ANDY PORTER STEPS IN - Penn GSE · Madlyn K. Abramson Ed’57 GEd’60 Dr. Benjamin M. Ashcom Gr’74 Dr. Reina Marin Bassini CW’72 GEd’72 Dr. Patricia Cayne CW’60 Susan Frier

Spring 2007

M A G A Z I N E

The Graduate School of Educat ion • University of Pennsylvania

ANDY PORTERSTEPS IN

ANDY PORTERSTEPS IN

Education in Wartime:GSE prof looks at Israel & America

Meet Penn GSE’s new deanMeet Penn GSE’s new dean

From excellenceto eminence—

Called the PENN COMPACT, President Gutmann’s visionis built on principles integral to the mission of the Graduate School of Education—

ä increasing access to education

ä integrating knowledge across disciplines

ä engaging locally and globally

A GIFT TO THE PENN GSE ANNUAL FUND SUPPORTS

ä access for students through needs-based financial grants

ä faculty research that cuts across disciplines and schools

ä engagement with partners across the street and around the globe

MAKE YOUR GIFT TODAY and help Penn GSE rise from EXCELLENCE TO EMINENCE1. Charge your gift to Visa, American Express or

MasterCard.

2. Send a check or money order made payable to:Trustees of the University of Pennsylvania.

3. Give appreciated securities. For details about how totransfer securities to Penn GSE, call the Office of theTreasurer at (215) 898-7254.

4. Matching Gifts: If you or your spouse/partner is affiliat-ed with a company that has a matching gift program,you can obtain a matching gift form from the personneloffice and include the completed form with your gift.

With these words, Penn President Amy Gutmann articulated her vision

for the University’s future.

FOR MORE INFORMATION: Office of Development and Alumni RelationsPenn Graduate School of EducationOffice of Development3700 Walnut Street, Suite 223Philadelphia, PA 19104-6216

(215) 898-6962

www.gse.upenn.edu

Spring 2007 | Penn GSE | 1

The Graduate School of Education • University of PennsylvaniaM A G A Z I N E

F E A T U R E S

2 Dean’s Letter

3 Noteworthy

26 Alumni Notes

D E P A R T M E N T S

Penn GSE News sits down with Andy Porterfor a candid conversation about our soon-to-

be dean’s career, his research interests, and what brought him to Penn.

Introducing Andy Porter8

8

14

An international roster of experts share theirthoughts on educational opportunities for women in

the Middle East and North Africa.

18 A Call to Work

On the cover:Andrew C. Porter will start as PennGSE’s tenth dean in August 2007. He comes to GSE from VanderbiltUniversity, where he serves as a professorin the Peabody College of Education andas the director of the university’s LearningSciences Institute.

Credit: Trevor Dixon

One Leg in the FutureThriving democracies accommodate diversityand dissent. But in times of war, when stark dis-tinctions are drawn between “them” and “us,”how can they sustain such civic ideals?Searching for answers, Penn GSE AssistantProfessor Sigal Ben-Porath looks at the roleeducation can play.

By Ann de Forest

14

20 Learning from History’sDarkest Days

Penn Alexander students post high test scores andattend the city’s most selective high schools. Can

their success be replicated for students nationwide?

22 Best Practices

By Shiva Vakili

Penn GSE teams up with Facing History andOurselves to teach tolerance through the historical

lessons of the Holocaust and other genocides.

2 | Penn GSE | Spring 2006

F R O M T H E D E A N

In 1914 Penn’s education program became a full-fledged School ofEducation, with Frank Pierrepont Graves named as the first Dean. Today, 93years later, what was a tiny undergraduate school has become one of thenation’s renowned graduate schools of education. GSE works across manyfields of education research and a leader in innovative academic programsthat prepare professionals for service in education, K-16 and beyond.

This year, we are very proud to announce the appointment of AndrewPorter as Penn GSE’s tenth Dean. Without question, Andy is prepared totake the helm at this great school during this time of great opportunity andchallenge. He has a stellar scholarly background, which prepares him to leadteaching and research initiatives that will engage the most critical issues of theday. He has the energy and creativity to further strengthen GSE’s impressivelocal and global engagements. And he can draw on his extensive leadershipexperience to position the School for even greater successes in teaching,research, and service.

Andy will need our support moving GSE forward, and he will certainlywant to hear insights and suggestions from you—our alumni, students, andfriends—about how GSE can best serve society through education and col-laboration. As I look forward to working with him in the years ahead, I amhappy to report that GSE’s future is in extremely capable hands.

With best regards and expectations for the brightest possible future forPenn GSE,

Amy Gutmann

The Penn GSE Magazine is produced bi-annually by the Universityof Pennsylvania Graduate School of Education, 3700 WalnutStreet, Philadelphia, PA 19104-6216. Reproduction of these articles requires the written permission of the editor. ©2007 bythe Trustees of the University of Pennsylvania. Please contact theeditor for references.

Nondiscrimination StatementThe University of Pennsylvania values diversity and seeks talented students, faculty and staff from diverse backgrounds.The University of Pennsylvania does not discriminate on the basisof race, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, religion, color,national or ethnic origin, age, disability, or status as a VietnamEra Veteran or disabled veteran in the administration of educa-tional policies, programs, or activities; admissions policies; scholarship and loan awards; athletic, or University administeredprograms or employment. Questions or complaints regarding thispolicy should be directed to:

Executive DirectorOffice of Affirmative ActionSansom Place East, Suite 2283600 Chestnut Street, Philadelphia, PA 19104-6106voice: (215) 898-6993; TDD: (215) 898-7803; fax: (215) 662-7862.

Stanton WorthamInterim Dean

Alexis Beshara WolsonAssistant Dean, Development& Alumni Relations

Nancy BrokawEditor

Ann de ForestJanice RaffertyShiva VakiliContributing Writers

Kathy DowneyElizabeth HillProduction Assistants

The Graduate School of Education • University of PennsylvaniaM A G A Z I N E

Graduate School of Education Board of Overseers

Judith R. Berkowitz CW’64, Chair Lawrence C. Nussdorf, Esq. W’68,

Vice-Chair

Madlyn K. Abramson Ed’57 GEd’60

Dr. Benjamin M. Ashcom Gr’74

Dr. Reina Marin Bassini CW’72 GEd’72

Dr. Patricia Cayne CW’60

Susan Frier Danilow CW’74, G’74

George E. Davis NAF’00

Lee Spelman Doty W’76

Milton A. Feldman Esq. W’52, L’55

Jay S. Fishman W’74 WG’94

John F. Gamba W’61

Michael J. Glosserman Esq. W’68

Emanuel A. Gonzalez-Revilla W’88

Joel M. Greenblatt W’79 WG’80

Peter C. Madeja C’80 GEd’80

Gregory A. Milken C’95

Diana Riklis C’76 GEd’77

Nancy Horwich Rothstein CW’75

Leonard A. Shapiro W’64

Molly D. Shepard GEd’79

Ellen Cohen Stein CW’69

Dr. Susan Taylor C’79

Merryl Tisch NAF’00

Seth T. Toney II WG’88

Allison Weiss Brady C’93

Jennifer Saul Yaffa C’92


N O T E W O R T H Y

Harris Sokoloff, executive director of PennGSE’s Center for School Study Councils,

has been working with university and citypartners to give Philadelphia some valuablelessons on civic engagement this year.

As the city’s 2007 election year getsunderway, Sokoloff has been teaming upwith the Project on Civic Engagement, basedat the Fels Institute, and the PhiladelphiaInquirer on a project titled “Great Expecta-tions: Citizen Voices on Philadelphia'sFuture.” This collaborative effort initiatedcivic conversation about how to build on thecity’s considerable strengths and how tochange a political culture all too often char-acterized by corruption.

The project is sponsoring a series ofmajor election-related events – includingonline, radio, and televised debates. Twoweeks before the May primary, GreatExpectations sponsored ““Deliberation Day,”an all-day series of events culminating in acandidates’ TV debate. Questions for thatdebate were generated at ten neighborhoodsessions where citizens had the chance toquiz representatives of the candidates and

then propose questions for the debate thatnight. The project will culminate with thedelivery of a citizen-generated Agenda forthe Next Great City to the new mayor andcouncil in 2008.

At the same time, Sokoloff was hard atwork on another civic engagement project—this one spearheaded by the School ofDesign’s Penn Praxis. Called PlanPhilly, theproject focused on the development of thecity’s Delaware River waterfront. With PennPraxis Director Harris Steinberg handlingthe design issues, Sokoloff oversaw the civicengagement pieces of the project, includingthe series of public forums held throughoutthe winter to solicit citizen input.

In March, PlanPhilly sponsored a three-day brainstorming session with citizens, cityplanners, and architects to forge a new visionfor Philadelphia’s waterfront. Their conclu-sion was virtually unanimous: bury Interstate95 and reestablish the connections betweencity and river.

Can We Talk?

The 2007 GSE Faculty Research Fund for the Study of Race in Education will be supporting a project, directed byHoward Stevenson, to promote the academic engagement of black high school students through racial socializa-

tion. Stevenson will be working with Penn GSE faculty members Vivian Gadsden and Duane Thomas on the project.Stevenson’s two-year project, called “Can We Talk?” will start with an in-depth survey and a series of focus groups

designed to help researchers understand how black students make sense of racial dynamics at school and home. Students will then be randomly assigned to a six-week Race Relations Psychology mini-seminar, adapted for highschool students from Stevenson’s GSE course on African-American psychology. To determine the efficacy of the course,researchers will administer a battery of measures to students from both the intervention group and the control.

Established in the 2005-06 academic year, the Faculty Research Fund for the Study of Race in Education is intend-ed to help ensure that Penn GSE’s research addresses the intersection of race and education. With this fund, GSE isdedicating seed funding to collaborative faculty research projects that focus on teaching, learning, and the context ofschooling for African-American and Latino students in American urban schools or institutions of higher education.

Citizenship 101

AMY

SIAN

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N O T E W O R T H Y

Working with East China Normal Uni-versity (ECNU), Penn GSE Internation-

al has been making history recently by help-ing in the creation of China’s first-ever doc-torate of education program.

In recent years, GSE has been sharing itsexpertise on curriculum development with itsChinese colleagues and sending Penn facultymembers and associates to Shanghai to leadintensive seminars.

This fall, the program’s first cohort of stu-dents made its way to the Penn campus foran intensive 12-week course that introducedthem to cutting-edge issues in Americaneducation. Combined with site visits to areaschools and universities, the course at Pennwas intended to expand the students’ under-standing and introduce an international com-parative element to their doctoral research.

“Penn GSE is breaking new ground inter-nationally by working with ECNU,” saidCheng Davis, vice dean for International Pro-grams and Development. “The program, apractical departure from the more theoreti-cal PhD programs available in China, allows

participants to tap into the experiences andresources of Penn GSE and other leadingplayers in American education, in order toimprove the schools and universities theyadminister.”

Based in Shanghai, ECNU is one of China’spremier teachers’ colleges, and the joint EdDprogram has been developed in cooperationwith the Chinese Ministry of Education. Pro-gram degrees will be issued by ECNU.

Penn GSE Partners in China’s First Ever EdD Program

Penn GSE Interim Dean Stanton Wortham (left)participated in a roundtable discussion

with students in the joint ECNU-GSE doctoralprogram. Fang Shoujiang (right), a student in

the program, works in the international program at Shanghai Finance University.

Kudos . . .Penn GSE Professor Vivian Gadsden was on Capitol Hill in Decemberto testify at a Congressional Staff Briefing on Fatherhood. The discus-sion was organized by the National Fatherhood Leaders Group andWomen in Fatherhood together with the offices of Senators EvanBayh and Barack Obama.... The Association for the Study of HigherEducation presented Penn GSE Assistant Professor Marybeth Gas-man with its Promising Scholar/Early Career Achievement Award atits fall meeting. This award is presented to an emerging scholar “fora significant body of scholarship or a single extraordinary researchachievement by a higher education scholar and in recognition ofpotential for future research.”... Pennsylvania Governor Ed Rendellappointed Associate Professor Kathy Schultz to the empowerment

board of the Chester Upland School District in March. Chester Uplandhad the second-lowest average score in Pennsylvania on stateaccountability tests last year.... The University of Chicago AlumniAssociation has awarded Penn GSE Professor Diana Slaughter-Defoeits Alumni Professional Achievement Citation. The Alumni Profession-al Achievement Citation recognizes alumni whose achievements intheir vocational life, including but not limited to the arts and letters,industry and commerce, and the academic professions, have broughtdistinctions to themselves, credit to the university, and real benefit totheir communities.... Vice Dean Doug Lynch is chairing the US dele-gation to the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) ini-tiative to develop standards in the field of non-public educationalservices. Educational services, which encompass higher education


and workforce training, are the nation’sfifth largest export. The ISO is a 142-nationmembership body headquartered in Gene-va that facilitates the international coordi-nation and unification of industrial stan-dards.... Marissa Shapiro, a student in the Psychological Servicesprogram, has been elected to serve as a member of the Provost'sCouncil on Arts and Culture.... The Kingsley Trust Association hasawarded doctoral student Vernita Williams the A. Bartlett GiamattiFellowship award, given annually to Yale College graduates engagedin full-time doctoral studies in the humanities or social sciences.

Kathy Schultz

CAN

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The William Penn Foundation has award-ed a three-year, $600,000-dollar grant

to the University of Pennsylvania in supportof the Kids Integrated Data System (KIDS)project.

Drawing on individual databases main-tained by separate municipal agencies,KIDS links the records of individual childrento provide researchers with population-based information that enables them toidentify critical needs, evaluate current pro-grams, and develop improved services. Theproduct of an unprecedented collaborationamong the City of Philadelphia, the SchoolDistrict of Philadelphia, and Penn, KIDS isone of the only fully integrated archival datasystems in the U.S.

Penn GSE Professor John Fantuzzo co-founded the KIDS database with Dennis Culhane, a professor in Penn’s School ofSocial Policy and Practice, and Trevor Hadley,a professor in the School of Medicine. SaysFantuzzo, “From the very beginning of thisproject, it has been our goal to institutionalizethe KIDS database. With this grant, we’ll be able to establish KIDS as a sustainableresource within the city of Philadelphia andeven as a replicable model for other urbanmunicipalities.”

