The Vice President's Grant for Diversity & Community Initiatives (DCI)

2017-2018 Abstracts

 

I. 2^nd Annual Hip Hop Ed Conference

Dr. Christopher Emdin, Dr. Edmund Adjapong, and Courtney Rose
Sponsors: Mathematics, Science & Technology Department, and Science Education Program

This conference explores the use of Hip-Hop culture as a tool to develop innovative practices and pedagogies that can increase the engagement and achievement of all students, especially those from urban communities. The Hip Hop conference creates a space shared amongst educators, researchers, community members and students to demonstrate and discuss the use of Hip-Hop culture in educational spaces to better serve/engage all students. 

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II. African Cultural Events
Dr. S. Garnett Russell, Tobore Egborge, and Chiara Fuller
Sponsors: George Clement Bond Center for African Education

The George Clement Bond Center for African Education (CAE) designed a series of events to highlight and expose students and faculty to various African cultures and the African Diaspora. This project will include the African Film Festival Traveling Film Series: film and discussion, a food festival, and a dance and music showcase. The events create diverse learning spaces that encourage critical thinking and discourse directed to countering stereotypical narratives about Africa and contemporary African culture.

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III. C&T Graduate student-led Conference
Shamari Reid, Seth McCall, Sara Van Den Berg, and Kelsey Darity
Sponsors: Graduate Student Collaborative, and Department of Curriculum & Teaching

The C&T student-led Conference brings together students from various programs within Teachers College. This conference creates a space for mentoring students from diverse backgrounds, allowing students to share their work with other TC community members and increase student participation in TC departments.

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IV. Communities of Practice; Teachers in Conflict and Displacement Workshop
Dr. Mary Mendenhall, and Arianna Pacifico
Sponsors: International & Transcultural Studies Department, International & Comparative Education Program, and Teachers for Teachers Project Team

Communities of Practice: Teachers in Conflict and Displacement Workshop draws attention to the challenges faced by teachers in displacement and crisis-affected settings, fosters community around teachers working with marginalized learners in New York City and around the world, and builds on the skills of participants through an interactive human-centered design exercise.

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V. Days of Resistance: Documenting Black Lives Matter in Higher Education
Cyntha Tobar and Dr. Noah Drezner
Sponsors: Higher and Postsecondary Education Program

Days of Resistance: Documenting Black Lives Matter in Higher Education (BLMHE) is a participatory community oral history archive project that collects and contextualizes stories focusing on themes of social inequities in higher education. Stories take form in a multi-media exhibit during the Spring 2018 semester that raises public awareness around the issues addressed by the Black Lives Matter in Higher Education Task force.  

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VI. International World Cultural Winter Banquet
Justin Cox, Yimiao Gong, and Linxi Ma
Sponsors: Future China Initiative

The International World Cultural Winter Banquet  will celebrate the holiday season with traditional American food and music as well as cuisines and music from cultures across the world. This event will bring together multiple student organizations to promote diversity and collaboration across the TC Community.

Initial program goals include:

1.     To celebrate this traditional American holiday season with both American food as well as international cuisines

2.     To provide opportunity for executive and general members of various cultural/student-focused clubs to collaborate on this intercultural program/dinner.

3.     Enjoy delicious food, interactive games and build community

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VII. La Cocina de Las Patronas: A Journey of Purpose, Dignity, and Hope along las Vias del Tren
Victoria Hernandez, and Lucia Caumont-Stipanicic
Sponsors: Coalition of Latinx Scholars

Film screening and panel discussion: Directed by Javier Garcia, La Cocina de Las Patronas (The Kitchen of Las Patronas) documents the stories of a group of peasant women from the small town of La Patrona, in the Mexican state of Veracruz. Since 1995, these women have been cooking and delivering around 300 daily meals to Latin American migrants making their journey to the United States via freight trains collectively known as La Bestia (The Beast).  This screening promotes a critical discussion about our role as educators working with newly arrived immigrant youth from Latin America in New York City and the United States at large.

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VIII. Making the Difference: Your Role in Civic Participation
Lauren Williams, and Chloe Dawson
Sponsors: Student Senate

The program will inform  participants about strategies to enact change within society through intentional organization and participation. Making the Difference: Your Role in Civic Participation is a hands-on workshops that provides access to research and promotes civic participation today and responsive civic leaders of tomorrow.

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IX. MASCLAB Engage

Elyse Blake, and Lisa Mertes Sepahi

Dr. Ioana Literat, Dr. Lalitha Vasudevan,  
Sponsors: Media and Social Change Lab (MASCLab)

MASCLab Engage provides opportunities to explore how we can make media engagement meaningful and participatory beyond the production and publication of media artifacts. This project is composed of three components: Podluck (Podcast Launch and Broadcast series), Brown Bag series, and Digitally Different.

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X. The 2^nd Annual Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Oratorical & Spoken Word Competition
Selema Moliga, and Jackie Tuliau
Sponsors: Office of Residential Services, and Office of Student Affairs

The Martin Luther King, Jr. Oratorical and Spoken Word Contest is an opportunity for TC students to share their passion or interest in social justice with the TC Community. This event provides students with an opportunity to perform pieces related to this year’s theme, “Injustice Anywhere is a Threat to Justice Everywhere.”  

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XI. The Spring 2018 Rural Education and Healthcare Initiative
Ty McNamee, and Chase McNamee
Sponsors: Rural Student Group

This initiative educates communities on the issues rural areas face concerning education and healthcare. The Rural Education and Healthcare Initiative includes a film screening, speaker event about the rural opioid crisis, a TC admitted rural student social, and “Rural Day.”

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XII. Theater of War Performance with Guest Speaker Brigadier General Loree Sutton (Ret.) MD, Commissioner of New York City Department of Veterans Services
Joseph Geraci, and Lauren Withmore
Sponsors: Resilience Center for Veterans & Families

The Theater of War presents readings of Sophocles’ Ajax and Philoctetes to military and civilian communities across the United States and Europe. These ancient plays timelessly and universally depict the visible and invisible wounds of war. The purpose in presenting these two plays is to de-stigmatize psychological injury, increase awareness of post deployment psychological health issues, disseminate information regarding available resources, and foster greater community resilience.

 

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XIII. (Un)Spoken: A Celebration of Mother Tongue Day

Dr. Carol Bensen, and Julianne Parayo
Sponsors: Department of International and Transcultural Studies

(Un)Spoken is an initiative that recognizes all mother languages, encompassing both oral languages and sign languages. To reclaim and celebrate the many languages and cultures in our local community, individuals from Teachers College and from Columbia University, local participating schools, and Harlem community members join in to share their mother tongues through any form of expression. Academic professionals from the United Nations, as well as, hopefully, the New York City Chancellor of Education also speak about the significance of linguistic diversity in our homes, classrooms, and communities. Professor Carol Benson of the International and Transcultural Studies Department, in addition to professors from other departments, discusses the array of linguistic diversity at Teachers College and why it is important for institutions worldwide to incorporate more languages into action items. Public speakers from the Harlem community also discuss why linguistic diversity needs to be represented more in communities across New York City.

 

I. Asian/ Asian American Educational Conference

Jungmin Kwon, Yeji Kim, and JungHyun Kim

Sponsors: Korean Graduate Student Association

Despite the large number of Asian and Asian American students at Teachers College, few efforts have been made to create an academic conference focusing on the educational experiences and voices of Asian and Asian Americans. The Asian/Asian American Educational Conference is an academic conference where students. Researchers, educators, and professionals can share their educational and teaching experiences and research on educational issues in Asia/ Asian American community.

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II. Contributions of Indigenous Knowledge to Education: Responding to New Migration in New York City Schools (A Conference)

Regina Cortina and Amanda Earl

Sponsors: International and Transcultural Studies Department

The Contributions of Indigenous Knowledge to Education: Responding to New Migration in New York City Schools is a two day conference of academics, researchers, and students from Teachers College and wider NYC communities to learn and engage from conversation with indigenous leaders and educators who are wither from indigenous communities in Mexico or work closely with the communities from which many immigrants are entering the NYC public school system. The conference will host a series of panels of educators and academics working both in the US and Mexico.

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III. Curriculum and Teaching Graduate Student Led-Conference

Sarah Van Den Berh & Dr. Haeny Yoon

Sponsor(s): C&T Student Advisory Council

The idea of the Graduate Student Led Conference (GSLC) arises from C&T’s spring 2016 ‘Creating Spaces for Diversity’ town hall, which is centered on the department’s Diversity Report and students’ lived experiences of diversity. The GSLC addresses multiple issues of diversity and community raised at those conversations and the subsequent conversations in Student Advisory Council, including 1) creating opportunities for student leadership and familiarization with the academic community norms to which all students have had access to; 2) making public advanced masters and doctoral student research that deals with issues of diversity and community; 3) creating spaces to promote the research of communities in particular who feel less represented in the academic discourse of C&T and education more broadly, including international students and teacher practitioners.

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IV. Deaf Awareness Events

Rebecca Jennings and Maria Hartman

Sponsors: Deaf and Hard of Hearing Services

The Deaf Awareness initiative aims to educate members of the TC campus and broader public about topics surrounding the Deaf and Hard of Hearing community. The planned events will focus on the Deaf and Hard of Hearing as a cultural minority. These events include: Religion in the Deaf Community which will discuss how being deaf has influenced the beliefs od Deaf people and how they are shared outside the Deaf community, Parenting a Deaf Child and Making which focuses on how the research and book of Laura Mauldin has impacted her own perspectives of educating Deaf children, and Noise in Silence which is a 19-minute film that immerses viewers into a completely Deaf world.

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V. Deaf Music: Universal Design in the Classroom and Beyond

Hannah Ehrenberg & Dr. Julia Silvestri

Sponsor(s): Deaf Education Program-Health and Behavioral Studies Department (HBSE)

Deaf Music: Universal Design in the Classroom and Beyond, would build on the goals outlined in a previous Deaf music event at Teachers College by leading educators and musicians into the world of deaf music with the goal of collaborating on a project that underscores the principles of universal design to provide accessible musical education and produce accessible musical compositions. With a dual focus on education and production, the collaboration will explore Deaf culture and deaf education through the shared experience of music.

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VI. A Discussion on the Medicalization of Mental Illness and its Effect on the Lives of People with Mental Illness

Dr. Helen Verdeli, Alaa Alhomaizi & Srishti Sardana

Sponsor(s): Department of Counseling and Clinical Psychology

A Discussion on the Medicalization of Mental Illness and its Effect on the Lives of People with Mental Illness aims to bring together the TC community of graduate mental health students, professionals and educators, mental health professionals in the field, researchers, policymakers, members of the media and persons with lived experience to discuss effects of the biomedical model of mental illness. While the increases in research in epigenetics in psychiatry has benefited people with mental illness through the development of improved treatment modalities and nuanced, complex understanding of mental disorders, it inadvertently promoted a more deterministic and stigmatizing view of mental illness. Therefore, we aim to discuss in depth the advantages and disadvantages of assuming the medical model for the etiology of mental health diseases and the way it affects the lives of people with mental illnesses.

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VII. 8th Annual Diversity in Research and Practice Conference

Andrew Mulinge & Brian Allen

Sponsor(s): Black Student Network

The Diversity in Research and Practice Conference is successfully entering its 8th year at Teachers College. The annual conference seeks to create a platform for sharing academic research that will impact and empower communities of color. Scholars invited to this conference will present original research papers, host roundtable discussions, and participate in symposia. There will be a keynote speaker and an esteemed panel selected by the conference committee. Each component seeks to provide attendees with exposure to current research in various disciplines dedicated to the advancement of minority and marginalized groups. A second and important goal of the DiRP Conference is to expose students interested in academic research to the conference format, and opportunities for networking so that they are prepared to thrive in settings of academic discourse.

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VIII. Fracturing the Silence(s): Life Writing for Survival for Same-Gender Loving (SGL) African American Men

Dr. Janet Miller, M. Irene Oujo, Joyce Maxwell & John-Martin Green

Sponsor(s): Department of Arts and Humanities & English Education

The workshop Fracturing Silence(s): Life Writing for Survival for Same Gender Loving (SGL) African American Men will be a two-day event connecting same-gender loving men living within the Harlem community to the TC community. The initiative focuses on storytelling, life writing, memoir, memory and personal history as creative tools for empowerment and positive mental/emotional health. The workshop goals; are manifold; however, the primary goal is to launch a healing paradigm grounded in self-reclamation by creating safe spaces in which African American men articulate and share their stories about racialized identity, masculinity and sexuality.

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IX. Intercultural Film

Lauren Norville and Portia Williams

Sponsors: Office of International Services

Intercultural Film event seeks to display the film The Dialogue (or known as Crossing Borders) and engage in meaningful dialogue between international and domestic students at Teachers College. The initiative aims to provide a safe space to discuss a range of potentially sensitive topics raised in the film, such as identity, cultural perceptions, and culture shock. There continues to be a gap between student views and experiences. This event hopes to not only take a step toward bridging the gap, but also allow participants to re-assess or re-think their place in the world.

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X. Language that Labels! Deconstructing Negative Discourse Brown Bag Series

Martha St. Jean and Rashida Moore

Sponsors: Department of Mathematics, Science, and Technology

Within urban education, words and phrases including trouble-maker, at-risk, defiant, have been used to define and explain the experiences of certain boys and girls, thereby affecting and determining their treatment in schools. Instead of identifying students by their names, they are perceived through behavior. This space is not the final solution but will play an important role in transforming how educators of students of color, within urban spaces, interact with and address the politics of schooling. Brown Bags are an informally positive method of disruption. The space will be used to address the negative schema developed through the years by students about success, failure, and school, with the goal of what educators can do to initiate formal and lasting change.

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XI. Leadership Salon

Chloe Wright & Jumpei Kato

Sponsor(s): Organizational Leadership Association

This event is composed of panel discussions and round table activities hosted by students or alumni from different programs with different backgrounds and will end with a group discussion with the facilitator(s). Through communication, it is our hope that the attendees will gain an opportunity to exchange ideas with students from variety of programs on the topic of leadership and what that looks like in a variety of fields. Leadership is one of the core values most of our academic programs promote. However, there are very few opportunities to cross-pollinate skills, and knowledge across departments. It is our hope to create a community space where together, faculty and students and discusses leadership and what leaderships looks like in a diverse community.

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XII. Mapping LGBT History

Dr. Melanie Brewster & Kenya Crawford

Sponsor(s): The Sexuality, Women, and Gender Project 

Mapping LGBT History will be an event that invites historians from the NYC LGBT historic Sites Project to come to Teachers College and lead a lecture educating the audience on the history of the LGBT community specifically within NYC. After the lecture, there will be a walking tour of sites on campus, the surrounding Upper West Side, and within the Harlem community. Through collaboration with the NYC LGBT Historic Sites Program we hope to promote diversity regarding the LGBT history and enhance community ties. The event’s goal is to create a cohesive community amongst the surrounding communities while simultaneously educating people about NYC LGBT historic sites.

 

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XIII. Martin Luther King Speech Competition

Lema Moliga & Jacki Tuliau

Sponsor(s): Office of Residential Services & Student Development and Activities

The Martin Luther King Jr. Speech Competition is an opportunity for TC students to share their passion or interest in social justice issues with the TC community. Students will have the opportunity to submit speeches related to a social justice issue that they are passionate about and a committee will narrow down the submissions and select 4 finalists to recite their speeches at the speech competition. Speeches must be 5 minutes or less and must stick to the theme of “Keeping the Dream Alive.” Students will be able to share personal experiences, things they’ve learned in the classroom or issues/topics that are close to their hearts. 

