Current Students

Previous Colleges:

Ed.M. in Math Education from Pace University, NY

B.A. in Government from Darthmouth College, NH

Steven Koutsavlis is a full-time Ph.D. student in Education Policy at Teachers College, Columbia University. Steven is a National Board Certified Teacher in Adolescent Mathematics and a NYC Teaching Fellow. Prior to TC Steven taught middle school math at the New Voices School of Academic and Creative Arts, in Park Slope, Brooklyn, where he also served as a grade team leader and technology coordinator. Steven is very active in professional development focused on STEM education, having worked as both a participant and program leader. He is a graduate of Coro NY's Education Leadership Collaborative, which brings together teachers and administrators from across district and charter schools to share and develop best practices in the field. In 2013 he attended the Park City Mathematics Institute, where he worked with hundreds of K-12 math educators, administrators, and university researchers from around the world on exploring teaching methodologies and the intricacies of the Common Core Learning Standards. Steven has also worked for The New Teacher Project in advising and developing new educators, has attended multiple conferences run by the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics, and has led workshops through the Math in the City Program at the City College of New York. Steven is also very interested in community and public policy issues, having served as a field director for a political campaign and having helped launch the NYC Academy for Discovery as a new school founding committee member.

Steven was born and raised in New York City and attended Stuyvesant High School. 

Previous Colleges:

B.S. Health Education, University of Florida

MPP Goldman School of Public Policy, University of California Berkeley

Taylor Myers is a second year Ph.D. student in Education Policy at Teachers College, Columbia University. Her research is focused on higher education policy, including equity and diversity in student access and success, state and institutional planning and organization of higher education systems, and the impacts of postsecondary credentials on social and economic mobility. 

Taylor's career has spanned the non-profit educational ecosystem, from data analysis and program evaluation to policy development and advocacy. She developed a keen interest in higher education after interning at the U.S. Department of Education in the Office of Postsecondary Education. This period codified what she had experienced in her own journey as a first generation college graduate and inspired her to use public policy to advocate for increased access and stronger institutional support for all college students. Taylor has since worked for the University of California Office of the President, California Competes, a higher education policy and research think tank, and presently conducts research at the Community College Research Center at TC and at the Office of Institutional Research and Analysis for the City University of New York. 

With policy and research experience at both the institutional and state level, Taylor understands the complicated landscapes and siloes in which policy meets practice. She hopes her research will help improve and inform policy design that reflects the needs of a dynamic higher education system and the diverse students it serves, leading to more equitable and stronger outcomes for all postsecondary learners. 

Previous Colleges:

B.A. with Honors in Political Science from the University of South Carolina

Masters in Public Policy from Georgetown University

Katharine Parham is a Ph.D. Candidate in Education Policy focused on issues of educational equity. Her research interests span the field of K-12 education, and include school choice and charter schools, special education, and the impacts of accountability policies at local, state, and federal levels.

Previous College: B.A. in History with Honors, Scripps College 2016

As an undergraduate, Sierra majored in history, focusing on race, class, and gender politics in the United States. She won two awards for her senior thesis on the parallels of media narratives of 20^th century lynchings and 21^st century police executions and published an abridged version in the Critical Theory and Social Justice Journal of Undergraduate Research.

Since graduating in 2016, Sierra has worked at WestEd, an education research non-profit. She contributes to all aspects of research projects including proposal submission, participant recruitment, content and instrument development, data and participant management, quantitative and qualitative data analysis, and dissemination. While very rewarding, Sierra was eager to engage in more policy- and equity-focused research.

At Teachers College, she plans to specialize in critical K-12 education policy and is interested in exploring the way policies such as zoning, school choice, tracking, or disciplinary protocols shape and constrain opportunities for low-income students and students of color.

Until in-person instruction is available, Sierra will continue to work part-time at WestEd while taking courses part-time.

Previous Colleges:

• M.S. in Teaching (Special Education), Pace University, New York, NY
• B.S. in Vocational Rehabilitation and Disability Studies, Auburn University, Auburn, AL

Sarah’s professional experience encompasses special education and vocational rehabilitation. For the past eight years, Sarah has shaped her academic studies and work experience around advocating for young adults with moderate to severe disabilities. In addition to her studies at Teachers College, Sarah works as high school classroom teacher in District 75, a self-contained special education district of the NYC Department of Education. She has taught a high school classroom of alternate assessment students with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) for the past six years, focusing on transition and work-based learning skills in order to prepare her students for employment and independent living as they transition out of the public school system. Sarah holds the Model Teacher position at her school, and in addition to teaching, she mentors and leads professional developments to increase teachers’ capacity to become more effective in the classroom. In conjunction with this leadership role, Sarah is a part of multiple leadership teams within the school including the transition team, instructional leadership team, racial equity team, sustainability team, and extended administrative cabinet. Additionally, Sarah has conducted two years of teacher-led action research at her school measuring effects of different communication instructional strategies for students with ASD.

At Teachers College, Sarah specializes in Law and Education. She aims to use law to redesign special education policy for alternate assessment students in order to provide them with an equitable, free, and appropriate public education that can effectively prepare students for independent living and working when they transition out of high school and into their community.

Previous Colleges:

B.A. in Economics and Latin American Studies from Colby College 2018

M.Ed in Arts in Education from Harvard Graduate School of Education 2020.

Clare is a first-year student in the Education Policy program, and an aspiring early childhood education and care (ECEC) leader. Shaken alive by the transformative power of the arts, education, and museums in her own life, Clare is uniquely fascinated by the power of the arts and museum-based learning in ECEC; indeed, it prompted her to pursue graduate studies in the arts in education at the Harvard Graduate School of Education, and to plunge deeper into arts and museum education work with youth in a variety of different contexts ranging from a qualitative independent study focusing on the role of museums in society with Project Zero Senior Researcher, Ellen Winner, to a role designing and leading of the Colby College Museum’s pioneering Art + Storytelling program, a research assistant position studying the impact of ROUNDS with Steve Seidel, a Graduate Student Teacher position leading object-centered lessons at the Harvard Art Museums, a Fulbright Predoctoral Research Fellowship to Spain to study the funding models and best education practices of an emerging network of independent cultural spaces, and a leadership role organizing elementary school mobile-museum visits as Co-Founder and Executive Director of cARTie. At Teachers College, Clare is most excited by the prospect of understanding international perspectives of ECEC and how cultural institutions in particular may offer co-conspiring potential for intentionally integrated ECEC provision.

B.A. International Relations with Honors, University of California, Davis 2020 

For the past 6 years, Vi has been teaching and working with youth as a classroom assistant, after school tutor, pen pal, workshop facilitator, and mentor. Her passion for education began when she traveled abroad to Nicaragua before her senior year of high school and volunteered as an English tutor for local children. She began her college journey with an interest in international education and interned for a non-profit organization that supports children’s education in rural Zimbabwe. The summer of 2019, she traveled to Zimbabwe to teach and work with the students that they supported on the topics of health and hygiene. However, her passion for education in the U.S. remained, and she shifted her focus to examining the racial and ethnic inequities in the United States. Wanting to learn more about her community, she conducted research focusing on the identity development of Vietnamese American high school students for her honors thesis. 

She is now pursuing an M.A. degree in Education Policy in the hopes of learning how to create meaningful and impactful changes to our education system to achieve justice and freedom for our diverse students.

Vi's research, titled "Cultivating Identities in a Place Called Home: Intersectional, Ever Changing Identities of Vietnamese American Youth in Culturally Sustaining Spaces" has recently been published by the Journal for Southeast Asian American Education and Advancement.