, they’ll still be getting the story I hoped for.

Did you get to keep the direc-tor’s chair with your name on it shown on your website?Not from The Tenth Circle, but I did get my own chair for My Sister’s Keeper and that’s in my office now.

Are you tempted to cast the potential film adaptations in your head as you write the novels? It’s pretty rare that I cast in my head because the characters are so real to me and unique when they arrive on the page. But every now and then, I’ll think, ooh, wouldn’t Johnny Depp make a great Ross in Second Glance? Wouldn’t Nicole Kidman be terrific as Charlotte in Handle with Care? (So, um, if Johnny and Nicole happen to be reading, call me!) There have been a few casting deci-sions for my books in the past that have left me scratching my head, but often they turned out better than I expected when I saw the adaptation.

You have a book tour coming up for Handle with Care. What will your typical day be like?Caviar, jets, fine wine — oh, wait, I’ve confused myself with a real celebrity. Book tours are grueling. Usually I get up at about 6 a.m. in order to get to an airport, where I strip down to my skiv-vies to get through security, juggling my laptop, coffee, and whatever edible item I’ve found for breakfast. I fly to a city and meet a media escort at the airport. (It sounds much sexier than it is — usually a woman in her 60s or 70s.) The

escort takes me to interviews on radio and TV and print, and then to my events, which are one hour of talking and Q&A, followed by signing books. I get to a hotel around 10 p.m., eat dinner, crash, and wake up at 6 a.m. to get to another city and do it again. I’m on tour in the United States for 25 straight days and then come home, go into a three-week coma, and emerge to tour the U.K. for another three weeks.

You recently wrote several issues of Wonder Woman. Were you a fan of comic books prior to this? When I was a little girl, I used to go with my dad every Sunday to buy The New York Times at the newsstand. I was al-lowed to pick out a Charms lollipop and a comic book. I was a big fan of X-Men at the time. Wonder Woman, in the ’70s, wasn’t doing it for me. She needed me to revamp her.

If you were a superhero, what would your superpower be?

The ability to change people’s minds without them even realizing it was being done. Oh wait, that’s

what a writer does, isn’t it?

— Marin Jorgensen

Do you ever miss the classroom?I miss parts of it! The kids in particular. I really get a kick out of teenagers and the feelings they have and the questions they raise. I still remember diagram-ming sentences by hanging signs for parts of speech around the neck of kids and making them do acrobatics (i.e., the adjective piggy-backed on the subject, the adverbial clause hanging off the predicate). I loved the assignments I designed, too.

Such as?The last assignment I gave was a 10-year letter that kids had to write to themselves. I carted those letters around for a de-cade and then mailed them. I heard back from so many of them, now adults. Every now and then one will pop up at one of my book events!

Do you pull from your teaching or your par-enting experience when writing adolescent characters, like those in Nineteen Minutes, a novel about school violence and bullying? Both. Although Nineteen Minutes had its genesis in bullying that I experi-enced as a kid and that my children ex-perienced, I taught plenty of kids who fell into that marginalized category. The Pact, which is about teen suicide, came directly from my classroom experi-ence, when a young suicidal girl was dealing with her depression by writing in a journal, and meeting with me to discuss it. I’m happy to report that she does research in neurology and is doing very well!

How do you prepare yourself emotionally to deal with some of the sensitive and controversial issues?I write about the things that are keeping me up at night because I don’t have the

For Jodi Picoult, Ed.M.’90, becoming a professional novelist was always Plan A. It was one of her reality-dictated Plan Bs, though — teaching — that led her to the Ed School to pursue her master’s in teaching and curriculum. But starting a family, coupled with layoffs in the school system where she taught, gave her the time to go back to Plan A and complete her first novel, Songs of the Humpback Whale. “They hired six new teachers that year and pink-slipped us on the third day of school because they lost the money they had in the budget to pay our salaries,” Picoult remembers. “Three of us wound up getting pregnant that year — including me. I knew I was going to stay home with my newborn, so I spent time that summer finishing the book I’d been writing on the side, and it became my first published novel a year later.” Picoult hasn’t looked back. She has published 16 novels, the most recent in March, all of which have landed on The New York Times’ bestsellers list and several of which have been turned into feature films and made-for-television movies. Still, despite her success, Picoult stays grounded thanks to her husband and three kids. “They are amused by fans who treat me like a celebrity,” she says. “To my kids, I’m just the lady who yells at them to pick up their bedrooms.”

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bookS

1000 Steps: An ESL Teaching Adventure in Taiwanclaudia carroll

lulu.com, 2008

In July 2007, Carroll completed one year with the Taiwan Ministry of Education, teaching

at four progressive, rural schools in the mountains south of Taipei. This book rep-resents a conversation the author had with herself via her yearlong blog, intended to offer insight into one American’s experi-ence in Taiwan and encourage others to reach out and teach. The author also in-cludes information about teaching English as a second language as a foreign guest, as well as the script from her presentation at the Taiwan ESL Teacher Conference. Claudia Carroll, Ed.M.’02, has published 11 books since returning from Taiwan in 2007.

Beyond Tracking: Multiple Pathways to College, Career, and Civic ParticipationEdited by Jeannie oakes

and marisa Saunders

Harvard Education

Press, 2008

This book assesses American high schools, responding to the dilemmas of high dropout rates, educational gaps, and wide-spread student disengagement. The editors present a notion of multiple pathways as an alternative to current practices. All multiple pathways schools would include a college-preparatory core, a professional core, field-based learning and workplace simulations, and support services to meet the particular needs of students and com-munities. In its consideration of multiple pathways, Beyond Tracking contributes to current discussions about high school re-form and the educational challenges of the 21st century. Marisa Saunders, Ed.M.’93, Ed.D.’00, is a senior research associate at the Institute for Democracy, Education, and Access at UCLA.

