Learning Sciences & Human Development

Meet Sarah Leonhart, accidental adrenaline seeker and intentional equitable education advocate

Anonymous — Wed, 26 Apr 2023 22:37:26 +0000

Meet Sarah Leonhart, accidental adrenaline seeker and intentional equitable education advocate Anonymous (not verified) Wed, 04/26/2023 - 16:37

Sarah Leonhart credits her support system for helping her pursue and persist in graduate school. Much like hucking a cliff—her true story of accidentally skiing off a cliff with friends, a move reserved for adrenaline junkies —Leonhart entered graduate school in the Learning Science and Human Development program at CU �鶹ӰԺ as a leap of faith, and she is grateful for the support from her network of friends and family.

While working in higher education at the University of Utah, a mentor encouraged her to enroll in a graduate program in education, and she chose CU �鶹ӰԺ to be close to family in Colorado.

Fast forward to today, and Leonhart has been selected by program faculty as the Outstanding Graduate of the Learning Science and Human Development program.

Her research interests include equitable K-12 science education and school hegemony, and faculty honored her as an eager and interdisciplinary student, who dives deeply into how student success and failure are constructed and resisted from sociological, anthropological, and historical perspectives.

Through the program, she has made a powerful impact on the analyses of state science leaders’ noticing for equity. She also contributed to studies of middle and high school student’s collaborative problem solving for the National Science Foundation’s cutting-edge Institute for Student-Artificial Intelligence Teaming (iSAT), an interdisciplinary research community dedicated to transforming classrooms into more effective, engaging, and equitable learning environments through the development of the next-generation collaborative learning.

Leonhart's capstone work focused on ideological hegemony and the perpetuation of systems that continue to disadvantage marginalized communities.

"She advocated for disruption of concepts like meritocracy and competitiveness that define success in terms that inherently advantage dominant culture," said a peer. "Her work was a true "capstone," clearly building on discoveries and concepts she gathered throughout her MA program."

Leonhart will graduate from the CU �鶹ӰԺ School of Education having made her mark on learning sciences studies, while making time for well-being and hobbies and encourages graduate students who follow to do the same.

“You have to make time for yourself,” she says to other students. “Grad school can feel overwhelming and there is a mindset of toxic productivity in academia. Carve out time to explore your hobbies, spend time with friends, and enjoy what Colorado has to offer.”

In her own words

Please tell us a bit about yourself

I was born in raised in Des Moines, Iowa (go Hawkeyes!) although I've moved around quite a bit since then. Before coming to CU �鶹ӰԺ, I was working at the University of Utah/Department of Veterans Affairs as a Research Analyst. My mentor, Andrea Kalvesmaki, was completing her PhD in educational policy from the UoU. Andrea provided me with the knowledge and confidence to navigate applying to graduate school, specifically education programs. I selected CU �鶹ӰԺ to be closer to 2 of my 3 sisters. A lot of my family is from Colorado so it felt like coming home."

What is one of the lessons from your time at CU �鶹ӰԺ that you’ll carry with you into the next chapter?

One of the greatest lessons that I learned while at CU �鶹ӰԺ was the importance of community. My greatest, most memorable moments were with my friends and family: singing along to Harry Styles with my friends, accidentally hucking a cliff while skiing with my roommates, engaging in discussions with my classmates... these are the learning moments and stories that I carry close to my heart.”

What does graduating from CU �鶹ӰԺ represent for you and/or your community?

Graduating from CU �鶹ӰԺ is a testament to the support of my family. As cliche as it sounds, I wouldn't have been able to do it without them. They have provided me with a solid foundation to build upon and I cannot thank them enough. I want to give a special shoutout to my grandparents. Their unwavering support over the years has been incredible. Y'all, look at the heights we've reached!”

What is your best piece of advice for incoming students?

You have to make time for yourself. Grad school can feel overwhelming and there is a mindset of toxic productivity in academia. Carve out time to explore your hobbies, spend time with friends, and enjoy what Colorado has to offer. Also, go to therapy. CAPS is a great resource! ”

What continues to drive your passion for your work after graduation?