The grant is designed to help strengthenthe KIDS system so that, in time, it can pro-vide Philadelphia with a self-sustainingresource that can inform services for chil-dren. Among the anticipated outcomes arean increase in awareness among the largerresearch community of KIDS’ capacity; thedevelopment of research projects from cityagencies and of annual agency-specific dataquality reports; the dissemination ofresearch findings and recruitment of newKIDS researchers, and the creation of a com-munity work group charged with developingan access plan. William Penn also hopes tosee the Penn team help replicate the systemin other municipalities around the country.

Investing in Penn-Philly PartnershipNew Executive Program for

School Counselors

Penn GSE has introduced a new executive-style master’s-degree pro-gram for working educators and professionals interested in working asschool counselors.

Created in partnership with the American School Counselor Associa-tion (ASCA), the Professional School Counseling Program uses an execu-tive-learning format to enable students to earn their degree without giv-ing up their current employment.

“We have found that mature educators with classroom experience aswell as mid-career counseling professionals are well suited to masterthe school counselor’s skills for fostering students’ academic and per-sonal success,” explains Howard Stevenson, chair of Penn GSE’s AppliedPsychology and Human Development division.

Candidates will study psychology, counseling, and education theory andpractices to help enhance student development in school, at home, and in the community. The program will address issues of academic achieve-ment, personal and social development, and career planning.

The degree can be earned in two years of monthly weekend classesand one week of intensive study each summer.

Students who successfully complete this program may apply to thePennsylvania Department of Education-approved Certification Programin School Counseling and receive the Educational Specialist-SchoolCounselor certificate.


N O T E W O R T H Y

For 14 years—from 1986 to 1999—FredErickson’s name was virtually synony-

mous with Penn GSE’s Ethnography in Edu-cation Forum. When Erickson took on therole of convenor, the Forum was a youngster,just six years old. By the time he left Penn forUCLA, the event was a strapping youth of 20.

This year—the Forum’s28th—Erickson came back toPenn, and to the Forum, todeliver a keynote addresstitled “Keep Your Hands onthe Plow: Reflections onEducational Ethnography inTimes of Difficulty.”

Equal parts cri de coeurand cri de guerre, Erickson’saddress outlined recent cri-tiques of ethnography—fromcritics both inside and out-side the field—and managednonetheless to reach “anupbeat conclusion.”

The critique from withinthe field is a familiar one,arising from the difficultyinherent to ethnography of“writing about somebodyelse and getting it right.” Of

more concern, though, are the charges lev-eled by those outside the field.

This critique has picked up steam inrecent years, Erickson explained, with theU.S. Department of Education declaring ran-domized field trials as the gold standard ineducational research. Challenging the prima-cy of that standard, he argued that “treat-ments in education are ways of life that arelocally constructed on the basis of localmeanings that vary between localities.... Andprediction is necessarily a local matter.”

For Erickson, the best response ethnogra-phers can make is, quite simply, to continue“to do well what we are best at.” The first

task of ethnographic research is an inquiryinto “the qualities of things, into what kindsof things there are in local settings of prac-tice—what kind of people, things, andactions.”

But identification alone isn’t enough.Ethnographic research must also create theunderstanding that these local meaningsmatter. “Meaning is causal,” Ericksonexplained. “People do things because thosethings make sense. When people don’t taketheir blood pressure medicine, they are mak-ing sense in some way. And once we under-stand those meanings, we can begin to figureout what to do.”

Ignoring context, Erickson cautioned, hasserious consequences. Calling randomizedtrials “a fool’s gold standard,” he argued that“a monitoring system that leaves out localmeanings makes it impossible to trace thenegative consequences that are not in thepolicy discourse because they’re not one ofthe variables.”

Erickson’s keynote kicked off two days’worth of paper sessions and data analysisdiscussions, in which participants brain-stormed about analysis methods of sampledata sets. This year’s Forum also featured amilestone anniversary—the 20th PractitionerInquiry presentation featuring Penn GSEAssociate Professor Susan Lytle and BostonCollege Professor Marilyn Cochran-Smith.

Gloria Ladson-Billings, professor of Cur-riculum and Instruction and Educational Pol-icy Studies at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, presented the Friday eveningkeynote, “The Ethnography of Misery: Teach-ing in the Midst of Suffering.”

A student-run event, the Forum wascoordinated by Educational Linguistics Ph.D.students David Cassels Johnson and Fran-cis Hult.

Start Making SenseFred Erickson delivers keynote at 28th Ethnography Forum

STU

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Fred Erickson

On January 27, about 40 students fromfour Philadelphia schools gathered at

Penn GSE for some close encounters withsome exotic animals—a chinchilla, a GreatHorned Owl, and an Egyptian sand boa.

The students were on campus for thekick-off of a new Penn GSE program, calledSPARK! (Science Projects Are Right for Kids).Funded by the National Science Foundation,the three-year program is designed to enrichscience education for students in grades fourthrough eight from four public schools andtwo charter schools in Philadelphia. Studentswill meet after school, Saturdays, and in thesummer to complete activities that focus onreal-world engineering problems in biotech-nology, zoo habitats, and robotics.

The kick-off introduced students to ani-mals from the Philadelphia Zoo, and gavethem their first lesson in biotechnology, mak-ing a complex molecular structure—slime—out of simple kitchen ingredients. From there,it was on to the School of Engineering andApplied Science for a tour of the robotics laband then to the Annenberg Center, for a visitto the LEGO League Nanotechnology Tourna-ment—an annual robotics competition thatprogram organizers hope that SPARK kidswill be competing in next year.

As Associate Dean for Educational Prac-tice Nancy Streim explains, “We hope toinspire students in Penn’s partnershipschools to consider careers in science, mathand technology. By leveraging the expertiseof the partners at Penn, Philadelphia Zoo,and iPraxis, we expect to have a collectiveimpact on children’s academic and careeraspirations that is greater than what any ofus could hope to accomplish individually.”

The SPARK! grant will also provide insightinto how children learn science inside andoutside the classroom. Researchers will beable to investigate whether students learnbetter when they study science and technolo-gy through real-world problem-solving. Theywill also evaluate how mentors and individualattention affect student learning.

GSE’s partners in this program are Penn’sschools of Engineering and Applied Scienceand Social Policy and Practice, along with theSchool District of Philadelphia, iPraxis, andthe Philadelphia Zoo.

This semester, executives from Sta-ples and JetBlue, Xerox and Chubb

were on the Penn campus for a new pro-gram offered jointly by Penn GSE and theWharton School.

The first cohort in the Executive Programin Work-Based Learning Leadership, the 17students have signed on for a programunique among top-tier universities—onedesigned to provide formalized educationfor executives charged with improving andfurthering workplace learning.

“Most adults learn on the job ratherthan in a formal educational setting,”explains Doug Lynch, GSE vice dean andthe program’s academic director. “Theaverage Fortune 1000 company spends 2.5percent of its operating budget on learn-ing. For many of these companies, thatamounts to tens of millions of dollars.”

With so much at stake, it’s no surprisethat response to the new program hasbeen so strong. The first cohort representsan array of businesses: vice presidents ofStaples and JetBlue have enrolled, as haveexecutives from Chubb & Son Insurance,the Lehigh Valley Hospital & Health

Network, Xerox, Constellation Energy, andthe Corporate University Exchange.

The public and non-profit sectors arealso well represented, with participantscoming from the Planning Commission ofthe City of Los Angeles, the Department ofLabor’s Career OneStop program, and thelocal Boys’ and Girls’ Club.

And on the global front, the programhas welcomed a former employee of theBolivian government and the president ofthe Philippines-based company Learningand Performance Partners.

The program is executive in nature,allowing students to continue workingwhile they study. Using a blend of on-siteclasses and distance learning, the pro-gram will use the students’ expertise andexperience to inform the curriculum. Doc-toral and master’s students are expectedto ground their research in the workplacerather than in academia.

Participants may pursue a master’s ordoctoral degree—awarded through GSE—or individual certificates awarded throughWharton Executive Education.

On the Job Learning

Learning Technologies Program DebutsFrom PowerPoint to podcasts, technology hastransformed the way the world lives—andlearns. This year, Penn GSE has introduced anew program designed for students interestedin exploring how these new technologies playout in the classroom and beyond.

The Learning Technologies in Education(LTE) master’s program focuses on emergingtechnologies in educational settings and willprepare students for success in information-rich environments. Students will learn how to

effectively assess, design, and implement technology in a wide range of learningenvironments—from individual distance education and instructional design to massmedia and web-based information collection and dissemination.

Job opportunities for graduates should be found in a variety of institutions(schools and colleges, school districts, government agencies, private voluntaryorganizations, and the private sector) and a variety of fields (instructional design,learning theory, communication, media, technology, and organizational systems).

The program, which culminates in a Master of Science in Education degree,requires completion of ten course units of graduate work, which can be completedin one year.

Program Sparks Kids’Interest in Science



GSE News: Can you tell me something about your training?You were trained as a psychometrician and applied statistician.What drew you to that particular field? Andy Porter: I went into college thinking I was going tobe a chemist—I had a great high school chemistry teacherand I loved chemistry. But one year of college chemistrywas just so awful, so boring—which is too bad because itcould have been fun.

My undergraduate degree was at Indiana State and mymajor was special education and my minor was mathemat-ics. How I began as an applied statistician—a psychometri-cian—is a great story, to me anyway. I didn’t know what edpsych was, and I was recruited by Julian Stanley. He was avery famous guy, an applied statistician then. He was atWisconsin at the time but ended up his career at JohnsHopkins, where he became known for his Gifted andTalented programs. Anyway, he was a big fan of test scores,and he recruited me into a master’s and doctoral program atthe University of Wisconsin, Madison.

I took my first position at Michigan State back in the late1960s—as an assistant professor in a tenure-line position—to teach statistics andmeasurement courses in a gargantuan college of education. I’m not sure how big itis now, but it was huge at that time. I think they were producing something like onehundred PhDs a year.

News: You worked at the National Institute of Education in several posts. How didthat come about, and how did it influence your academic career? Porter: This is a long story, but it really shows how things unfolded for me. TheAmerican Educational Research Association offers small courses, pre- and post-

Andy PorterIntroducing

When Penn President Amy Gutmann announced the appointment of Andy Porter as Penn GSE’s tenth dean, she welcomed him as aprominent researcher, a seasoned administrator, an accomplishedfundraiser, and an energetic collaborator who has won the respect of a wide range of educational researchers, scholars, and practitioners.

Dr. Porter is currently the Patricia and Rodes Hart Professor ofLeadership, Policy, and Organization at Vanderbilt University’s PeabodyCollege of Education and the director of the Learning SciencesInstitute, also at Vanderbilt. Before arriving at Vanderbilt in 2003, hewas professor of Education Psychology at the University of Wisconsinand director of the Wisconsin Center for Education Research. From1967 to 1988, he was on the faculty at Michigan State University, wherehe also served as associate dean for Research and Graduate Study.

In the mid-1970s, Dr. Porter signed on for a stint in Washington, DC,at the National Institute of Education, where he served as a visitingscholar, chief of the Methodology and Measurement Division, and associate director in charge of the Basic Skills Group. A formerPresident of the American Educational Research Association, he waselected a member of the National Academy of Education in 1994, hasbeen Vice President of the Academy since 2005, and is a LifetimeNational Associate of the National Academies.

This spring, Penn GSE News sat down with Dr. Porter for a candidconversation about his career in education, his research interests, andwhat brought him to Penn.



convention, and I taught one on non-parametric statisticswith some buddies of mine, a colleague at Michigan Stateand a professor from UC Berkeley. One of our studentswas a guy named Garry McDaniels, from the Universityof Maryland. He took a job in the government to do theevaluation of the Follow Through Program.

Well, Garry grew up on a fruit farm in Michigan, and hehad a lot of people from Harvard working for him. He calledme up one night and said, “Do you remember me? I was astudent of yours.” Now, to be honest, I barely rememberedhim, but he said, “I’ve got a problem. I need somebodyfrom the Midwest”—see, he was a Midwestern guy—“to

keep these Harvard guys under control.” I joined him inthat enterprise, and we had a great time. It turned out thatone of the Harvard guys was Mike Smith—later, he becamethe dean at Stanford and the undersecretary of education.

I consulted for a while, and then the government createdthe National Institute of Education with a Visiting ScholarsProgram. Garry, who had moved from the FollowThrough Program to the NIE and what became the divi-sion for research on teaching, nominated both Mike andme to be visiting scholars.

Cambridge must be a lot closer to DC than East Lansing,because Mike knew all the vocabulary, and I didn’t knowanything. So fast-track Mike—he’s smart as sin—said, “I’mgoing to create a new division.” Can you imagine in the gov-ernment? A new agency. In 1974. He created a divisioncalled Essential Skills—with bipartisan support.

I’m obviously slower than Mike, but not so slow that I

couldn’t think, “Well, hey, I’ll create a division,Measurement and Methodology.” I stayed on a year to setup the program. In the second year, they asked me if Iwould become the associate director in charge of the BasicSkills group, and then they asked Mike if he would becomeassociate director for budget and management. I alwaysthought I got a much better job than Mike.

Mike stayed and became the first chief of staff to thefirst secretary of education, Shirley Hufstedler. But I wentback to Michigan State. I always knew I was going to be aprofessor—my dad was a professor. And I stayed there alltold for 21 years. I was there a long time, with three yearsoff in the government.

But my experience in DC was transformative: for me,trained as a statistician, psychometrician, to end up run-ning the Basic Skills Group with its wide portfolio of workwas probably the most intense educational experience Ihad in my life. It got me thinking about larger things.

News: At Wisconsin, you ran the Wisconsin Center forEducation Research. Can you tell me more about this? Howdid the Center’s program of research change and grow underyour leadership?Porter: The Center was founded in 1964, and I took overin 1989. But guess who had been directing it before I gotthere? Mike Smith. But then he took a job at Stanford, andCarl Kaestle, who’s an education historian at Brown now,was their interim for a year. Then they recruited me.

The Center was created back in the mid-1960s, backbefore the NIE, back when there was an assistant secretaryfor education at Health, Education and Welfare. Thedepartment created a national infrastructure of researchcenters and regional laboratories. The labs still exist, butthe centers don’t in quite the same form. The Hopkinscenter, the Wisconsin center, the Learning Research andDevelopment Center at Pittsburgh, CRESST at UCLA—they all started that way. And they all got sole-source fund-ing until about 1987 or so, when the government decided it

My experience in DC was transformative: for me, trainedas a statistician, to end up running [such a] wide portfolioof work was probably the most intense educational experience I had in my life.