Boys Should Be Boys: A Headmaster’s ReflectionsBrian Walsh

tmc Books, 2008

Boys not only learn differently than girls of the same age, but, according to the author, they make friends differently, have entirely different issues of self-esteem and motivation, react to their parents and teachers differently, and process just about everything differently. What is particularly challenging to boys during the formative years of elementary school is that they are almost univer-sally under the guidance and care of women — mothers and teachers — who innately gauge their behavior, learning, and interpersonal relationships on the model of girls because that is what they relate to most naturally, Walsh writes. In Boys Should Be Boys, the author reflects on 30 years of running two independent schools, one coeducational and the other all boys. His observations are presented through anecdotes of actual situations and through the actions and voices of the boys themselves. Brian Walsh, Ed.M.’66, lives in Katonah, N.Y., where he serves as an educational consultant, specializing in independent school placement.

Caleb Neelon’s Book of Awesome: Murals, Gallery Installations & Street Paintings from All Over the Placecaleb neelon

Ginko Press, 2008

Artist and author Neelon began his graffiti career like anyone else, but the Cam-bridge, Mass., native took a hard right and caught a flight out of town. Deliber-ately ignoring the obvious global centers of New York, Los Angeles, and London, Neelon painted subject matter close to his heart while making a street presence in places like Kathmandu, Sao Paulo, and Tegucigalpa. Across five continents, indoors and out, Neelon has created color-ful work both alongside collaborators like Os Gemeos and Andrew Schoultz, as well as in streets where he is the first foreigner

to wander in quite some time. Featuring travel stories that discuss the sociopoliti-cal situations that surround them, as well as Neelon’s large-scale gallery installations from venues such as the Boston Center for the Arts, Caleb Neelon’s Book of Awesome provides an overview of his work. Caleb Neelon, Ed.M.’04, is an artist, writer, and educator. He is an editor at the culture hardbound bimonthly Swindle and has been a contributing writer to many other magazines and journals.

The Case for Character Education: A Developmental Approachalan lockwood

teachers college Press, 2008

In this look at the current state of character education, Lockwood assesses its strengths and weaknesses and finds fault with leading advocates for failing to respond to sound critiques of their work. The author argues that contemporary character education can be significantly improved by using key principles from es-tablished theories and research on devel-opmental psychology. He offers examples to support his recommendations while inviting character education theorists and practitioners to generate their own implications from his presentation. Alan Lockwood, M.A.T.’64, C.A.S.’67, Ed.D.’70, is professor of curriculum and instruction at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

Creating Extra-Ordinary Teachers: Multiple Intelligences in the Class-room and BeyondBranton Shearer and mike fleetham

network continuum Education, 2008

This is a guide to understanding multiple intelligences (MI) and how they can be implemented to create inspired leaders and motivated students, and a guide to the creation of a personalized path to the development of leadership potential. It has five main aims: to increase understand-ing of the skills utilized by highly effective teachers; to inspire readers to recognize and appreciate their own or others’ poten-tial; to increase readers’ insight into their MI strengths and the relationship of these

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Currently reading: I currently have about four books in various stages of “partially read.” I am most actively trying to finish New England White, a mystery by Stephen Carter.

First impressions: That it would be a quick, fast-paced book that would be entertaining. I also thought it would be intriguing because it takes place on the campus of an elite private university in New England ( … hmm … ).

Noneducation genre of choice: Biographies and autobiographies. I love to hear the stories of people’s lives and the events that shaped them.

Last great read(s): Inkheart by Carolyn Funke [and] Barack Obama’s Dreams from My Father.

Book you’ve read over and over: There are too many books that I want to read to allow for repeats!

Favorite spot to curl up with a good book: In our family room, on the couch, sitting in the afternoon sun.

Next up: I will revisit the four partially read books to see if one is worthy. I am tempted to skip ahead and read The Third Chapter by our very own Sara Lawrence-Lightfoot!

Nancy Hill has been a visiting associate professor since 2007. She will assume her role as professor of education on July 1, 2009.

PrOfEssOr NANcY Hill


faculty in tHE nEWS

“It’s a situation that’s foisted upon young persons who are not ready for it.” Professor Howard Gardner on how some new digital media, including social networking sites, are causing unique ethical challenges for students. — Education Week, 1/16/09

“Schools and colleges around the world are not adequately preparing their students and other citizens to understand the nature of shared planetary challenges like international terrorism, regional and global conflicts, and global warming.” Professor Fernando Reimers, Ed.M.’84, Ed.D.’88, writing about increasing global competency.— The Chronicle of Higher Education, 1/30/09

“What’s distinctive about it is that it truly integrates cutting-edge thinking in early literacy, child and parent mental health, and economic security for low-income families.”Professor Jack Shonkoff discussing the program being launched by the Center on the Developing Child in Tulsa, Okla., that will address school readiness, health, workforce development for parents, and behavioral economics. — Harvard Magazine, 3/09–4/09

“They are causing a shift in the kinds of knowl-edge and skills the world values; driving the development of new methods of teaching and learning; and changing the basic characteristics of learners of every age.” Professor Chris Dede on the range of new media available to both students and teach-

ers today, and how they need to be integrated into education in order to make classrooms as technologically advanced as the outside world.— T.H.E. Journal, 1/09

“Why don’t we face the reality that a large percentage of our youth neither want nor need a college education in the traditional sense?” Senior Lecturer Katherine Merseth, M.A.T.’69, Ed.D.’82, responding to an op-ed by New York City Schools Chancellor Joel Klein and Rev. Al Sharpton that called for national standards and assessments for student achievement, and emphasized charter schools as a potential solution to the achievement gap.— The Wall Street Journal, 1/20/09

out portraits of daily life in these schools. Using an analytic framework grounded in the research literature on nonprofit management and effective schools, the authors show that these schools excel along the organizational dimensions of struc-ture, systems, human-resource strategies, culture, and clarity of mission — func-tions executed with remarkable coherence. Katherine Merseth, M.A.T.’69, Ed.D.’82, is a senior lecturer and the director of the Teacher Education Program at the Ed School. Kristy Cooper, Ed.M.’07, is a doc-toral student and editorial board member of the Harvard Educational Review. John Roberts, Ed.M.’03, is a doctoral student and a consultant for a charter school in Lowell, Mass. Mara Casey Tieken, Ed.M.’06, is a doctoral student and cochair of the Harvard Educational Review editorial board. Chris

Wynne, Ed.M.’05, is a doctoral student and an editorial board member of the Harvard Educational Review.