My family and the youth.”

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Meet Quinton Andre Freeman, a committed teacher, teacher educator, and mentor

Anonymous — Tue, 03 May 2022 05:15:44 +0000

Meet Quinton Andre Freeman, a committed teacher, teacher educator, and mentor Anonymous (not verified) Mon, 05/02/2022 - 23:15

Quinton Andre Freeman comes from a family of educators. His wife, Adrienne, is a middle school principal. His parents, now a retired county agent and a retired special education teacher, met while student teaching, and his mother urged him to get a teaching certificate as a fallback plan after college graduation.

“What was supposed to be one year as a teacher in a 7th-grade life science classroom became five, then about the same number of years as an instructional coach in Houston,” he said. “I always had an inkling that, at least in part, teachers become teachers because of the teachers they interact with day-to-day.”

Both as a beginning teacher and someone who often supported teachers new to the profession, I felt Holmes (my one-year, non-traditional prep program) prepared me for many things. Yet, I always had an inkling that, at least in part, teachers become teachers because of the teachers they interact with day-to-day. And some of those teachers happen to be adults. I came to graduate school hoping to better understand what happened to me and what I surmised was happening to others."

Freeman credits his one-year, non-traditional teacher prep program with helping prepare him for many things as a beginning teacher and someone would later support other new teachers. Freeman sought a doctoral program that could help him make sense of his journey and others’ paths, which led him to Learning Sciences and Human Development program area with an additional focus on Teacher Learning, Research and Practice at the CU �鶹ӰԺ School of Education.

At CU �鶹ӰԺ, Freeman has been a committed teacher and teacher educator, and he is the 2022 Outstanding Graduate for Outstanding Teaching.

He taught undergraduate courses in for the School of Education’s elementary teacher education program, served as the teaching assistant in a required first-year qualitative methods course, and was an unofficial mentor to multiple cohorts of doctoral students in Learning Sciences and Human Development.

For 5 years, he was a member of the EPIC research team where he taught the course on learning and social justice and supported undergraduates as they learned alongside children at the EPIC afterschool club at an elementary in Lafayette. EPIC is part of a long-standing university-community partnership with Alicia Sanchez International Elementary School that aims to: support learning opportunities for children from non-dominant communities, organize teacher education for social justice, and cultivate new practices at the university and the elementary school that can facilitate more humanizing educational experiences.

In these spaces, Freeman always embodied curiosity and extended grace for learners. He would, for example, stop a planned lesson to make time to understand people’s ideas and invite others to engage with him in turning problems around so that they could understand their complexity.

As a scholar who read voraciously, he also regularly shared rich resources including books, articles, videos, and Twitter threads, that pushed his peers’ and students’ thinking in unexpected and creative ways.

Freeman designed his pedagogy with great intention, so that undergraduates would be challenged and supported.

“He approached teaching undergraduates holistically – from inside the classroom to program design, to teacher educator learning and research on teaching,” his nominators said. “This robust approach to teaching is necessary if we, as a school of education, are going to support the development of grounded and innovative teachers and teacher educators.”

In his own words

Please tell us a bit about yourself

I still consider home a small (population of 5,500) town in central Louisiana called Marksville. I am the oldest of three (younger brother and sister), and our parents are both from small Mississippi towns. So we were transplants, a somewhat unusual circumstance there among my friends. However, I now have numerous play cousins and other fictive kin that made growing up there, in many ways, a wonderful experience.

My parents met during student teaching. My father is a retired County Agent, and my mother is a retired Special Education teacher. I remember her telling me that I should get at least certified to teach regardless of any other plans. That advice came back to me as I faced college graduation with no idea of what I wanted to do next. What was supposed to be a year as a teacher in a 7th-grade life science classroom became five, then about the same number of years as an instructional coach in Houston. Both as a beginning teacher and someone who often supported teachers new to the profession, I felt Holmes (my one-year, non-traditional prep program) prepared me for many things. Yet, I always had an inkling that, at least in part, teachers become teachers because of the teachers they interact with day-to-day. And some of those teachers happen to be adults. I came to graduate school hoping to better understand what happened to me and what I surmised was happening to others.

