Education Research
Current Projects
Disrupting School Pushout: A multi-sector inquiry of community, school, and mental health factors (2024)
Structural racism and systemic disinvestment in urban communities of color have driven large disparities in health and educational outcomes that show up in various ways. These conditions contribute to school pushout—a term used to describe how students can be systematically driven out of the educational system by a variety of factors and circumstances that are often beyond their control.
This project aims to promote equity in education, improve mental health outcomes, and support healthy development by investigating and addressing the systemic factors that contribute to school pushout in New York City. The project will connect data on neighborhood-level opportunity structures and resource allocation in schools with information about the academic and mental health outcomes of students.
For more information, visit the Research Alliance.
Fugitive Care: The Politics of Care Enacted by Afro-Caribbean Women Teachers (2024)
In this article published in The Journal of Teacher Education, we explores how Afro-Caribbean women teachers in the U.S. enact “fugitive care”—a form of culturally grounded, resilient, and often invisible support for students while navigating racialized and gendered challenges in schools.
Drawing on Critical Race Theory, Decolonial Feminism, and Transnational Black Feminist frameworks, the research reveals how these educators balance high expectations and firm boundaries with deep commitment, respect, and love for their students.
Using interviews, life histories, focus groups, and surveys with teachers in the Southern U.S. and New York City, the findings highlight practices such as radical transparency, culturally responsive pedagogy, and community building as tools for resisting deficit narratives. The work calls for greater visibility of Black immigrant educators, more inclusive teacher preparation, and policy changes that recognize the unique perspectives Afro-Caribbean teachers bring to educational spaces. Read the full brochure to learn more.
Finding Place: Strengthening Pedagogical Practices on Forced Migration (2023)
Co-authored with undergraduate students in various departments, this book chapter (2023) examines the intersections of forced migration and higher education, focusing on how to meaningfully engage with and center migrant voices in academic spaces. The chapter draws on a Vassar College course—“Finding Place: Refugee Youth Schooling Experiences in Athens, Greece”—that sought to build a novel, grassroots approach to studying forced migration and education. Students and faculty partnered with a refugee-led community organization in Athens to design educational programming and contribute to fieldwork research on refugee schooling experiences.
The work highlights how restorative justice pedagogy was woven into the course design, offering a case example of how dialogic, relationship-centered teaching can support displaced learners. It also reflects candidly on the course’s pivots and challenges, particularly pandemic-related travel restrictions, and concludes with strategies for educators seeking to integrate migrant perspectives into curricula. This collaborative, student-authored chapter contributes to ongoing conversations about addressing educational inequities for migrant populations while modeling the impact of undergraduate-led scholarship.
Maroon Epistemologies: Afro-Caribbean Women Teachers (2022)
Presented at the AERA Annual Meeting (2022), this roundtable discussion centered on Afro-Caribbean women teachers and their unique epistemologies—rooted in resistance, survival, and cultural preservation. We examined how these educators embody and transmit knowledge through alternative, non-Eurocentric pedagogies, drawing on historical legacies of Maroon communities and their struggles for autonomy.