Learning to Educate: Proposals for the Reconstruction of Education in Latin Americanoel mcGinn and Ernesto Schiefelbein

unESco/iBE, 2008

Schiefelbein and McGinn suggest that, if Latin America is to catch up with the rest of the world, a broader view of education, and particularly teaching, is required. This book includes a close examination of learn-ing and teaching in the classroom, the ad-ministration of schools and school districts, the management of systems of education in ministries, and the political processes that generate educational policy and law — and consensus. The authors base their argu-

ments on what research tells us and they dismiss a great number of time-honored “truths,” proposing five major strategies for a radical improvement in the quality of teaching and learning in Latin America: greater emphasis on learning how to learn; converting teachers from producers of learning to managers of learning; funda-mental improvements in teacher training; shifting the emphasis for change from the central to the local level; emphasizing learning that will lead to increased free-dom for all. Ernesto Schiefelbein, Ed.D.’69, has been director of the Regional Office of UNESCO for Latin America and the Caribbean, minister of education in Chile, rector of the Universidad Santo Tomas in Santiago, Chile, and a visiting professor in several universities. Noel McGinn is profes-sor emeritus at the Ed School.

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to effective leadership; to guide readers in the creation of realistic, personalized leadership development plans to maximize strengths and manage limitations; and to help readers learn how to use their mul-tiple intelligences to contribute something of value to their community in a leader-ship role. The book includes self-assess-ment and interactive leadership develop-ment planning materials. Branton Shearer, Ed.M.’86, is a developmental psychologist and instructor at Kent State University.

Dignity for All: How to Create a World Without Rankismrobert fuller and Pamela Gerloff

Berrett-koehler Publishers, 2008

Dignity for All demonstrates how to identify, challenge, and prevent “rank-ism” — the abuse that happens within hierarchies, whether it’s the corporate structure, the educational system, or the family. The authors focus on individuals — how they can recognize rankism in their own experiences, even in themselves, and how, on a day-to-day basis, individuals can help others see its influence and prevent it from taking root in the first place. The book includes examples of rankism in action as well as advice on the best ways to forcefully but compassionately bring such behavior to light. Pamela Gerloff, Ed.D.’88, is a writer, educator, and consultant special-izing in transformational change.

Engaging Classrooms and Communities through Art: A Guide to Designing and Implementing Community-Based Art EducationBeth krensky and

Seana lowe Steffen

altamira, 2008

At the same time that arts funding and programming in schools are declining, ex-citing community-based art programs have successfully been able to build community, foster change, and enrich children’s lives. Engaging Classrooms and Communities through Art provides a guide to the design and implementation of community-based art programs for educators, community

leaders, and artists. The book combines case studies with diverse groups across the country that are using different media — including mural arts, dance, and video — with an introduction to the theory and history of community-based art. It is a handbook for those looking to transform their communities through art. Beth Kren-sky, Ed.M.’91, is an assistant professor of art education and the area head of art teaching at the University of Utah.

How to Change 5000 Schools: A Practical and Positive Ap-proach for Leading Change at Every LevelBen levin

Harvard Education

Press, 2008

Not long ago, public education in Ontario, Canada, was in deep trouble, writes Levin. Student achievement was stagnating, labor disruptions were rampant, and public satisfaction with the schools was low. In 2003, a new provincial government initiated a series of reforms that embodied a positive, outcome-focused agenda for public education that resulted in improved student outcomes and high teacher morale. In this book, Levin, former deputy minister of education for Ontario, draws on his experience overseeing these and other major systemwide education re-forms in Canada and England. Ben Levin, Ed.M.’75, holds a Canada research chair in education leadership and policy at the University of Toronto.

Immunity to Change: How to Over-come It and Unlock the Potential in Yourself and Your Organizationrobert kegan and lisa laskow lahey

Harvard Business Press, 2009

A recent study showed that when doctors tell heart patients they will die if they don’t change their habits, only one in seven will be able to follow through successfully. Desire and motivation aren’t enough: Even when it is a matter of life and death, the ability to change remains elusive. In Immunity to Change, the authors show

how our individual beliefs — along with the collective mindsets in our organiza-tions — combine to create a natural but powerful immunity to change. Through hands-on diagnostics and case studies, they reveal how this mechanism holds us back and how we can pinpoint and uproot our own immunities to change, bringing our organizations forward with us. Robert Kegan is a professor in adult learning and professional development at the Ed School. Lisa Laskow Lahey, Ed.M.’80, Ed.D.’86, is associate director of the Change Leadership Group at the Ed School.

InitiationSusan fine

flux, 2009

The author’s first young adult novel tells the story of Mauricio Londoño — Latino, middle class, and new to the brutality of prep school life — who just wants to survive ninth grade at St. Stephen’s, a private school in Manhattan. Apartments the size of a city block, vacations in the Hamptons — being near all this extrava-gance, intellect, and beauty is a thrill, but navigating this world is another story. When two warring freshmen use the web as a weapon, Mauricio gets burned in the online crossfire and learns firsthand how the privileged don’t always play by the rules. Susan Fine, Ed.M.’92, was an English teacher in New York City and is now work-ing on her second novel.

Inside Urban Charter Schools: Promising Practices and Strategies in Five High-Performing Schoolskatherine merseth with kristy

cooper, John roberts, mara

casey tieken, Jon valent, and

chris Wynne

Harvard Education Press, 2009

This book offers a glimpse into the world of charter schools by profiling five high-performing urban charter schools serving predominantly low-income, minority youth in Massachusetts. Interviews, focus groups, and classroom observations con-ducted over the course of two years flesh


Spanish-Language Narration and Literacy: Culture, Cognition, and Emotionallyssa mccabe, alison Bailey, and

Gigliana melzi

cambridge university Press, 2008

This book examines how diverse groups of Spanish-speaking children in the Ameri-cas learn to express memories and stories, as well as ways in which their mothers and fathers assist them in this acquisition. The current project includes diverse nation-alities, socioeconomic backgrounds, and genres of narrative. The authors seek to deepen our understanding of narration in Latino cultures, children’s ways of think-ing and expressing emotion in stories, and implications for school achievement.Allison Bailey, Ed.M.’91, Ed.D.’95, is associ-ate professor in the Division of Psychological Studies in Education in the Department of Education, UCLA.