A term, practice-linked identities, found on Susan Jurow's faculty page made my nascent theory more concrete. I don't even remember what I searched to come across her page. The first time I set foot in Colorado was Welcome Weekend. All I knew is that everything I read said (if you can) choose advisor over place. And that has made all the difference. . .”

What is one of the lessons from your time at CU �鶹ӰԺ that you’ll carry with you into the next chapter?

For me, one of the best parts of being able to go to graduate school are the things you can learn and do outside of class, at least in part because of the kinds of collisions and connections supported by being in class/community with others. Many of my favorite moments happened in the C4C or over mounds of pork bulgogi or hanging in the Learning Sciences shared space or riding on Flatiron Flyers.”

What does graduating from CU �鶹ӰԺ represent for you and/or your community?

I think this is one of those questions best answered with some time and distance. What graduating will represent will perhaps best be described by answering "And, then what?" . . .and probably better answered by someone else.”

What is your best piece of advice for incoming students?

Remember why you came here. . .but also know that to learn is to change. Maybe a way to gauge the experience is not just asking "Did I do what I came here to do?" but also "Am I doing what I perhaps could or would not have done otherwise?"”

What continues to drive your passion for your work after graduation?

Two things come to mind.

First, I know what some of the ideas I have encountered in the Learning Sciences have done for me. What they have helped me to notice for example. There is still an open question of how we might "put a handle" (H/T Susan Jurow) on these kinds of perspectives. Particularly in places where attempting to move differently is at least marginalized or perhaps even regarded with hostility.

The second is related to the first. I am fascinated by the design work of others. People and communities make full, rich lives in the face of absurdity and cruelty. This is not to say that ingenuity requires indignities. Instead, to play on an argument Ruth Wilson Gilmore has made, we might remember that what the world could be already exists.

So, I'm driven by what we can all learn about our own micro-interactions, the ways we live together, by looking at the micro-interactions of others.”

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Meet Tanya Davis Ennis, working to eradicate inequity and injustice in education and beyond

Anonymous — Tue, 03 May 2022 05:13:41 +0000

Meet Tanya Davis Ennis, working to eradicate inequity and injustice in education and beyond Anonymous (not verified) Mon, 05/02/2022 - 23:13

A leader on campus in broadening participation in STEM education as the most recent director of the BOLD Center, Tanya Ennis is committed to developing and studying strategies that can create a more equitable environment for racially minoritized and first-generation students.

Ennis studied electrical engineering at an Historically Black College/University, Southern University, and then computer engineering for her Master’s degree from the University of Southern California before coming to CU �鶹ӰԺ to direct the Engineering GoldShirt Program and now the BOLD Center in the College of Engineering and Applied Science. Her work supporting underrepresented students to succeed as engineering students and her high regard for the School of Education doctoral program led her to enroll in the Learning Sciences and Human Development PhD program.

I am a first-generation student and the first in my family to earn a PhD., and many in my family and my community have shared that I am an inspiration to them, and that my scholarly work has lasting impact. I stand on the shoulders of my parents, Ethel B. Davis and Ernest Davis, Sr., who did not have the educational opportunities I did. This is also true for many of the ancestors upon whose shoulders I stand today. I dedicate this award to my husband, Cedric Ennis, Sr., our children, parents, and ancestors.."

Ennis’ dissertation, “Yearning to Learn: A Qualitative Comparative Analysis of Black Engineering Students Deciding to Stay or Leave Engineering Majors,” grew out of her desire to center and understand Black students’ experiences in engineering. She studied Black students’ decisions to stay or leave their engineering majors at a Predominantly White Institution, revealing the complexities of why Black students choose to stay or leave. Ennis’ findings emphasize the importance of friendships with peers who lend both social and academic support. Her impressive and comprehensive research has earned her the 2022 Outstanding Graduate and Outstanding Dissertation Award by the School of Education faculty committee.

