2009 Echoes and Reflections Professors’ Study Tour

Participant Profiles

Warren J. Blumenfeld

Warren is Assistant Professor in the Department of Curriculum and Instruction at Iowa State University in Ames, Iowa specializing in Multicultural and International Curriculum Studies; and Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, and Queer Studies. Dr. Blumenfeld is co-editor with Khyati Y. Joshi and Ellen E. Fairchild of Investigating Christian Privilege and Religious Oppression in the United States; editor of Homophobia: How We All Pay the Price; co-author, with Diane Raymond, of Looking at Gay and Lesbian Life; co-editor of Readings for Diversity and Social Justice; co-editor with Margaret Sönser Breen of Butler Matters: Judith Butlers Impact on Feminist and Queer Studies; and author of AIDS and Your Religious Community.

Sylvia Bulgar

Sylvia is currently Professor of Mathematics Education at Rider University in New Jersey, where she teaches courses in elementary mathematics methods, mathematics preparation for teaching, and supervises student teachers. The two predominant themes of her philosophy of education are that learning is an ongoing process and that teaching must be founded on practice that is grounded in reputable research. Dr. Bulgar has published extensively on understanding how children construct knowledge of fractions, teacher preparation for the teaching of mathematics, identifying characteristics of mathematical proficiency, and test preparation in classrooms. Her work has been included as a textual resource for teachers, teacher trainers, and educational institutions by the International Institute for Capacity Building in Africa (IICBA), an affiliate of UNESCO. She serves as the Director of Honors for the School of Education and helps to identify students for outside grants such as Fulbright, Rhodes, etc. She also serves as liaison between the Department of Teacher Education and the Rider University Holocaust Resource Center, arranging for future teachers to have workshops where they can learn about how they can use resources to comply with the New Jersey mandated Holocaust and Genocide education. As the child of two Holocaust Survivors, this involvement has become one of passion.

Beverly Ann Chin

Beverly is Professor of English, Director of the English Teaching Program, and former Director of the Montana Writing Project at the University of Montana in Missoula. In 1995-1996, Dr. Chin served as President of the National Council of Teachers of English (NCTE). She has served on the Executive Committees for the Conference on English Leadership and the Conference on English Education. For eight years, she served on the Board of Directors of the National Board for Professional Teaching Standards. She is the Senior Project Consultant for the 2011 Writing Framework for the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP). Formerly a high school English teacher and adult education reading teacher, Beverly has also worked with educators in many countries, including Japan, Taiwan, India, Pakistan, Nepal, Sri Lanka, Thailand, People's Republic of China, Bangladesh, Guam, Scotland, England, Germany, Canada, Czech Republic, Ukraine, and New Zealand. Beverly consulted with Annenberg/CPB on professional development videotape programs. In 2004, she was featured in the video program, “The Expanding Canon: Teaching Multicultural Literature in the High School.” In 2005, she served as the Senior Content Advisor and Web Writer for another Annenberg/CPB video project, “Teaching Multicultural Literature: A Workshop for the Middle Grades.” Beverly is the author, editor, and/or consultant for several texts on teaching reading and literature; writing and grammar; children's literature, and multicultural literature. During her thirty-five years as an educator, she has received numerous awards for her teaching and service.

Janice S. Dinsmore (Jan)

Jan is a full time faculty member in the School of Education and Counseling at Wayne State College, Nebraska. Presently, she teaches classes to preservice and inservice teachers in the areas of Human Relations (required of all educators in Nebraska), Child and Adolescent Development in addition to coordinating and teaching in the English as a Second Language graduate program. Until recently, she also taught World History as part of the general education requirements. She is a member of the Nebraska English Language Learners Leadership Institute and the Nebraska Holocaust Education Consortium. Jan has spent several years involved with International Education and as Director of the Extended Campus outreach program (1986–1996). Early teaching experiences include positions as a high school social science teacher in Maine and as a junior high science teacher in Wiesbaden, Germany where she lived for eight years. Her undergraduate degree is from the University of Maine in history and biology and her graduate degrees are in history (MAE) and counseling (MSE) from Wayne State College.