1910sIn 1914, Frank Gravesnamed first dean ofPenn’s newly establishedSchool of Education.

Dean John Minnicklaunches graduate divi-sion in 1931, and Schoolconfers first master’sdegrees.

1940s1930sUnder Dean EmitGrizzell, whose tenurelasts two decades,School awards first doctoral degrees in 1941.


wanted more competition and switched to a five-yearfunding model.

When I arrived at the Wisconsin Center for EducationResearch, the budget was about $3.2 million a year. When Ileft, it was $30 million. It was good growth. Honestly, Ithink the best thing that ever happened to that center was toget off sole-source funding from DOE and to let the entre-preneurs start to take hold. It brought in more players.

The center was a unit of the ed school, but I saw it as auniversity resource. When I got there, probably nine out often PIs were from the ed school and when I left five out often were. We opened it up to the rest of the university andgot a lot more interdisciplinary work going—especially inthe sciences, both life and physical sciences, and mathemat-ics. For example, in my last year there, we had the biggestpayday in the history of the university. On one day, the cen-ter brought in 49 million dollars worth of new work.

The growth came from two sources, I think: first, open-ing up the door to a lot of professors by getting off that onecore grant, and then aggressively creating relationshipswith the rest of the university.

News: What about the Learning Sciences Institute atVanderbilt? How does that compare to what you did inWisconsin?Porter: At Wisconsin, we did not try to have a carefullydefined mission like, for example, the human cognitionfocus of the LRDC at Pitt. When we asked, “What are wefor?” we answered very broadly, “We’re for excellence ineducation research and development.” I had come fromMichigan State, which had a very distinct mission: theentire college of education was focused on teaching andteacher education, and that focused mission attractednational and international recognition. But the down sidewas that it could become constricting.

So the pendulum swings. When I went to Wisconsin, Iknew that I wanted to connect to the rest of the university,that I didn’t want to put up any barriers. At Vanderbilt,

I’m back to a sharper focus. The Learning SciencesInstitute (LSI) is one of a number of what Vanderbilt callstrans-institutional centers that have been founded tojumpstart interdisciplinary research in one sector or anoth-er. One way to think about LSI is that human cognition isat its core. We do very, very basic neuroscience—we stopjust short of animal research—but then we also do quite abit of applied research. LSI covers a big, long range ofresearch, from very basic to very applied—but all focusedon the idea that learning is integral. There are people in thelearning sciences who would say that teaching doesn’t fitinto our mission, but we think it does. And curriculum.And policy.

News: Let’s focus on one particular theme of your own work.Much of your scholarship tries to understand teachers’ deci-sions of what to teach.Porter: The basic question that’s driven my work—theone line in my work for probably 25 years now—is howdo teachers decide what to teach? If you’re an elementaryschool teacher, how much time will you spend teachingmathematics? What topics will you cover within thattime? Will you teach all students the same things, or willyou differentiate the content across students in some way?And to what standards of achievement will you be teach-ing your students?

Obviously, these are decisions that influence students’opportunities to learn: we find over and over again thatwhat is taught is the strongest predictor of gains in studentachievement. So if you want to ask, why this teacher getsbig gains and this teacher does not, the bulk of the variancewill be explained by the fact that the first teacher is teach-ing what is being tested and the second is not.

How can that be? I’ll give you an example. Not thatmany people study how teachers use textbooks, but we didsome of this work back a while ago. In elementary school,we found out that a common practice for teachers of math-ematics is to skip all the measurement and all the geome-

1960sMorris Viteles, named fifthdean in 1963, recruits facul-ty in statistics, measure-ment, and human learningand development.

As fourth dean, WilliamArnold leads School as itis renamed GraduateSchool of Education andmoves to new building.


try. I don’t know whether it’s a result, but it’s not too curi-ous to find that the United States is tied with Zimbabwe ineighth-grade mathematics achievement in geometry.

The other reason I became interested in teachers’ deci-sion-making is that content, up until recently, was largely ataken-for-granted part of schooling and all the emphasiswas on pedagogy and studying how we can get better atteaching whatever it is that we’re teaching. Now, of course,with the days of content standards in every state andNCLB, content has become very important.

A Nation at Risk started the conversation about the rele-vance of content to achievement. That report, whichappeared in 1983, had some starter-up language, specifi-cally about what would make a good high school curricu-lum—four years of math, four years of English, three yearsof science.

Then the National Council of Teachers of Mathematicscame out with math standards, and President Bush seniorheld the NCTM standards up in some meeting and said,“This is what we need.” Then people got interested in sci-ence content standards: the American Association for theAdvancement of Science started its scientific literacy proj-ect, James Rutherford came out with Science for AllAmericans, and then the government asked the NationalResearch Council to come up with science standards.

It has really taken off with the NCLB law, where statesdon’t get Title I money unless they have challenging aca-demic content standards and aligned assessments. Thestate response has been to revise content standards andnow NCTM has gone back to make their standards morefocused and the National Science Teachers Association istrying to do the same thing in science. So content is nolonger being taken for granted at the policy level.

In the classroom, I’m still not sure. I’m teaching acourse right now to EdD students at Vanderbilt onTeachers and Teaching, and you won’t be surprised thatone of the messages of the readings is that content isimportant. Now I’ve got some principals in there and, in

particular, this one guy says, “I just never thought about it.This is just huge to me.”

News: How did you get interested in this particular line ofinquiry?Porter: When I was in the government on leave fromMichigan State, Lee Shulman, who was at Michigan Statethen, was pushing the idea that it was time for research onteaching to get out of the strict behaviorist model and intoteachers’ heads. In other words, teacher decision-makingwas important. The government was convinced and fund-ed Michigan State for the Institute for Research onTeaching. It was five years, ten million bucks, and thenthere was another five years after that. They held a placefor me: when I came back, I was to run the statistics unit.But I got to thinking, “I really don’t think this is whatthese guys need. But I am interested in measurement: peo-ple say that teachers teach what’s on the test. So, if thisclaim is true, what’s on the test must influence teachers’decisions about what to teach.”

Then other people told me that teachers teach what’s inthe textbook, and I wondered if what was in the textbookwas the same thing that was on the test. I wondered ifeither of these things was true. Couldn’t it be that there areother influences on teachers?

I proposed a new study to Lee Shulman, and we formeda group called the Content Determinants Group. BillSchmidt was in it and Jack Schwille and Bob Flodden—they’re still at Michigan State. Also Don Freeman was init. The five of us started a set of studies and did it for aboutfive or six years. Then I went off to Wisconsin, but I keptgoing with that line of work.

By the way, it’s also what got me into policy because oneof the things that can influence teachers’ decisions aboutwhat to teach is policy, like mandated tests.

News: So what were your findings? Are they teaching to thetest? Or are they teaching to the texts?

In 1975, Dell Hymes isappointed dean, developingthe School’s language-basededucational programs.

1970sNeal Gross takes the helmin 1968, bringing expertisein grant-writing and begin-ning tradition of winningcompetitive grants.


Porter: One thing we found was that there wasn’t asmuch overlap between the tests and textbooks as we wouldexpect. One of the most cited studies I’ve ever published ison that very finding.

But like most of these decisions, there’s a little bit ofeverything. Some teachers go through the textbook likeSherman through Georgia. The only thing that stops themis the end of the year. And others, as I said, skip the geom-etry and the measurement.

So the answer is: it all depends. But what does it dependon? Will they teach what’s on the test? Well, they mightteach what’s on the test if they know what’s on the test. Butif they don’t have any idea what’s on the test, it’s tough forthem. A policy that is specific in its content message forteachers will have great impact. Well, is what’s on the testconsistent with what other people want? Is it consistentwith the norms? Is it consistent with the textbook? Is itconsistent with the professional development? Is it consis-tent with what was taught last year? The more consistencywith these other possible influences, the more impact itwill have.

Are there rewards and sanctions attached to whetheryou do this or not? The more there are, the more likelyyou are to do it. Is it authoritative to you in a Weberiansort of way? Is it backed by expertise? Is pushed by acharismatic individual? Is it consistent with norms?Finally, is there any stability here? Has it been in placelong enough? Do people think it’s going to stay in placelong enough to be influential?

Out of a lot of work, we’ve evolved this theory that nowguides the hypotheses stated in our studies: that tests couldbe more or less influential as described by those attributes.

News: What are your thoughts about the field of educationin general? From your perspective, what are the most pressingissues facing American education?Porter: Probably, the biggest challenge to educationexcellence is size. It’s such a huge enterprise. I don’t know

how many teachers there are, but it’s probably more thanthree and a half million, K through 12. We know a lotabout what the characteristics of effective teaching are, weknow a lot about how to measure learning, but we have aterribly difficult time doing any of these things on a mas-sive scale with quality. So size is one.

Obviously the achievement gap is another. The gap inachievement between students from affluent and poorfamilies or between students of color and white studentshas been around for a long time. It’s very robust. Now thething about the achievement gap is that it’s alive and wellbefore kids go to school, and the other thing is that to theextent that it increases as kids go to school, it tends to do soin the summer time, not during the academic year. Soschools are not so much the problem—and that’s notunderstood as well as it should be—but they’ve got to bepart of the solution. It’s very difficult to be part of the solu-tion for a problem you’re not creating.

News: You’ve been doing policy-relevant research for years:do policymakers respond to the serious challenges in educationgainfully? Can you give an example or two of positivechanges that you’ve seen in American education?Porter: In terms of positive changes in American educa-tion, you’ve got to love the increases in math achievementthat we’re seeing more now. They’re quite widespread,

continued on page 24

We know a lot about what the charac-teristics of effective teaching are, we know a lot about how to measurelearning, but we have a terribly diffi-cult time doing any of these things ona massive scale with quality.

Marvin Lazerson isnamed GSE’s eighthdean in 1987, leavingto serve as Penn’sinterim provost.

Under Susan Fuhrman,GSE’s first woman dean,School becomes knownas center for educationpolicy and research.

2000sIn 2007, Andrew C.Porter is named GSE’stenth dean.

1980s 1990s

D


During World War II, schoolchildren planted VictoryGardens and collected old tires and cans to support the wareffort. Baby boomers remember ducking under their schooldesks as air sirens blared, a Cold War drill to prepare themfor future nuclear attack. And, to that same generation, mathand science studies took on patriotic urgency as Americanscompeted with the Soviets for technological prowess.

A few decades later, America responded to the terroristattacks of September 11 with similar displays of unity andurgency. In Nebraska, for instance, in October 2001, thestate board of education unanimously endorsed a 1949state law requiring schools to teach lyrics to patriotic songs,reverence for the flag, and the dangers of communism.Many American high schools opened their corridors andclassrooms to military recruiters. Unity, sacrifice, obedi-ence. All are typical of the way democracies respond to warand conflict, asserts GSE researcher Sigal Ben-Porath, in

her thoughtful, provocativenew book Citizenship UnderFire: Democratic Education inTimes of Conflict. Citing

examples from the United States and her native Israel,Ben-Porath observes that in wartime, the very definition ofwhat it means to be a citizen changes. Priorities shift.Security takes precedence over individual rights; solidarityoverrides diversity. In short, a democracy in wartime oftencompromises the values most cherished in times of peace.To describe this phenomenon, Ben-Porath coins the term“belligerent citizenship.”

The nature of these changes, the necessity for citizens tomake compromises in order to endure a period of conflict,and the long-term effects of “belligerent citizenship” on a

democratic society are all issues Ben-Porath grapples within her study. A social and political philosopher with a BAand MA in education, and years of experience teachinghigh school in Israel, Ben-Porath delivers an analysis thatis “like its author, both far-ranging in its theorizing andpragmatically focused,” says Penn President AmyGutmann, a political philosopher herself, and instrumentalin bringing Ben-Porath to the United States. “An originalthinker,” Gutmann calls her younger colleague, “she chal-lenges conventional wisdom on educational policy andpolitical philosophy.”

Passionate and optimistic, Ben-Porath sees the most dif-ficult challenge for societies in times of conflict as balanc-ing the temporary, pressing needs of wartime with theenduring need to preserve democratic values. In a cultureof warfare, where the need for solidarity and security takeprecedence over other democratic values, peace remains avague Utopian notion. Without a conscious effort to recog-nize the problems inherent in belligerent citizenship, Ben-Porath argues, war will repeat, generation after generation.

No sphere is more vulnerable to these changes than anation’s classrooms, where the values of belligerent citizen-ship are inculcated—intentionally or inadvertently—infuture citizens. Rather than take on the responsibilities of atrue civic education, teaching students to be active partici-pants in the democratic process, public educationbecomes, in Ben-Porath’s phrase, “war by other means.”

So what’s a democracy to do? Fortunately, Ben-Porath does much more than present a

fascinating, if disturbing, analysis of the nature of “bel-ligerent citizenship” and then throw up her hands—leav-ing outraged readers to do the same. She offers a blueprint

By Ann de Forest

FutureOne Leg

in the

Winter 2004 | Penn GSE | 15Spring 2007 | Penn GSE | 15

Thriving democracies accommodate diversity and dissent. Butin times of war, when stark distinctions are drawn between

“them” and “us,” how can they sustain such civic ideals?Searching for answers, Penn GSE Assistand Professor Sigal Ben-Porath looks at the role education can play.

In Tel Aviv, a first-gradertries on a gas mask on hisfirst day back to schoolduring the Gulf War.

for change, with education as the vehicle. She advocates anapproach she names “expansive education,” public educa-tion focused on engaging citizens in preserving democracy.“To fully respond to the psycho-social needs of society atwar,” Ben-Porath told an audience at the University ofPennsylvania Bookstore, “we need to consider a publiceducational response … that would incorporate a nuancedunderstanding of the needs of society at war with an unwa-vering commitment to democratic values.”

In Ben-Porath’s view education is always political.“The main job of the public education system is political

in the broadest sense of the word,” she says, her handsslicing the air for emphasis. “We do necessarily politicalwork, and if we don’t do it reflectively and intentionally,we don’t do it right.”