“This is a critical insight that engineering colleges can act upon, through community-building programs and interventions that help create space for supportive peer interactions,” her nominators shared. “No other study has undertaken such a comprehensive look at their experiences to develop and test conjectures of just why students stay or leave.”

Her experience in the doctoral program at CU �鶹ӰԺ has also benefited from the support of faculty and peers. She credits these supports, her faith, and stepping into her power with helping her through the program while balancing her career in engineering and the adversity she has faced in her academic, professional, and personal life. Not unlike the students’ experiences she documented in her research, community and support systems make all the difference.

“I had great PhD colleagues,” she said. “We enjoyed learning together and formed very strong friendships during our time together.”

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Meet Douglas Watkins, a Denver schools leader dedicated to research, STEM education

Anonymous — Fri, 29 Apr 2022 22:19:33 +0000

Meet Douglas Watkins, a Denver schools leader dedicated to research, STEM education Anonymous (not verified) Fri, 04/29/2022 - 16:19

Douglas Watkins already had a busy and fulfilling career and family life, when he enrolled in the master’s program in the CU �鶹ӰԺ School of Education to deepen his grounding in learning sciences. With a newly minted master's degree, Watkins hopes to inspire his young son.

Watkins is the secondary science curriculum coordinator with Denver Public Schools, and now the 2022 Outstanding Learning Sciences and Human Development Master’s Graduate.

Since coming to CU �鶹ӰԺ, Watkins has pursued coursework across both the Learning Sciences and Human Development program and STEM education program area to deepen his understanding of learning theory and curriculum and assessment in science.

As an older graduate student, with a full life already and young son, making the time to fit school work in with my 'normal' job and family commitments was tough. So, for me personally, I feel a great sense of accomplishment. I hope it means a lot for my son, too. I hope he is motivated to pursue advanced degrees in his life and can reflect back on how he saw me doing it so he knows he can do it, too."

He has continued to be a strong partner to CU �鶹ӰԺ’s inquiryHub, a research-practice partnership between CU �鶹ӰԺ researchers and science education leaders that develops materials, tools, and processes to promote equitable student learning of STEM. Watkins is not just as a co-designer of curriculum and professional development but also a co-researcher for the inquiryHub.

As a student, he has contributed to two published manuscripts and one published on the partnership’s innovative assessment work, “Assessment to promote equity and epistemic justice: A use-case of a research-practice partnership in science education” in the Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science with Distinguished Professor Bill Penuel.

“Douglas always brings thoughtful questions and infectious enthusiasm to his work; he is most deserving of this award.”

In his own words

Please tell us a bit about yourself

I was born and raised in Las Vegas, Nevada and moved to the Denver area after my son was born. I joined Denver Public Schools (DPS) as a teacher and then moved into an administrative position as a science curriculum specialist. After working for about a year within the Research Practice Partnership already in place between CU �鶹ӰԺ and DPS, I came to really appreciate what the research side of the partnership had to offer to help move the education system forward. It was that appreciation that prompted me to pursue coursework at �鶹ӰԺ, specifically within the Learning Sciences program. Tammy Sumner, Katie VanHorne, and Bill Penuel were really instrumental in convincing me of the utility in such a pursuit.”

What is one of the lessons from your time at CU �鶹ӰԺ that you’ll carry with you into the next chapter?

Learning alongside and with Bill Penuel will always rank high. I'm incredibly fortunate to have had his mentorship and scholarly advice. But I think what has changed the way I see the world is the first course I took at �鶹ӰԺ: Education and Sociolinguistics with Dr. Mileidis Gort. She opened my eyes to the ways language and languaging can and are used to influence cultures or disadvantage peoples and cultures. The reason I came back to school and pursued this degree was to support me with being better at my curriculum coordinator job in DPS. I think the impression Dr. Gort left on me, and my new appreciation for sociolinguistics, have helped me as much or more than anything else.”