Speaking and Listening for Preschool Through Third Gradecatherine Snow and lauren resnick

international reading association, 2008

This guidebook, complete with a supple-mentary DVD of videos, outlines the oral language and listening skills that young children should have as they progress from preschool to the early elementary grades. The book includes concrete advice and examples that teachers can use in the classroom. Catherine Snow is a professor of education at the Ed School. Lauren Resnick, Ed.D.’62, is a professor and director of the Learning Research and Development Center at the University of Pittsburgh.

Still Failing at Fairness: How Gender Bias Cheats Girls and Boys in School and What We Can Do About Itdavid Sadker and karen Zittleman

Scribner, 2009

This book argues that gender bias makes it impossible for girls to receive an educa-tion equal to that of boys. Sadker has spent decades studying the relationship between gender and success in the class-

room. In this revised edition of Failing at Fairness: How Schools Cheat Girls, the book he wrote with his late wife, Myra, the authors examine test scores, athletics, and college matriculation as indicators of this continuing bias. In addition to educa-tors, the book is intended for parents, coaches, and other mentors that stand to learn so much about gender equality. Still Failing at Fairness is not about blame, but about finding solutions that work. David Sadker, M.A.T.’65, is professor emeritus at American University and teaches part time at the University of Arizona.

Stop the Screaming: How to Turn Angry Conflict With Your Child Into Positive Communicationcarl Pickhardt

Palgrave macmillan, 2009

In Stop the Screaming, Pickhardt offers a practical guide for parents on how to tackle the most pervasive and difficult problems they face in childrearing, from the early toddler years through college. He empowers parents to turn conflict into an opportunity to engage with their children on a deeper level. He teaches parents to manage emotion during a fight; give criticism to children in a way that focuses on the behavior and not the person; find a hook inside silent tension that will let them connect with your children’s feel-ings and show them a way to empathize with yours; and consider their children’s points of view during disagreements and teach them to voice their grievances with respect. With a distinctive emphasis on how to distinguish types of conflict depen-dent on age and gender, Pickhardt shows parents how to turn the daily battles into opportunities for growth. Carl Pickhardt, Ed.M.’66, is a psychologist in private practice in Austin, Texas. He is a contributing editor to Only Child magazine.

blogS and More

binoarealuyo.comBino realuyo

Author Bino Realuyo developed binoarealuyo.com to provide informa-tion about his books and his life as a writer, Filipino American, and student. The website includes a bio, a link to his personal blog, and summaries and reviews of his novels and poetry. Realuyo hopes that with this website he will “debunk the stereotypical image of writers as being standoffish, dogmatic, or unapproachable.” Bino Realuyo is a master’s student in the Technology, Innovation, and Education Program and a Catherine D. Reynolds Fel-low in Social Entrepreneurship.

Making Learning Whole: How Seven Principles of Teaching Can Transform Educationdavid Perkins

Jossey-Bass, 2009

In Making Learning Whole, Perkins intro-

duces a new research-based framework for teaching. Using learning the game of baseball as a metaphor, he illustrates how teaching any subject at any grade level can be made more effective if students are introduced to the “whole game” rather than isolated pieces of a discipline. With real-world examples, this book describes how learning can be orga-nized for deep and lasting impact by using seven principles: play the whole game, make the game worth playing, work on the hard parts, play out of town, uncover the hidden game, learn from the team, and learn the game of learning. David Perkins is a professor at the Ed School and senior codirector of Project Zero.

Oh, Dolly! Leader-ship Lessons from a Female CEOangela Walz

kokopelli Publishing

company, 2008

In her first book, Walz reveals the mindset and winning strategies of Dolly Oberoi, one of the United States’ most success-ful female and foreign-born leaders, and shares the leadership lessons she learned while an employee of Oberoi. This book is intended to help managers, novices, men, and women evaluate their leadership tac-tics, develop guidelines for more effective leadership, and reach their full leadership potentials by challenging society’s norm. Dolly Oberoi, Ed.M.’86, is founder and chief technology officer of C2 Technologies Inc., an e-learning company that develops virtual environments for training.

One Family’s Response to Terrorism: A Daughter’s MemoirSusan kerr van de ven

Syracuse university Press, 2008

On January 18, 1984, Malcolm Kerr, president of the American University of Beirut and a respected scholar of Middle East politics, was shot in the back of the head on his way to work, but the chaos of Lebanon’s civil war made it impossible to investigate the killing. Seventeen years later, armed with new information and supported by the Anti-Terrorism Act, his family came to a consensus that nonvio-lent justice through the rule of law was a duty they could not ignore. This book is a portrait of the way in which violence pulls lives apart, of an American family caught on the stage of Middle East politics, and of the moral choices required in seeking jus-tice. Susan Kerr Van de Ven, Ed.D.’90, lives in Cambridge, England, where she runs a creative writing program for primary school children and serves as a Liberal Democrat councilor on the South Cambridgeshire District Council.

Outside Time: My Friendship with WilburStephen rich merriman

four rivers Press, 2009

This book gives the account of a friendship forged, over the course of many winters, on river ice between a much younger, questing man and an older, atheistic “river wizard.” In the full-ness of time this unlikely association led, inexorably, to a post-death pact that was most wonderfully honored. The narra-tive is written as both a paean to a special kind of friendship and a discriminating inquiry into the whole question regard-ing the possible continuation of per-sonal consciousness beyond what we call “death.” Stephen Rich Merriman, Ed.M.’80, lives in San Francisco, where he works as a corporate consultant, psychotherapist, and jazz pianist.