Promoting education as an agent for political change hasbeen the thrust of Sigal Ben-Porath’s career. As a youngsocial philosopher and educator in Israel, she participatedin an interdisciplinary study group funded by the FordFoundation. Discussing social, environmental, economic,and educational issues, these Israeli scholars began hopefulpreparations for “The Morning After,” setting forth a pos-

DAVID H. WELLS/CORBIS


itive agenda of actions and reforms their nation would befree to address the day that peace arrived. “When thegroup first formed, peace seemed possible,” says Ben-Porath wistfully. Instead, the week they started meeting, inSeptember 2000, the second intifada began. “Literally thelast day of peace.”

Despite the group’s deflated hopes, the exchange of ideaslasted a year, with the final meeting taking place onSeptember 13, 2001. “Not the best time to talk about ‘themorning after,’” she says. “Instead we ended up talkingabout the way war affects the conception of citizenship in ademocratic society,” the first seeds of Citizenship Under Fire.

In the meantime, Ben-Porath, a mother with twobabies, was finding life in Tel Aviv increasingly stressful.“I know other people were suffering so much more; peoplefrom the Occupied Territories had it even worse,” she says.But in Tel Aviv, the most ordinary acts—the hour-longdrive to visit her mother in Jerusalem, a trip to the grocerystore—were fraught with anxiety. She and her husbandagonized over what route was least likely to be bombed orwhether it was better to bring the children to the super-market or leave them home, better to be killed as a familyor to leave the babies orphans. When Princeton Universityoffered her a post-doctoral fellowship, Ben-Porath and herjournalist husband seized the opportunity, “thankful,” shesays, “to leave these tensions behind and move to the safe-ty and comfort of life.”

Ben-Porath and her family arrived in the tranquil sub-urban New Jersey town at the end of August 2001.

Whenever she tells this tale, to an audience at a booksigning or an academic conference or to an interviewer inher office, Ben-Porath pauses at this point. She doesn’t

need to say what happened next. Every American knows. She smiles ruefully, “My husband’s a journalist, and

friends back home joked that he wanted to keep life inter-esting.” Meanwhile, Ben-Porath “was in awe” as shewatched a situation unfold that seemed eerily familiar.This time, with the benefit of an outsider’s perspective, shewitnessed how quickly a democracy can change focuswhen national security is threatened. As Americans ralliedround the flag and ballparks played “God Bless America”during the seventh inning stretch, Ben-Porath behaved likean astute diagnostician charting the stages of a conditionshe recognized all too well. The U.S. had an acute case of“belligerent citizenship.”

In Israel, the condition seemed chronic. As a teacher,she had noted how the belligerent stance pervaded theeducation system. In the youngest grades, children cele-brate Jewish holidays as historic military victories, “trans-mitting a national message of a people perpetually at war,”she writes. History textbooks likewise emphasize militaris-tic themes and the story of Israel as a nation forgedthrough constant struggle, “while projecting a uniform anduncritical image of the people and state.” Suppression ofdissent or debate is one of the most problematic character-istics of a belligerent citizenship. Citizenship under Fireopens with a telling anecdote of a final exam questionposed to Israeli high school students in 2002: “Explainwhy conscientious objection is subversive.”

Educators across America, hearing her ideas, have sentBen-Porath examples from their own experiences in thewake of September 11 and the war in Iraq. Her “belligerenteducation folder” is filled with “horrific examples,” shesays. One high school teacher wrote about a flyer distrib-uted to all teachers from military recruiters, who offered to“cover classes” and present a new, school district-approved“self-esteem” curriculum. A state law requiring a certifiedteacher in every classroom was waived for these recruiters.

“Recruiters visit weekly,” this teacher wrote. “… theyhad office space. They develop relationships with studentswhich obviously enhances their ability to recruit.” Just likethe Israeli military, the US military portrays itself as“unique” and “moral.” The recruiters not only stressed“service” but also “educational opportunity.”

Rather than denounce the conservative, insular tenden-cies of a democratic society under attack, Ben-Porath seeks

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the U.S. Army recruits at a high school football

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ways to respond to what she sees as the constructive aspectsof “belligerent citizenship.” Wartime, much more thanpeacetime, provides the ideal opportunity to engage stu-dents in the democratic process and to become more activecitizens. When a democracy is “under fire,” citizens shouldbe taught “it’s not just what you contribute—enlist in mili-tary service, go out shopping to boost the economy—it’show you participate.” Recasting the patriotic emphasis onnational identity into a notion of “shared fate,” for example,is one way of transforming the more harmful and destruc-tive tendencies of “belligerent citizenship” into a moreinclusive and active view of civic participation.

And public education is society’s best tool for effectingsuch transformations. Education, with “one leg in the pres-ent and its other leg in the future,” she says, “is always, atleast potentially, an agent for change.” Yet schools, Ben-Porath believes, don’t usually go far enough in their civicslessons or take seriously enough their fundamental role inraising tomorrow’s citizenry. In October 2003, when“Operation Iraqi Freedom” no longer looked to be thequick, effective mission the U.S. government had declared,the districts around the country, she recalls, introduced anad hoc unit on Iraq’s geography, history, and culture. Tipsfor reducing personal stress accompanied the unit. WhileBen-Porath commends school districts for attempting tobroaden students’ understanding of the world and to knowmore about the country their own nation was occupying as“better than nothing,” she mourns the “lost opportunity totalk about political issues.” Drained of political content andavoiding any controversy, the ad hoc unit in the end sentstudents a message of disempowerment. The only way tocope with the strain and horror of war was to practicebreathing and stretching exercises.

For similar reasons, Ben-Porath feels that peace educationoften lulls students from taking meaningful political action.“The work towards peace is very abstract because peaceitself is not tangible, right?” Ben-Porath’s eyes shine as shespeaks. “Children release doves into the air and it’s all verynice,” she muses. “But balloons and butterflies and doves,that’s all about us [making ourselves feel good].” These ges-tures may nurture hope in children’s impressionable minds,but they do not change political reality. Teaching childrenthat they have a voice and a role as citizens is far moreimportant than instilling Utopian dreams.

“The main challenge we have—and the main hope—isin maintaining democratic principles. That will help usstem the tide.” Teaching democracy, she says, is “a morerobust way of incorporating peace into the process.” Moreimportant, in times of war, preserving democracy becomeseducation’s most significant role. “Educational resourcesdevoted to creating a commitment to democracy and peacein each country can support the endurance of democracythrough war,” Ben-Porath writes in her book’s introduc-tion. “In this way, expansive education can… contribute tocreating democratically committed citizens who maintain arealistic appreciation of peace even in times of conflict.”

“Expansive education” then is civic education duringwartime aimed at strengthening democratic values, skills,and practices. She defines it as “the practical rendering ofwhat Kant called ‘enlarged thought’ or putting oneself—inthought—in the place of everyone else.” In her vision,expansive education reaches out to include more voices,more opinions, more citizens, especially those belonging togroups marginalized in times of national solidarity.

Ben-Porath seeks models for expansive education in thefields of peace education, feminist pedagogy, and multicul-

tural education. She sees peace educators’ tools of conflictresolution, anger management, and mediated dialogue asuseful for inter-personal and social relations, but less valuablein the political sphere. More relevant are the lessons offeredby feminist and multiculturalist theories and practice.

The feminist struggle provides an especially compellingmodel. It was, and is, writes Ben-Porath, “pursued bypeaceful means not to conquer social constructions but toexpand them so that they include further perspectives.”

“Talk back,” bell hooks’s rallying cry for “criticalresponse to the social mainstream,” neatly sums up whatfeminist pedagogy offers educators working for peace anddemocracy. But feminist scholars, theorists, and educatorsoffer more than crucial lessons in resistance or recognizingdifference. Feminism also provides an important, alterna-tive narrative to the patriarchal paradigm, that even themost liberal democratic society tends to adopt in times ofwar, when men become soldiers while women tend thehome front. The feminist emphasis on “creating a positiveconception of the future self” translates to the social arena

continued on page 25

Expansive education reaches out to include more voices,more opinions, more citizens, especially those belongingto groups marginalized in times of national solidarity.


as well. “A main aim of civic education for peace is toenable the formation of a positive vision of the future,”writes Ben-Porath.

But it is multicultural education that provides theclearest template for expansive education. They shareessentially the same mission and differ, says Ben-Porath,only in context. Multicultural education is dedicated to“responding to social conflicts, tensions, and differenceswhile creating democratic citizens,” while expansive edu-cation responds to the tensions and differences of armedconflicts. Multicultural education has already taught citi-zens to reverse their perspective; where traditional patri-otic response in times of conflict sees “unwelcome diver-sity,” multiculturalism sees instead “oppressive unity.”Ben-Porath quotes Susan Muller Okin’s “compellingformulation” of multicultural education as “the radicalidea that people in other cultures, foreign and domestic,are human beings too,” and finds in multiculturalthought especially valuable examples of how to acknowl-edge past wrongs and incorporate forgiveness into thepolitical process.

While there are few active examples of the kindof politically engaged, expansive education sheespouses in Citzenship Under Fire, Ben-Porathdoes point to one example of educators workingto prevent the replication of war. In Israel andPalestine under the auspices of PRIME (PeaceResearch Institute in the Middle East), teachersfrom both sides of the conflict are “developing

dual narratives of their common history.” The goal isnot for students to agree on a common narrative, nor is itto dismiss or even alter their own primary reading of his-tory. “We don’t have to share our reading of the 1948 war.There’s no chance of that,” says Ben-Porath pragmatical-ly. “Each studies their own version, infused with how theother side understands it.” Expanding one’s understand-ing to include an alternative view, without ignoring it ordenigrating it, broadens and enriches one’s understandingof history.

Ben-Porath’s attempt to “grapple with the unique chal-lenges of citizenship in wartime” has earned accoladesfrom colleagues in the field of education and social philos-ophy. But, as demonstrated by a panel convened at theannual conference of the American Political ScienceAssociation to discuss the issues presented in Citizenship

Under Fire, not everyone agrees wholeheartedly with herargument. Sharing the podium with Ben-Porath were Amy Gutmann, a longtime supporter; Rogers Smith, aprofessor of political science at Penn and author of thePulitizer Prize-nominated Civic Ideals; and politicalphilosopher Michael Walzer, author of Just and UnjustWars and fellow at the Institute for Advanced Studies.Gutmann, while enthusiastic about Ben-Porath’s analysisof “belligerent citizenship” and her antidote of “expansiveeducation,” criticized Ben-Porath for wavering on themoral threat that the compromises of “belligerent citizen-ship” entail. “I wish,” said Gutmann, “that Sigal distin-guished between merely perceived and real states of defen-sive war. And therefore between necessary and unneces-sary belligerence.” Gutmann also insisted a moral distinc-tion be made between “protracted warfare that is aggres-sive rather than defensive.”

While Smith shared much of Ben-Porath’s perspective,Walzer criticized Ben-Porath for downplaying the urgentneed to keep citizens secure in times of conflict. Relatingthis discussion a month later, Ben-Porath eyes spark as she

smiles, “One respondent said I gave far too much room todemocratic considerations and not enough to security, andthe other respondent said just the opposite.”

Ben-Porath does not shy away from controversy.Argument, questioning, conversation, and learning toacknowledge the opinions of those who disagree with one’sown is a key part of living in an engaged democracy. Shehopes her book will generate discussion, questions, andeven disagreement. Her hope is that Citizenship Under Firereaches an audience beyond her fellow scholars and will beread by teachers, policymakers, and school board mem-bers. “Even if they disagree with me,” she says, “it wouldhelp them re-think how conflict or war affects our demo-cratic processes.”

Despite all she has witnessed in Israel and the UnitedStates, she remains an optimist. “Political education is oursingle most important hope for attaining this worthy goal,”Ben-Porath addressed the bookstore audience. “And ourschools—as underfunded, over-stretched, and underval-ued as they are, are our best bet.” n

Citizenship Under Fire: Democratic Education in Timesof Conflict is published by Princeton University Press, 2006

Argument, questioning, conversation, and learning to acknowledge the opinions of those who disagree with one’s own is a key part of living in anengaged democracy.

One Leg in the Future, continued from page 17


In the West, conventional wisdom maintains that womenin the Middle East are all relegated to life behind the

veil—confined to the home, constrained from participatingin public life, and, except perhaps in their earliest years,discouraged even from attending school.

It may come as something of a surprise then to learnthat 65 percent of all Iranian college students are women.Or that Moroccans overwhelmingly support the notionthat girls should enjoy the same right to education—including higher education—as do boys.

Clearly, Western preconceptions may require someadjustment.

Still, the perception that women in the region are deniedthe educational opportunities open to men isn’t a completeinvention. For, at the same time that their countrymenargue for equal access, 65 percent of all Moroccan womenare illiterate (as compared to 39 percent of men). Andwhile Iranian women may be storming the Ivory Tower,their counterparts are in a distinct minority at universitiesin Djibouti and Yemen.

The situation is, needless to say, complicated.On October 27, Penn GSE convened an international

roundtable of distinguished scholars to shed a little light onsome of those complexities by examining the state ofwomen’s education in the Near East and North Africa.According to Penn GSE Vice Dean Doug Lynch—whofirst conceived of the event—the summit was meant as “acall to work,” a means to kick off a fruitful conversationthat will help us create a vision for next steps.

Variation Is the NormEducation is a fundamental indicator of a democratic

society and an imperative precondition of economic devel-opment. In calling this summit, GSE wanted first to learnabout the state of education for women in these coun-tries—with the follow-up goal of determining how Penncan help support future educational equity in the region.

JACQUES PAVLOVSKY/SYGMA/CORBIS

A Call to Work

By Shiva Vakili

An international roster of experts gather at Penn GSEto share their thoughts on educational opportunities

for women in the Middle East and North Africa

Dressed in traditionalchador, an Iraqi womanwrites on a blackboard

at an adult literacy class for women in Baghdad.


Seven scholars were on hand to share their particularexpertise and, throughout, the message they had to deliverwas that the situation in the region is indeed complex.

For instance, Farzaneh Roudi-Fahimi, a project directorat the Population Reference Bureau, pointed to recentencouraging trends—like the growing rates of primaryschool enrollment—but still cited high illiteracy rates, espe-cially among rural populations, that compromise economicdevelopment. Across the region, more than 75 millionadults (and two thirds of all women) are illiterate, with onlyfour countries—Egypt, Morocco, Iraq, and Yemen—mak-ing up fully three quarters of that number.