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XIV. MASCLAB Participatory Screening Series

Joe Riina-Ferrie, Cristina Salazar Gallardo & Lisa Mertes Sepahi

Sponsor(s): Media and Social Change Lab

The Media and Social Change Lab (MASCLab) participatory screening initiative is our way of putting into action the idea that engagement with media products can be more than a passive act of receiving information. Rather, we aim to use three screenings to intentionally build connections between the community participants that both produce and watch media. We will use these film screenings to anchor events that invite people to use what they have learned and seen to engage across institutional boundaries on the social issues presented: immigrant rights, foster care, and gun violence. This series invites people to be active participants in a set of ideas, conditions, and challenges--to accept roles as not just attendees of a series but as co-inquirers and citizens. This supports a focus on diversity and community by bringing together many interested parties through the use of a common media artifact to start conversation, allowing for common ground outside of our usual patterns and partners of discourse.

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XV. Mind-Body Wellness for Special Needs

Shivangi Khatter, Saloni Dev & Jin Zhao

Sponsor(s): Neurodiversity & Student Development and Activities

Neurodiversity is the philosophy and civil rights movement that advocates the fact that the conditions identified as developmental disabilities (e.g. Autism, Dyslexia, ADHD) are natural expressions of the human brain and mind. Akin to the intersectional identities based on sex, gender, race, ethnicity. These conditions can be considered as different cognitive orientations. People diagnosed with such conditions often have a remarkable talent in certain areas, however, those exceptionalities are often overlooked, and said people are stigmatized for not conforming to the typical majority. Nevertheless, a healthy society needs all kinds of minds to work together, as well as educators who are versatile to learning differences. NeurodiversiTC aims to reach students, faculty, and staff across many departments to shift the paradigm on curricula, pedagogy, assessment and policy. The motto behind our work is: “Different, not less”- Temple Grandin. 

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XVI. Queer TC Week

Jason Wang & Darius Brown

Sponsor(s): Queer TC

Queer Week (Q-llage) brings together scholars, citizens, members of the media, and civic figures to discuss the real life issues faced by members of the LGBTQ community. Participants will engage in thoughtful, critical discussion about a variety of topics spanning the LGBTQ spectrum. There will be up to 5 sessions over the course of the week, which will address intersectionality between Queer TC and other collaborating student groups: Black Student Network, the Coalition of Latin@ Scholars, the Sexuality, Women, and Gender Project, and Peace Education Network.

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XVII. SIEats Dinner

Carihanna Morrison, Olivia Pan & Elizabeth Park

Sponsor(s): Society for International Education

After conducting a survey of the Teachers College community, SIR found that there is a strong desire for more social events and opportunities to learn more about the community at TC. The SIEats Dinner provides that opportunity to bring the Teachers College community together, specifically to celebrate our diversity with a community dinner sponsored by several cultural organizations. In Everett Lounge, we will provide student organizations and independent groups of students with individual tables where they will bring two to three cultural dishes (one grain-bases and one meat-based) and music. In the center of the room will be several round tables to seat our 40-50 expected participants. Students and faculty will be able to eat, connect, and learn about the home and culture of a few of their classmates at these tables. These conversations will also be facilitated and nurtured by discussion and art activities. We expect at least five organizations to participate and two student groups representing Jamaica and China have been confirmed.

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XVIII. Stories from an American Institution

Dr. Brandon Velez, Sarah AlSaidi & Dalal Alhomaizi

Sponsor(s): Department of Counseling and Clinical Psychology

This initiative is a first time event for the TC community. This is a unique opportunity to engage in a multidisciplinary conversation on mental health care and policy in America with Lucy Winer, a person with lived experience of mental illness. The film reveals the painful legacy of our state hospital system and the crisis left by its demise. The screening of Kings Park will bring a new lens to discussions on public mental health care and stigma. We aim to provide students and the TC community with a safe space to discuss stigma and mental health care as well as bring awareness to the issues impacting our country’s mental health care system.

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XIX. Strengthening Community Collaborations around Rights and Justice: Non-profit Organizations, Academia and the Community in Dialogue

Dr. S. Garnett Russell, Fatima Abdelwahab & Sandra Sirota

Sponsor(s): George Clement Bond Center for African Education

In the 2017 spring semester, the George Clement Bond Center for African Education will launch an event series at Teachers College including presentations, panels, and workshops that bring together the Teachers College community, the greater New York City communities, and the global communities that are engaged in work, research and activism related to education, rights and social justice in Africa and the African diaspora. Our goal is to foster meaningful dialogue and collaboration around the pressing issues facing these communities today. Racial discrimination has been brought to the forefront locally, nationally, and internationally around issues such as police and community relations and unequal access to education. The Black Lives Matter movement in the United States and Fees Must Fall movement in South Africa are just two examples of a coordinated response to this discrimination. The Center hopes that by bringing different actors seeking to end discrimination into dialogue they may work in collaboration towards justice and equity.

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XX. A Workshop on Revolutionary Love: Exploring Individual & Collective Understandings of Race, Culture, and Self within Education

Moira Pirsch and Christina Chaise

Sponsors: Hip Hop Pedagogy and Research Group & Institute for Urban and Minority Education (IUME)

This is an interactive workshop that will offer not only opportunities for participants to experience these creative workshop styles, but also to be able to apply their own contexts to utilizing these contexts. This workshop will expand beyond the walls of the room it is housed in, incorporating the use of social media and sharing/exploring ideas with a global community online through twitter and facebook. The workshop will utilize contemporary Hip Hop cultural practices, small groups, interactive exercises and creative prompts that lead the audience to collectively brainstorm.

The Committee for Community and Diversity is pleased to announce the award recipients from The Vice President’s Diversity and Community Initiatives Grant Fund. The grant fund provides financial support for projects that foster interactive, inter-group communication, collaboration and educational programming with an emphasis on diversity and/or community. Eighteen proposals were submitted and the following twelve projects were selected for funding.

Thank you very much to the DCI Grant Selection Committee (a Sub-Committee of the President's Committee for Community and Diversity [CCD]): Frederick Awity, Yvonne Destin, Nicholson Durand, Prof. Daniel Friedrich, Prof. Jay Heubert, Jolene Lane, Samantha Lu, Janice Robinson, and Chelsey Saunders.

DCI GRANT ABSTRACTS 2015-2016

I. Black History Month Film Festival
Mikel Moss and Samuel Ortiz
Sponsors: Student Senate, Queer TC, Black Student Network, and the Coalition for Latino(a) Scholars

The Black History Month Film Festival seeks to engage in a dialogue around the issues that people within the African Diaspora face through the medium of film. There are five films that will be shown once per week. The Film Festival will provide the space to discuss and dissect the themes of each film, and how the issues addressed in the films relate to contemporary issues and future work in the field.

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II. Building Bridges: Recreating Communities: Afro-Latino(a) and the Breach between African Americans and Latinos
William Garcia, Andrew Viñales, and Omaris Zamora
Sponsors: The Coalition of Latino(a) Scholars and Black Student Network

The Coalition of Latino(a) Scholars and the Black Student Network are hosting Building Bridges: Recreating Communities: Afro-Latino (a) and the Rift between African Americans and Latinos by engaging in an interactive conversation that will cross community boundaries, in order to address this ongoing rift between African Americans, Latin, and Afro-Latino communities. This event hopes to encourage its participants to embrace the differences and similarities between blackness and latinidad.

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III. Celebration of Teaching
Dr. Beth Clark-Gareca
Sponsor: TESOL and Applied Linguistics Program

The Celebration of Teaching (CoT) is a mini-conference that focuses on issues surrounding serving English Language Learners (ELL) in public schools in New York. The CoT seeks to promote inter-group communication and collaboration by connecting different groups of practitioners, pre-service and in-service teachers, and the teachers’ different disciplines across the College.

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IV. Critical Dialogues and Diverse Perspectives on African Education: Voices from
Community, Academia, and Civil Society
Dr. S. Garnett Russell, Amelia S. Herbert, and Christine Bell
Sponsor: George Clement Bond Center for African Education

The George Clement Bond Center for African Education is hosting Critical Dialogues and Diverse Perspectives on African Education: Voices from Community, Academia, and Civil Society which is a series of presentations, panels, and roundtables that will bring together the Teachers College community, the greater New York City community, and the global communities that are engaged in work and research related to education in Africa and the African Diaspora. The primary goal of the series is to highlight the array of resources and organizations related to African studies and education in both the TC and NYC communities, to celebrate diversity of Africa and the African Diaspora, and to foster critical dialogues on issues relating to the education of Africa and people of African descent.

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V. 2016 Annual Diversity in Research and Practice Conference (DiRP)
Jennifer Etienne and Erica Bibby
Sponsor: Black Student Network

The 2016 Annual Diversity in Research and Practice Conference aims to provide a platform to showcase academic research that will impact and empower communities of color. Invited scholars will share their original research papers and host roundtables. Another important goal of the DiRP conference is to expose students interested in academic research to the conference format as well as to networking opportunities that will help them thrive in future settings of academic discourse.

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VI. Educational Equity ACTion!: NYC Public High School Students Use Theatre to Shine a Spotlight on Education Inequities in New York State
Michael A. Rebell, Joe Rogers Jr., Ambar Paulino
Sponsor: The Campaign for Educational Equity

The Education Equity ACTion! is a joint project of the Campaign for Educational Equity (CEE) at Teachers College, Columbia University, and Epic Theatre Ensemble (Epic). With this initiative, talented New York City public high school students step into the spotlight and use theatre to expand youth leadership in the movement for educational equality.

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VII. The Hidden Treasure of Black ASL
Rebecca Jennings
Sponsor: Deaf and Hard of Hearing Services

The Hidden Treasure of Black ASL will explore the ideologies about disability and deafness, the history of education for deaf African-American children, the distinct language patterns and items in the African-American variety of sign language, and the change in the sign language variety after desegregation. In addition to focusing on the inequality of the educational system for racial minorities, this event will focus on the disparities experienced by individuals within the Black Deaf community.

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VIII. The Mental Health Awareness Conference: Shattering the Stigma, Breaking Down Barriers, and Creating Change
Dala Alhomaizi, Sarah Alsaidi, and Alaa Alhomaizi
Sponsor: Department of Counseling and Clinical Psychology

The Mental Health Awareness Conference: Shattering the Stigma, Breaking Down Barriers, and Creating Change aims to bring together the TC community of graduate mental health students, professionals and educators, mental health professionals in the field, researchers, and persons with lived experience to discuss effective interventions to reduce stigma and discrimination of mental illnesses. This conference hopes to help individuals with existing mental illness reduce the stigma of mental illness, better serve this population with compassion, empathy, and professional efficiency, and share current research about the diverse manifestations of stigma and the interventions that can be utilized to reduce the burden of mental health stigma.

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IX. Participatory Intergenerational Hip Hop & Health Research Project
Moira Pirsch
Sponsor: Institute for Urban and Minority Education

The Participatory Intergenerational Hip Hop & Health Research Project is a two event series that explores the effort of understanding the connections between healing, spirituality, and hip hop culture. This event hopes to cross community boundaries by promoting inter-group communication, collaboration, and education.

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X. Sustainability and Innovation: Social Policy in South Asia
Soumya Mishra and Srishti Sardana
Sponsor: Development in South Asia

The Development in South Asia is hosting Sustainability and Innovation: Social Policy in South Asia for graduate students from across New York State. The conference is centered on the United Nations agenda of the shift from Millennium Development Goals to Sustainable Development Goals. In addition, the conference will provide avenues for students to network with scholars interested in South Asia, aid their professional development and support individual scholarly work to lead to publication.

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XI. (Un)Spoken: A Celebration of Mother Tongues
Sara Frodge and Chiara Fuller
Sponsor: Society of International Education

The Society of International Education presents (Un)Spoken: A Celebration of Mother Tongues which is an initiative primarily to celebrate Mother Language Day. This initiative seeks to emphasize the importance of recognizing mother tongue languages at educational and community based levels. Students and professionals are invited to share stories through artistic forms of expression that highlight their unique mother language.

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XII. Writing for Wellness: A Writing Workshop for Women of Color in the Academy
Esther Ohito, Nicole Pearson, Karishma Desai, and Mary Ann Chacko
Sponsor: The Department of Curriculum and Teaching

The Department of Curriculum and Teaching presents Writing for Wellness: A Writing Workshop for Women of Color in the Academy is a daylong workshop on writing and wellness, and writing for wellness. This workshop will be designed to support the professional, academic and intellectual success and well-being of self-identified women of color, in and beyond university spaces. The workshop participants will be guided in learning habits and structures that are the foundation of a productive, proactive and (re)generative writing practice.

 

The Vice President’s Grant for Diversity and Community Initiatives
2014-2015 Grant Recipients

The Committee for Community and Diversity is pleased to announce the award recipients from The Vice President’s Diversity and Community Initiatives Grant Fund. The grant fund provides financial support for projects that foster interactive, inter-group communication, collaboration and educational programming with an emphasis on diversity and/or community. Eighteen proposals were submitted and the following fourteen projects were selected for funding.

Thank you very much to the DCI Grant Selection Committee (a Sub-Committee of the Committee for Community and Diversity [CCD]): Yvonne Destin, Isaac Freeman, Jolene Lane (Chair), Keith Layton, Tiffany Lindley, Janice Robinson, and Yolanda Sealey-Ruiz. Thank you also to Ashley Maxie-Moreman, Veronica Puente, and Choumika Simonis, Graduate Assistants, for their administration of the details of the grants.

DCI GRANT ABSTRACTS 2014-2015

I. 13th Annual ALAS Conference: Creative Economy in Latin America, Perspective from Culture and Education
Lina Alfonso, Maria del Pilar Riofrio-Flores
Sponsor: Association of Latin American Students (ALAS)

The Association of Latin American Students (ALAS) is hosting the 13th Annual ALAS Conference: Creative Economy in Latin America, Perspective from Culture and Education. This one-day conference is dedicated to a cross-cultural discussion exploring the role of culture and education as drivers of social and economic development. Along with providing a platform for critical discussion, this conference seeks to provide a space for students and scholars to present their research and papers on the topic of cultural economy and to learn from the professionals who are scrutinizing the challenges being addressed through cultural and educational interventions and policies.

II. 2015 Annual Diversity in Research and Practice Conference (DiRP)
Ashley Maxie-Moreman, Courtney Rose
Sponsors: Teachers College Black Student Network

The 2015 Annual Diversity in Research and Practice Conference aims to provide a platform to showcase academic research that will impact and empower communities of color. Invited scholars will share their original research papers and host roundtables. An important goal of the DiRP conference is to expose students interested in academic research to the conference format as well as networking opportunities to help them thrive in settings of academic discourse.

III. Circle of Voices: A TC Celebration of International Women’s Day
Christian Tanja, Kevin Wong, Amanda Earl
Sponsor: Society for International Education, International and Transcultural Studies

The Society for International Education and International and Transcultural Studies are hosting an event to celebrate the achievements and progress in advancing gender equality, equity, and rights for all. Circle of Voices seeks to encourage cross-cultural, cross-departmental, and cross-sector dialogue related to girls’ and women’s rights to encourage awareness of International Women’s Day and inspire younger generations. This event is open to all in the TC and Columbia community, NYC teachers, high school students, and NYC professionals.

IV. Community Theatre Event: “Renaissance in the Belly of a Killer Whale” Professor Yolanda Sealy-Ruiz
Sponsor: Teachers College English Education Program

Renaissance in the Belly of a Killer Whale serves as an invitation to the TC community to engage in a topic that has and continues to affect the community surrounding Columbia directly – gentrification. The play promotes inter-group communication, encourages understanding that can lead to collaboration, and promotes education on an issue that remains a contested topic for many. Through a montage of dialogue, spoken word, poetry, song, and memories, Renaissance tells the story of three young women from Harlem who journey through its streets, history, landmarks, renaissance, and evolving culture.

V. Cultural Event and Educational Workshop
Dianne Marcucci-Sadnytzky
Sponsor: Teachers College Center for African Education (CAE)

Teachers College Center for African Education’s (CAE) Cultural Event and Educational Workshop initiative seeks to bring the vibrant cultures of Africa to TC’s campus and into the classrooms of local public elementary and high school teachers. The first component, the Cultural Event, will highlight the diverse arts found across Africa for a broader audience at TC. Following, the Educational Workshop, occurring in the Spring 2015 semester, will provide an opportunity for teachers to discuss ways to teach about Africa and the diaspora, topics of cultural sensitivity and cultural differences, and to strengthen the relationship between New York City teachers and the CAE.