The Parents We Mean to Be: How Well-Intentioned Adults Undermine Children’s Moral and Emotional Developmentrichard Weissbourd

Houghton mifflin Harcourt,

2009

The author argues that parents — not peers, not television — are the primary shapers of their children’s moral lives. And yet it is parents’ lack of self-awareness and confused priorities that are dangerously undermining children’s development. Through original field research, he demon-strates how parents’ intense focus on their children’s happiness is turning many chil-dren into self-involved, fragile conform-ists. The suddenly widespread desire of parents to be closer to their children often undercuts kids’ morality. Our fixation with being great parents, and our need for our children to reflect that greatness, can actually make them feel ashamed for fail-ing to measure up. Weissbourd’s ultimate message is that the intense, crisis-filled, and profoundly joyous process of raising a child can be a powerful force for our own moral development. Richard Weissbourd, Ed.D.’87, is a child and family psychologist and a lecturer at the Ed School.

in the media

ed. magazine provides notice, on a space-available basis, of recently published books, blogs, podcasts, and websites by hgSe fac-ulty, alumni, and students. Send your name, degree, and year of graduation, along with the title of the book, the publisher, and date of publication, or a url link to your blog, podcast, or website.

Ed. magazine, In the MediaHarvard Graduate School of EducationOffice of Communications44R Brattle StreetCambridge, MA 02138E-mail: [email protected]: 617-495-7629

Is Paper Getting You Down?We don’t want to lose you as a reader, but we understand the need to whittle down your mail pile and do good for the environment, so we’re giving you the option of opting out of the hard- copy version of the magazine that you receive and instead letting you read it online. To do this, send us an e-mail at [email protected] with the words OPT OUT in the subject line. We will send you an e-mail alert once a new issue comes out and is available for you to read online.

www.gse.harvard.edu/news_events/ed

Read related stories on some of the featured books

online at www.gse.harvard.edu/news_events/features. There you will

find “Inside Urban Charter Schools,” an interview with Senior Lecturer Katherine

Merseth, and “The Parents We Mean to Be,” a Q&A with Lecturer

Richard Weissbourd.




http://www.gse.harvard.edu/news_events/ed


Question everything. That is one of the lasting les-sons that Rafael Martinez, Ed.M.’05, took away from Professor Fernando Reimers, Ed.M.’84, Ed.D.’88, while he was a student at the Harvard Graduate School of Education. And it has served him well in his native Brazil, where he returned after graduation to work on improving the country’s education system.

“We should especially question data,” Martinez told a group of students last fall while at Harvard to give a series of talks. Martinez, who at the time was serving as undersecretary of education for the state of Rio de Janeiro, talked at length about the coun-try’s controversial Education for All campaign, fueled in part several years ago by businesses demand-ing a more educated population. The goal of the campaign was to dramatically increase the number of students in school. Martinez said that despite an increase, the numbers are not telling the whole story.

“The official discourse says we’ve already achieved universal enrollment in Brazil, but in reality, that’s not true,” he said. “We cannot consider our goal done if 94 percent enter but only 54 percent complete school. That’s a big fat lie, and it’s my goal to wake people up.”

Martinez also questioned the quality of schooling in Brazil, which historically has not been good. “A national evaluation in 2005 found that 30 percent of fourth-graders had grades below 150 out of 500. They were functionally illiterate,” he said.

In order to turn things around, Martinez said the country first needs to acknowledge the problem and then to “research it relentlessly.” He also suggested heavily monitoring students that repeat grades and drop out, increase professional development for principals, and help some teachers find new careers.

“The bottom 10 percent of the sector in Brazil tends to go into teaching,” he said, shaking his head.

Martinez didn’t start out in education. An engineering under-graduate who went on to study business, he initially worked for Shell Brazil before moving onto a string of sales and marketing jobs in smaller companies. Although he liked his work, he felt he should be making a more meaningful contribution to society.

“I decided I was going to work in education,” he said in a subse-quent interview. It took a few years to make the transition, which included a year in the Ed School’s International Education Policy

Program. When he returned to Brazil, he became superintendent of a school district of 15,000 students and 54 schools. A few years later he became undersecretary of education for the state of Rio de Janeiro, where he was responsible for developing policy, creat-ing new curriculum, and evaluating practices. He also created an ombudsperson to listen to outside complaints and a resource database for teachers.

His ideas were well received, he said, but he had to move slowly at first with his “Harvard ideas.” “People think you’re trying to force foreign ideas,” he said, “but in truth, most of the ideas that I brought back were my own.”

In December, Martinez moved back to the private sector but with a public service twist. Under his guidance, BR Investments, a Brazilian equity fund, will invest $400 million in education projects in its first year. Before leaving government, however, he turned back to his Ed School roots. “I was pleased to see that as he left the position of undersecretary of education,” says Reimers, “he was succeeded by Teresa Pontual, Ed.M.’08, whom he had encouraged to apply to the program and hired to work with him in the ministry.”

This is a clear example of Martinez’s commitment to education, says Reimers. “As a student, Rafael displayed clear leadership qual-ities, a strong intellect, drive, and passion to improve education in the two courses he took with me,” he says. “There was no ques-tion in my mind that he had all the qualities to make a significant impact in the field of education in Brazil.”

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1947John Sheard, M.A.T., has been retired for 23 years after working 34 years at DuPont. He writes that, although he spent his career in the business world, his M.A.T. helped in dealing with his customers.

1953George Pappas, M.A.T., retired in 1993 as professor and chair of art (emeritus) after 40 years of university teaching and administration. He is now a full-time exhibiting artist.

1957Joseph Cronin, M.A.T., a former HGSE faculty member, recently gave the Burton and Inglis Lecture at the Ed School on his new book, Reforming Boston Schools, 1930–2006.

David Lukens, M.A.T., teaches a math course at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. He is a professor emeritus at Shimer College in Chicago.

1964Howard Greene, Ed.M., continues his career as an educational consultant to insti-tutions and families. His new book about educational and life planning will be published in September 2009.

1965Phyllis Snyder, M.A.T., spent the last 15 years at the Center for Adult and Experiential Learning in Philadelphia as vice president. Her current focus is developing encore careers — a career that starts after one’s primary career has ended and often includes a public service focus.