The balance of the conference presentations confirmedthe lesson behind such statistics: that is, regional variationis the norm. Thus, Niloofar Haeri, a professor at JohnsHopkins University specializing in anthropology and lin-guistic ethnography, described her analysis of Iraniantextbooks. What she found in their pages was far moreintellectually sophisticated than most Westerners mightexpect, including material that many U.S. textbooksavoid—competing interpretations of secular and religiousviews of science, for instance.

Offering a similarly nuanced account, Margot Badran, asenior fellow at Georgetown University, shed some newlight on the opportunities afforded to women by drawing onthe example of Al Azhar University, Egypt’s major universi-ty, which opened its doors to women in 1961. Al Azhar,Badran explained, has been an empowering force forEgyptian women, spreading the ideas of “Islamic feminism”and providing higher education to generations of women.

Painting a more sobering picture, Alisa Tugberk, thedirector of cultural programs at Georgetown’s Institute forTurkish Studies, raised an issue that resonates withAmerican educators: that is, equity. Tugberk focused on theroadblocks to schooling in Turkey and made particular noteof the class inequities, as revealed by the gaps between pri-vate and public schools and between urban and rural ones.

Heather Sharkey, an assistant professor of Near EasternLanguages and Civilizations here at Penn and a scholar ofIslamic history, thought and culture, described a similargap between rich and poor in Sudan, especially the ruralpoor. In the last century, Sudan made enormous strides inwomen’s education but, reported Sharkey, “it is unclearwhere these advances are taking place—most likely inKhartoum and towns along the Nile that have benefitedfrom colonial and post-colonial growth.”

Miriam Westheimer, the director of the HomeInstruction Program for Preschool Youngsters (HIPPY),added a practitioner’s perspective, suggesting some practicalways forward for redressing educational inequalities. Israel’sanswer to Head Start, HIPPY is a home-based, early child-hood literacy program serving the immigrant community(including Arabs, Russians, and Ethiopians). An in-depthethnographic study of the program suggests that it is helpingto empower women: by legitimizing the role of the mother

as an actor in the community and redefining the spousalrelationship (as women start earning income).

The presentations concluded on a more philosophicalnote, as Golbarg Bashi, a visiting scholar at ColumbiaUniversity, issued an impassioned plea for what she called“transnational feminism.” Lodging her critique in the situ-ation of Iran and its expatriate community, Bashi arguedfor a brand of feminism that makes room for conceptual-izations of empowerment beyond those espoused by secu-lar, Eurocentric thinkers. Charging the ex-patriate com-munity of feminists with encouraging false binaries (secu-lar vs. religious, modern vs. traditionalist), Bashiexplained, “At the core of Islamic feminism is a merging ofreligion and secularism—a breaking down of binaries.”

What’s Next?Summing up, Lynch commended the participants for a

lively discussion that underscored “the incredible com-plexity of the tensions in the region—linguistic, theologi-cal, philosophical, cultural.” And he raised the question ofwhat steps should be next for GSE. Prime among the sug-gestions offered was an expansion of the conversation.

To that end, Penn GSE is planning a two-day confer-ence, currently scheduled for February 2008, with the aimof bringing together scholars and policymakers to sharepractical knowledge and solutions. Designed to create abridge between theory and practice, the conference willinclude representatives from education ministries; expertsfrom international organizations such as UNESCO,UNICEF, Working Group on Girls, and the U.S.Department of State; university researchers and scholarsfrom the U.S. and the Middle East; and practitioners.

With so many key players involved, the event is intend-ed to inspire dialogue around the issue of gender equity ineducation in the Near East and North Africa—and, partic-ularly for the American educational community, to foster adeeper understanding of the issues that face these coun-tries. Drawing on the data from the United Nations’Millennium Project to eradicate extreme poverty and onreports from the field, the conference will take a close lookat the current state of affairs for women and education andbegin envisioning ways that Penn might help.

Under the leadership of President Amy Gutmann, Pennhas positioned itself as one of the nation’s most engageduniversities. The Penn Compact, which articulates hervision for the university, embraces the three principles ofincreased access, integrated knowledge, and local and globalengagement. With its goal of opening up dialogue amongscholars, policymakers, and practitioners on an issue crucialto a critical region of the world, the InternationalConference on Women and Education in the Near East andNorth Africa perfectly embodies those principles. n

Shiva Vakili is director of Special and International Projectsat Penn GSE.

OVERSET


Agrand demonstration in creating a quality neighborhood public school inan urban setting, the Penn Alexander School has been a high-profile enter-prise from the start. And virtually since opening its doors, PAS has beenproving that, given the right conditions, public schools can deliver a supe-

rior education to all its students even in challenged urban neighborhoods.Like many urban schools, Penn Alexander boasts a diverse student body: 48 per-

cent African-American, 28 percent Caucasian, 13 percent Asian, 6 percent Hispanic,5 percent other. What is more, that diversity extends to the school’s socioeconomicmix, with 49 percent of its students qualifying for free and reduced-priced lunch.

What’s been especially gratifying is that the academic track record of those stu-dents has been stellar. To take just one example, 70 percent of last year’s fifth-gradeclass—the first to include students that had been enrolled at PAS since the firstgrade—performed at or above grade level in reading and 83 percent in math.

Nancy Streim, associate dean for Educational Practice and Penn GSE’s point per-son with the School District of Philadelphia, speaks for her colleagues at PAS and atGSE when she says, “We’re extraordinarily proud that at the end of five years, PennAlexander has earned a reputation as one of the best neighborhood elementaryschools in Philadelphia.”

But Penn Alexander was meant to be more than an exemplary public school.From the start, Streim explains, “our hope was to create a demonstration site for

The Penn Alexander School is anexemplary urban public elementary

school, with students posting highscores and graduating into some of

Philadelphia’s most selective highschools. But can that success be replicated for other students in

other cities? With some help from aquartet of generous Penn alumni, GSE

researchers are in the process ofanswering that question.

BestPractices

Middle School Math Teacher Arlene Brown helpseighth-grader Zhané Dadson to solve a slope

equation using a graphing calculator.

By Nancy Brokaw

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best practices in urban public education that could lever-age improvements elsewhere.”

In other words, GSE researchers want to understandhow and why Penn Alexander has achieved its success andwhat lessons from the PAS experience might be applied incities around the country. “Up until now,” says Streim,“we have been so busy implementing the school’s model,that we haven’t taken the time to document what faculty atthe school are doing that is working well, and figure outwhat’s making the difference. We’ve known for some timethat what’s called for is a best practices study that wouldenable other urban schools to learn from our experience.And for some time, we’ve been hoping to undertake astudy of the success factors at Penn Alexander.”

A Strong Urban AgendaEnter a quartet of Penn alums who care passionately

about public education in urban America. John GambaW’61 and his wife, Mary Anne Gamba HUP’65 G’84,and Lawrence C. Nussdorf W’68 and his wife, MelanieFranco Nussdorf CW’71.

“We’ve always had a sweet spot for public education,”says John Gamba. A graduate of Penn’s nursing school,Mary Anne Gamba worked as a Head Start nurse early inher career and that experience inspired a lifelong concernabout poverty, race, and education. At the same time,John, a Wharton grad who was in senior leadership at BellAtlantic before retiring, was serving on the public schoolboard of the West Chester, Pennsylvania, Area SchoolDistrict. Today, John sits on GSE’s Board of Overseers.

Larry Nussdorf, president and chief operating officer ofClark Enterprises, is the vice chair of Penn GSE’s Board ofOverseers and a member of the Advisory Board of Penn’sUrban Research Institute. A former member of Penn’sBoard of Trustees, he has been involved with the PennAlexander School from the very beginning. MelanieNussdorf, a lawyer, sits on the Penn School of Nursing’sBoard of Overseers, a position that reflects her interest inthe delivery of health care services in urban settings.

Residents of Washington, DC, the Nussdorfs directmuch of their philanthropy to urban issues. “I’m a greatbeliever in cities,” explains Larry, adding, “I have a verystrong urban agenda, and Penn Alexander fits squarelywithin that agenda.”

And indeed, the best practices study offered the Gambasand the Nussdorfs the perfect opportunity to advance theircommitment to urban education. The project provides anopportunity for Penn GSE to document what’s beenlearned from the PAS experience so that urban districtsthroughout the country can apply those lessons.

Says Larry Nussdorf, “Like all great educational insti-tutions, Penn has education and research as its primarypurpose. But, as a businessman, I’d like to add one moreelement to the mix and that is the Franklin approach ofputting theory into practice.”

Lessons LearnedThe new research will be qualitative, but the study is

designed to account for the copious quantitative dataalready available about PAS. On state assessments, forexample, students are consistently scoring at or abovegrade level in reading and math, and graduates areenrolling in some of the area’s most selective high schools.(In 2005, 72 percent of the school’s first eighth-grade grad-uating class was admitted to one of the city’s selective pub-lic or private high schools.)

The school’s success is undeniable and, while everyoneinvolved relishes the continued achievements of PennAlexander’s students, Streim and her colleagues wantmore: they want to understand why the PAS model worksand what lessons might be drawn from it—lessons thatcould be applied in urban districts throughout the country.To answer those questions, she has engaged two independ-ent educational researchers, H. Dickson Corbett and BruceL. Wilson, to conduct an in-depth investigation of successfactors at Penn Alexander.

A comprehensive look at the school’s daily routines, thebest practices study will feature interviews and surveyswith teachers, administrators, students, and parents as wellas classroom observations and a review of school docu-ments. Corbett and Wilson will focus their data collection

on the issues of teaching practices, professional develop-ment, instructional leadership, school culture and opera-tional arrangements. In the process, they’ll be looking atthese practices with an eye to understanding whether thefactors that contribute to Penn Alexander’s success arepotentially replicable.

The project is on the fast track: site visits took place inthe spring and data analysis will begin in the summer. Thefinal report, due at the end of this summer, will mine thedata for explanations for Penn Alexander’s success. Basedon these findings, Streim and her colleagues will determinehow to best share those elements of the PAS model thatmight be applicable elsewhere.

For, as Larry Nussdorf puts it, “There is always the ten-dency to become Philadelphia-centric. Philadelphia is cer-tainly important, but it’s important for us to expandbeyond Philadelphia. Penn Alexander can serve not onlyas a great public school but as a laboratory, and I’m hopingthat its experience can be shared with others, not only inthe region, but in cities throughout the country.” n

“We’ve known for some time that what’s called for is abest practices study that would enable other urbanschools to learn from our experience.”


Anytime a class can make me cry I know it’s done some-thing impressive,” says Andrew Campbell.

A Teach for America corps member assigned to SimonGratz High School in North Philadelphia, Campbell isdescribing a two-day summer institute he participated in aspart of the Penn GSE/TFA master’s program last summer.

The institute was created by Facing History andOurselves, a non-profit organization that prepares stu-dents for humane and engaged citizenship through thestudy of some of history’s darkest days. Thanks to twogenerous Penn alumni—Mark and Lori Fife—Penn GSEis now partnering with Facing History to bring the pro-gram to teachers in the Philadelphia area.

Believing that young people are “moral philosophers,”Facing History connects history—particularly that of theHolocaust and other genocidal conflicts—to students’experiences and the choices they face in their own lives. Inthe process, students come to appreciate the need for civic

participation and responsible decision-making.The heart of the program lies in professional development.

Offered to middle- and high-school teachers, Facing Historyprovides a rigorous program that prepares teachers to helptheir students develop a sense of civic responsibility and tol-erance by examining the troubled history of racism, preju-dice, and anti-Semitism. Says Penn GSE Vice Dean DougLynch, “Thanks to the Fifes’ generous support—particularlyon the conceptual front—we’ve been given a great opportu-nity to enter into a relationship with a stellar program thatchanges teachers’ lives by helping them contextualize historyand encourage students to engage in civic society. What’smore, the mission of Facing History and Ourselves alignsperfectly with President Gutmann’s Compact.”

Representing Amy Gutmann’s vision for the University,the Penn Compact holds as one of its prime tenets a com-mitment to local and global engagement: “Through ourcollaborative engagement with communities all over theworld, Penn is poised to advance the central values ofdemocracy: life, liberty, opportunity, and mutual respect.”

For Andrew Campbell, the Facing History program hasbeen compelling. As he explains it, the training builds fromthe personal out to the societal. “The topic was broachedfirst by considering our own identities and experiences—soit was immediately accessible. Then we slowly related ourexperience to the greater, international issues, specificallythe Holocaust. The magnitude of the topic and seeing itsrelationship to my own experience was extremely powerful.”

Facing History uses the Holocaust as a starting point forits training. Mark Fife W’78, who sits on the organization’sboard of trustees, explains, “One of the reasons that theHolocaust makes such a good backdrop is that it took many,many years to develop. So there were so many situationswhere people had to make choices before you could go to thenext step: first one law came into effect and then another.The ghettoes and the Star, the Jews being thrown out of theuniversities, Kristallnacht. People had to acquiesce.... Thereare so many things that students can study and see how theirchoices really do make a difference.”

Penn GSE has teamed up with Facing History and Ourselves—an organization that aims to encourage tolerance by teachingstudents the historical lessons of the Holocaust

from History’sLearningDarkest Days

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Both of Lori’s parents are survivors: her father, born inPoland, was in “many, many” concentration camps,while her mother spent the war in hiding, outsideBudapest. For Lori, Facing History’s focus seems cen-tered on that particular history: “One of the organiza-tion’s goals,” she says, “is to make people who don’tunderstand anything about the Holocaust aware of thefact that it actually happened.”

But the history isn’t limited to the Holocaust. As MarkFife points out, “Unfortunately we have a lot of things tochoose from. Just think about the last ten years. You haveRwanda, you have Yugoslavia, you have Sudan.”

Indeed Andrew Campbell recounts that the single mostaffecting moment for him was watching a video of SouthAfrica’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission, estab-lished in 1995 to investigate human rights violations during the period of Apartheid. “Seeing the powerfulmoments of confrontation and forgiveness between victimsand perpetrators brought many of us to tears,” he says.

“This work is urgent,” explains Facing History andOurselves Executive Director Margot Stern Strom, “andthe strategic significance of the Fifes’ gift is that it valuestwo institutions and leverages their partnership to producea greater impact.”

Headquartered in Brookline, Massachusetts, FacingHistory has eight regional offices in the U.S. and partner-

ships with educational organizations around the world.With its Penn GSE partnership, it is expanding its reachinto the tri-state area.