Ellen G. Friedman

Ellen is Professor of English and Women’s and Gender Studies at The College of New Jersey. She was director of the Women’s and Gender Studies Program for eighteen years. Dr. Friedman teaches courses in representations of the Holocaust and has led an NEH grant in Women and the Holocaust for New Jersey educators. In addition, she teaches Gender and Democracy, literary and feminist theories, and modern U.S. literature. Her publications include Joyce Carol Oates, Breaking the Sequence: Women’s Experimental Fiction, Morality USA, as well as other books and articles in such journals as PMLA, Modern Fiction Studies, and Studies in the Novel. Currently, she has an article on teaching in Ms. Magazine called “Out of the Box Education.” She is working on a book relating the experiences of her family during the Holocaust.

Jesus Garcia

Jesus is Professor of Social Studies Education in the Department of Curriculum and Instruction at the University of Nevada Las Vegas. He teaches courses in the areas of general and social studies methods, multicultural education and graduate courses in curriculum, pedagogy, and current issues in social studies. His areas of interest include the portrayal of societal groups in social studies materials, multicultural education, and social studies methods. Jesus is a member of the Southern Nevada Council for the Social Studies and the Past President of the National Council for the Social Studies and co-author of three professional books: Field Experience: Strategies for Exploring Diversity in School, Social Studies for Children: A Guide to Basic Instruction, and Contexts of Teaching: Methods for Middle and High School Instruction and three middle school U.S. history textbooks: America’s Past and Promise, Creating America, and McDougal Littell’s American History Program. Examples of his numerous articles in the areas of cultural diversity and social studies education include “Reinventing the Social Studies: By All Mean! (Phi Delta Kappan, Spring 2008),” “Presidential Address – Democracy and Diversity: Social Studies in Action” (Social Education, Jan./Feb. 2005, pp.8-9+), and “Multicultural Education in Social Studies” (Social Education, Nov./Dec. 2002, pp. 246-248). Dr. Garcia is a native Californian. He was raised in Northern California and attended college in the Bay Area. He taught high school in Fremont and the elementary grades in San Jose. He received his terminal degree from the University of California, Berkeley. His experiences include teaching at Sonoma State University, Texas A&M University, Indiana University, University of Illinois, and the University of Kentucky.

Heidi Gregori-Gahan

Heidi has been active in the field of international education for thirty years. She currently serves as Director of International Programs and Services at the University of Southern Indiana, a comprehensive office responsible for providing services to international students/scholars, international recruitment, the development and implementation of study abroad programs, and campus-wide programming. She has held several regional and national positions with NAFSA: Association of International Educators and with the International Student Exchange Program. Heidi has presented regionally, nationally, and overseas at NAFSA conferences and other professional meetings. She is the USI representative on the Committee to Promote Respect in Schools, which was formed to encourage teaching about the Holocaust in area schools because of its lessons of tolerance and respect for diversity. Heidi, who holds a Master’s degree from Loyola University of Chicago, has received numerous grants to fund international projects which have enhanced both the campus and the community, most recently a NAFSA Collaborative Training Grant to fund a project entitled Increasing Cross-cultural Understanding and Competence through Collaboration and Dialogue: Addressing the Needs of Students from Saudi Arabia.

Heather Hackman

Heather is Associate Professor in the Department of Human Relations and Multicultural Education at St. Cloud State University in St. Cloud, Minnesota. Dr. Hackman teaches courses in social justice and multicultural education, heterosexism and homophobia in the U.S., race and racism in the U.S., and oppression and social change. She received her doctorate from the University of Massachusetts at Amherst in 2000 and has been teaching at St. Cloud since then. Heather consults locally and nationally on issues of racism and white privilege, classism in education, LBGT issues in education, and power dynamics in education. She has sat on the boards of Minnesota NAME (the National Association for Multicultural Education) as past president, Rainbow Families as an Executive Committee member, the national board of NAME, and has served on numerous education and community committees dedicated to multicultural and social justice work. She is a co-editor of Readings for Diversity and Social Justice, has published in the area of social justice education theory and practice, and is currently working on two books, one addressing LBGT issues in multicultural education and another addressing E-12 professional development around anti-racism and challenging white privilege.