1967ann Collins, M.A.T., has moved from Boston to Port-land, Ore., and is greatly enjoy-ing retirement.

1969rhoda Morss Trooboff, M.A.T., had her latest picture book, A Book for Elie, published by Tenley Circle Press. It is for children ages three to eight and is about how books are made.

1970Wayne Beyer, M.A.T, is an administrative appeals judge at the U.S. Department of Labor.

Barbara Powell, M.A.T.’65, Ed.D., works as an educational consultant. Her recent projects include Exploring Humanities Law, a curriculum about the rules of law taught in more than 60 countries; and evaluat-ing the Along the Silk Road curriculum as part of Yo-Yo Ma’s Silk Road Project.

allen Parker, Ed.D., retired last year as CFO of the Con-cord Consortium, which he cofounded in 1994. The consor-tium conducts research and development in science, math, and computer-related educa-tion. He is now writing a book about his quest and its findings for integrations of technology, society, and spirituality for well-being.

1974Martha Keller, Ed.M., is “delighted” to be a part of the education her five grandchil-dren are getting both in and out of formal settings.

Sherry Forman Litwack, Ed.M., is a publishing consul-tant who works with educa-

tional publishers to conduct market research and create preK–8 reading and language arts materials.

1975Peter Cooper, Ed.M., is inter-im headmaster of Hilton Head [S.C.]Preparatory School.

Warren Kimbro, Ed.M., passed away in February. An obituary in The New York Times profiled his life as a Black Pan-ther who eventually became a community leader and founder of Project MORE, an organiza-tion the provides job training and drug rehab to ex-convicts.

1979Terrence Cheeseman, Ed.M., is happily retired and enjoys volunteering in the Writing Lab at Walnut Hills High School in Cincinnati, Ohio.

1981Louise Taylor Gilliland, Ed.M, is a nursing home resi-dent, aged 82, and still mobile!

Wilai Panurach, Ed.M., has retired from all professional vocations. She is now living a “simple life” in a suburb of Bangkok and visiting her son in Chicago from time to time.

David Sortino, Ed.M., recently sold his screenplay, a true account of his three years as a teacher/principal at a residen-tial school for at-risk teens in the inner cities of Oakland and San Francisco, Calif.

1982ray Kelley, Ed.M., retired as program director of the Supreme Court Substance Abuse Program. He has four

grandchildren: Cory, Ryan, Brian, and Jenna. He continues to do volunteer work related to substance abuse.

Patricia McKinley, Ed.M., continues her nonprofit work for educational and community organizations in Connecticut including the University of Hartford, Women’s Hall of Fame, Community Founda-tion Women’s Initiative Fund, Waterbury Hospital Health Center, and Mercy Housing and Shelter.

1984Irene Goodman, Ed.D., is the founder and president of Goodman Research Group, Inc., a research firm in Cam-bridge, Mass., that specializes in program evaluation. The firm celebrated its 20th an-niversary in January.

1985Wayne Dudley, Ed.M., was involved with the Obama campaign in Florida during the 2008 election. He has also been working on the Civil Rights Commission for the state of Georgia and maintains his status as emeritus professor of history at Salem State College in Massachusetts.

1987Margo Okazawa-rey, Ed.D., recently had a fellowship created in her name by the Intercollegiate Department of Asian American Studies at the Claremont Colleges. The Margo Okazawa-Rey Social Justice Fellowship is designed to encourage outstanding stu-dents to implement communi-ty-based projects that integrate social justice, multiracial solidarity, and feminism.

alumni news and notes

Rafael Martinez, Ed.M.’05

A Question of Education By Lory Hough



1988Guru Kistnasamy, Ed.M., is a psychologist in private practice and would like to hear from friends, especially the 1987–1988 Ed School group. He would be happy to be a resource person for anyone wishing to visit South Africa.

antonia Kaull, Ed.M., has been the owner of Living Rooms, a home décor and interior design service in the Georgetown section of Wash-ington, D.C., since 2003.

1990ana Garcia Blanco, Ed.M.’79, Ed.D., is currently working with the New School Movement, an education reform project in Puerto Rico.

Jon Price, Ed.M., recently com-pleted his Ph.D. in education from Texas A&M University, College Station. He is now the specialist for Applied Educa-tion Research and Program Evaluation with Intel Corpora-tion, where he is responsible for managing evaluation efforts for the company’s global education technology programs.

1992Tom Carter, Ed.M., and his wife and just had their sixth child (a girl), and he has a whole new appreciation for educational needs across the spectrum! One of their children has autism, and they run an in-tensive program for him out of their home in New York City. He runs a consulting firm that he founded four years ago after leaving the diplomatic corps.

1993Susan Mangels, Ed.M., recently earned her Ph.D. in

policy studies in education at the University of Illinois at Chicago. Her dissertation was on the relationship of work-life balance and success for female college presidents. Mangels is the president of Lexington Col-lege in Chicago.

1994Linda Greyser, Ed.M.’90, Ed.D., works as a consultant in school improvement and accountability with the Massa-chusetts Office of Educational Quality and Accountability and several projects abroad, most recently with the Supreme Edu-cation Council in Qatar and an ongoing project with the Dubai Schools Inspection Bureau.

Denise Juneau, Ed.M., was elected superintendent of public instruction in Montana, becoming the first Native American woman to hold an executive office in the state.

1995Erik Gregory, Ed.M., was named director of continu-ing education at New England Conservatory in Boston.

Gerard robinson, Ed.M., and his wife, Kimberly, celebrated the first birthday of their daughter, Sienna Simone Rob-inson, on February 20, 2009.

1997Meg Campbell, C.A.S, is founder and executive director of Codman Academy Charter Public School in Boston, which has been chosen by the Mas-sachusetts Cultural Council to receive the Commonwealth Award for its partnership with the Huntington Theatre Com-pany. Codman Academy is the first public school to receive

this award, presented to organi-zations or individuals deemed to have made extraordinary contributions to the commu-nity quality of life.

1999Jo Forman, Ed.M., is develop-ing educational materials for Discovering Justice, a nonprofit civic education organization headquartered in the Moakley U.S. Courthouse in Boston.