In addition to the two-day institute with GSE’s second-year Teach For America corps members, Penn GSE haspartnered with Facing History in an intensive weekend sem-inar for the School’s teacher education students in October2006. For both the TFA corps members and the teacher edstudents, Facing History’s online campus provides ongoingguidance in the form of extra lesson plans, opportunities tointeract with fellow teachers, and monthly online forums.

Plans don’t end there, however: a two-day course for theSchool’s teacher ed students is planned for Fall 2007.(These courses qualify as part of the master’s degree andstate certification requirements.) And, to help FacingHistory staff imagine new approaches to online learning,Penn GSE Associate Professor Kathy Schultz will be shar-ing her research on using multimedia websites to representteaching for new and experienced teachers.

As for Andrew Campbell, he is looking forward to draw-ing on what he learned in the institute, especially when hisfreshmen start discussing the Holocaust. “The techniques,the videos, and the other materials are sure to be success-ful,” he says, “because they are so engrossing.” n

“Lori and I have always been interested in education and young people—and obviously wehave an affinity for Penn since we both went there and we met there and our daughter

goes there,” says Mark Fife W’78.Those twin commitments to young people and to Penn are the common threads that run

through the couple’s philanthropy. At Penn, Lori Rutman Fife C’80, a partner in the New Yorklaw firm of Weil, Gotshal & Manges, serves on The Board of Overseers of the School of Artsand Sciences and on the Trustee’s Council of Penn Women.

Lori also sits on the Board of Trustees of the Jewish Board of Family and Children’sServices, the largest social services organization in New York. “Its great strength is in its men-tal health programs,” she explains, “but it spans the whole spectrum—from severe illness tolearning disabilities to alcoholism. It’s a terrific organization, really well run, that providesservices to people in the city who can’t afford regular hospitals.”

It was Mark’s initiative that introduced Penn GSE to Facing History and Ourselves. A manag-ing partner and co-founder of EnTrust Capital, Mark sits on that the Facing History board oftrustees. Again, what excites the couple about this project is its potential impact on young peo-ple. Says Mark, “The thing about Facing History is that it’s such a leveragable organization:teaching teachers who go back into the classroom and affect so many lives. And now that wehave Penn on board, the leverage is just multiplied.”

As if that weren’t enough, the couple has endowed four scholarship funds, currently sup-porting four students at Penn. The Fifes take the time to build relationships with their schol-ars. As Mark explains, “We love following their progress and where their careers are after theyleave Penn. Our first scholarship kid just got into Harvard Business School!”

Mark and Lori Fife

The Fifes with their daughter, Elizabeth C’09.


they’re quite robust. They’re not huge but they’re thereand they’ve gone on for a while.

And the quality of the courses—at least by title—thathigh school students are taking these days has dramaticallyimproved. That’s the state-level response to A Nation atRisk; they upped the high school graduation requirements.People hypothesized that it would affect the graduation rate,but the graduation rate went up slightly when those policieswere implemented. Then people said, well, they’ll takeremedial courses, but that didn’t prove to be true either.

Then the third hypothesis—we certainly are a bunch ofnay-sayers, aren’t we?—is that they’ll dumb down the cur-riculum. I did a study where I went into high schoolswhere states had increased the requirements and I lookedat courses in math and science where the enrollment hadincreased the most dramatically. I studied the nature of thecurriculum to see if it had been dumbed-down and found,

with almost no exception, it hadn’t. It was a counter-intu-itive finding, and it led to a lot of states requiring collegealgebra of all students. Louisiana was the first. I don’tknow whether those findings still stand today. To work,this reform asked teachers not to change what they’d beendoing, not to dumb down the curriculum, and I don’tknow whether, over time, they’ve been worn down or hadto accommodate influxes of weaker students.

I do know this: I did another study in which we com-pared students who took basic math to students who tookcollege prep math to students who took transition math. Itook the public release items from the NationalAssessment of Education Progress and made AndyPorter’s NCTM-like homemade test, and we went toschools in San Francisco, San Diego, Buffalo, andRochester. We gave the test in fall, winter, and springbecause we were looking at fairly mobile student bodies.

What we found—it was clear as a bell—was that thebiggest gains in student achievement were for the kidsenrolled in college prep, even controlling for prior achieve-ment. The lowest gains were in the basic math and transi-tional math was in the middle. You say, well, the confound-

ing of the quality of student must have been ridiculousbetween these courses, but the truth of the matter was thatthe top kid in the basic math course would be at about the80th percentile in the college prep course. There was veryloose coupling in terms of who went into which course.

Here’s the big thing: if you get a good measure of whatteachers actually teach—and I’ve got a way of quantita-tively measuring the degree of alignment between whatthey teach and what’s on the test—and you enter that as amediating variable in your analysis, then what you’ll findis this: college prep, biggest gains in student achievement;transition math, next; remedial math, least. Stick in theintervening variable of the alignment of what was taught tothe test, all the effects are gone. In short, the differences inachievement between these three types of courses wasentirely explained by the content covered in the courses. Ifachievement is the goal, put students in the more content-rich courses.

Remember when I said that what is taught is important?

News: Let’s turn to Penn and your transition to the dean-ship here. You’re obviously an experienced, senior scholarwith a perfectly good job….Why Penn? Porter: What could be more exciting? It’s a great univer-sity. Susan Fuhrman did a wonderful job with the School.It’s well positioned to get even better. It’s not a humon-gously large place—which I like. It’s in Philadelphia,which is just a terrific city. I chaired a technical panel forthe school board back when Hornbeck was superintend-ent. It’s a great town, and I’m very excited to be comingback in a permanent way.

News: Why GSE?Porter: I’ve been in three places, as you know. I’ve been ined schools all my life. But this will be the best universityI’ve ever been in. I think the ed school, more than perhapsany other part of a university, profits from the quality of itsuniversity. My whole job at Vanderbilt and Wisconsin hasbeen to promote interdisciplinary work. I intend to take thewonderful connections that have already been built,strengthen them, develop new connections, and reallyengage this university in education. The top leadership isready for that. President Gutmann and Provost Daniels arebehind it. Almost everybody, if given a chance, will helpout in education because people care so deeply about it. n

I’ve been in ed schools all my life. But this will be the bestuniversity I’ve ever been in. I think the ed school, morethan perhaps any other part of a university, profits fromthe quality of its university.

Introducing Andy Porter, continued from page 13


as well. “A main aim of civic education for peace is toenable the formation of a positive vision of the future,”writes Ben-Porath.

But it is multicultural education that provides the clear-est template for expansive education. They share essential-ly the same mission and differ, says Ben-Porath, only incontext. Multicultural education is dedicated to “respond-ing to social conflicts, tensions, and differences while creat-ing democratic citizens,” while expansive educationresponds to the tensions and differences of armed conflicts.Multicultural education has already taught citizens to

reverse their perspective; where traditional patrioticresponse in times of conflict sees “unwelcome diversity,”multiculturalism sees instead “oppressive unity.” Ben-Porath quotes Susan Muller Okin’s “compelling formula-tion” of multicultural education as “the radical idea thatpeople in other cultures, foreign and domestic, are humanbeings too,” and finds in multicultural thought especiallyvaluable examples of how to acknowledge past wrongs andincorporate forgiveness into the political process.

While there are few active examples of the kind of polit-ically engaged, expansive education she espouses inCitzenship Under Fire, Ben-Porath does point to oneexample of educators working to prevent the replication ofwar. In Israel and Palestine under the auspices of PRIME(Peace Research Institute in the Middle East), teachersfrom both sides of the conflict are “developing dual narra-tives of their common history.” The goal is not for studentsto agree on a common narrative, nor is it to dismiss or evenalter their own primary reading of history. “We don’t haveto share our reading of the 1948 war. There’s no chance ofthat,” says Ben-Porath pragmatically. “Each studies theirown version, infused with how the other side understandsit.” Expanding one’s understanding to include an alterna-tive view, without ignoring it or denigrating it, broadensand enriches one’s understanding of history.

Ben-Porath’s attempt to “grapple with the unique chal-lenges of citizenship in wartime” has earned accoladesfrom colleagues in the field of education and social philos-ophy. But, as demonstrated by a panel convened at theannual conference of the American Political ScienceAssociation to discuss the issues presented in CitizenshipUnder Fire, not everyone agrees wholeheartedly with her

argument. Sharing the podium with Ben-Porath were Amy Gutmann, a longtime supporter; Rogers Smith, aprofessor of political science at Penn and author of thePulitizer Prize-nominated Civic Ideals; and politicalphilosopher Michael Walzer, author of Just and UnjustWars and fellow at the Institute for Advanced Studies.Gutmann, while enthusiastic about Ben-Porath’s analysisof “belligerent citizenship” and her antidote of “expansiveeducation,” criticized Ben-Porath for wavering on themoral threat that the compromises of “belligerent citizen-ship” entail. “I wish,” said Gutmann, “that Sigal distin-

guished between merely perceived and real states ofdefensive war. And therefore between necessary andunnecessary belligerence.” Gutmann also insisted amoral distinction be made between “protracted warfarethat is aggressive rather than defensive.”

While Smith shared much of Ben-Porath’s perspective,Walzer criticized Ben-Porath for downplaying the urgentneed to keep citizens secure in times of conflict. Relatingthis discussion a month later, Ben-Porath eyes spark as shesmiles, “One respondent said I gave far too much room todemocratic considerations and not enough to security, andthe other respondent said just the opposite.”

Ben-Porath does not shy away from controversy.Argument, questioning, conversation, and learning toacknowledge the opinions of those who disagree with one’sown is a key part of living in an engaged democracy. Shehopes her book will generate discussion, questions, andeven disagreement. Her hope is that Citizenship Under Firereaches an audience beyond her fellow scholars and will beread by teachers, policymakers, and school board mem-bers. “Even if they disagree with me,” she says, “it wouldhelp them re-think how conflict or war affects our demo-cratic processes.”

Despite all she has witnessed in Israel and the UnitedStates, she remains an optimist. “Political education is oursingle most important hope for attaining this worthy goal,”Ben-Porath addressed the bookstore audience. “And ourschools, as underfunded, over-stretched, and undervaluedas they are, are our best bet.” n

Citizenship Under Fire: Democratic Education in Timesof Conflict is published by Princeton University Press, 2006

Argument, questioning, conversation, and learning to acknowledge the opinions of those who disagree with one’s own is a key part of living in anengaged democracy.

One Leg in the Future, continued from page 17


A L U M N I N O T E S

Arnold Rabin Ed’48 GEd’49 wrote The Sexu-al Guide to Written Intercourse, FulfillingGrammar, and Seductive Usage, published byConsortium Publishing last year. His radioplay “Epilogue” was recorded by stationKUNM at the University of New Mexico and has been released for distribution in thiscountry and abroad.

Carl J. Giuranna Ed’50 has been a baseballcoach on the high school (26 years) and colle-giate level (26 years). When he returns to Fla-gler College for the 2007 season, it will mark his53rd consecutive season as a baseball coach.

Shirley Magitson Grallnick Ed’53 writes,“After receiving my reading specialty degree fromPenn, I became a reading specialist for thePhiladelphia School District Title I Program. Sinceretirement, winters have been spent in Florida,where I have volunteered for the past 12 years forthe South Palm Beach Elementary Schools, help-ing groups of children improve their reading andwriting skills. As an artist, I have had several one-man shows, been juried into Art Leagues, andwon several awards. I also keep active in sports,write poetry, and make dolls: busy in retirement.”

Paul G. Humber C’64 GEd’65 <[email protected]>, a former upper-school facul-ty member of the Haverford Society (1977-2001), has written a new book, EvolutionExposed (2006), available through many onlinebookstores. He writes that his son Paul D.Humber C’95, “is in Pointe Noire, Congo-Brazzaville, with his wife, Kristin, and threedaughters, Esther, Marie, and Elayna, workingon a project to get the Vili language into writtenform so that at least parts of the Bible can betranslated into this ‘language of the heart.’ Histwin sister, Ruth P. Brittain C’95, is mother offour: Netanya, Jesse, Evelyn, and Priscilla. Sheand her husband, Jeff, are contemplating going

to Papua New Guinea with their children in thespring to assist native peoples there for fourmonths. The twin’s grandmother, Evelyn A.Humber, was secretary to Weightman Hallcoaches in the 1950s and 1960s. She departedthis life in November 2005 at the age of 98.”

Emile Rocheleau GEd’61, now living in Jaf-frey, New Hampshire, writes, “We would loveto hear from some of the members of the class of1961, who were at Penn as ‘guests’ of theNational Science Foundation.” You can contacthim at [email protected].

Michael Bentley GEd’72 has retired as associ-ate professor of science education at the Univer-sity of Tennessee, Knoxville. He will make hishome in Salem, Virginia. His latest book isTeaching Constructivist Science K-8: NurturingNatural Investigators in the Standards-BasedClassroom (2007, Corwin Press). He also has achapter on community-connected learning inThe Manual of Museum Education (AltaMiraPress, 2007).

Myrna Skobel Agris EdO JD, CW’63GEd’73 GrEd’79 is currently a financial advi-sor with Smith Barney, Division of Citigroup, inHouston, Texas. Before joining Smith Barneyseveral years ago, she practiced law in the area ofestate planning.

Dr. Helen F. Giles-Gee CW’72 GEd’73 Gr’83began in July as president of Keene State Col-lege, part of the University of New Hampshire.Janet Lee Cohen CW’74, a volunteer at thecollege, writes, “Dr. Ingrid Waldren, Penn biol-ogy professor and Helen’s adviser and friend,sat on the podium at the inauguration. Imarched in the processional as a Penn delegate,as did Charles Prigge WG’60.”

Dr. Davida Padawer Harlem CW’72 GEd’73GrEd’77 writes, “I am pleased to announce theopening of the Center for DevelopmentalAdoption Medicine (www.devadoptmed.com)in the Philadelphia area, created in response to

the increasing necessity to unite multiple disci-plines to best serve the needs and issues of theadopted child. The goals of our program are toprovide pre-adoption guidance and post-adop-tion services that will support both parents andchildren through all stages of development. Ourmulti-disciplinary team consists of myself, adevelopmental psychologist; we have two physi-cal therapists, including Arlene Tota VernoSAMP’77.”