VI. Date Columbia
Chen Zheng, Shicong Li
Sponsor: Future China Initiative

Date Columbia intends to build a platform for social networking. The two sub-themes of Date Columbia are Date Columbia People, and Date Columbia Campus. The former aims to encourage networking relationship for the student community, while the latter promotes the services that the university has to offer. Finally, Date Columbia will recruit a bilingual Master/Mistress of Ceremonies, holding auditions for qualified candidates from different backgrounds.

VII. Deaf Education: Perspective on Media and Literacy
Julia Silvestri, Professor Ye Wang
Sponsors: Deaf Education Program – Health and Behavior Studies Department

Deaf Education: Perspective on Media and Literacy is a one-day event consisting of a panel/roundtable discussion with a diverse group of participants in the field of Deaf Education. In accordance with the National Deaf Education Center’s Critical Needs of Students Who are Deaf or Hard of Hearing: Public Input Summary and the collaborative National Agenda for Moving Forward on Achieving Educational Equality for Deaf and Hard of Hearing Students, this event seeks to address the urgent and the critical need of developing collaborative partnerships and to remove barriers and support the language and literacy development of deaf children.

VIII. Grassroots Advocacy & Leadership Training Workshop: Changing the Climate of Your Field
Ashley Maxie-Moreman
Sponsor: Department of Counseling and Clinical Psychology

The Grassroots Advocacy & Leadership Training Workshop: Changing the Climate of Your Field seeks to strengthen student’s skills in grassroots advocacy work on diverse issues. This workshop will teach students ways in which they can become more involved in the outcomes of policy initiatives and acts of legislation in their field of work by focusing on inter-group communication skills and collaboration with political figures. Becoming involved in the ongoing battles concerning access to care in underserved communities, lack of diversity in the workplace, and important issues plaguing graduate students every day is essential for change. This workshop will teach students the “how” and the “why” of lobbying, getting to know your legislator and building a networking relationship, facilitating appropriate forms of communication with your legislator and staff, and getting electorally involved.

IX. I Learn America, Screening and Panel Discussion
Annie Cho
Sponsor: Department of Curriculum and Teaching

The proposed event is a screening of the documentary, I Learn America, followed by a panel discussion and question/answer period with the filmmaker and International High School teachers and students. The screening and panel discussion aim to provide a deeper understanding of the complicated experience of adolescent immigrants as they navigate their new home in America. The panel will invite questions and generate discussion on educational practices and policies for English language learners and immigrants. Though this film is based on a high school in Brooklyn, New York, the issues are applicable to any community, including Harlem and Morningside Heights, in its emphasis on cultural diversity and equal education for all students.

X. Intimate Partner Violence Within LGBTQ Relationships
Elizabeth Geiger
Sponsor: The Sexuality, Women and Gender Project; New York City Anti-Violence Project

The Anti-Violence Project specializes in violence impacting LGBTQ populations and has agreed to provide an educational presentation to the Teachers College community. The event will consist of panelists from the Anti-Violence Project who will provide education specifically focused on domestic violence and sexual assault within the LGBTQ population. Thus, the goals of this event are to expand the community’s awareness, knowledge, and understanding of violence within LGBTQ relationships. This event hopes to inspire mental health professionals and vast community members to obtain competency through its educational focus.

XI. Korean Night
Eun Jeong Jun
Sponsor: Korean Graduate Student Association

Korean Night is an opportunity to bridge the gap between the international community and the rest of the campus, to enhance the ongoing efforts to broaden cultural awareness, and to eliminate the cultural boundaries which undeniably still exist within Teachers College today. The idea is to provide an occasion in which the entire TC student body can come and enjoy an evening of fun, hands-on games, and entertainment specific to the Korean culture, and by doing so, celebrate the country’s rich culture and history. Activities consist of making traditional crafts, playing folk games, writing names in Korean calligraphy, trying on traditional costumes/attire, tasting Korean traditional snacks, and more.

XII. Neurodiversity Awareness Month
Brian Kinghorn; Professor John Black; Daniel Deihle
Sponsor: Department of Human Development

In order to promote awareness of Neurodiversity a month-long series of events is proposed showing media and engaging discussion. Neurodiversity, first coined by sociologist Judy Singer in the 1990s, is the burgeoning philosophical movement that advocates for rights and equality for individuals with many conditions that are called disorders (i.e. Autism, Dyslexia, ADHD). The Neurodiversity movement promotes that these conditions are natural expressions of the human brain and mind and can be considered different cognitive orientations. Educators must be versatile to learning differences. This initiative aims to reach students, faculty, and staff across many departments to shift the paradigm on curricula, pedagogy, assessment and policy.

XIII. Q-llage@TC
Jacks Cheng; Emma Candon
Sponsor: QueerTC

Q-llage@TC is an initiative aimed to create a multifaceted learning platform which views queerness as an holistic concept for scholars who conduct research in queer issues and who express themselves as queer persons and allies outside of academia. Q-llage@TC will organize a one-day conference featuring academic presentations (e.g. workshops, roundtable/panel discussions, poster and paper presentations) and creative performances on queer issues (e.g. film, writings, fine arts, music, spoken art). Q-llage@TC seeks to cross community boundaries by affirming various intersectional identities of a scholar’s life – as an academic, a community member, an artist, a performer, an athlete, etc. – by providing a space to showcase these identities holistically to the community, and promoting intergroup communication, collaboration, and education by involving the communities associated with these identities and those at large.

XIV. The Left in South Asia
Nyoka Joseph; Maulshree Gangwar
Sponsor: Development in South Asia (DISHA)

Development in South Asia (DISHA) is organizing a half-day conference for graduate students from universities in New York and nearby areas, around this year’s academic theme entitled The Left in South Asia. The theme is addressing emerging leftist politics in South Asia regarding educational policy and development through-out the region. This half-day conference will be organized around four working groups addressing aspects of the conference theme, and culminate with a key-note speaker.

The Vice President’s Grant for Diversity and Community Initiatives
2013-2014 Grant Recipients

The Committee for Community and Diversity is pleased to announce the award recipients from The Vice President’s Diversity and Community Initiatives Grant Fund. The grant fund provides financial support for projects that foster interactive, inter-group communication, collaboration and educational programming with an emphasis on diversity and/or community. Eighteen proposals were submitted and the following fourteen projects were selected for funding.

Thank you very much to the DCI Grant Selection Committee (a Sub-Committee of the Committee for Community and Diversity [CCD]): Randall Allsup, Christina Chaise, Yvonne Destin, Deanne DeCrescenzo, Jay Heubert, Isaac Freeman, Jolene Lane (Chair), Janice Robinson, and Melanie Williams. Thank you also to Shyla Dogan, Ashley Maxie-Moreman and Choumika Simonis, Graduate Assistants, for their administration of the details of the grants.

GRANT ABSTRACTS

I. Conference – Creating a Better Future for ALL: Doing My Part
Dr. Christine E. Pawelski, Leslie Schmerler, FCA-TC Student President
Sponsor: Future Child Advocates of Teachers College (FCA-TC)

The Future Child Advocates of Teachers College is planning a one-day conference to raise public awareness about the child abuse issues and creating healthier communities for the future, to establish professional development activities on critical child abuse issues including hosting community speakers to enhance knowledge and skill development, and to create an opportunity to demonstrate community-school involvement in the areas of child abuse prevention. FCA hopes to be a model for other clubs interested in getting involved in child abuse issues and establishing student organizations in their communities.

II. Date Columbia
Zhiyin Jin, Chen Zheng
Sponsor: Future China Initiative

Date Columbia aims to build a romantic and relaxing atmosphere for students at Columbia University. This initiative aims to provide an opportunity for students to mix and mingle with one another and make new friends or find a significant other. In the first part of the initiative, “Blind Group Date,” students will be blind-folded, and make their first impressions by talking about their interests and experiences. The goal is for students to have a positive and delightful experience by getting to know another person.

III. Diversity in Research and Practice Academic Conference 2014
Allen Wright, Christina Douyon, Tameka Spence
Sponsor: Black Student Network

The Diversity in Research and Practice (DiRP) Conference seeks to create a platform for sharing academic research about empowering communities of color. Scholars will present original research papers and host roundtable discussions. One goal of the conference is to provide exposure to current research in various disciplines dedicated to the advancement of minority and marginalized groups. Another important goal is to expose students interested in academic research to the conference format as well as networking opportunities that will help them thrive in settings of academic discourse.

IV. Interrogating Girl’s Empowerment in South Asia
Mary Ann Chacko, Maulshree Gangwar
Sponsor: Development in South Asia (DISHA)

Development in South Asia (DISHA) will hold a workshop seeking to examine girls’ empowerment in South Asia. The Workshop is open to graduate students attending universities in New York City with the hope of promoting professional collaborations and mutual support for scholars studying South Asian studies with a focus on gender. The conference will focus on dominant conceptions of girls’ empowerment, how discourse surround this topic constructs the lives of girls in that region, and the implication for focusing on girls’ education and empowerment for boys in South Asia.

V. Join the Conversation: Uniting People with Swallowing Disorders and Their Supporters
Dr. Georgia Malandraki
Sponsor: Swallowing, Voice and Neuroimaging Laboratory

This conference sponsored by the Swallowing, Voice and Neuroimaging Laboratory aims to raise awareness about swallowing disorders and their complications across the Morningside Heights and Harlem communities; educate the community about dysphagia and safe swallowing practices; bring people together facing similar challenges and encourage them to participate in inter-group discussion in order to create a supportive network and make them feel more integrated within the community.

VI. Latin American Arts and Society: Performance and Discussion
Oscar Ardila, Julian Zapata
Sponsor: ALAS

The Latin American Arts and Society: Performance and Discussion event will present live extracts from one of Verdi’s operas dedicated to Latin America (particularly to Peru and Brazil’s Amazon region). The musical performance will be presented as a representation of the socio-economic realities of Latin America in the 19th century. Extracts of Verdi’s contemporary Brazilian composer Antonio Carlos Gomes, who wrote music inspired by the Amazon region, will be presented as well. The two musical performances will initiate a group reflection and discussion. The event’s purpose is to present Latin American music as an alternative to traditional music, and one aim is to discuss the role of the arts as a social construct based on culture, education, and economic relations.

VII. Mindfulness into Action
Mariana Vergara
Sponsor: Organizational Leadership Association

Mindfulness into Action is an initiative that aims to help participants become more mindful when engaging in discussions about diversity. The rationale for this initiative stems from the insight that many personal and societal issues occur due to people being unaware of their taken-for-granted assumptions at a subconscious level. By using Collaborative Inquiry, the initiative will facilitate students’ experiences to foster transformative learning that encourages reflection and challenging their assumptions. It will create a space that will facilitate awareness of their taken-for-granted assumptions regarding diversity issues. The group will meet weekly for two hours live and/or via video conference. In addition, a blog, website, and Facebook group will be set up for global communication, interaction, and multimedia sharing.

VIII. Neurodynamic Lunch Hour
Serena Wolf
Sponsor: Spirituality & Mind/Body Institute

Neurodynamic Lunch Hour is a straightforward educational approach to health prevention through body awareness based on work by Dr. Theodore Dimon, Adjunct Assistant Professor in the Department of Counseling Psychology. Dr. Dimon will lead participants through interactive exercises. The Lunch Hour has already attracted participants of all ages, backgrounds, and various members of the TC community. It is offered to all students, faculty, and administrative staff at the College.

IX. Neuroscience Spring Lecture Series
Dr. Gina Buontempo, Mary Elizabeth Birarelli
Sponsor: Psi Chi International Honor Society in Psychology

The Neuroscience Spring Lecture Series for the Spring 2014 semester was selected to include research on School, Developmental, Clinical, Counseling, and Social-Organizational Psychology with Neuroscience. It will provide the opportunity for inter-departmental discussion on research and academic opportunities in the field. The event will draw graduate students and professors from a wide range of specialties at Teachers College, which adds breadth and dimension to the discussions. By providing an opportunity to see world-renowned researchers discuss their work, we are giving a solid platform for all students to experience the value of higher-level thinking and academic pursuits. The Psi Chi Society will host a “Meet and Greet” before the lectures with food and beverages provided.

X. Pathways of Possibility: Reversing the School to Prison Pipeline
Dr. Lalitha Vasudevan
Sponsor: MST/CCTE

Pathways of Possibility: Reversing the School to Prison Pipeline is an interactive series featuring panel discussions, arts projects, and workshops which focuses on the constellation of social, racial, and economic justice issues at the intersection of the criminal justice and education systems. It also investigates opportunities to facilitate systems-level change. This series will highlight education and criminal justice system partnerships that will both place the needs of justice-system involved youth and adults as their central focus and shift interventions from a punitive to rehabilitative strategy. The goals of the series are threefold: (1) to create a robust TC and Columbia-wide dialogue on making educational equality and racial justice central in the approach to justice system reform; (2) to present stories and narratives of the people most impacted by the consequences of educational and justice system inequity; and (3) to create opportunities for cross-departmental, cross-discipline, and cross-sector partnerships that place the needs of involved people at the center of initiatives.

XI. TC Players
Gladys Perez-Mojica
Sponsor: Community College Research

TC Players aims to bring together actors, singers, musicians, and dancers in the TC Community on a weekly basis to explore art forms, work in-depth on projects, and create an annual performance. The goal is to provide enjoyment, inspiration, and education among the participating artists and for the TC community as work is shared. There will be physical and vocal exercises, feedback and discussion from group members about performances, and small group work sessions for performers who want feedback on specific projects. All sessions will be open to everyone in the TC community, regardless of performance background.

XII. TEDx Teachers College
Andras Molnar
Sponsor: TEDx Teachers College

TEDx Teachers College is committed to hosting an annual conference with the purpose of promoting TED’s goal: “Ideas worth sharing.” Agents of Change is the theme for the April 4, 2014, TEDx event. TEDx TC plans to invite a variety of speakers from within the TC community, the greater New York area, and international organizations and individuals to discuss topics relevant to this year’s theme. Several TEDx speakers from our student population will share ideas, projects, and dissertations. The aim is to promote reflection on topics representing a wide range of academic fields and interests, encourage discussion of ideas shared, and raise the academic discourse at TC. In addition to the panel, other events will be held leading up to the main event in April to introduce topics and generate interest.

XIII. Women of Color Scholars (WoCS) Symposium
Esther Ohito, Nicole Fleming, Karishma Desai
Sponsor: Department of Curriculum and Teaching

The Women of Color Scholars (WoCS) is proposing a symposium to promote intellectual interchange, inter-group communication, and education. WoCS aims to do this by assisting women of color scholars in developing supportive peer and mentor networks; providing relationship, community, and coalition building opportunities; and crafting and implementing targeted programming that assists development of skills and strategies for professional success and personal well-being. The symposium activities will focus on one key question: What are the intersections and interstices of sisterhood, scholarship, and social justice, for women of color in the academy? This colloquium will be open to the public and geared towards drawing in people and resources from the Morningside Heights and Harlem communities.

XIV. Youth Historians in Harlem
Barry Goldenberg, Myrtle Jones, Dr. Ernest Morrell
Sponsor: Institute for Urban and Minority Education (IUME)

The Youth Historians in Harlem (YHH) initiative is an after-school program where local high school youth learn to “do” the work of historians by researching the history of the Harlem community. During the academic year, participants in the initiative will meet with students twice a week, help them apprentice as historians, and research topics about the history of education in Harlem through interactive culturally relevant pedagogy. The YHH initiative’s goals are to promote inter-group communication, collaboration, and education. In order to accomplish these goals, the initiative has three interactive components built into the curriculum: historical interactions, technological interactions, and community interactions. The initiative’s curriculum and program structure will provide students with the opportunity to engage in various ways over the course of the year.