2000rose DiSanto, Ed.M., was appointed to the board of Next Step, a Cambridge-based nonprofit organization that provides life-changing support programs to teens and young adults impacted by cancer and life-threatening blood diseases.

2002Meria Carstarphen, Ed.M.’99, Ed.D., was named finalist for the position of superintendent of the Austin [Texas] Indepen-dent School District.

Jocelyn Pascoe, Ed.M.’02, is now working as a high school guidance counselor in South San Francisco.

2003Brooke DiGiovanni Evans, Ed.M., was promoted to head of gallery learning at the Mu-seum of Fine Arts, Boston.

2006Janey Pearl, Ed.M., is the public information officer and Latino outreach coordinator for the Arizona Department of Health Services. She was recently accepted into the Anti-Defamation League’s GLASS Leadership fellowship.

2007Carol Baldwin, Ed.M., is cur-rently teaching ninth-grade biology and sixth-grade science at Boston Preparatory Charter Public School in the Hyde Park section of Boston.

Katie Heim, Ed.M., was en-gaged to Jared Feinman on De-cember 29, 2008, at New York’s Rockefeller Center and plans to marry in January 2010.

Felisa Tibbitts, Ed.M.’91, C.A.S., Ed.D., is a fellow at the Carr Center for Human Rights Policy at the Harvard Kennedy School this academic year. She welcomes contact from class-mates at [email protected].

Ed’s List is designed for alums who want to reach out to their for-mer classmates and other members of the Ed School community to share their interests, their time, and even — possibly — job opportunities. This is not a classifieds section — no used cars for sale, please! — but an area in which alums can cultivate, or re-cultivate, Ed School relationships for either work or play.

E-mail us at [email protected] and we’ll print your request in the next issue.

ED’s lisT

In the mid-1990s, Ledyard McFadden, Ed.M.’93, left the classroom as an ESL teacher in Chelsea, Mass., to serve as the director of op-erations at City on a Hill Charter School during its startup and first few years of operation. The experience, he says, helped him realize his love for new projects and inspired him to eventually work for Beacon Education Management, one of the first educational management organizations in the country.

“While working at Beacon, my friends and family kept telling me that I should start my own business, that I loved the variety of project-based work and should follow that passion,” he says.

In 1998, McFadden followed their advice and started School-Works, an educational consulting firm in Beverly, Mass. “It was the beginning of a lot of charter school law and charter school openings across the country, and at that time there was an op-portunity to be a part of starting the accountability system,” he says of the inspiration behind the company.

SchoolWorks provides support to educators at all levels, from individual schools to districts, state departments of education,

and private foundations. The company provides clients with teams of consultants who assess their strengths and areas for improvement.

“We focus on helping them assess their current practices, plan for improvement, and really achieve that improvement through leadership coaching and intensive workshops,” McFadden says.

The company has grown significantly from its initial focus on charter schools and accountability to a much wider client base. For example, SchoolWorks has placed a greater emphasis on leadership and school coaching as a way to sustain client rela-tionships and increase their ongoing impact on student achieve-ment. In addition, as a result of its reputation within the educa-tional consulting sector, the organization has also developed a relationship with the prestigious Broad Prize, which annually awards one million dollars to the top performing urban school districts in the United States. SchoolWorks is responsible for con-ducting the qualitative analysis of the finalist districts, and then a national panel determines the recipients based on that analysis.

McFadden credits the Ed School and its individualized master’s program (now Special Studies) with helping him determine what aspect of education he ultimately wanted to pursue.

“I taught in Costa Rica for a few years after college and knew that I wanted to continue in education, but I wanted to be in a program that would allow me to be flexible and try different things,” he says. “The Ed School program really fit with where I was in my career, and it gave me a very good sense of education-al theory.” Furthermore, he says the connections he made while studying there have been invaluable in making SchoolWorks successful and effective.

Having just celebrated SchoolWorks’ 10th anniversary, McFad-den and his colleagues are now reflecting on their overall suc-cess. “Our focus right now is on asking the question, What is our impact on student achievement, on educator practice, and on policy?” This self-assessment is essential to McFadden’s vision for his company and to SchoolWorks’ sustained influence. “We are striving to be an organization that can understand and measure our impact in those areas,” he says.

— Amanda Dagg is an undergraduate at Harvard College.

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Ledyard McFadden, Ed.M.’93

Helping Schools Work By Amanda Dagg





Mosheng Stone lu, ed.M.’23

ethelind elbert austin, gSe’34

althea arnold dyer, M.a.T.’43

erle witty, gSe’44

edward wieber kahler, M.a.T.’46

wilbur alexander Millard, ed.M.’47

andrew baggaley, ed.M.’49

Malcolm upshur pitt Jr., ed.M.’49

norton allan levy, M.a.T.’50

Mildred Jarvis, ed.M.’51

curtis nash, ed.M.’46, ed.d.’52

John buffinton, M.a.T.’54

earl Mcgovern, ed.M.’55

elaine paradise Muise, M.a.T.’56

raymond Murphy, M.a.T.’56

abraham yanover, ed.M.’56

robert Joseph goff, M.a.T.’57

edward victor, ed.d.’57

inez woodberry, ed.M.’57

charles alcorn, ed.M.’58

ernest walston, ed.M.’38, ed.d.’58

Mary MacMillan, ed.M.’59

benjamin peterson, ed.M.’59

renee reagan, ed.M.’59

virginia lewis, c.a.S.’58, ed.d.’60

enn Tatar, ed.M.’60

robert eugene herriott, M.a.T.’55, ed.d.’61

claire cecile Mcdonough, ed.M.’61

robert lemer, M.a.T.’63

bennett Taylor, ed.M.’63

rebecca conrad young, M.a.T.’63

brooks wheeler, M.a.T.’65

florence hunter russell, c.a.S.’66

edward french, ed.M.’67

christine rotermund kuhn, M.a.T.’67

frank Manchester, c.a.S.’64, ed.d.’67

linda Miles, M.a.T.’67

woodward wickham, M.a.T.’69

warren kimbro, ed.M.’75

barbara burrage, ed.M.’82

paula Sossen lawson, ed.M.’84

kathrne howell, ed.M.’85

rosalia chow, ed.M.’86

Terrance whitright, ed.M.’86

karen walker, ed.M.’91

Thomas downey, ed.M.’01

Ed. and the office of alumni relations

welcome news from HGSE alumni about

employment, activities, or publications.

classnotes will appear either in Ed. or on

the alumni relations website.