What does graduating from CU �鶹ӰԺ represent for you and/or your community?

Graduating with a graduate degree from CU �鶹ӰԺ means a lot for me, personally, as it was a challenging time in my life to have gone back to school. As an older graduate student, with a full life already and young son, making the time to fit school work in with my 'normal' job and family commitments was tough. So, for me personally, I feel a great sense of accomplishment. I hope it means a lot for my son, too. I hope he is motivated to pursue advanced degrees in his life and can reflect back on how he saw me doing it so he knows he can do it, too.”

What is your best piece of advice for incoming students?

My success in the graduate program came from two places: desire and support. For incoming students, I'd advise them to be sure they are motivated and passionate about what they are studying. If those aren't there, then I'd suggest changing studies. Additionally, I'd advise students to lean on their advisors if times get tough. I saw so many of my collegiate peers work with amazing advisors to figure out paths forward so many times over the four years it took me to complete this degree. CU �鶹ӰԺ advisor, especially in the SOE, are amazingly supportive.”

What continues to drive your passion for your work after graduation?

I was passionate about my work before coming back to school. I feel I'm super prepared to continue exploring the new research, as it is communicated, in order to keep doing the best I can within the DPS system.”

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Meet Lianna Nixon, whose lens on climate communications is changing education and activism

Anonymous — Wed, 05 May 2021 23:18:44 +0000

Meet Lianna Nixon, whose lens on climate communications is changing education and activism Anonymous (not verified) Wed, 05/05/2021 - 17:18

Lianna Nixon is an environmental photographer and activist, but on Earth Day 2020, she was not thinking about marches or demonstrations. That was the day she found out if her spot on the world’s largest polar research expedition was still on despite the spread of a global pandemic.

Photography and film are really great spaces to hold people. I am still learning and it’s a big learning process, but my goal is never to inundate people with the fear of climate change or environmental destruction. It is about inquiry and joy — to get people to fall in love with these wild spaces, so that maybe they can do something to help."

A few weeks later Nixon’s bags were packed, and she was aboard the Polarstern research vessel with nine cameras as part of MOSAiC, the Multidisciplinary Drifting Observatory for the Study of Arctic Climate. She joined researchers from over 30 nations for almost six months of studying and capturing the dynamic beauty of the Arctic region and its implications for global climate change.

It was the trip of a lifetime, and yet Nixon’s powerful work at the intersection of photography, activism, and education has been budding for a long time.

Even as an inquisitive child, Nixon has always been interested in the interconnections between the natural world and humankind. As a 19-year-old filmmaker, an internship allowed her to document rhino poaching in South Africa and organize activism back in the U.S. Now in her 20s, she frequently photographs in the Katmai National Park in Alaska to chronicle how the Pebble Mine threatens the last, largest sockeye salmon fishery that sustains massive ocean and coastal ecosystems and 14 indigenous communities.

Nixon mindfully works to bring these global issues and wild places home to connect with people’s hearts and minds no matter where they live or fall on the political spectrum.

“Photography and film are really great spaces to hold people,” she said. “I am still learning and it’s a big learning process, but my goal is never to inundate people with the fear of climate change or environmental destruction. It is about inquiry and joy — to get people to fall in love with these wild spaces, so that maybe they can do something to help.”

From polar bears to vibrant blue sea ice, Nixon’s breathtaking photography and savvy social media skills offer an educational lens on climate by tapping into our shared humanity and forging bold but accessible conversations about humans and the environment.

As an undergraduate at CU �鶹ӰԺ, Nixon took an education course that resonated with her social-justice orientation and questioning of conventional education. The Learning Sciences and Human Development master’s program in the School of Education just clicked. She is the program’s 2021 Outstanding Graduate to honor her research’s ability to invite understanding, experience, and action.