The Committee for Community and Diversity is pleased to announce the award recipients from the Vice President’s Diversity and Community Initiatives Grant Fund. The grant fund provides financial support for projects that foster interactive, inter-group communication, collaboration and educational programming with an emphasis on diversity and/or community. Eighteen proposals were submitted and the following twelve projects were selected for funding.

Thank you very much to the DCI Grant Selection Committee (a Sub-committee of the Committee for Community and Diversity (CCD): Yvonne Destin, Isaac Freeman, Richard Keller, Jolene Lane (Chair), Samantha Lu, Sherill Ren, and Janice Robinson. Thank you also to Randolph Scott-McLaughlin, Graduate Assistant, for his administration of the details of the grants.

 

(1) 10th Annual Education Across the Americas Conference

María Pía Otero and Ana Cecilia Galindo Diego

Sponsor: Association of Latin American Students

The 10th Annual Education Across the Americas Conference brings together scholars working on education issues in Latin America and the Caribbean to discuss research, build collaborative relationships, and develop new critical conversations. This year’s conference brings together scholars conducting research related to Latin American and Latino education focusing on questions concerning education in and across these regions.

(2) Becoming a Critical Organic Catalyst

Siqing He and Jenny Ko

Sponsors: Asian & Pacific Islanders in America Initiative (APIA), Coalition of Latino/a Scholars, Black Student Network

Becoming a Critical Organic Catalyst is a new series which seeks to implement a forum and career panel, through which students of color and white allies from the TC community can come together to share and learn from their unique experiences as ethnic and racial individuals while also recognizing their community and their place in larger society. The forum is structured like an Open Mic Night reception, where pre-chosen students will share about their experience at TC, a particular social justice issues that is important to them, a poem, or any topic or issue concerning them. Thus they will be inviting other presenters to share as well. There will also be a career panel featuring speakers who will discuss alternative career paths for conducting research outside of academic institution, and in community-based organizations.

(3) Breaking the Bamboo Ceiling Series

Siqing He and Jenny Ko

Sponsors: Asian & Pacific Islanders in America Initiative (APIA), Organization and Human Development Consulting Club (OHDCC)

The Breaking the Bamboo Ceiling Series will consist of a reading and discussion group revolving around Jane Hyun’s book, “Breaking the Bamboo Ceiling” which will be given out in December before Winter Break. Participating students from different fields will meet twice during spring 2012 to deconstruct the implications of the book and to analyze the effects that the intersection of race, culture, and power have in the workplace and larger society in creating the bamboo ceiling effect. The culminating event will be a career panel composed of Asian Americans in leadership positions from different fields and organizations who will examine their careers, offer advice, and discuss their experience as Asian Americans in leadership roles.

(4) The 2012 Critical Race Studies in Education Conference (CRSEA)

Dr. Michelle Knight-Diop, Associate Professor of Education, Curriculum and Teaching,

Terrenda White and Limarys Caraballo

Sponsor: Department of Curriculum & Teaching

The primary goals of The 2012 Critical Race Studies in Education Conference are (1) to engage students with critical issues of race and diversity and also (2) to highlight students of color whose research and scholarship involves the enrichment of educational experiences for traditionally under-represented students and groups across the P-20 spectrum.

(5) Educational Justice in South Asia and The South Asian Diaspora

Dr. Monisha Bajaj, Assistant Professor of Education, International and Transcultural Studies,

Karishma Desai and Shenila Khoja

Sponsor: Development in South Asia (DISHA)

The Educational Justice in South Asia and The South Asian Diaspora one-day conference is a unique and critical initiate that aims to foster dialogue among current and future leaders, practitioners, scholars, activists, and students interested in educational equity and justice in South Asia and the South Asian diaspora. This is an effort to illuminate issues of inequalities that are context specific, and themes that transgress across geographical and cultural boundaries. The conference will cultivate transnational discourse on pressing topics such as human rights education, immigration, schooling, youth experiences, activism, social movements, education, gender, and sexuality.

(6) Envision Yourself

Dinorah Sanchez and Lisette Sanchez

Sponsor: Coalition of Latino/a Scholars

Envision Yourself is an outreach program for traditionally marginalized students in community, city & state colleges in New York City and surrounding areas. The outreach will consist of bringing together Teachers College and Columbia students, faculty, and staff and students from other colleges. Students and faculty of color will form informational panels to provide inspirational models specifically for first generation college students, and encourage them to abandon their perception of inconceivable possibilities in higher education. The panelists are chosen on the basis of excellence in academic achievement, involvement, and transition so as to serve as role models – thus enabling participants to envision themselves in college and as professionals.

(7) Exploring Cultural Competence

Kai Chung Tam and Hantian Wu

Sponsor: Teachers College Chinese Students and Scholars Association (TCCSSA)

The Exploring Cultural Competence series is attempting to bring various members of the TC community together, sharing the knowledge of experience in the topic of cultural competence, and also to encourage students who might have taken the avoidance strategy to interact more actively with the broader culture. They aim to achieve this through a deeper understanding of the perception international students have of cultural differences and how they are dealing with such differences. The series will create opportunities that allow all members of the TC community to be more informed about cultural competence, and to discuss manners of personal and organizational adjustments to improve it.

(8) Middle East and Muslim World Education Research Dialogue: Insider and Outsider Perspectives

Janae Bushman and Karen Bryner

Sponsor: The Association for the Advancement of Learning in The Middle East and Muslim World (TAALIM), Society of International Education (SIE)

This initiative provides a venue each semester for Teachers College students to connect with their counterparts in the Middle East and around the world. There will be three presentations from each university participating in the web-conference which will give students the opportunity to show their research from that semester. The goals are to bring together students and faculty members who are interested in the academic and cultural aspects of the Middle East and Muslim world, to provide a forum for students to talk about different perspectives and experiences relating to education issues in the Middle East, and to extend the research themes explored by TC’s Society for International Education.

(9) Mindfulness and Education Working Group Lecture Series

Sarah Sherman

Sponsor: Mindfulness and Education Working Group

The Mindfulness and Education Working Group Lecture Series seeks to promote the role of mindfulness and contemplative practices in education by inviting the leaders in this burgeoning field to discuss their research and practices. The series will be a four-part series with two events in the fall and two events in the spring. The lectures of the series will feature scholars and practitioners who are recognized nationally and internationally in the mindfulness community and will allow attendees to engage in small group workshops to explore their personal practice of mindfulness.

(10) Racial Literacy Roundtables Series: Peer-to-Peer Conversations on Teaching in Urban Schools

Dr. Yolanda Sealey-Ruiz, Assistant Professor of English Education, Arts and Humanities

Sponsor: Teachers College English Education Program

The Racial Literacy Roundtable Series will feature six discussions which will be facilitated by established scholars in the field of urban education, masters and doctoral students across Teachers College as well as doctoral students from Ithaca College. The Racial Literacy Roundtables are a student-facilitated series that focuses on issues of race, class, privilege and access with in-service and pre-service teachers and members of the Teachers College Community. TC Assistant Professor of English Education, Dr. Yolanda Sealey-Ruiz, is faculty supervisor for the Roundtables.

(11) Spring Leadership Summit

Thomas Eskew, Christie Rall and Aarti Subramanian

Sponsor: Organization & Human Development Consulting Club (OHDCC), Organizational Leadership Association (OLA)

The second annual Spring Leadership Summit is a four-part workshop series that aims to bolster leadership growth of TC students, staff, and community members. The series will feature lectures and discussions from leadership experts to help individuals further develop their own leadership strengths.

(12) What is an African? Migration and African Identity

Dr. George C. Bond, William F. Russell Professor of Anthropology and Education, International and Transcultural Studies, Evan Hendon and Dan McGovern

Sponsor: The Center for African Education

This four-part series, What is an African? Migration and African Identity, seeks to explore the question of what it means to claim African identity in an era of migration and globalization. The goal is to provide inter-university collaboration and dialogue by including speakers from a range of universities and from the New York City African community.

The Vice President’s Grant for Diversity and Community Initiatives

2010-2011 Grant Recipients

The Committee for Community and Diversity is pleased to announce the award recipients from The Vice President’s Diversity and Community Initiatives Grant Fund. The grant fund provides financial support for projects that foster interactive, inter-group communication, collaboration and educational programming with an emphasis on diversity and/or community. Thirty proposals were submitted and the following eighteen projects were selected for funding.

Thank you very much to the DCI Grant Selection Committee: Yvonne Destin, Peter DiCaprio, Isaac Freeman, Jolene Lane (Chair), Samantha Lu, Janice Robinson, and Professor John Saxman. Thank you also to Adrianna Maldonado, Graduate Assistant, for her administration of the details of the grants.

I. 9th Annual Education Across the Americas Conference

Rita Kamani and Enery Lopez

Sponsor: Association of Latin American Students (ALAS)

The 9th Annual Education Across the Americas Conference will bring together scholars working on educational issues in Latin America and the Caribbean to share research, build collaborative relationships, and develop new critical conversations about questions concerning education in and across Latin America and the Caribbean.

II. Bi- and Multi-Lingualism in Young Children: Supporting Families, Cultivating Linguistic Diversity

Professor Susan Recchia and Patrice Nichols

Sponsor: Rita Gold Early Childhood Center (RGC)

The RGC is committed to supporting families by cultivating children’s language development and respect for cultural and linguistic diversity. The initiative includes an interactive symposium open to the TC community, consisting of a panel with expertise and scholarly interest in emergent bilingualism.

III. Black Student Network 2011 Diversity in Research Conference

Nathan N. Alexander

Co-Sponsor: Black Student Union (BSN) and Teachers College Student Senate

The primary goal of this inaugural Diversity in Research Conference is to provide a local space for TC and other graduate students to present their ongoing research. The conference will primarily focus on issues surrounding diversity in education, presenters will also speak to broader issues in educational policy, teaching and learning, race and ethnicity, urban youth studies, higher education, and justice initiatives.

IV. Brown Bag Meditation Series

Sarah Sherman

Sponsor: Active Minds and Peace Education Network

Co-Sponsors: Dr. Catalina Crespo-Sanchez, International and Comparative Education Programs, Mili Thomas, Clinical & Counseling Psychology, Joe Levitan, Peace Education Network, Samantha Snowden, Columbia University, Buddhist Association, Franziska Stutz, Developmental Psychology, and Nathan Baptiste, Student Senate

The aim of the Brown Bag Meditation Series is to take a break from academic work, grades, publishing, and work productivity to refocus and invigorate students, faculty, and staff to return to their tasks refreshed and renewed. Members of the TC community will be invited to participate in 20-30 minutes of guided meditation sessions twice each week. They will sit, relax and focus on their breathing. At the end of the sessions all attendees will have the opportunity to debrief and share their experiences with the group.

V. China Scope

Susan Mays and Yao Zhang

Sponsor: Teachers College Chinese Students and Scholars Association (TCCSSA)

China Scope seeks to provide students, teachers, and others with a broad-based understanding of contemporary China so that they can be more effective and engaged in their 21st century communities. The conference will offer a solid introduction and analysis of today’s Chinese economy and society and special emphasis will be given to how TC as an institution and community can truly have an impact as “global educators” to address this challenge.

VI. “Discovering Your Leadership Strengths” Summit

Martin Gonzalez and Marissa Magno

Co-Sponsors: Organization & Human Development Consulting Club (OHDCC) and Organization and Leadership Association (OLA)

The “Discovering Your Leadership Strengths” Summit is a series of workshops aimed at helping TC students learn how to lead effectively across their varying roles and contexts. It will focus on building leadership capacity in a multifaceted manner by utilizing several methods: lecture and discussion with leadership experts, leadership assessment tools, reflective practice, group coaching, and networking opportunities.

VII.Enfocándonos en Nuestro Futuro

Gabriela Alvarado, Nancy Mata, and Elena Vasquez

Sponsor: Coalition of Latino/a Scholars

Through Enfocándonos en Nuestro Futuro, The Coalition of Latino/a Scholars seeks to provide outreach to high school students who are traditionally underrepresented in higher education and may be marginalized, encouraging them to finish high school and pursue higher education. By bringing together local NYC high school students, Teachers College and other Columbia University students, as well as faculty and staff, this initiative seeks to open communication lines among students of different socioeconomic, geographic, educational, and cultural backgrounds.

VIII. Envision Yourself

Gabriela Alvarado, Nancy Mata, and Elena Vasquez

Sponsor: Coalition of Latino/a Scholars

This annual event brings together college students, Teachers College and Columbia University students, as well as faculty and staff to create open lines of communication among students of different socioeconomic, geographic, educational, and cultural backgrounds specifically to create pathways to graduate school. Envision consists of a panel and workshop organized in conjunction with the Offices of Admission and Financial Aid and TC faculty and administrators.

IX. Everyday Africa

Melissa Cushman, Thieny Vinh Nguyen, and Soo Park

Co-Sponsor: Center for African Education (CAE), Professor George Bond, Department of International and Transcultural Studies, Program in Anthropology & Education, Society for Anthropological Studies (SAS), and African Studies Working Group (ASWG)

This four-part event seeks to provide participants with glimpses of every day life in different parts of Africa, with the intent of educating them about this often misconceived continent and its people. It endeavors to promote new knowledge, tolerance, and respect for the diversity of linguistic, cultural, racial, and ethnic difference that exist in Africa and communities of the African Diaspora around the world.

X. Expanding Access to Learning: Possibilities and Challenges for Higher Education in Urban, 21st Century America

Leslie Williams and Milagros Castillo

Sponsor: Higher and Postsecondary Education Program and Professor Anna Neumann

The Teachers College Higher and Postsecondary Education (HPSE) lecture series extends the conversations and activities that are currently alive in the HPSE program regarding concerns about diversity and access to learning to the entire TC and Columbia University communities.

XI. Fostering Social Action Through Social Issue Media

Professor Lalitha Vasudevan & Ahram Park

Sponsor: Program in Communication, Computing, and Technology in Education

This four-part series, “The Social Issue Media Series,” seeks to explore the intersection of social issues, social action and media. The goal is to provide opportunities for the TC community to explore and engage in an open dialogue about issues that affect our daily lives, on a local and global scale.

XII.Friday Conversations

Jovany Suriel, Nii Ato Benti-Enchill, and Professor Laura Smith

Sponsor: Department of Counseling Psychology

Friday Conversations is a student led discussion group that is open to all TC students. The content of the group’s discussions are not preset, rather, they are driven by the thoughts, experiences, and emotions of the students who attend. Through the interactions of the diverse attendees, the group aims to create an enriching educational experience.

XIII. Intercultural Bilingual Education

Catalina Crespo-Sancho

Sponsor: Latina/o and Latin American Faculty Working Group and Professor Regina Cortina

This initiative seeks to bring together experts in the field of intercultural bilingual education, with scholars and students in the TC community to examine and learn more about this educational approach. Intercultural Bilingual Education will focus on bilingual education, particularly within the context of Guatemala and Peru. It will feature a presentation on the history and political mobilization of indigenous organizations, and how initiative can lead to educational reforms and intercultural bilingual approaches.

XIV. Intersections: A Learning Symposium on Immigration, Gender & Youth

Ramatu Bangura

Sponsor: Professor Michelle Knight-Diop and the Department of Curriculum and Teaching

Intersections: A Learning Symposium on Immigration, Gender & Youth is an opportunity for scholars, community-based practitioners, students, and professors to share and learn from scholarship and community work at the intersection of immigration, gender, and youth. In addition to roundtable discussions, panels, and poster sessions, this initiative will include a post-symposium listserv and blog in order to ensure that the conversations initiated at the symposium will be on-going.