Please e-mail your classnote to classnotes@

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In Memory

Taking the helm of the American Sociological Association (ASA) to become its 100th president, Patricia Hill Collins, M.A.T.’70, says that her leadership motto is to make herself “expendable.”

Collins, who is the first African American woman to head the ASA, explains that her goal is not to be “the type of leader that people can’t imagine what they are going to do without,” but one that empowers others to a point where they can take over — maybe doing things a little differently — yet well equipped to deal with the challenges they will confront.

This attitude has evolved out of a career in which Collins has smashed through racial and gender barriers to create her own professional opportunities, and one in which she has also worked diligently for those who have come after her in pursuing their professional goals.

“I’m often the first person to get there,” says Collins, “so I have to look behind me and say, ‘Now, what opportunities are in my wake that people can take advantage of and take this further than I have?’”

In her current position as distinguished university professor of sociology at the University of Maryland, Collins works with graduate students in examining race, feminist scholarship, and sociological theory. She traces many of the questions and issues of her present research — especially about education and its role in democracy — back to her time as a student at Harvard. “It was a time of so much political activity,” she says. “And the school really tried to be responsive to those issues of urban education in terms of equality and democracy.”

For example, Collins says that the Ed School reached out to lo-cal communities, and her placements in Roxbury and other areas of Boston encouraged her to think more broadly about education than just classroom instruction, to its significance in civic partici-pation. “Many of the larger theoretical issues that I am interested in now — structural issues, and of social change, equity — are re-fracted through the lens of my time at Harvard,” says Collins. “The questions of social justice: How do we actually construct just, fair communities for people that protect individual freedoms, and yet do not construct individual freedoms at the expense of others? Is it possible to have an idea of freedom that is not predicated

upon someone else’s subordination? Can you have a definition of masculinity that doesn’t require women’s subordination?”

Her commitment to these issues raised in her research is re-flected in her involvement with the ASA’s minority fellowship pro-gram. As president, Collins stresses the importance of providing students of color with the support and opportunities necessary for them to excel. She also sees and respects an interconnected-ness with those who came before her and contributed to laying the foundations for her own success. However, she believes that eventually the role model has to step aside, and the next wave of scholars must step up and take the lead.

She cites the presidential campaign of Barack Obama as a fas-cinating example of the participation and willingness of youth to assume responsibility and leadership roles, and perhaps see new possibilities that they hadn’t seen before.

“I tell my students, who always want me to be in front of the line, at some point you have to be in front,” says Collins. “I hold myself, and my students, to very high standards. And what is surprising to them is what they can actually do, that they didn’t imagine they could do.”

— Amy Magin Wong is a frequent contributor to Ed. whose last piece was on Academic Dean Robert Schwartz and the Bloomberg Chair.

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Patricia Hill Collins, M.A.T.’70

Out in FrontBy Amy Magin Wong

http://www.gse.harvard.edu/alumni_friends/


recess

Father Bob by Amanda Dagg

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They call him the unofficial dean. His title is desk supervisor at Gutman Library, but to many Ed School students, Bob Rogers is much more; he is a friend, a mentor, and in some cases, a father figure.

Rogers has been an employee at Gutman for more than 28 years and has befriended many students along the way. It usually starts when someone comes to the desk asking for help, but his reputation has grown so that now people ask for him specifically. “Students from all over will come and say, ‘I’m looking for Bob Rogers, someone told me to look you up,’” he says. From there, he just strikes up a conversation.

No matter how the introduction is made, once it is, the relationship is permanent. “They keep it in their heads that I’m here,” he says. “If someone’s having a bad day, they’ll come to the desk and ask what they should do. I try to give them advice and tell them not to worry about it.”

Rogers’ caring nature is a welcome presence for those who know him and does not go unappreciated. “Of course he’s a great help in anything library-related, but Bob is there for us in every way,” says doctoral student Jay Huguley, Ed.M.’04, who

has known Rogers since his first year at the school. “Whether it’s a friendly smile, a boost of confidence, or a caring voice, Bob is there and goes the extra mile for the students.”

Students often express their gratitude by mentioning him in their dissertations, and many of them keep in touch with Rogers after graduation through e-mail, phone calls, and cards. Around the holidays, he says, he reserves a section of a wall in his home to cover with the cards and baby pictures he receives.

Rogers’ friendship and support has made him a very popular figure both on and off campus. He has traveled across the country to visit former students and attend weddings and christenings. In addition to the travel opportunities, he says the number of free lunches he gets when alumni visit campus is a definite perk. “But best of all I like the friendship,” he says. “It’s an everlasting friendship.”

Even though Rogers says he should probably be retired by now, it’s the students that keep him around. “I really like work-ing with students and interacting with them,” he says. “I’ve always loved kids, and now I have lots of big kids.”

We value this, too.Which is why we’ve made it easy to get involved with the Ed School again and to reconnect with former classmates and current students.

To find out how, go to www.gse.harvard.edu/alumni_friends/getinvolved.

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http://www.gse.harvard.edu/alumni_friends/getinvolved

Harvard Graduate School of Educationoffice of communications44r Brattle Streetcambridge, ma 02138

nonprofit organizationu.S. Postage Paidcambridge, maPermit no. 50998

after 40 years at Harvard, i’ve come to more fully appreciate e. B. White’s familiar words: ‘i arise in the morning torn between a desire to improve (or save) the world and a desire to enjoy (or savor) the world. That makes it hard to plan the day.’”

— professor Jerry Murphy, former dean of the school,

in “reflections of a retiring former Misfit,” page 34

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Documents

Ed. Magazine, Summer 2009