Newswise — Gloria J. Ladson-Billings, Ph.D., professor of curriculum and instruction at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, has been elected president-elect of the 22,000-member American Educational Research Association (AERA). Her term as president starts at the end of AERA's 2005 Annual Meeting, after a year of service as president-elect.
Dr. Ladson-Billings will succeed Marilyn Cochran-Smith, professor of education at Boston College's Lynch School of Education. Dr. Cochran-Smith, an expert on teacher education across the professional lifespan and teacher research/practitioner inquiry, assumes office this year at the conclusion of the 2004 Annual Meeting, taking place April 12 to 16 in San Diego, California.
At this 85th Annual Meeting, Dr. Ladson-Billings was selected to deliver the DeWitt Wallace-Readers Digest's Distinguished Lecture. Her address, Landing on the Wrong Note? The Price We Paid for Brown, is set for Wednesday, April 14, at 12:25 p.m. in the Manchester Grand Hyatt San Diego. She will argue that 50 years is adequate time to look back critically at Brown, assess our progress, and determine where we can go from here to ensure educational equity and quality.
An AERA member since 1989, Dr. Ladson-Billings has served this professional society in many positions, including editor of the Section on Teaching, Learning, & Human Development of the quarterly American Educational Research Journal; member-at-large of AERA's Council, the Association's governing board; affirmative action officer and faculty mentor in several Divisions; and as a member of the Association's Professional Development and Training Committee. She also has been presented several Association-wide awards, including the Palmer O. Johnson Award and the Early Career Award.
At the University of Wisconsin's School of Education, Dr. Ladson-Billings, who also serves as a project director at the Wisconsin Center for Education Research (WCER), has concentrated her research on multicultural education, social studies, critical race theory and education, and culturally relevant pedagogy. At WCER, she and colleagues developed Teach for Diversity, a graduate program for teachers who want to teach in diverse racial, ethnic, and socioeconomic settings. She is a visiting scholar this academic year at the Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences, Stanford, California.
In 1994, Dr. Ladson-Billings authored the book, The Dreamkeepers: Successful Teachers of African American Children, in which she examined eight outstanding teachers who differ in personal style but approach teaching to affirm cultural identity. "The quest for quality education remains an elusive dream for the African American community. However, it does remain a dream—perhaps the most powerful for the people of African descent in this nation," she wrote.
Among Dr. Ladson-Billings's numerous professional activities, this 1984 Stanford University graduate has been a senior fellow in urban education of the Annenberg Institute for School Reform at Brown University and has also published scholarly articles in journals such as Teachers College Record, Qualitative Studies in Education, Journal of Teacher Education, and Qualitative Inquiry.
AERA represents 22,000 educators who are dedicated to research that addresses fundamental problems and informs policy and practice in education, from pre-kindergarten to post-secondary education and beyond. Founded in 1916 and based in Washington, D.C., AERA offers a comprehensive program of scholarly publications, training, fellowships, and meetings to advance educational research, to disseminate knowledge, and to improve the capacity of the profession for the public good.
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