“The learning science degree has been really transformative,” she said. “It reminded me that learning doesn't happen just in my head, it’s also embodied, holistic, and interconnected with the things that we do in our everyday lives.

“It also helped me ground myself in what kind of community I want to surround myself with — a community that challenges you can hold space for you to thrive and be supported as well.”

With mentorship from Learning Sciences Professor Susan Jurow, Nixon weaves together her expertise in environmental and social justice and the arts to design transformative learning experiences. She integrated MOSAiC filmmaking into her capstone project, where she uses educational equity and social justice frameworks to examine questions of power, justice, and learning in climate communications.

Her film is an exciting task with substantial responsibility, as she applies the anti-oppressive pedagogies of her education studies to address story bias and missing voices and ultimately change the best practices for inclusive storytelling.

“I was depending a lot on the script style of Sir David Attenborough of the BBC, and while he is influential in my storytelling, he also is a privileged, white, male scientist and asking my narrator Elmahdi, an African male, to embody that was wrong on many levels,” she said. “It took that kind of work and humility to realize those things, and sometimes we need that as storytellers.”

Nixon also acknowledges the privileges that have afforded her experiences, and she is paying forward by working to change climate communications and nature photography, both predominantly white and male, by honoring mentors and mentoring young women.

Despite its occasionally daunting nature, the collective work on climate action gives her hope for the future.

“Part of this activism work has been about handing over the power to the youth, the ones who are heirs to our planet and whose futures are at stake,” she said.

“I am in Susan Jurow’s class called ‘radicalizing possibilities.’ I think that’s really where the future is going to be. We’re just emerging, and the future is really challenging, innovating, and supporting an incredible space that will make room for a lot of possibilities.

“I’m optimistic about what the future holds for education and the climate because of the passionate people that are in this community.”

Lianna’s advice for students

It sounds very cliche but don't lose sight of your strengths and your passions. I think those are really key drivers and sometimes in academia, we can lose ourselves within it. There's still a lot of work that needs to be done in how we protect ourselves in the academy. Allow yourself to explore. I wouldn't have been as successful without taking some theater and community engagement classes. Going into other schools, colleges, and institutions and having those intersect with your degree in education can be really helpful and transformative in how you are looking at what you want to do in your life, as well for the School of Education.”

Graduation, A Poem by Lianna Nixon

From the North Pole to Zoom meetings,
Blazing Trails and shattering ceilings
Coming together for justice and equity
Contributing to practice and pedagogy
Intrinsic, expansive, challenging
Dedication to education everlasting
As tassels take place on my left endless possibilities begin to unrest
I am thankful, I really am for all of you
For your support and kindness rings true
For this community hold each other up
Now it is my turn to pass on its love
Here’s to the challenges and opportunities ahead
It’s time we part ways, no important words unsaid
I am an Education Buff, I always will be
Looking towards horizons of curiosity"

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Meet Taphy Tivaringe, changing the education system from the inside out

Anonymous — Mon, 03 May 2021 20:39:24 +0000

Meet Taphy Tivaringe, changing the education system from the inside out Anonymous (not verified) Mon, 05/03/2021 - 14:39

College opportunities, not to mention graduate studies, were rare in the small Southern African country of Zimbabwe where Tafadzwa Tivaringe grew up. With unyielding support from his parents, his community, and mentors, Tivaringe, or “Taphy” as he is known, did his undergraduate and postgraduate training at the University of Cape Town in South Africa, and now Tivaringe is earning his PhD in Learning Sciences and Human Development from the CU �鶹ӰԺ School of Education.

Through rigorous research, I am committed to understanding how education policies and learning environments can be inclusive and democratic. That way, we can get closer to Mandela’s vision of education’s role in transforming society."

Even though a doctoral degree is often called a “terminal” degree, Dr. Tivaringe is just getting started, as he works to transform the educational system from the inside out.

Much of Tivaringe’s passion stems from his lived experiences. In his parents’ colonial Zimbabwe, then Rhodesia, the education system of their youth was designed for them to complete high school and to be absorbed into the work force as “semi-skilled workers,” but his parents and many others in the community strived for new educational futures for their children.

