UIC College of Education Grant Awards Top $10 Million

Faculty of the University of Illinois at Chicago College of Education have received grants totaling more than $10 million for research and educator preparation.

“We are extremely proud of our faculty and the continued recognition of their outstanding work,” said Victoria Chou, dean of the college. “This grant money allows us to continue to produce the kinds of applied research and educational programs that can have a major influence on effective policies and practice.”

The grants awarded include:

• A three-year, $2.1 million grant from the Eli Broad Foundation to Urban Education Leadership program director Peter Martinez, Assistant Professor Shelby Cosner, and Professor Steve Tozer, to prepare 50 principals for Chicago Public Schools over the next three years. UIC was the first university the foundation funded in this area.
• A five-year, $1.5 million grant from the U.S. Department of Education to Clinical Associate Professor Karen Sakash and Assistant Professor Dory Lightfoot to produce a pool of highly trained secondary and upper-elementary teachers to work with English language learners in the Chicago public schools.
• A five-year, $1.5 million Education Department grant to Professor Flora Rodriguez-Brown and Assistant Professor Aria Razfar to create opportunities for bilingual and mainstream teachers to collaborate on developing teaching strategies for English language learners.
• A five-year, $1.5 million Education Department grant to Assistant Professor Aria Razfar and Associate Professor Lena Licon Khisty to provide professional development for bilingual and mainstream K-8 teachers from schools with predominantly working-class English learners.
• A three-year, $1.2 million grant from the Institute of Education Sciences to Clinical Associate Professor Michelle Parker-Katz and Associate Professor Marie Tejero Hughes to enhance middle school teachers’ content-area reading instruction to improve the achievement of students with disabilities. The two were also awarded a four-year, $758,000 Education Department grant to recruit and prepare special education leaders who have expertise in working with students from culturally and linguistically diverse backgrounds in urban centers.
• A four-year, $785,000 Education Department grant to Associate Professor Norma Lopez Reyna and Associate Professor Mary Bay to increase bilingual special education teachers’ ability to work with English language learners.
• A one-year, $500,000 grant from the Chicago Community Trust to Professor Taffy Raphael to improve literacy teaching and learning in Chicago public schools. Raphael also was awarded a one-year, $230,000 grant from Chicago Public Schools for developing literacy leaders and for recruiting a diverse group of students into the literacy, language and culture M.Ed. program at UIC.
• A one-year, $40,000 grant from the Spencer Foundation to Senior Research Associate and Visiting Assistant Professor Barbara Abel and Professor Artin Goncu to examine children’s ability to self-regulate in school from a sociocultural perspective.
• A two-year, $315,000 NSF grant to Stacy Wenzel, UIC senior researcher; Bret Feranchak, Chicago Public Schools; and David Slavsky, Loyola University-Chicago; to research the systemic reform of math and science education in Chicago from 2002 through 2007.

UIC ranks among the nation’s top 50 universities in federal research funding and is Chicago’s largest university with 25,000 students, 12,000 faculty and staff, 15 colleges and the state’s major public medical center. A hallmark of the campus is the Great Cities Commitment, through which UIC faculty, students and staff engage with community, corporate, foundation and government partners in hundreds of programs to improve the quality of life in metropolitan areas around the world. For more information about UIC, please visit www.uic.edu