Valerie Thompson Broadie CW’74 GEd’74writes, “I am a 1974 graduate of GSE and theCollege for Women—I participated in theBA/MS program. Just wanted to provide a littleupdate.... After a fundraising career that includ-ed seven years at Penn and over 15 additionalyears at other colleges, universities, and non-profits, I started my own development consult-ing firm in 2005. My clients include a variety oforganizations in the Washington metropolitanarea, primarily. My family and I live in SilverSpring, Maryland.”

John F. (Jeff) Claus GEd’74, associate profes-sor of education at Ithaca College, has just beenawarded a $70,000 Rockefeller Foundationgrant to create a recording studio program foryouth at the Southside Community Center, ahistorically African-American community cen-ter in Ithaca, New York, where he’s on theboard.

Barbara J. Lorry GEd’75 writes, “In 2003,after relocating to Sarasota, Florida, I opened anoffice to practice as a psychologist. I see a rangeof patients from teenagers to Medicare-age. Mytraining in family therapy has been especiallyuseful in work with all age groups.”

Gwen T. Samuels GEd’79 received the JapanFulbright Memorial Fund Teacher Program Fellowship to attend a three-week study tour ofJapan, visiting schools, universities, businesses,local government, and staying with a host family.

Pamela Goren Yohlin C’78 GEd’78 recentlyearned a master’s in counseling, and also earnedsecondary-school counseling certification. She

1940s

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1960s

1950s

works for Cora Services as a full-time counselorat Archbishop Ryan High School, outsidePhiladelphia; previously she taught Latin atSpringside School, and served as director ofadmission and development at the Meadow-brook School. She and her husband, JosephYohlin C’76, are the parents of Elizabeth YohlinC’08 and Hilary, who graduated in 2004 withdual degrees from Columbia University and theJewish Theological Seminary.

Marsha Kline Pruett C’82 GEd’ 82was recently appointed the MacondaBrown O’Connor Professor of SocialWork at Smith College. Previouslyshe served on the faculty of the YaleUniversity School of Medicine, with ajoint appointment at the Yale ChildStudy Center. She specializes in inter-ventions for families dealing withdivorce and child custody.

Barbara D. Acosta GEd’84 received her PhDin Multilingual/ Multicultural Education fromGeorge Mason University in 2005. She haswon the 2007 AERA outstanding dissertationaward from the Bilingual Education SIG. Herresearch examines the influence of early literacyinstructional practices on the long-termachievement of English language learners intwo-way bilingual immersion programs. Shewas recently appointed Senior Research Scien-tist/ELL Specialist at the George WashingtonUniversity Center for Equity and Excellence inEducation. She also continues to teach adjunctcourses at George Mason University in Multi-cultural Education, working with pre-serviceand in-service teachers to examine issues ofrace, social class, gender, culture, and languagewithin a multicultural social justice framework.She and husband Francisco continue in theirlifelong pursuit of social justice as trustees ofthe Monsignor Oscar Romero University in ElSalvador. Daughter Margarita (20) is in hersecond year at Bryn Mawr, where she is build-ing on her own multilingualism to pursue adegree in Linguistics and Spanish. Gabriela


Orphaned at the age of seven, Dr. Robert M. Aiken was sent to Girard College in 1929.It was at Girard that he discovered he wanted to become a teacher. While he wasworking as an apprentice, his supervisor suggested that he should teach woodwork-ing. And so his story begins.

Dr. Aiken graduated in January 1940; married his lovely wife, Bertha Smith, ofGermantown, in 1942; and then enlisted in the Navy. In January 1947, he enteredPenn GSE as a first-time freshman, beginning his incredible story of sheer persever-ance. Aiken spent the next 17 years completing his bachelor’s degree from theSchool of Education on a part-time basis while supporting a growing family and

working full time as a vocational arts teacher. He spent his last year an “accelerated” schedule in order to

graduate before his son, Robert M. Aiken, Jr. W’65. The fatherjokes that when the two had a class together, “I would try toget the better grades.” He then went on to complete a master’sfrom GSE in 1966 and later an EdD from Temple University.

Aiken’s entire life has been about the pursuit of excellence inteaching. He served as the principal of an Ocean City, New Jer-sey, school from 1966 to 1972. This experience prepared himfor the post of superintendent of the brand-new KittatinnyRegional School District in northern New Jersey. Starting in1972, he created the district from the “ground up” and, during

his six-year tenure, he transformed it to receive the State Medallion for excellence.He and his wife were “wooed back” to the Philadelphia area by the opportunity to

become the superintendent of New Hope-Solesbury School. He retired, for the firsttime, in 1983 but, in 1988, was lured out of retirement to serve as acting superin-tendent for six months for the Deer Lakes School District near Pittsburgh.

The Aikens are very active in the Penn community and have “an ongoing connectionto Penn and remain well-informed on current Penn events.” For decades, he has vol-unteered to both GSE and the University as a telephone solicitor for phon-a-thons andother activities. What’s more, he adds, “we never miss a home Penn basketball game!”

In 2005, Aiken received the first Ethel Carruth Sustained Leadership in EducationAward from GSE. The recipient is a Philadelphia-area educator who serves as aninspiration to others, and through his/her leadership provides opportunities for oth-ers pursuing careers in the profession.

Aiken represents what it means to be a Penn GSE alumnus: he is a living example ofthe significant impact a GSE education can have on one person, and he has a genuinecommitment to teaching and a belief in the importance of sustaining Penn for the bene-fit of future generations—both he and his wife have named Penn as beneficiary of theirestate. If Aiken could give words of wisdom to teachers and students he would tell them“maintain perseverance, always believe in one’s self and help anyone that needs it.”

Aiken jokes that “he probably has outlived many GSE faculty members, but he istremendously proud to be a part of GSE’s past as well as its future. He will continueto support the school which always will play a large part in his life.”

—Janice Rafferty

Dr. Robert M. Aiken / Ed’64, GEd’66

AlumniProfile

1980s


(17) is a junior in high school and will be per-forming this spring in a production of City atPeace, which will be written and performed byyouth from diverse urban and suburban com-munities in the Washington, DC, area.

James M. Day PhD Gr’87 and his colleagues inthe Center for the Psychology of Religion atLouvain have recently been granted a prize forexcellence in research in science and religion bythe Metanexus Institute of the John TempletonFoundation (at www.psp.ucl.ac.be/psyreli/). Inaddition to his post as professor at Louvain,James has been appointed assistant chaplain inthe Pro-Cathedral of the Holy Trinity, Brussels.He returned to The Memorial Church, at Har-vard, to preach in March of this year. He hasrecently been named to the editorial boards ofThe European Journal of Developmental Psychol-ogy and the International Journal for TerrorismResearch (APA). His third son, BenjaminJoachim, died January 20, 2007.

Paula Benner GEd’88<[email protected]> has writtenBenjamin Franklin’s Art of Virtue Journal, whichwas published by Infinity Publishing in June.

Robinette "Robin" Dasher-Alston Gr’91,who was formerly executive associate director atthe Middle States Commission on Higher Edu-cation, is now serving as senior manager forAccreditation Services at Dow Lohnes PLLC, aWashington, DC law firm.

Thomas W. Meyer C’90 GEd’91 GEd’96was recently promoted to associate dean of Aca-demic Affairs at Miami Dade College’s WolfsonCampus.

Tim Johnson GEd’92 writes, “I graduatedfrom Dr. Larkin’s one-year teacher ed master’sprogram in 1992. I am now teaching at Chel-

tenham High School, where I have been since1994. I am now in my third year of teaching ourAP Calculus BC course (a very challengingcourse). For both years so far I have had 100%of my students earn a 3 or better on the APExam. In 1995, 17 out of 20 scored a 5. In1996, 22 out of 29 scored a 5. I am very proudof my students and enjoy telling others of theirsuccess.”

Susan Reid GEd’94 recently published a pro-motional book about Philadelphia, Fitting intoYour Genes: Healthy Living and Eating inPhiladelphia. The book defines Philly as a “fitcity” and highlights the current revitalization ofCenter City and University City.

Margie Linn Gr’95 writes, “I graduated fromGSE in 1995 with a PhD in school psychologyand am currently an associate professor of spe-cial education at Widener University. I havebeen awarded a Fulbright fellowship to teach

In January, Penn GSE hosted an alumni weekend for fourcohorts’ worth of Executive Doctorate in Higher Education Man-

agement graduates. More than 30 alumni were joined by faculty, current students,

and other members of the Exec Doc community. This year’stheme, The Future of Higher Education, gave participants theperfect opportunity to mull over the implications of the recentlyreleased Spellings Commission Report on the Future of HigherEducation. The diverse group of guest speakers addressed issuescentral to the report, namely, accessibility, affordability, andaccountability.

Lucie Lapovsky, former president of Mercy College and educa-tional consultant on the AGB Cost Project, looked at the issue ofaccess and the barriers created by price. Making sure to differen-tiate between price (what students pay) and cost (what schoolsspend), she looked at program growth, breadth-of-degree

offerings, and faculty research expectations as major drivers ofcost. She then suggested some innovative strategies for address-ing this problem—introducing year-round classes and assessingwhere technology can lead to savings.

Next on the docket was Doug Lederman, senior editor of InsideHigher Education. In his discussion of the role of the media, Led-erman offered up his thoughts about why stories on the Spellings

Alumni Weekend, Exec-Doc Style

Executive Doctorate

Members of Cohort 5 at this year’s Exec Doc alumni reception: left toright, Raj Bellani, Dean of the Sophomore Experience, Colgate University;Bill Kiehl, Executive Director, Public Diplomacy Council; Jim Garvey,Associate Dean for Development, University of Pennsylvania; and MichelePerkins, Interim President, New England College.

JULI

A G

OR

DO

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1990s


and do research in Portugal this spring. I will beteaching graduate and undergraduate educationstudents about learning disabilities and doingresearch on cross-cultural models of inclusion of children with special needs.”

Christine McNelly C’93 GEd’95 and her hus-band, Andrew, are very happy to announce thebirth of their first baby, Ella Michele, in October2005. Currently in Glen Ridge, New Jersey, theyhave bought a house in Doylestown, Pennsyl-vania. “We are happy to be closer to our Pennfriends in Pennsylvania.” Christine has been astay-at-home mom for the last year but willmost likely return to sales at some point soon.

Michelle Leone Riley C’95 GEd’96 and RichRiley W’96 are thrilled to announce the birth oftheir third child, Matthew Jake, who was bornon September 26. “Fortunately, big sisterAlexandra (four) and big brother Michael (two)have adjusted nicely to having a new baby in thehouse. We are still living in San Francisco, butcontinue to travel frequently to the Philadelphiaarea to visit friends and family.”

Kelly Larsen Baughman C’98 GEd’99 andMichael Baughman L’96 are thrilled toannounce the birth of their daughter, CharlotteCampbell, on May 24, 2006. Mike is a partnerat Dechert LLP in Philadelphia, and Kelly iscurrently staying home with Charlotte. Theylive in Chestnut Hill and would love to hearfrom friends at <[email protected]>.

Cecelia Jones GEd’98 is currently living inthe northern Virginia area (Vienna) with herhusband of eight years and their five-year-oldson. Cecilia writes, “I am also in the (arduous)process of getting my clinical PsyD from TheAmerican School of Professional Psychology inDC/Argosy University! Please drop me a lineat [email protected].”

Dr. Gloria J. McNeal GNu’75 GrEd’98, anassistant dean at the University of Medicine andDentistry of New Jersey, has been named a fel-low of the American Academy of Nursing.

Rachel Skerritt C’98 GEd’99 is spending ayear in the Boston Principal Fellowship, anintensive program preparing educators for prin-

cipal and headmaster positions. She is alsoexcited to announce the publication of her sec-ond novel, entitled No More Lies, whichbecame available through nationwide book-sellers in January. More information can befound on <www.rachelskerritt.com>.

Kelly Curtin GEd’00 married MatthewMcDow on May 20, 2006, at St. ClementRoman Catholic Church of Matawan, New Jer-sey. Grace Enriquez GEd’99 was one of thebridesmaids. After a honeymoon in Hawaii,Kelly and Matthew are making their home inAberdeen, New Jersey.

Vicky Menexas-Giouroukakis GEd’01 andJohn Giouroukakis are proud to announce thebirth of their first child, Emanuel Giouroukakison July 6, 2006. The happy family lives in NewYork, where John is a corporate attorney withLatham & Watkins, LLP, and Vicky is an assis-tant professor in the graduate education depart-ment of Molloy College, Rockville Centre,New York.

Arielle McGovern GEd’01 writes, “I got mar-ried on November 11, 2006, to Shaun McGov-ern (Drexel ‘01) in New Haven, Connecticut.We will be living in New Haven. I also earnedmy sixth-year degree from Fairfield Universityin special education. I’m still teaching ESL inTrumbull, Connecticut, and I love it!”

Derya Erice GEd’03 reports from Ankara,Turkey, that she is currently on the educationfaculty of Abant Izzet Baysal University, in thedepartment of English Language Teaching.She works as an ELT instructor teachingcourses and is pursuing her PhD at Gazi Uni-versity’s ELT department. Her dissertationaddresses the in-service training of Englishteachers in Turkey, with a special focus on theirprofessional needs and providing a trainingframework. In 2006, Derya presented at anumber of conferences, including a “Tips andTricks for Teaching English to Young Learn-ers” workshop at the International Postgradu-

We want to hear from you!Please send your news to: Editor, Penn GSE News, University of Pennsylvania, Graduate Schoolof Education, 3700 Walnut Street, Philadelphia, PA 19104-6216. Or you may send them via e-mailto [email protected]. Please include your degree and year of graduation. The deadline forAlumni Notes submissions for the fall 2007 issue of the Penn GSE Magazine is August 30, 2007.

Commission resonated with such a wide audience. He also posed the interesting ques-tion of whether change for higher education is most effectively done at the national orlocal level.

Shifting the discussion to professional development, Katherine Jacobs, senior execu-tive at Isaacson, Miller, led a presentation on what to expect when working with an exec-utive search firm. “Keep in touch, but be patient too,” she advised her audience, alsoreminding them not to get discouraged. Perhaps the most interesting insight she had tooffer came in response to an audience question about how the EdD looks on a resume.According to Jacobs, the degree is looked on favorably: “It means you’re out there,” shesaid, “you have a clear career path, and you’re intentional about your education.”

Last up was Michael Goldstein, JD of Dow Lohnes, PLLC, and former associate vicechancellor for Urban and Governmental Affairs at the University of Illinois at Chicago.Focusing his remarks on the international scene, Goldstein argued that few Americansknow about the system of higher education abroad. And, he cautioned, with competitiveinstitutions are on the rise internationally, leaders in this country need to develop a strat-egy based on whether they see their foreign competition as a threat or an opportunity.