“While my childhood friends and I took our parents’ wishes to heart, the reality for many of us was that the pathway from high school to college was marred by barriers and potholes that made it incredibly difficult to access college education,” he said.

Tivaringe credits good fortune, amazing mentors, pathway programs — such as an undergraduate fellowship that allowed him to conduct research early in his postsecondary studies— and family and a community that unflinchingly believed in him to be able to access college and graduate education.

In 2014, Tivaringe was appointed a local researcher on the International Study of Youth Organizing, a project that led to a fateful collaboration with Ben Kirshner, CU �鶹ӰԺ learning sciences and human development professor and the study’s co-director. Kirshner was committed to understanding the story of youth in Africa and he took an interest in Tivaringe’s development as a person, both in ways that were refreshingly nuanced.

“Our great working relationship culminated in him taking me under his wing to pursue a PhD in Education at CU �鶹ӰԺ,” he said. “Beyond that relationship, I was drawn by the school’s strong reputation in two of my core areas of interest, human development and ed policy.”

Finding like-minded mentors, who care for their colleagues and students on a personal level made all the difference for Tivaringe. Graduate studies can be seen as an isolating and self-driven experience, but he found mentors make up one’s team, and success is tied to how well that team works together.

“I have learned that doing good scholarship and being a good person are two sides of the same coin,” he said. “It’s commonplace for people in the academy to focus on the academic project and lose the basic understanding that we are all just human beings who thrive if we center basic care for each other — what we call Ubuntu back in Southern Africa.

“In my experiences with faculty and staff at CU �鶹ӰԺ, particularly in the School of Education, I’ve observed that people care about academic rigor as much as they care about being great human beings.”

For Tivarange’s mentors and peers, the feeling is mutual. He is well-liked and well-respected by professors and peers.

During his time at CU �鶹ӰԺ, he contributed to public scholarship in a multitude of ways, including skillful evaluation of CU Engage programs and his dedication to collaborative partnerships with the Research Hub for Youth Organizing. In 2019, Tivaringe received a prestigious invitation from the United Nations to attend the WIDER Development international conference due to his work in Cape Town and doctoral research. The faculty selected Tivaringe and his impressive three-article dissertation, “The Possibilities and Limits of Using Education as a Lever for Structural Transformation,” for the 2021 Outstanding Graduate Award for Outstanding Dissertation.

“I am most impressed by the rigorous and nuanced approach he takes to examining the social world and the role of education in it,” wrote one faculty nominator. “Indeed it is remarkable that in the arc of Taphy’s 3-article dissertation, some of which is already published in top-tier journals, he manages to offer a sobering yet powerful analysis of both the possibilities and limits of public education in efforts to improve social mobility for historically marginalized groups.”

He sees his own story as representative of the potential for change among communities that, like his, remain underserved and marginalized by various systems.

“That potential demands that we create systems that ensure that graduands like me are not merely a function of a fortuitous alignment of key determinants of college success,” he said. “We have to continue devising strategies that broaden access to education across all levels.”

However, Tivaringe does not believe stories like his should be left up to chance, but rather, his work and passion center around change.

As inspiration, he cites Nelson Mandela’s famous quote, “education is the most powerful weapon which you can use to change the world,” and he argues for the need to continue the legacy and work of transformative leaders like Mandela.

“Unfortunately, many people across the world still do not have access to education and/or their experience of education is truncated by unwelcoming environments and/or pedagogies that are marginalizing,” he said.

“Through rigorous research, I am committed to understanding how education policies and learning environments can be inclusive and democratic. That way, we can get closer to Mandela’s vision of education’s role in transforming society.”

Taphy’s special thanks

I would really like to thank my academic mentors, Ben Kirshner, Terrenda White, Susan Jurow, and Roudy Hildreth from the School of Education and Andrew Philips and Srinivas Parinandi from Political Science who invested so much in my development as a scholar.”

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