DEI News

DEI News

The IU School of Education recently celebrated the legacy of Elder Watson Diggs, the first African American to graduate with a degree in education from Indiana University, with a symposium that explored issues surrounding the future of education given recent and anticipated court decisions and legislation around access and diversity.

Alumnus Brian A. Burt has been awarded the 2023 Alumni Achievement Award from the Neal-Marshall Alumni Club. Burt graduated in 2004 with a degree in secondary English education from the IU School of Education.

Tennisha Riley has been named an Outstanding Junior Faculty by Indiana University. This award recognizes promising tenure-track faculty who have not yet been awarded tenure and provides resources to further develop their research programs or creative activity.

Dasha Carver, a fourth-year doctoral student in Counseling Psychology, has won the Lieber Memorial Associate Instructor Award from IU. This award recognizes young teachers who have not yet achieved faculty rank at IU.

During Asia Burgett’s freshman year at IU, they weren’t happy with their chosen major of Astronomy. But thanks to the welcoming atmosphere they felt working in the Office of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion at the IU School of Education and after a meeting with their career counselor, Burgett switched majors to Early Childhood Education - keeping Astronomy as a minor.

How did Black IU School of Education students navigate student teaching in the 1930s, when they were not allowed in segregated classrooms? A new series of blog posts from IU Archives graduate assistant Jo Otremba will answer that question while giving a glimpse into the lives of these students and the difficulties they faced.

Assistant Professor Oscar Patrón has been named a Faculty Fellow of the American Association of Hispanics in Higher Education, Inc. The program’s primary goal is to prepare Latina/o/x faculty for successful careers in academia and beyond by increasing the number of tenured and promoted Latina/o/x faculty.

The Holmes Scholars Program provides a supportive environment to doctoral students traditionally underrepresented in higher education. This year’s cohort includes eleven students from around the country, with around 26 total students in the program.

Graduate student Karyn Housh has won the 2022-2023 President’s Diversity Dissertation Fellowship from the University Graduate School. Housh is a doctoral candidate of Learning and Developmental Sciences within Counseling and Educational Psychology.

A student group at the IU School of Education has been hard at work this semester bringing together over 30 members with a goal dedicated to the retention, support and success of underrepresented minority students who plan on becoming future educators.

A portrait of Martha Dawson is now hanging in the East Lounge of the Indiana Memorial Union. Dawson earned her masters and doctoral degrees at the School of Education and later became the first African American woman to become a tenured member of the IU Bloomington faculty.

Understanding history can help rethink the way things are done today while acknowledging missteps of the past. That was part of the message Eddie R. Cole, Associate Professor of Higher Education and History at UCLA and a graduate of the Higher Education and Student Affairs program, brought with him in two events last week in honor of Martin Luther King Jr. Day.

The Center for First-Generation Student Success launched the inaugural First-Generation College Celebration this week, and the IU School of Education is joining in.

Josclynn Brandon, a fourth year Ed.D. candidate in the Higher Education Student Affairs (HESA) program, won a Graduate Student Rising Star Award from NASPA Region IV-East.

For years, Allison BrckaLorenz has studied faculty teaching behaviors with the Faculty Survey of Student Engagement, a project at the Center for Postsecondary Research. She started to think about faculty motivations for teaching – and how to improve the environments in which they teach.

Carl Darnell, Assistant Dean for Diversity, Equity and Inclusion, has been appointed Director of the Hudson & Holland Scholars Program at Indiana University. The Hudson & Holland Scholars Program (HHSP) is a scholarship and academic support program for high-achieving underrepresented minorities.

Underrepresentation in higher education faculty, experiences of Black female law students and college choice experiences of Black women are just three of many critical topics that eight soon-to-be graduates of the Higher Education and Student Affairs program have focused their research on.

As the nation continues to grapple with righting the wrongs from racial injustice, a new community theatre project—the Bloomington City Wide Youth Theatre Collective—hopes to provide a space for youth voices to address these issues.

For the past several years, Professor Joel Wong has researched the psychology of encouragement. With a new study, he hopes to understand the power of encouragement for Black college students as a means of social support – and a tool to disrupt the negative effects of racism.

A new scholarship at the IU School of Education will honor Elder Watson Diggs, the first African American to graduate from the school in 1916. The scholarship is a partnership with the Kappa Alpha Psi Fraternity, Inc., an organization Diggs co-founded.

Throughout his time in academia, Ph.D. student Nelson Zounlome experienced several forms of gendered racism. But he also experienced the transformative power of culturally responsive practices that foster comprehensive wellness among groups with marginalized identities. In that spirit, Zounlome created a workbook as a resource of support for students of color.