XV.Leadership through Service: KDP Foundation Day Conference

Alexander Pope

Sponsor: Kappa Chapter, Kappa Delta Pi (an International Honor Society in Education)

In keeping with the organization’s ideals of Service, Leadership, and Scholarship, the Kappa Chapter of Kappa Delta Pi will host two events – A one-day conference entitled “Leadership through Service” will have a special focus on the role of education and educational institutions in the larger New York City community, and the Kappa Chapter of KDP welcomes the TC community to participate in the restoration of the mural located at the KIPP/PS125/Columbia Secondary School facility on 123rd Street. March 8, 2011, is the 100th Anniversary of the founding of Kappa Delta Pi, and TC’s chapter is one of the founding chapters.

XVI. The New York City Department of Education’s Young Male Initiative

Travis J. Bristol and Professor Carolyn Riehl

Co-Sponsors: The Department of Organization & Leadership and the Black Student Network (BSN)

Recently, the New York City Department of Education created a young male initiative in response to the low and decreasing numbers of male high school graduates. This first-time event seeks to bring together New York City’s Deputy Chancellor, Santiago Taveras, faculty members from the department of Organization and Leadership, Professors Carolyn Riehl and Luis Huerta, and members from the Black Student Network and Association of Latin American Students, to develop an action plan on practical solutions to address this crisis.

XVII.Racial Literacy Roundtables: Peer-to-Peer Conversations on Teaching in Urban Schools

Emily Carman, Lauren Gengo, James Kang, Prof. Yolanda Sealy-Ruiz

Co-Sponsor: Prof. Yolanda Sealy-Ruiz, English Education Program, Arts & Humanities Department

Racial Literacy Roundtables (RLR) seek to foster open dialogue about race, issues pertaining to race, language difference, and sexual orientation, primarily among pre-service and in-service teachers across the college. Conceptualized as a peer-to-peer forum, RLRs hope to bring together students and faculty across departments to discuss the different topics.

XVIII. TC Allies Reading Group

Professor Laura Smith

Sponsor: Counseling and Clinical Psychology Department

The TC Allies Reading Group is designed to bring together staff, faculty, and students around common texts focused on privilege and/or whiteness. The initiative seeks to utilize a book club format as a springboard for discussion and critique of privilege, and as a means of bring together faculty, staff and students.

The Vice President’s Grant for
Diversity and Community Initiatives
2009-2010 Grant Recipients

The Committee for Community and Diversity is pleased to announce the recipients of awards from The Vice President’s Diversity and Community Initiatives Grant Fund. The grant fund provides financial support to projects that foster interactive, inter-group communication, collaboration and educational programming with an emphasis on diversity and/or community. Numerous proposals were submitted and the following fourteen projects were selected for funding.

ALAS Second Art Exhibit: From Latin America

Rita Sanchez and Paul Neira

Sponsor: Association of Latin American Students (ALAS)
The goal of ALAS Second Art Exhibition is to educate the community about Latin American art and culture through the display of paintings from different artists from Latin America and Spain, documentary screenings, and educational programs. This year, the exhibit will run parallel to ALAS’ Annual Conference, will feature work from new artists, and will offer the workshop Latin American Art: Teaching and Learning Mathematics through Art.

Educating on the Edge: Panel on Alternative Education Programs in the City of New York

Erick Gordon, Director of SPI

Sponsor: Student Press Initiative

Co-Sponsor: National Center for Children and Families - Jondou Chen, Project director

The initiative seeks to introduce the TC community to the work of New York City educators working with students in alternative education programs. Students from these populations are often overlooked and underserved and the session aims to bring together administrators, teachers and TC students working in these settings. In collaboration with District 79, the Alternative Education Department at the NYC Department of Education, this panel hopes to encourage Teachers College and alternative education schools to work collaboratively to improve the lives of students in alternative settings.

GiSCA-Palooza!

Sarah Bever and Eric Shieh

Sponsor: Global Initiative for Social Change through the Arts (GiSCA)

GiSCA-Palooza! is an initiative sponsored by GiSCA (Global Initiative for Social Change Through the Arts) with the specific goal of enacting dialogue across Teachers College’s diverse departments about the role of the arts in social change and in creating equitable education communities. The event invites students from across the TC and broader Columbia graduate communities to participate in a performance/exhibition and to process exploring different approaches to artistic work and their relationship to social change.

Got Stress? Stress and Time Management Strategies

Dr. Dinelia Rosa, Director of the Dean-Hope Center for Educational and Psychological Services & Mia Ihm

Sponsor: The Psychological Emergency Response Team (PERT)

Co-Sponsor: Office of Student Activities and Programs

The Psychological Emergency Response Team and the Office of Student Activities and Programs will co-sponsor a series of six two-hour stress and time management workshops for the TC community. The workshops will raise awareness of the role of stress on the body and the mind, on interpersonal relationships, and on performance in school or at work. The workshops will teach highly-effective ways to identify and reduce stress in the hopes that all participants will incorporate stress-reduction and time management techniques into their daily lives.

Party for the People

Jondou Chen and Joanne Wu

Sponsor: Asian & Pacific Islanders in American (APIA) Initiative

Co-Sponsor: The Black Student Network
Party for the People will consist of two social gatherings that seek to unite students of color with white allies in the TC community to celebrate our unity in diversity. These events aim to celebrate the unique experiences of different ethnic and racial groups represented by student organizations such as the Asian and Pacific Islanders in America (APIA), the Black Student Network (BSN), and the Coalition of Latino/a Scholars (CLAS) while also recognizing commonalities between and among other groups. These events will promote healing and restoration and promote greater dialogue throughout the TC community. The events will take place in the fall and in the spring.

Peace Education Conference

Laura Menchaca Bishop, Maria Bermeo, and Chris Wescott

Sponsor: Peace Education Network

Co-Sponsor: Peace Education Center

The Peace Education Conference is envisioned as a new space where participants from various disciplines can explore concepts, ideas and practices related to educating for peace and justice. This event will engage TC community members in the process of critical thinking and creativity and discuss the importance of fostering dialogue regarding human rights and conflict resolution. The conference will feature workshop sessions, traditional forums and other opportunities for self-reflection.

People of Color Caucus:

No Longer Minorities: Experience of Students of Color at Teachers College

Jondou Chen and Tracy Ng

Co-Sponsors: Asian & Pacific Islanders in American (APIA) Initiative, Black Student Network, & Coalition for Latino/a Scholars

This joint venture between the Asian and Pacific Islanders in America Initiative (APIA), the Black Student Network (BSN), and the Coalition for Latino/a Scholars (CLS) seeks to create a forum for discussing the experiences of students of color at TC. Participants in the two forums will be encouraged to share their experiences in order to build a stronger community of change agents and create broader support networks for communities of color. In these forums, the TC community will join the students in discussing definitions of people of color and how we can all use our collective power to change our community. One forum will take place during the fall semester and the other during the spring.

Racial Literacy Roundtables: Peer-to-Peer Conversations on Teaching in Urban Schools

Emily Carman, Lauren Gengo, James Kang, and Prof. Yolanda Sealy-Ruiz

Co-Sponsor: Prof. Yolanda Sealy-Ruiz, English Education Program, Arts & Humanities Department

Racial Literacy Roundtables (RLR) seek to foster open dialogue about race, issues pertaining to race, language difference, and sexual orientation, primarily among pre-service and in-service teachers across the college. Conceptualized as a peer-to-peer forum, RLRs hope to bring together students and faculty across departments to discuss the different topics.

The Social Web: The Practice of Online Life

Karen Velasquez and Gabrielle Oliveira

Sponsor: Society for Anthropological Studies

Co-Sponsor: Teachers College Student Senate

The Social Web: The Practice of Online Life is an event which seeks to look at online social networking through an anthropological and interdisciplinary lens in order to gain a better understanding of how diverse communities of practice and subcultures interact through online mediums such as blogs and social networking sites (facebook, Wikipedia, twitter, 4chan, and others). The forum discussions will be moderated by Dr. Herve Varenne, Professor of Education in the Anthropological Education Program.

TC Table Tennis Club

Gang Bao and Ena Haines, Director of CIS

Sponsor: CIS

Co-Sponsor: The Chinese Students Association

The initiative seeks to set up a TC Table Tennis Club that will provide an alternative setting for faculty, staff and students from different cultural backgrounds to socialize, relax, exchange ideas, build friendship, and last but not least, to improve health. The club will provide weekly practice sessions under the instruction of Dr. Gang Bao, a one-time professional table tennis player. As members’ skills improve, two teams will be created (one for staff and faculty, the other for students), and will complete in an annual open tournament.

Training Workshop for Working with LGBT Students

Michael Weinberg

Sponsor: QueerTC

This initiative provides a forum for professional trainers to educate the TC community on effective ways to make schools safer for LGBTQ youth in primary and secondary schools and to disseminate information related to the experiences of LGBTQ youth. The presentation by GLSEN (the Gay, Lesbian, Straight Education Network), will address a myriad of issues specific to the LGBTQ community, including the experiences of LGBTQ students of all racial, socio-economic, cultural and religious backgrounds.

What’s the Deal with A.P.I.A.?

Faculty Reflections on the APIA Experience in U.S. Higher Education

Tracy Ng and Joanna Wu

Sponsor: Asian & Pacific Islanders in American (APIA) Initiative

What’s the deal with A.P.I.A.? Faculty reflections on the APIA experience is hosting three faculty meet-and-greets where TC community members will hear TC APIA faculty members share about their lives and their work specifically through a racial identity paradigm. These sessions are also designed to foster dialogue between faculty and students who often have little opportunity to connect beyond the classroom.

Who is African? Writing about Africa and the Diaspora

Stephanie Bengtsson and Kathleen Dowling

Sponsor: Center for African Education (CAE), The African Studies Working Group, and Professor George Bond, Department of International and Transcultural Studies

This three-part event seeks to explore how writers write about Africa in a number of different spheres and the impact that writing about Africa has on public opinion. This initiative brings together a diverse audience on a conceptual journey, which involves attempts to understand how Africa exists in the written word. The three part sessions include – A Book Breakfast (featuring Uzodinma Iweala, author of Beats of No Nation, which depicts a child soldier in an African country), a panel discussion & reception, and a student panel & workshop.

The Women’s Movement and NGOs in Latin America

Dr. Regina Cortina and Angye Rincon Castillos

Sponsor: International & Transcultural Studies Department

This initiative seeks to provide an opportunity to analyze the social reality of Latin American women and the role played by women’s Non-governmental Organizations (NGOs) in the region. This event will consist of a lecture featuring Dr. Lia Zanotta Machado (a leading scholar who specializes in feminist movements, violence, and sexual and reproduction rights) and Ruth Cardoso (Professor at the Institute of Latin American Studies), as well as a panel with the executive directors of leading women’s NGOs in the region.

The President's Grant for Diversity and Community Initiatives

2008 - 2009 Grant Recipients

The Committee for Community and Diversity is pleased to announce the recipients of The President's Community and Diversity Grant Fund. The grant fund provides financial support to projects that foster interactive, inter-group communication, collaboration and educational programming with an emphasis on diversity and/or community. Numerous proposals were timely submitted and the following thirteen were selected for funding:

(1) Inclusion, Collaboration, and Engagement

Katharine Keenan, Jeffrey Schiffer, Lauren Click, and Stephen Tippett

Co-Sponsor: Society for Anthropological Studies, Professor Lambros Comitas

“Inclusion, Collaboration, and Engagement” is a series of events that will include a lecture, a panel discussion, and a film, all focusing on “hot topics” in anthropology. The series will host Professor Nadia Abu El-Haj of Barnard College who will lecture on archaeological practices in Israel as a form of nation-building. A panel discussion will be devoted to anthropological practice in war zones as it is pertinent to current U.S. Army practices in Iraq and Afghanistan. Finally, the film Born into Brothels will be shown and discussed in the context of HIV/AIDS and at-risk sexual practices in developing countries. The focus of all of these events echoes the program of the American Anthropological Association’s annual conference, and will revolve around different forms of collaboration and different methods of presenting themes with the hope of promoting cultural understanding.

(2) Second Annual Asian and Pacific Islander Faculty Meet and Greet

Jondou Chen and Shirley Duong

Co-Sponsor: Asian Pacific Islander American Initiative, Office of Student Activities and Programs

The 2nd Annual Asian and Pacific Islander Faculty Meet and Greet is designed to cross community boundaries, promote inter-group communication, collaboration, and education, while highlighting the fact that there remains a limited Asian political presence on campus. The Asian Pacific Islander American Initiative hopes to replicate last year’s successful Meet and Greet where over 100 faculty and students from various Asian backgrounds came together to meet one another.

(3) Rock Milbank! TC Battle of the Bands

Professor Randall E. Allsup, Program in Music and Music Education

Co-Sponsor: Department of Music and Music Education

“Rock Milbank! TC Battle of the Bands” will be a live concert that will feature original composition by TC music majors. Intended as a celebration to mark the end of the school year, this event is the culmination of the work of a two-semester course on creativity, democracy, and music education. This fun-filled event will be open to TC and Columbia community members, and will hopefully serve to bring together the larger Columbia community.

(4) Community Symposium on Teaching English Language Learners in Public Schools

Thao Tran and Yi-Sheng Lin

Co-Sponsor: Quality Teaching Partnership for English Language Learners Program

The Community Symposium on Teaching English Language Learners in Public Schools will gather educators, professionals, and students at TC in an all-day symposium to share and exchange experiences and ideas specifically addressing issues related to the education of English Language Learner students in the public schools, particularly in New York City. The symposium will foster a dialogue between educators from different specializations about challenges and methods of teaching and working with English Language Learners, discuss lessons and best practices in hope of incorporating them into classrooms, provide meaningful information to mainstream and content area teachers regarding English Language Learners, and to promote a collaborative initiative at TC to build a linguistically conscious learning community. The symposium is open to all members of TC who are interested in learning more about teaching English Language Learners and/or meeting teachers with similar goals.

(5) Workshop Series in Peace Education

Maria-Jose Bermeo and Chris Westcott

Co-Sponsor: Peace Education Network (PEN)

This workshop series is designed to explore both the pedagogical traditions and issues within the field of Peace Education; and to create a space for practitioners, academics, and activists within and beyond Columbia University to come together to share ideas, and to build relationships and community around the broadly defined field of Peace Education. Three to five events will be hosted in the winter and spring, featuring prominent guest speakers from local and global communities; workshops will also emphasize interactive skill-based trainings in popular education and Theater of the Oppressed.

(6) The Critical Conversations Coffeehouse

Jor-El Caraballo and Jondou Chen

Co-Sponsor: A.P.I.A. Initiative, TC Jewish Student Association, Queer TC, Coalition of Latino/a Scholars

The Critical Conversations Coffeehouse is designed to create a safe space to discuss the often side-stepped issues of diversity and community. Participants in these coffeehouses can be free to express themselves while committing to being challenged by alternative perspectives. Each CCC will focus on a particular topic – race, sexual identity, gender, religion, class, able-ism, political parties – and will begin with a casual meet and mingle with refreshments, followed by a facilitated conversation regarding a shared resource (video, song, poem, brief reading). The CCC seeks to balance, in the words of Emily Style, “the textbooks on the shelves and the textbooks of ourselves.”

(7) Human Dignity and Diversity: Celebrating Human Rights (an SIE Film Festival)

Hakim Williams and Dina Lopez

Co-Sponsor: Society for International Education

“Human Dignity and Diversity: Celebrating Human Rights” will be a one week festival using the art of film to celebrate the unalienable dignity of every member of our community. Each night will feature one film representing different parts of the world, and the directors/screenwriters/film representatives will be invited to present for a Q&A segment immediately following the film. The film festival will not only be a celebration of diversity, but a call to tackle, reflect upon, and eventually act on some of the most pressing contemporary issues relating to Human Rights.

(8) “Unifying South Asian Education”: a Roundtable and Networking Conference

Dr. Ameena Ghaffar-Kucher, Lauren Connolly, Maham Mela, Robert

Sepeda, Sarah Usmani

“Unifying South Asian Education” will be a half-day roundtable and networking conference that seeks to bring together and foster dialogue among current and future leaders, policy makers, practitioners, academics, and students interested in educational issues in South Asia. This event will also serve as a showcase of student research focusing on educational issues within various South Asian countries as a way to bridge different geographical and cultural boundaries within academia and policy making. U.S.-based representatives from a small group of non-governmental organizations (NGOs) that work with South Asia will be invited to present on their organization’s mission and projects.