Catherine Lewis

Catherine is an Associate Professor of History, the Director of the Museum of History and Holocaust Education, and the Coordinator of Public History at Kennesaw State University in Kennesaw, Georgia. In addition to her work at KSU, Dr. Lewis is a curator and special projects coordinator at the Atlanta History Center and has curated more than thirty exhibitions, including Parallel Journeys: World War II and the Holocaust Through the Eyes of Teens. She is the author, co-author, or editor of eight books. She holds a B.A. in English and History from Emory University and a M.A. and Ph.D. in American Studies from the University of Iowa.

Maryann McLoughlin

Maryann is Assistant Supervisor in the Holocaust Resource Center at The Richard Stockton College of New Jersey and teaches undergraduates and graduates in Stockton’s Holocaust and Genocide Studies Program — online and face-to-face courses: Women and Genocide, Music and the Holocaust, and Literature of the Holocaust and Genocide. Dr. McLoughlin also works with Holocaust survivors helping them to write and/or edit their memoirs—she has published twenty memoirs with survivors. In addition, she has edited two books of their portraits and brief biographies; the second edition of this book: Portraits of Resilience: Holocaust Survivors of South Jersey includes eighty-two of these portraits and narratives. Maryann also creates podcasts of Holocaust survivors and liberators as well as survivors of the Nanking Massacre and other Japanese atrocities during World War II for students and faculty. During the summer of 2008 Maryann was a fellow for a study tour to China—Shanghai, Nanjing, and Changde, studying especially “Comfort Women” and the Nanking Massacre.

Miles Myers

Miles is currently the Senior Researcher for the Los Angeles Institute for Standards, Curricula, and Assessment (ISCA), and a consultant for various projects, having this year completed his work as a consultant for the Hewlett Project at the Institute for Learning, (IFL) University of Pittsburg. ISCA focuses on Classroom Design and the architecture of subject matter. Dr. Myers is currently a consultant to the BookEd project, headquartered in Sonoma, California. He has served as Executive Director for Edschool.com, Advantage Inc; Executive Director of the California Subject Matter Projects (CSMP, President’s Office, University of California); Executive Director, the National Council of Teachers of English; Co-Director of the English\English Language Arts Project of the New Standards Project, University of Pittsburg; Co-Director and later Administrative Director of the Bay Area Writing Project (BAWP), the California Writing Project (CWP), and the National Writing Project (NWP) at the University of California, Berkeley; Lecturer, Secondary English Credential Program, University of California, Berkeley; Adjunct Professor of English at the University of Illinois, Urbana.; a guest lecturer at many universities, and an English teacher and later English Department Chair at Oakland High School, California. He has served on numerous boards, chairing the Executive Board of the Alpha Plus Corporation for over twenty-five years (a group of preschools) and most recently completing Board service on BASRC and Springboard, both located in the San Francisco Bay Area. Miles has authored or co-authored many articles and about ten books. He earned his Ph.D. (Language and Literacy), M.A. (English), M.A.T. (English), and B.A. (Rhetoric) at the University of California, Berkeley.

Elizabeth Spalding (Liz)

Elizabeth Spalding is an Associate Professor in the Department of Curriculum and Instruction at the University of Nevada Las Vegas where she teaches courses in English education. She is an active member of the National Council of Teachers of English (NCTE), Past President of the Kentucky Council of Teachers of English, and former director of a National Writing Project site. She was Project Manager for Standards at the NCTE in Urbana, Illinois where she worked on the development of the national standards for English language arts. Dr. Spalding’s research interests include performance and portfolio assessment, secondary English teaching and teachers, and experiential learning, including experiences in Holocaust education. Her publications on this topic include: Spalding, E., Savage, T., & Garcia, J. (2007), “The March of Remembrance and Hope: Teaching about diversity and social justice through the Holocaust,” Teachers College Record, 109(6), 1423-1456 and Spalding, E., & Garcia, J. (2008), and “Infusing Holocaust education into teacher education through experiential learning,” pp. 99-116 in T. Duboys, Ed., Paths to Teaching the Holocaust, New York: SENSE Publishers.