(9) Fun Ways to Support Your Child with Reading & Writing

Jane Bean-Folkes

Co-Sponsor: Teachers College Reading and Writing Project

“Fun Ways to Support Your Child with Reading and Writing” is a series of workshops for all support staff and faculty members who wish to learn how to interact with their children around literacy. The goal is to foster conversation with parents and care-givers at TC by bringing a cross section of the community together. The workshops provide support but also help to expand community members’ knowledge through hands-on workshops in reading and writing. Workshops are given by Marjorie Martinelli, a K-2 literacy staff developer; Jane Bean-Folkes, a 3-5 literacy staff developer; and Chris Lehman, a middle school literacy staff developer.

(10) “Understanding Latin America…through Movies and Documentaries”

Angye Rincon Castillos, Santiago Alonso Diaz, Paul Neira Del Ben

Co-Sponsor: Association of Latin American Students

“Understanding Latin America…through Movies and Documentaries” is an event that seeks to provide an opportunity to analyze the social reality of Latin America. Through documentaries and movie screenings combined with academic discussion, the participants will reflect on the differences and the commonalities in issues such as globalization, poverty, government, immigration, and politics in the region. The event will be held on two different days and include a documentary/film screening preceded and followed by a guided academic discussion that will offer a framework to contextualize the social issues presented and to allow for a Q&A session that will allow the interaction and active reflection of the participants. All movies and documentaries will be donated to the TC library after the event.

(11) Student Symposium on African Education: Interrogating Educational Quality

Annie Smiley and Matthew Thomas

Co-Sponsor: African Studies Working Group

The Student Symposium on African Education will bring together students, researchers, and practitioners from inside and outside TC to share ideas and learn from each other about educational quality in Africa. This one day event is intended as a venue for graduate students to present their work and share their ideas, professors and practitioners will also be invited to participate via a keynote addresses and panel discussions. A poster session will also be held for those who wish to participate without actively presenting a paper. The conference will be interdisciplinary, and will draw from participants in the fields of education, anthropology, sociology, political science, and more. It will also be multicultural, featuring panelists from different backgrounds from the United States, Africa, and beyond. The African Studies Working Group sees this symposium as an opportunity to strengthen the TC-based community of students and scholars with interests in African Education.

(12) Got Stress? Stress Relief through Expressive Therapy

Dr. Dinelia Rosa and Lauren Fisher

Co-Sponsor: The Psychological Emergency Response Team (PERT) of Teachers College-Columbia University

The Psychological Emergency Response Team (PERT) and the Office of Student Activities and Programs will co-sponsor four Expressive Therapy Workshops for the TC community. The goals are: to provide education regarding stress and its impact on one’s mind, body, interpersonal relationships, and performance in school and at work; to teach different expressive techniques to reduce stress; to provide attendees with an opportunity to practice techniques together in a safe space; and to offer new ways to reduce stress among its attendees as they learn to incorporate expressive techniques into their daily lives. Each workshop will be two hours in length.

(13) LGBTQ Research Initiatives at Teachers College

Michael Weinberg and Lauren Fisher

Co-Sponsor: Queer TC

This event will provide a forum for researchers at TC to present their research to the entire Teachers College-Columbia University community in order to disseminate information related to the experiences of LGBTQ individuals. These presentations will deal with a myriad of issues specific to the LGBTQ community, including the experiences of LGBTQ “intersections” with race and gender, applications of research on microaggressions against members of the LGBTQ community, and the mental health concerns of LGBTQ persons, thus broadening the scope of gender, ethnic, and race studies. These interactive presentations will give the researchers an opportunity to present their work and for attendees to discuss the work in a safe, open, and productive manner.

The President's Grant for Diversity and Community Initiatives

2007- 2008 Grant Recipients

The Committee for Community and Diversity is pleased to announce the recipients of The President's Community and Diversity Grant Fund. The grant fund provides financial support to projects that foster interactive, inter-group communication, collaboration and educational programming with an emphasis on diversity and/or community. Thirty-one proposals were timely submitted and the following sixteen were selected for funding:

(1). The Eighth Annual Second City International Conference on Disability Studies in Education: Mitigating Exclusion: Building Alliances Toward Inclusive Education Reform in Pedagogy and Policy

Professor Alicia Broderick and Professor Lynne M. Bejoian

Cosponsors: TC – Department of Curriculum and Teaching; City College/CUNY; Long Island University; National Louis University

This conference will explore the politics of exclusion in schools with a view to strengthening alliances between the field of disability studies in education and complementary areas of study and advocacy (i.e., feminist studies, queer studies, critical race studies, and so on) as we continue to agitate for and implement change toward more inclusive policies and practices in public education. The sponsoring organization for this conference is the Disability Studies in Education (DSE) special interest group (SIG) of the American Educational Research Association (AERA). This year the aim is to broaden our alliances in working toward inclusive education reform, by seeking both to build alliances with researchers in complementary areas of study, as well as by seeking the broader input and participation of other constituencies invested in inclusive education reform (i.e. classroom teachers, individuals labeled with disability/disabled people, family members of individuals labeled with disability/disabled people).

(2). TC DocNet 2008 Academic Exchange

Linda Choi

As a group formed for and by current doctoral students at Teachers College, the goal has been to respond to the collective needs and requests of our fellow doctoral students. TC DocNet aims to facilitate interdisciplinary academic conversations across TC programs and departments to build an enriched learning community among part-time and full-time doctoral students, faculty, and alums. This is a continuation of our successful first Academic Exchange last year. The forum was created for the sharing of scholarly interests in a range of educational issues, as well as research experience in different contexts using a spectrum of theories and methodologies outside of our programs.

(3). The Advancing African Diaspora Scholars Project

Sosanya Jones, Leslie Williams, Bianca Baldridge, Professor George Bond

The purpose is to provide doctoral students at Teachers College who are pursuing research on any and all aspects of the African Diaspora (including domestic African American and African issues as well as those pertaining to the international community) an integrative academic and social support system. Participation in the Advancing African Diaspora Scholars Project will be open to all disciplines and research interests related to the Diaspora which will inevitably range from issues pertaining to public policy, health, religion, philosophy, race, ethnicity, cultural relations, assimilation, and acculturation to economic and leadership issues, among many others.

(4). Chinese Culture Festival

Daoquan Li, Di Zhang

The “Chinese Culture Festival” at Teachers College is a new initiative to

"Chinese Culture Festival”, which spans one week from March 30th – April 7th, 2008. Targeting to be a more creative, in-depth and successful event, the “Chinese Culture Festival” will be composed of:

• “China in Spotlight”-- a week-long exhibition
• Three China Lectures/Panel Discussions (on the topics of “TC and China”, “Arts in China” and “Travel to China”, respectively)
• “Chinese Culture Night”

(5). Bridging the Gaps: Exploring Race with Student Teachers

Debbie Sonu, Melissa Mullineaux, Juhyung Lee

Cosponsor: Professor Molly Quinn, Dept. of Curriculum and Teaching

Bridging the Gap is a series of events and conversations around urban schooling and student teaching. It emerged from needs expressed specifically by pre-service students enrolled at Teachers College. The goals for this project include:

Bringing student teachers from different programs at TC together in safe spaces to explore constructs of race, class, and identity, as they relate to teaching and education, across disciplines and grade levels.

Connecting with local educators, scholars, practitioners, teacher networks, and non-profit organizations to inform our learning and pedagogy.

Synthesizing our inquiry by compiling a working handbook of critical readings and resources designed to support our future work as teachers committed to children of color.

(6). European Film Festival

Aygul Kabaca

The European Film Festival series is aimed at fostering a knowledge and understanding of Europe within the TC community. The series shows films and hosts intellectual exchanges focusing on the history, political developments and the society of different European countries. After every film screening, a native from the same country as the film, who will also be knowledgeable of the film’s main discussion points, will facilitate a discussion. In the discussions we intend to focus on themes which arise during the movies and related topics. This will include both historical events and their impact on today’s society as well as contemporary European issues, including immigration and equality.

(7). Focusing on the Future/Enfocandose en Nuestro Futuro

Cristina Marquez, Jessica Cruz

This project aims to expose, enrich, and empower underrepresented students by inviting them to attend the first annual “Focusing on the Future/Enfocandose en Nuestro Futuro” program in which TC’s Coalition of Latino/a Scholars students will give presentations about gaining access to a university education. The presentations will focus on college admissions, financial aid, and the costs and benefits of staying in school. A student panel will also answer students’ questions. The goal is twofold. First, to disseminate vital information on preparing for college to students who do not have access/support to college information. Second, to expose middle school and high school students to other successful Latino/a students who like them have accomplished and are pursuing their dreams of receiving an education in order to become productive and responsible citizens in society.

(8). Running Dialogue

Leigh L. Graham, Rob Graham, Sarah Slattery, Staci McGonigal

Cosponsors: Professor George Bond – Center for African Education; The African Studies Working Group; Professor Carol Garber – Dept of Biobehavioral Studies; Professor Fran Vavrus – Dept. of International Transcultural Studies

The goal of Running Dialogue is to bring women’s worlds together through cross-cultural collaborations on issues of health & fitness, education, and technology.

Running Dialogues will hold two events to accomplish this goal:

TC International Women’s Day 5K Race on March 8, 2008 and Running Dialogue International Symposium on April 3, 2008.

In preparation for the run Sudanese women from Ahfad University in Sudan will have built a training period partnership through the internet offering advice, motivation and building friendships. The 2 ½ hour symposium will feature faculty and student panels from Ahfad joining TC faculty and students via live video conferencing. The topic will be women in literary, health, fitness, and technology. The international exchange is about the local and the global.

(9). Asian & Pacific Islander Identity at Teachers College

Andy Chen, Jondou Chen, Naomi Lau, Paul Li, Zahra Lutfeali, Naaz Khan, Manny Prieto, Amita Shah

Asian & Pacific Islander Identity at TC seeks to explore and establish the Asian/Pacific Islander American presence at Teachers College. The purpose is to establish a monthly meeting to explore and establish the Asian/Pacific Islander American presence at TC. Each meeting will be organized around themes such as:

· Who are we? Weaving our individual stories together.

· Who are we (Part II)? Defining ourselves as a student organization, political entity, and social group.

· Back to School? Talking about the APIA academic experience at TC and in general.

· Lunar New Year? Understanding our connections to Asia/the Pacific.

· Platoon or Joy Luck Club or Whale Rider? Deconstructing portrayals of APIA in the media.

· Model Minority or Terrorist/Yellow N-Word/Harold & Kumar/etc? Fighting stereotypes and joining the struggle against race-based oppression.

· Plans for the future? Making the APIA initiatives sustainable.

(10). “Striving for Excellence in Native American Education: Bringing Two Worlds Together”

Elvira Bitsoi Largie, Ph.D., Minority Post-Doc Fellow

Dept. of Orgainzation and Leadership

Cosponsor: Professor Carolyn Riehl – Education Leadership Program

This program provides for American Indian/Native American (AI/NA) educators/leaders to present on NA/AI history and reform, intergovernmental relationships, federalism education, and legislatures and education policy. Following the presentations interactive activities will ensue to promote inter-group communication, collaboration, and education for participants.

(11). Talk To Me, To Know Me: An Inter-Group Dialogue at TC

Kimberley Chandler, Farrah Khan

Cosponsor: Professor Margaret Crocco – Teaching of Social Studies Program

Talk To Me, To Know Me: An Inter-Group Dialogue at Teachers College is a series of six dialogues beginning in November 2007 and ending in April 2008. The series will center on six major issues affecting members of the TC Community such as race/ethnicity, religion, sexual orientation, immigration, disability, and body type/images. The series will be guided by a facilitator, a 3-guest panel, media/film support, and community participation.

The goal of this six-part series of talks is to create a comfortable space for faculty, staff, and students of Teachers College (TC) to discuss issues affecting them as members of the TC Community. A second goal is to initiate a dialogue about issues affecting the faculty, staff, and students as members of the TC Community. A third goal is to create awareness of the issues facing the TC Community members. Finally, an overall goal is to strengthen inter-group communication and community here at TC.

(12). Power on the Ground: Anthropology Applications Education Series

Ariela Zycherman, Riannan Wade, Maria Brodine,

Youngsan Goo, Katie Keenan

Cosponsor: Professor Lambros Comitas

The Society of Anthropological Studies at Teachers College is planning a lecture/ film program this spring entitled “Power on the ground: Anthropology Applications Education Series”. It is a three part series made up of two lectures and one film. The theme of “Power on the Ground” is a response to Teachers College initiatives to draw attention to educational equality and democracy. The program is meant to create an educational forum where students and faculty can listen to each others’ experiences about power and then discuss the broad range of questions that are inspired by what power is, including but not limited to; who it effects, how it effects, what it means, how others react, what it leaves behind, how it manifests itself, how it is visible and how it is hidden.

(13.) Survey of Institutional Diversity for Teachers College:
Teachers College Columbia University: Initiative for Developing a Local Model of Institutional Diversity

Pamela Felder Thompson, Ph.D. – Higher Education Program

The Survey for Institutional Diversity is a two-phase initiative that includes dissemination of a web-based survey to the entire TC community: its faculty, students and administrative staff. Its purpose will be to collect data that will speak to the overall institutional belief system (collective consciousness) about issues of campus climate and diversity. To promote inter-group communication, collaboration and education, the results of this survey will be presented in a TC Community Forum. The Community forum will be an opportunity to discuss the design of the survey, share the most prevalent issues of climate, community and diversity, to discuss recommendations for its continued use, and the development and/or implementation of a local model for institutional community and diversity for Teachers College.

(14). “Strange Fruit”: A History of Lynching in America

Nicole Le Blanc, Marcus Johnson

The initiative, “Strange Fruit”: A History of Lynching in America, is an informative photo exhibit for the TC community. The initiative will provide a visual time-line of the tragic history of lynching in America. The goal is to make aware and educate those within the TC community to the history and significance of lynching. In addition, it is the aim of “Strange Fruit” to open up the dialogue and communication concerning race, racial injustice, and varying human experiences/perspectives amongst administration, faculty, staff and students.

(15). Black and Brown Dialogues

James Alford, Isabel Martinez

Cosponsor: Coalition of Latino/a Scholars (CLS);

Black Student Network (BSN)

The Black-Brown Dialogue addresses issues of cross race communication and coalition building between African-American and Latina/o students at Teachers College. The Black/Brown Coalition Building programs/student forums are aimed at decreasing social distances between groups and to identify those common issues impacted by race and class that have disproportionately oppressed African American, Asian American and Latina/o communities. Furthermore, it is our hope that these forums and workshops might create a shared space for African American and Latina/o students to critically examine the social, political and educational forces that have traditionally wedged the communities a part. Our goals are twofold; to establish methods of coalition building for Black, and Brown students at Teachers Colleges as well as to set in place an effective and healthy dialogue between the groups that will empower them beyond the borders of TC and bring about social change in their communities.

(16). Project EOS: College Conversations

Professor Hope Leichter, Steven Flythe

Cosponsor: Veronica Holly – Institute for Urban & Minority Education
Harlem Children's Zone

Project EOS: College Conversationsis a monthly forum for college-bound high school seniors and their families to discuss issues and challenges related to college. Project EOS (Education, Opportunity and Success) is a week-long comprehensive college preparation program. Project EOS provides participants (high school rising seniors) with a range of information, resources and support as they begin the college application process and make the transition to college. Students work in groups of eight with mentors who facilitate discussions and activities to help students write their personal statements, organize their resumes, create a college selection list and begin their Common Application. The workshops also engage students in discussions to help clarify their own higher education and career goals.

The President's Grant for Diversity and Community Initiatives

2006-2007 Grant Recipients

The Committee for Community and Diversity is pleased to announce the recipients of The President's Community and Diversity Grant Fund. The grant fund provides financial support to projects that foster interactive, inter-group communication, collaboration and educational programming with an emphasis on diversity and/or community. Nineteen proposals were timely submitted and the following twelve were selected for funding:

(1) TC DocNet

Sirene Lim

Linda Choi

Current doctoral students formed the group TC DocNet to respond to collective needs and requests of fellow doctoral students to network academically outside of their departments. TC DocNet aims to facilitate interdisciplinary academic conversations so as to build an enriched learning community among part-time and full-time doctoral students, faculty, and alums across TC programs and departments. Online forum and friendly in-person meetings are designed to promote networking among doctoral students across disciplines; share scholarly interests in a range of educational issues, as well as research experience in different contexts using a spectrum of theories and methodologies.

(2) Voices of Youth: Community Scholars Group

Professor Edmund Gordon

Veronica Holly

"Voices" represents the various modes of communication TC has for broadcasting diversity; and it also represents the voices that surround, impact and support TC and its mission through Voices of Youth and Voices of Diversity. Voices of Youth is where the Community Scholars Journal (CSJ) will give TC members and area community residents the opportunity to learn from one another and to celebrate our common goals. CSJ will produce a short publication created from the written work of young Harlem residents chosen from submissions in neighborhood schools. There will be an event honoring these students by giving them an opportunity to read portions of their work, sit on a panel with TC students and faculty to discuss how TC and the surrounding community can come together.

(3) Voices of Diversity

Professor Edmund Gordon

Veronica Holly

Voices of Diversity is an initiative to bring faculty, staff, and students of color together to develop a system of mentorship and support, and create a space to share insights into successes and obstacles faced on a predominately white campus. The product of this meeting will be put in a historical narrative and featured on the IUME website.

(4) Who Decides? Choosing Films with Youth and Teachers for Schools

Elisabeth Johnson

Stavroula Kontovourki

PiCS, the Pedagogy in Cinema Society is interested in broadening the scope of its mission. They are interested in increasing the size and breadth of their dialogic community by reaching out to other student organizations interested in film and critical issues. The reasons are to better understand the impact of film and media as a tool to instigate critical dialogue on social action; and to reinforce the mission to utilize media as a pedagogical tool to stimulate conversation and action, by extending the organization's impact beyond the TC community and using these conversations to develop collaborative relationships with area high school students and teachers -- some of the people at the heart of their mission.

(5) Anthropology at Teachers College: Applications across the Disciplines

Ruth Kennedy-Mountjoy

Ariel Zycherman

Yan-di Chang

Kathryn Becker

Co-Sponsor: Professor Lambros Comitas: Applied Anthropology and Anthropology in Education Programs

An eight week initiative composed of a lecture series and a film series dedicated to demonstrating the relevance of anthropological theory and methods to the Teachers College community and in furthering the mission of the Office for Diversity and Community. They will be showcasing the relevance of anthropological knowledge to the TC community through a four part lecture series engaging the TC anthropology faculty and students with the faculty and students from other departments. They will also be showcasing a two-part film series that depict anthropology's involvement in current issues affecting the US and surrounding areas.

(6) Building Bridges: Creating a Healthy, Supportive, and Diverse Community

Lisa Farrel

Kamauru Johnson

Minkyung Kim

Building a diverse community by evaluating and establishing a sense of rapport within Teachers College community using three events: Involvement of facilities, security staff, students and faculty to mix and mingle; for the community to engage in discussion on issues and themes of concern throughout the TC community; and students and faculty to have an opportunity to voice opinions and discuss them at an informal setting. This project builds upon last year's successful smaller Building Bridges program that focused on Whittier and Lowell Residents.

(7) American Indian/Native American Perspective on Leadership Attributes: with a Discussion about the History, Culture and Effects of Forced Assimilation a Century Later

Dr. Elvira Largie -- Minority Post-Doc Fellow

Co-sponsor: Dr. Carolyn Riehl, Associate Professor -- Department of Organization Leadership

Dr. Craig Richards, Professor -- Department of Organization Leadership

American Indian/Native American (AI/NA) traditionalist/practitioners present on AI/NA history, culture and leadership attributes (live oral traditional story tellers) who will provide greater insight into a "Life" that is ignored or lost, or even misunderstood in academia. An opportunity to have interactions with AI/NA from the Navajo, Hope, and Cheyenne-Arapaho Indian Reservation, to increase understandings and hopefully spark interest in students to become active leaders and participants in understanding the unique relationship that the US government has with AI/NA Nations.

(8) State Asian IdentitY (SAY)

Ji Kyung Lee

Yoon Lee

Seungho Moon

Young Jung Suh

An all day forum for Asian students and the entire TC community to: recognize and understand the distinct culture and customs that Asian students bring to the TC community; to challenge misconceptions on Asian student image in the U.S.; and to increase awareness of the struggles Asian students face in school. The program will include a panel presentation: A Self Portrait of Asian Students; traditional Asian food lunch; traditional Asian activities including: Shu-Yeh (calligraphy), Talchum (Korean traditional mask dance); Yut Nori (Korean Traditional Games); and Sa-Mul-No-Ri (instrument/percussion); conversational dialogues and Korean film and discussions.

(9) Self-Care Workshops: How to Manage Stress, Time and Personal Needs

Dr. Dinelia Rosa -- Director, Center for Psychological Services

Gregory Payton

Sponsored by the Psychological Emergency Response Team (PERT) of TC promotes (educates) mental health wellness within its campus community through discussion of topics related to mental health well-being and to offer services in the form of didactics, experiential exercises, consultations and support groups.

(10) African Culture Night

Joy Spencer

Co-sponsor: SIPA's Pan African Network

A Columbia University campus-wide African Culture Night to introduce students to African culture where students have an opportunity to partake in various African dishes, dance and drumming workshop and a fashion show. Student interest in African continues to grow despite the closing of the Institute for African studies at SIPA.

(11) Working Towards Peace with Body and Spirit: A Women's

Self-defense Workshop

Yuko Uchikawa

Sponsored by The Peace Education Center at TC in collaboration with Ruckus Safety Awareness, a self-defense and safety awareness organization based in NYC will teach one self-defense workshop with the emphasis on the TC women's community. They will provide safety skills, discuss the issues of violence and peace, and build a sense of community for the diverse female population (faculty, student, staff) at TC.

(12) Second Annual Health Disparities Conference: March 9 - 10, 2007

Dr. Barbara C. Wallace -- Associate Professor of Health and Education

The two day conference goals are consistent with TC's mission to close the disparities and inequities gaps, with a focus on health, while fostering collaborations between health disparities, researchers, practitioners, and community members, as well as between academic, community-based, and faith-based organizations. This year, the conference has a special tract: the Health Care Disparity Reduction Certificate Tract. The grant will provide scholarships for TC community attendance and participation.

The President's Grant for Diversity and Community Initiatives
2005-2006 Grant Recipients

The Committee for Community and Diversity is pleased to announce the recipients of The President's Community and Diversity Grant Fund. The grant fund provides financial support to projects that foster interactive, inter-group communication, collaboration and educational programming with an emphasis on diversity and/or community. Twenty-one proposals were submitted and the following thirteen were selected for funding:

(1) A New Way to Learn Chinese

Dakai Li
Dr. Zhao Hong Han
Dr. James Purpura

In partnership with the TESOL program this project provides a fast-track curriculum, emphasizing Chinese language and cultural knowledge to serve the Columbia University community by offering a way to develop and maintain communicative Chinese proficiency. Courses will be designed for true beginners who have minimal or no background in the subject.

(2) Black History Month Celebration 2006

Leonda Whitaker
Rebekkah Hogan
Yvonne Destin

The Black History Month celebration is an annual event organized by the Black Student Network at Teachers College. The theme is "Remembering the Times. It was chosen not only as a tribute to Black heritage in America, but also as a tribute to the strength and courage demonstrated by the victims of Hurricane Katrina. Highlights of the month long celebration include a Casual Conversation event entitled Spirituality Discussion and Tea (past and present) and a Valentine's Social to encourage healthy relationships. The culmination of the month will be the annual Banquet to honor distinguished members of TC and the Harlem community.

(3) Building Bridges: Creating a Healthy, Supportive and Diverse Community

David Brown
Leonard Maurice Robertson
Doctor Marcus Truth

The Building Bridges promotes inter-group communication, collaboration, and education in a spirit that fosters unity and purpose. This project is comprised of three events. The first event entitled, Laying a Foundation is a weekend of activities designed to build diversity by evaluating and establishing rapport in Whittier Hall. The second event, Building the Bridge: Forging Relationships, will invite Whittier and Lowell residents to a community dinner and discussion. The last event, Crossing the Bridge Together: a Collaborative Project, will include a collaborative project between Whittier and Lowell residents to address concerns of the residents.

(4)The Children and Languages of New York: What Do Teachers and Parents Need to Know?

Jeehyae Chung
Leah Mason

The Conference will gather teachers, educators, parents, and students in order to share and exchange different experiences, viewpoints, and ideas that specifically address issues related to the education of language minority children in the city. The Conference will focus on the education of three language communities- Chinese, Korean, and Spanish. Inviting members of these three communities to merge together to talk about their issues and to listen to the advice of experts in the field. Expected speakers include Dr. Sarah Shin, known for her work with Korean youth, Dr. Danling Fu, who is currently working on a 5-year long project with Chinese speaking students in Chinatown, and Dr. Luis Reyes, who will address the education of Latino youth in New York City.

(5) The Comic Book Project

Dr. Michael Bitz
Dr. Hal Abeles
Department of Arts and Humanities

The Comic Book Project is an art-based literacy initiative hosted by the Department of Arts and Humanities at Teachers College. The project's mission is to help inner-city youths forge an alternative pathway to literacy by engaging them in the process of outlining, sketching, writing, and designing original comic books on a designated theme. The theme for 2005-2006 is Girl Power! Comic books by girls for girls in NYC and beyond.

(6) Education Across the Americas: Connecting Issues, People and Regions: The Latino Diaspora

Juan Carlos Calcagno
Mary Mendenhall
Milagros Nores
Dr. Francisco Rivera-Batiz
Peter Lucas- The Center for Peace Education

The Fourth Annual Education Across the Americas Conference has been planned for March 31st and April 1st, 2006. The event as a whole aims to strengthen the relationship between research and practice through participation of academic communities at Teachers College and Columbia University, as well as, with students, professors, and practitioners from other universities and organizations across the United States, who are engaged, at diverse levels with issues of education in Latin America and with Latino/a populations. This year's conference involves graduate student panels, faculty and guest speaker panels, film screenings, work shops with teachers, and a reception.

(7) Shared Multi-Cultures in Akin Euba's Footsteps: Concert-Lecture on Trans-Cultural Music

Laura Falzon Baldacchino

This concert-lecture is designed to open up the exciting aspect of intercultural music by providing a performative and learning environment that encourages an active interest through participatory forms of expression. The event will include a pre-concert lecture by Professor Akin Euba. Euba, a Nigerian composer and Andrew Mellon Professor of Music at Pittsburgh University, focuses on inter-cultural music arts both in his compositions and academic work. The event will serve as the world premiere of a new composition by the musician and feature new and trans-cultural music by composers who have followed in Professor Euba's footsteps.

(8)Teaching about Conflict, Building towards Peace: A Comparative Forum

Marian Hodgkin
Jed Oppenheim
Adam Voight

The Forum will examine the way in which teaching about conflict can increase our global community's willingness to benefit from diversity and work towards peace. Included in the Forum will be four central elements, all with an interactive, multidisciplinary, and cross-national focus. These four elements include: a panel discussion, workshop, Forum catalogue, and reception. The goal of the Forum and its sponsoring organization is to equip current and future educators with the knowledge and tools to implement components of conflict and peace education into their curricula.

(9)Teachers College Health and Wellness Fair

Peter Casey
Maria Terrana

The goals of the Teachers College Health & Wellness Fair are to educate students about general health information (i.e. physical, mental, hygienic, etc) as well as provide them with available resources throughout the community. Prospective participants, donors, and sponsors that include organizations such as: The American Cancer Society, American Diabetes Association, The Gay Health Advocacy Project, Naked Juice, Equinox Gym & Spa, Uptown Pilates, Comprehensive Breast Center, among many others. The range of prospective & confirmed participants provides services that cut across many communities and their related health concerns.

(10) Teachers College Students for a Cultural Initiative Conference

Matt Carlin
Jessica Hochman

TC Students for a Cultural Studies Initiative is comprised of graduate students representing various programs and departments at Teachers College, who also find common interests in their dedication to research in the area of cultural studies. The TC SCI 2006 conference is designed to recognize the collaborative efforts that have created a unique and valuable academic community at TC and to invite educators in our larger educational community of New York City to make valuable and necessary contributions to that academic community. This year's conference will include three unique elements: an emphasis on dialogue within and across disciplines using cultural studies as a bridge, participation of youth and k-12 educators from the New York City community, and offering workshops where participants many engage in activities around the theory presented at the conference.

(11) Voices Forum

Juana Armenta
Linda Choi
Regine Philippeaux
Debbie Sonu

This initiative stems from a shared experience of isolation and exclusion from a dominant discourse that has been historically normalized in higher education. We believe that retention, as well as recruitment, of ethnic students at Teachers College requires emotional support and a sense of belonging. This forum will serve as an initial attempt to reach out and to provide a support network to bring forth concerns and experiences specific to the schooling experience of ethnic students at Teachers College.

(12) Witt Student Activism Publication and Conference Project

Erick Gordon

The initiative is to disseminate to the Teachers College Community the ongoing work begun as collaboration between students in the Witt Seminar class at DeWitt Clinton High School, Student Press Initiative (SPI,) and Behind the Book. The goal of the Witt Seminar class is to present a student-written publication of activists' profiles at a borough-wide student conference on the power of writing to be held in January at DeWitt Clinton High School. Student Press Initiative, a program designed to develop, foster, and promote writing across the curriculum through student publication, will produce the publication. On February 15th, a panel of student-authors will present this work to the Teachers College Community. Copies of the student publication will be distributed free-of-charge to all that attend the presentation.

(13) Women and Empowerment: Education for the Legal, Political, and Human Rights of Women in Africa and the Diaspora

Leigh L. Graham
Donna Tonini

The African Studies Working Group will host a panel discussion and workshop on women's empowerment in three areas where women often lack the knowledge necessary to act in their own best interests and on their own behalf so as to exercise their rights and realize the freedoms and quality of life they deserve. These areas are the law, politics and education. The event will culminate with a one-hour reception bringing together TC and Columbia-wide faculty and students and members of the local community, to promote networking and dialogue and to celebrate the empowerment of women that is highlighted in TC student research and evident in the success of local organizations that serve the population of African immigrant women.

The Committee for Community and Diversity is pleased to announce the recipients of The President's Community and Diversity Grant Fund. The grant fund provides financial support to projects that foster interactive, inter-group communication, collaboration and educational programming with an emphasis on diversity and/or community. Thirty proposals were submitted (double last year's submissions) and the following thirteen were selected for funding:

(1) Vote or Veto: It's Your Voice

Soldanela Rivera, Shawn Bayer and Elyse Buxbaum
Student Advocates for the Arts
Co-Sponsor: Joan Jeffri, Director, Program in Arts Administration, TC

Student Advocates for the Arts empowers and represents student voices. The 2004 Presidential Election Year is a pivotal time to raise our collective voice - to influence legislation and policy affecting the arts and the future of public arts funding. SAA provides an educational platform that reaches out to a diverse national network of student and alumni communities. This conference is an extension of our mission and promises to unite speakers from varied professional, political, and artistic backgrounds with a cross-section of students representing academic, geographic, and ethnic diversity. This initiative is designed to educate future cultural leaders in the political process and in the integral power this process has in affecting the arts.

(2) Political Empowerment and the African American Community

Melanie Jones
Black Student Network Executive Board

The Black Student Network (BSN) is sponsoring a symposium on February 2, 2004 at TC. BSN has invited guest speaker Dr. Lawrence Hanks, Associate Professor of Political Science at Indiana University and former Chair of the Political Science department at Tuskegee University. The symposium will begin with a forty-five minute lecture given by Professor Hanks, with a brief question and answer period. The second half of this symposium will consist of a panel discussion, followed by dialogue between audience participants and the selected panel. A reception will follow. These events are organized in collaboration with Student Life, TC Office of Room Assignments, Facilities and Sage Hall Dining Services. Literature of diverse interests from community and campus organizations unable to present will be made available outside the auditorium.

(3) Conference on Computer Education in Africa

Khaitsa Wasiyo
Department of Organization and Leadership

The Computer Education in Africa conference seeks to mobilize the technological, entrepreneurial and professional expertise and resources of the African Diaspora to discuss how to overcome key obstacles; to discuss what is not working, and what is working. The conference includes a workshop on three case studies for computer education in Africa. These will provide the audience with the key practices to keep in mind when implementing computer education programs in the developing countries. The objective is to build a network of professionals in North America and Europe who will contribute to promoting digital opportunities in Africa.

(4) Education Across the Americas, 2nd Annual Conference: Bridging Latinos & Latin America.

Julieta GarcíHamilton and Milagros Nores
Association of Latin American Students (ALAS)
Co-Sponsors: Society for International Education; Society for Economics & Education; Center for Peace Education

This will involve four main types of activities: student panels, professor and guest speaker panels, a movie and a round table discussion with representatives of local NGOs and/or international funding agencies. The activities are planned for March 26th and 27th, 2004. The conference aims to strengthen cross community and academic boundaries through the participation of the academic communities at TC and Columbia University as well as students, professors and practitioners in other universities and organizations in New York City. They will strive to attract participants who are engaged, at diverse levels, with issues of education in Latin America and with Latino/a populations in the United States.

(5) Sexuality and Difference in a World We Dare to Imagine: A Conference

Scott Howe
QueerTC

With the intent to meaningfully address these concerns from the basis of our diverse experiences and unified vision of an equal and just community, Queer TC has identified three questions as distinct, yet complementary issues. These issues will be explored through a Saturday afternoon conference at the College in the Spring of 2004. Three keynote speakers, who will charge the attendees to address each of the three questions above, will lead this conference. In smaller groups, participants will discuss the implications of the speakers' messages for their specific disciplines and careers. This in turn will lead to the creation of an action plan for bringing awareness and reform into our classrooms and workplaces. With the participants' permission, their action plans will be published on the QueerTC Website, which will serve as a resource for TC students, alumni, and the broader community of educators that the College reaches.

(6) Afro-Brazilian Art and Culture Series

Rosse Mary Taveras Gamboa
Society for International Education (SIE)
Co-Sponsors: Society for International Education; African Students Working Group; Coalition of Latino Scholars

The multi-cultural event will be divided into a three-day weekend series scheduled for late April 2004. The goal of the event is to engage students, faculty, staff at TC/Columbia University's graduate and undergraduate departments and beyond by exposing this community to a weekend series on Afro-Brazilian art and culture. The series will include: an art exhibit of paintings and photographs, two Brazilian documentaries, a musical production, a sacred dance and drumming workshop and lecture/panel discussion on Northeastern Brazilian art and culture with invited scholars from Brazil. Both Ethnomusicologist Emilia Biancardi, and Dona Cici, from Pierre Verger Foundation are from the region of Salvador Bahia, Brazil. The grant will fund the art exhibition.

(7) Educational Policy and Research that Makes a Difference

Jason Willis, Elizabeth Rigby, Heather Schwartz, and Professor Jeff Henig
Politics & Education Program
Co-Sponsors: Professor Jay Heubert and Professor Hank Levin

This on-going roundtable series will be held four times this academic year and will be open to all TC students, faculty, and alumni interested in discussing the potential of educational policymaking to improve conditions in schools across the country. Each roundtable will feature one invited speaker (primarily selected among the domestic and international policy experts within the Teachers College community) who will contribute his or her unique perspective to a common set of thematic questions. These questions will address what he or she considers crucial education policy or policy issues, the skills and competencies needed to affect educational policy, and the individual's professional experiences aimed at improving educational conditions across the country. The four invited speakers will be chosen to represent the diversity of the education policy field (e.g., domestic and international). Across the four roundtable sessions, each speaker will respond to the same thematic questions and structure in order to provide an on-going discussion that cuts across individual perspectives and experiences. This allows for an analysis of the policy and education field, its future directions and how emerging leaders at Teachers College can best contribute to the debates and dilemmas facing the field.

(8) Rehumanize: A Conversation between Iraq and the U.S.

Kristin Brenneman Eno and Cyra Levenson
Peace Education Center / Rehumanize

This event will take place to commemorate the first anniversary of the war in Iraq, on Saturday, March 20, 2004, and would consist of four parts: (1) Viewing of Bridge to Baghdad I and II, by Downtown Community Television. This presents a casual dialogue between a group of young adults in New York City, and a similar group in Baghdad, speaking to each other via satellite, in both March and May, 2003, about the impending war, then about the war that just happened. Interspersed with the conversation is an ongoing look at Baghdad itself, from a uniquely "real-life" vantage point, rarely seen in the mainstream media. The participants on both sides ask raw and thought-provoking questions, and they say things that are uncannily similar to each other, revealing that they share the common bond of humanity that reaches beyond their nations' current struggle. (2) Presentation by and discussion with Jon Alpert, director/producer of these films, and founder of DCTV. (3) Presentation of the Rehumanize Memorial Quilt Project: We will show the website and give a brief theoretical framework and history of this project. (4) Whole-group Quilting Bee, in which each participant chooses a name from those who have died in the conflict and sews a quilt square together to memorialize that person.

(9) Second Annual Holiday Book Drive for North General Hospital's Pediatric Division

Stephania Vu
TC Student Senate

This book drive links two great Harlem institutions, Teachers College and North General, in an initiative to improve both health and literacy This initiative sends a powerful message to the community that we see ourselves as part of the solution to many of the problems that our neighbors encounter, such a pediatric asthma and under-performing schools. It also gives our students, many of whom who are not from New York, an opportunity to perform a valuable public service to our neighbors. It is also hoped that by building a relationship with North General Hospital the college will develop improved ties with our neighbors. Books will be collected in late November until the end of fall 2003 classes as part of a holiday book drive.

(10) Spring Gala

Stephania Vu
TC Student Senate

The end-of-the-year Spring Gala will be held on Thursday, April 24, 2004 at 7:00 p.m. The event will be open to all TC faculty, staff, administration, and students as well as invited guests. The evening will begin with entertainment by TC/Columbia students. This event may be either business/formal or semi-formal. During dinner, there will also be student musicians performing either classical or jazz music. The night will end with dancing provided by a band or disk jockey. The night will feature an awards portion possibly for a professor, staff member, and administrator of the year.

(11) The World Bank as International Educational Institution: Fix it or Nix it? and Launch of newsletter "Africa: International Education in Focus"

Andria Wisler, Mikaila Brown, and Maud Seghers
African Studies Working Group (ASWG)
Co-Sponsors: Professor Frances Vavrus; Tonya Homan - Society for International Education; Aleesha Taylor - CICE; Fida Adeley - Economics and Political Development Program

The professors invited as presenters for this conference speak to different audiences, as they are diverse in their academic backgrounds (i.e., anthropology, economics, social psychology) as well as geographic areas of specialization (Africa, Latin America, Asia). A student will moderate the panel and opportunities for such broad interaction are still rare at the College and deserve to be promoted. The panel discussion is, thus, a means to strengthen the campus-wide learning community and to forge and deepen lines of communication among numerous departments.

The newsletter aims specifically to establish linkages among issues of education, public health and social work, political governance and gender. As such, a primary goal is the promotion of inter-group communication among Africanists at Teachers College, the Mailman School of Public Health, the School of Social Work, Barnard and SIPA. Moreover, the newsletter will be distributed to other universities with the goal of instituting collaboration across academic communities. More particularly, ASWG also aims to use the newsletter to revitalize the historical ties of the College with scholars in Africa.

(12) Learning with Community: A Teachers College Interdisciplinary Forum on Community participation in Education

Tamo Chattopadhay and Tony Jenkins
Peace Education Center

The event's central idea is to create a TC community-wide dialogue around the theme of the participation of communities (of neighborhoods, cities, towns, national and international communities as well as other less formal social networks) in the educational process of their children. The proposed format for this even is a half-day poster session, followed by a panel of speakers. Students as well as faculty members whose works are presented will be requested to be present at their ?poster locations' at times convenient for them to answer questions of the viewers. The panel discussion will be conducted in more of a roundtable format to facilitate the interchange and intersection of ideas and approaches.

(13) Working Conference: Interrupting Oppression & Sustaining Justice

Professor Peter T. Coleman
International Center for Cooperation & Conflict Resolution

This conference will take place at Teachers College on February 27-28, 2004. The conference is part of a continuing program of the International Center for Cooperation and Conflict Resolution (ICCCR) to develop initiatives that address systemic injustice and destructive conflicts at the group, community, national, and global levels. It will be followed by a continuing seminar devoted to producing a book largely based on the conference. This continuing seminar will also be focused on such next steps as assessing how useful the intellectual frameworks developed at this first conference are for community and political activists as well as policy-makers.

The Committee for Community and Diversity is pleased to announce the recipients of The President's Community and Diversity Grant Fund.

The grant fund provides financial support to projects that foster interactive, inter-group communication, collaboration and educational programming with an emphasis on diversity and/or community.

Twelve thoughtful proposals were submitted. The following seven were ultimately selected for funding:

(1) Interfaith Forum

Daniel Greenwald
Society for Jewish Education, TC

Nathan C. Walker
Columbia University Senate, Student Affairs Committee TC Student Senate

The mission of the Interfaith Forum is to foster meaningful dialogue across the landscape of religious traditions. Moderated by Professor Thomas Sobol, the Interfaith Forum will host predominant New York City religious educators from Jewish, Christian, and Islamic traditions on the questions, "What is the responsibility of American religious educators to a democratic tradition in responding to sociopolitical conflict?"

(2) Education and Exclusion in Latin America

Julieta Garcia Hamilton
Association of Latin American Students (ALAS)

Mary Mendenhall
Society for International Education

This event will involve two main activities: a movie discussion, and a conference. The event aims to cross community boundaries by seeking the participation of the Teachers College and Columbia University communities, as well as individuals and international organizations in New York City engaged, at diverse levels, with issues of education in Latin America.

(3) The Future is Us: Arts Advocates for Tomorrow

Peter Heslip
Student Advocates for the Arts (SAA)

Annemarie Schoepfer
VP of External Affairs, SAA

Joan Jeffri
Program in Arts Administration, Department of Arts and Humanities

This half-day conference is designed to offer a critical opportunity for current arts and cultural leaders to address a diverse cross-section of future cultural leaders and advocates (students). Included in the audience will be students representing Columbia's many departments and divisions, including, and not exclusive to, Arts Administration, Arts Education, the Schools of the Arts, Business, Law, Journalism, and the School of International and Public Affairs (SIPA). In addition, the conference will cross intercollegiate boundaries: we anticipate attendance of delegates representing schools from around the city, state, and country. Given the uniqueness of this event, it is anticipated to generate national visibility and awareness of arts advocacy issues at the collegiate level.

(4) Get REAL*: A Conference in Support of Racial, Linguistic, and Cultural Diversity in Urban Schools

James Lerman
Professional Development School Partnership - TC

Verneda Johnson
Professional Development School Partnership - TC

Jacqueline Ancess
NCREST - TC

Christopher Calloway Brooks
Cab Calloway Harlem Renaissance Center

Angela Calabrese Barton
Programs in Science Education; Department of Mathematics, Science & Technology

We plan to conduct the Get REAL* conference as a way to engage a diverse community of teachers, students, parents, community members, and teacher educators around significant issues and concerns involving racial, linguistic, and cultural diversity in urban schools. Through a series of events and experiences conducted over a Friday evening and a Saturday, we project that Get REAL* will support participants in raising questions, expanding their awareness, articulating next steps, and learning about effective practices. Through outreach to the community and the involvement of many collaborators and co-sponsors, we anticipate between 125 and 175 participants from a wide variety of constituencies. While focusing primarily on people from the 5 schools in TC's PDS Partnership and TC itself, widespread publicity for Get REAL* will emphasize that all interested parties are welcome and encouraged to attend.

(5) Building a Better Academic Community in the Teachers College Residence Halls

Lori Mielcarek
Office of Housing and Residence Life - TC

Orla NicDomhnaill
Resident Director, Greystone Hall - TC

The project's primary goal is to provide an academically focused programming series for all TC students. The programs would be conveniently offered in the TC residence halls and all students would be invited. Faculty and staff will be asked to provide support for a variety of topics to assist students in preparing their theses, dissertations and other research projects. In the Fall 2002 academic semester, OHRL organized focus groups with students living in the residence halls, to better evaluate their programming needs. A strong theme emerging from the focus groups was that students desired more organized programs related to the following academic issues:

1. "Research Do's and Don'ts"
   A workshop addresses both qualitative and quantitative research.
   Presenter: TBA (A faculty member or an advanced doctoral student)
2. "Electronic Support for Research"
   A double workshop on how to use Endnote and SPSS software to organize and analyze information and to enhance the research writing and presentations.
   Presenters: Shawna Bu Shell and Lori Mielcarek, TC doctoral students and Community Assistants in Housing and Residence Life
3. "Work Block Workshop"
   A Saturday workshop on how to manage procrastination and how to prioritize completing theses and dissertations.
   Presenter: Dr. William G. Sommer of Columbia University
4. "How to Do a Dissertation in Psychology at Teachers College"
   A presentation focusing on psychology dissertations.
   Presenter: Mario Smith, TC doctoral student and Community Assistant in Housing and Residence Life
5. "How to Write Strong Grant Proposals and Scholarship Applications"
   A presentation and discussion that will help students improve their chances for getting external funding, so they can prioritize their academics.
   Presenter: TBA (A faculty member or an advanced doctoral student)
6. "NYC Teaching Certification Requirements"
   An informative presentation outlining the steps students should take to get their NYC Teacher Certifications.
   Presenter: TBA (A member of the Teacher Education program)
7. "Using Teachers College Career Services"
   A presentation on the vast array of services offered by the TC Career Services Office.
   Presenter: Mary Mendenhall, Assistant Director of Career Services.

(6) Representations of Diversity: Media, Art and Education

Celia Oyler
Educators for Social Justice - TC

David Shaenfield
Educators for Social Justice

A series of panels discussing representations of diversity in three areas: Media, Arts, and Community. The panel participants are members of different grassroots organizations located in New York City. Our goal is to have more people from the TC community understand and get involved in work done in communities and organizations around New York City concerned with social justice in the three areas. As members of Educators for Social Justice and the larger TC community, we feel that this event will widen community boundaries and promote inter-group communication.

(7) Haitian and Dominican Communities and Students in NYC: Historical and Contemporary Connections Across Diaspora

Mary E. Sefranek
The Program in Bilingual/Bicultural Education; Department of International and Transcultural Studies

This project is designed to be a panel activity and multimedia presentation in which guest speakers representing Dominican and Haitian American communities in New York City come together to dialogue with each other and with TC community members about the historical and contemporary connections across these two constituencies living in Diaspora. This dialogic encounter is envisioned as a critical educational project that will enable Haitian and Dominican Americans to collaborate in an open, public forum, with the intent of sharing issues and concerns affecting the two populations, such as immigration, education, community development and empowerment, and political conflict. Specifically, events in the Haiti and the Dominican Republic that affect Haitian and Dominican communities and students in the U.S. will be addressed, such as the recent arrival of 250 Haitians off the shores of Miami in October of 2002 and the response of the U.S. government, as well as the responses of individuals and groups within Haitian and Dominican communities.

TOTAL AMOUNT AWARDED: $17,345