By all accounts, this year’s event was the most successful ever. Those who missed itshould mark their calendars for next year’s: January 17-19, 2008.

2000s


ate Conference in Linguistics and LanguageTeaching, held in Adana, Turkey; a papertitled “Implications of Content and LanguageIntegrated Learning (CLIL) at School inEurope” at the International INGED ELTConference, in Konya, Turkey; and a paper on“Aggression Levels of English LanguageTeaching Department Students” at the Inter-national Violence in Schools Symposium, inIstanbul. She also participated in the EuropeanStandards in Language Assessment Confer-ence, held in Budapest.

Meghan Leary Essman C’99 GEd’03 mar-ried Matt Essman GEd’03 on July 15 at theIndependence Seaport Museum in Philadelphia.Included in the bridal party were Adia WileyMolloy EAS’99, Gwynee Givot JohnsonC’99, and Lindi Sabloff C’00, and BobHarscheid GEd’03 was a reader. Guestsincluded Ana Mendes Mann C’99 and TedMann C’99, Koey Pirouz C’99, GabeAherne C’99, Craig McGettigan CGS’98,Parisa Mousavi C’99, Matthew MolloyEAS’99, Paul Staudt EAS’99. Brian WalterGEd’03, Monica McCasland ScheinlerGEd’02, Laura Borden C’97, and NehaChampaneria W’99 WG’06, and JustinMarkle WG’06. Meghan and Matt live inPhiladelphia, where she heads the fan-develop-ment and educational-programs department forthe Phillies and he works as an associated direc-tor of admissions at Haverford College.

Marianne Hogue GEd’03, who earned a cer-tificate in elementary education through the lit-eracy internship program in 2003, writes, “I amcurrently a lecturer and curator of the digitalimage database in the art and art history depart-ment at the University of North CarolinaWilmington. I also teach reading to MexicanELL students enrolled in the after-schoolASPIRE program at a nearby elementaryschool. I feel truly fortunate in that I have theopportunity to teach at both the university andelementary levels.”

Vince Maniaci GrEd’03 was featured in sever-al news publications this year, including Busi-

ness West, The Springfield Reminder, and TheRepublican. Since becoming president of Ameri-can International College in Springfield, Massa-chusetts, in July 2005, Vince has been creditedwith turning the school’s extreme deficit into a surplus.

Gary Raisl GrEd’03 recently became vicepresident for Finance & Administration at theUniversity for Systems Biology in Seattle,Washington. Gary was formerly the vice presi-dent for Finance & Administration at the Uni-versity of the Sciences in Philadelphia.

Sarah Jordan C’03 GEd’04 writes, “I amthrilled to announce my engagement to JonathanRosenson on June 11. We are planning a wed-ding next September in Pittsburgh. Janet KangC’03 will be my maid of honor. I am currentlyworking as a proofreader and editor in theDepartment of University Marketing Commu-nications at the University of Pittsburgh. Jonand I were recently in Philadelphia (his first visitto Penn!) while I was auditioning for Jeopardy!”

Jennie Salwen C’01 GEd’04 married BrianRosenzweig C’01 on July 16, 2006, at TempleB’nai Sholom in Rockville Centre, New York.Jon De Virgilio GEd’04 was among the guests.Jennie and Brian honeymooned in Hawaii andnow live in Manhattan. She teaches fifth gradeon Long Island, and he is an associate at DeweyBallantine LLP in New York. They can bereached at <[email protected]>.

Geneva Walker-Johnson GrEd’04 has beennamed the acting vice president of StudentAffairs at Old Dominion University in Norfolk,Virginia.

Patrick Drewry GEd’05 recently authored the“telephone book-sized” grade school applica-tion submitted to the Pennsylvania Departmentof Education for the expansion of lower North-east Philadelphia’s Franklin Towne CharterHigh School to enroll students in kindergartenthrough eighth grade. Patrick is assistant CEOat Franklin Towne, and along with the school’sadministrators and board of directors, he envi-

sions a “scaffolded instructional model,” linkingprograms of what will become two institutionsat Franklin Towne Charter School. If approvedby the city’s School Reform Commission, thenew Franklin Towne Charter Grade Schoolwould be separate from, but work in coordina-tion with, the high school. The grade schoolwould operate alongside the high school in theFrankford Arsenal business complex.

Brett Sherman GrEd’05 recently became thedirector of Academic Support Services at EmpireState College in New York, New York. Brett wasformerly the director of Adult and ContinuingEducation at Pace University in Brooklyn.

Devon Skerritt GEd’05 (from the higher edmanagement cohort) writes, “I just accepted a jobas assistant director of Admissions at the HarvardUniversity Graduate School of Education startingFebruary 20. I’m moving to Groton, Massachu-setts, with my fiancee as we plan our June wed-ding. My email is [email protected].”

Dan Martin GrEd’06 accepted the position ofpresident of Mount Vernon Nazarene Universityin Mount Vernon, Ohio. Dan, who previouslyserved as the vice president for UniversityAdvancement at Point Loma Nazarene Univer-sity in San Diego, California, began presidentialduties at MVNU in February.

Jim Pellow GrEd’06 began teaching DiscoveryNew York, a course for freshman at St. JohnsUniversity in Queens, New York, where he cur-rently serves as the executive vice president.Earlier this year, Jim helped bring Pete Hamill,a Pulitzer-Prize winner and former editor of theDaily News and The New York Post, to St.Johns, where he gave a lecture on his bookDowntown, My New York to more than 3,000students. Jim is also helping to build an innova-tive study abroad program at St. Johns, wherestudents can study abroad in a modular formatin four regions of the world.

Brian Bissell GrEd’07 and his wife, Becky,welcomed their third child, Sarah Faith Bissell,on October 17, 2006. Brian is vice president


for Business Affairs and Chief Financial Offi-cer at Colorado Christian University in Lake-wood, Colorado.

Bill Kiehl GrEd’07 is the editor of America’sDialogue with the World, published by the Pub-lic Diplomacy Council. The book, released inNovember, is a collection of a dozen essays byscholars and practitioners of public diplomacy.Bill is the executive director of the PublicDiplomacy Council in Washington, DC.

Mary Mazzola GrEd’07 will be co-presentinga session on Leadership Development programsin Higher Education at a seminar sponsored bythe Council on Social Work Education. Mary isthe Director of Admissions and Recruitment atthe Penn School of Social Policy and Practice.

OBITUARIES1930s J. Henry Hitz GEd’39, March 15, 2007, Lan-caster, Pennsylvania.

Born near Hummelstown, Pennsylvania, onAugust 10, 1905, Henry was a 1923 graduate ofHershey High School and graduated from PennState University School of Architecture in 1928.He received his master’s degree in educationfrom the University of Pennsylvania in 1939.For the past five years, he has been GSE’s oldestliving alumnus.

Henry began his 35-year teaching career as amath teacher at Yeadon High School and latertaught for 27 years in the vocational technicaldepartment of Lansdale High School. Heretired in 1970.

He was married for 23 years to the late Min-nie Funk Baldwin Hitz, who died in 2005. Hisfirst wife, Philomena Alfonso, died in 1980.

Dr. Kenneth A. Shultz GEd’36, February 14,2006, York, Pennsylvania.

A teacher and the director of business educa-tion at William Penn High School for 40 years,Ken retired in 1974. In 1966, he was selected asPennsylvania’s Outstanding Business Educatorof the Year. From 1930 to 1943, he was a teacherin the Camden, New Jersey, school system.

During World War II, he served as a memberof the U.S. Army’s 154th Medical Unit. Sta-tioned in both the U.S. and Europe, he was afirst lieutenant in charge of a prisoner-of-warcamp in Tullahoma, Tennessee, which housedmore than 10,000 German prisoners. Hereceived the European-African-Mid EasternService Medal and the American Service Medal.

Ken was curator of the Indian Steps Museumfor 31 years. He served as a national directorof the Izaak Walton League, a conservation

organization.

1940s Lillian Zimmerman Bangs Ed’42 GEd’43,March 29, 2006, Southampton, Pennsylvania.

A physical education teacher until her retire-ment in 1991, Lillian was a high school teacherin Conshohocken, Pennsylvania, and later a sub-stitute teacher in the Centennial School District.During the 1960s, she became a full-time physi-cal education teacher in the district. Along with aphysical therapist, she developed an adaptedphys-ed program to identify and work with stu-dents with posture and coordination problems.

Lillian was an adventuresome traveler who,at age 80, went hang-gliding off a mountain topin New Zealand.

Dr. Raymond A. Biswanger Jr. C’44 GEd’48G’50 Gr’51, February 4, 2006, Slippery Rock,Pennsylvania.

A teacher of English literature for more than30 years, Raymond taught at Cortland StateTeachers College in New York from 1951 to1954 and at the University of Georgia from1954 to 1961. At that time, he began teaching atSlippery Rock University, where he stayed untilhis retirement in 1984.

During World War II, he served in the U.S.Navy on LSM-9, which participated in thebeach assault at Okinawa and was damagedwhen it became stuck on a reef. He later servedas captain of LSM-538.

Harry M. Roth GEd’47, April 2006, IslandHeights, New Jersey.

A teacher, principal, and administrator withthe School District of Philadelphia for 36 years,

Harry began his career with the district as ateacher in 1933. After being named principal ofElverson Elementary School, he became thefirst principal of the newly opened WanamakerJunior High School in 1959. He later served asprincipal of Olney High School. In the 1960s,he became human relations coordinator for thedistrict. In 1970, he retired as superintendent ofschools for District 2.

Active in the Boys Scouts for 81 years, Harryreceived the Silver Beaver Award in the 1980s.In Island Heights, he served on the boards ofeducation and the library.

Robert S. Marshall Ed’49 GEd’54, June 16,2006, Toms River, New Jersey.

At Penn, Robert performed radio shows forWXPN and later worked with the writer PearlBuck and Oscar Hammerstein’s son-in-law intheater productions at the Bucks County Play-house.

He served as the head of the English depart-ment at Central Regional High School, where healso coached and officiated for track and fieldevents. He was an adjunct professor of English atOcean County College and taught at TrentonState College and State Police Academy, Sea Girt,New Jersey.

For 40 summers he was a staff supervisor atIsland Beach State Park, where he was known as“Mr. Island Beach” for his extensive knowledgeof park history. He continued volunteering atthe nature center there for many years after hisretirement. During World War II, he served inthe 7th U.S. Air Force.

1950s William H. Boucher GEd’50, July 8, 2006,Mendenhall, Pennsylvania.

William worked as a mathematics teacher atMount Pleasant High School in Wilmington,Delaware, for 35 years. One of his Mount Pleas-ant students, James Griffin, later established anacademic chair in his honor at Indiana Universi-ty in Bloomington.

While teaching, William began various busi-nesses, including two land-development com-panies. One partnership, B&B Company,established in 1968, developed many residen-


tial subdivisions throughout southeasternPennsylvania and New Castle County,Delaware. After retiring from teaching in 1983,he continued to be active with B&B and alsoran a firewood business.

William served on numerous boards, includ-ing the Sanford School in Hockessin, Delaware,and the Delaware Mutual Insurance Co. He wasa devoted trustee of West Chester Universityand, in 1995, received an honorary doctoratethere and was elected to the Sturzebecker Hallof Fame in 1999. The campus science centerthere is named after him and his wife.

Robert R. Murphy GEd’50, July 3, 2006,Philadelphia.

A science and physical-education teacher atGeorge Washington High School, Robert devel-oped special equipment to help students withminor physical problems. He also coached thetennis team before retiring in 1980. When notteaching during the day, he taught night schooland worked at summer camps.

During World War II, he served as a lieu-tenant on the destroyer escort Waterman, whichsaw action in the Pacific. He was a foundingmember of the Philadelphia chapter of theDestroyer Escort Sailors Association.

1960s Joseph Dinkins GEd’63, April 27, 2006,Springhouse, Pennsylvania.

As a student at Abington High School,Joseph competed in the Penn Relays and wonmedals for the track team. In college, he servedas co-captain of the Cheyney University foot-ball team.

In 1958, he joined the staff of Anna B. PrattSchool in North Philadelphia, where he intro-duced chess and foreign cultures to his fourth-,fifth-, and sixth-grade students.

For five years before his retirement in 1998,he taught second-graders and loved tellingthem stories. Indeed, his love of storytellingwas such that he regularly attended the Nation-al Black Storytellers conventions. He was alsoactive with the World Affairs Council ofPhiladelphia and, during the 1970s, with theOpportunities Industrialization Centers in the

city, where he taught general equivalencydiploma requirements.

A skilled carpenter and plumber, he built ahouse for his mother and remodeled his ownhome. He was also a dedicated fisherman and,according to family lore, caught a record-breakingcatfish in a local creek when he was 12 years old.

He is survived by his daughter, Hon. Carol S.Wells L’85.

Faculty George Keller, February 28, 2007, Baltimore.

Chairman of Penn GSE’s higher educationdivision from 1988 to 1994, George had a variedcareer in education before coming to Penn. Heserved as a strategic planner for the Barton-GilletCo., as assistant to the chancellor of the Universi-ty of Maryland system and of the State Universi-ty of New York system, as assistant dean of thecollege at Columbia University and editor ofColumbia College Today, and as academic directorfor the Great Books Foundation in Chicago.

In 1965, President Lyndon B. Johnson pre-sented him with the U.S. Steel FoundationAward for distinguished service to higher edu-cation. Newsweek magazine recognized him forexcellence in education reporting in 1967, andthe next year, Atlantic Monthly named him edu-cation writer of the year.

After retiring from Penn, George worked as awriter and educational consultant to institutionsand governments throughout the nation. Hewas the author of Academic Strategy: The Man-agement Revolution in Higher Education andTransforming a College, both published by theJohns Hopkins University Press, and Prologueto Prominence, published by Lutheran Universi-ty Press. His last book, Colleges, Universities,and the New Society, will be published next yearby Hopkins Press.

Born in Union City, New Jersey, the son ofimmigrants from Germany and Latvia, heearned a bachelor’s degree in government andpolitical science from Columbia University in1951 and a master’s degree in political science in1954, also from Columbia.

He is survived by his wife, the former JaneEblen; a son, the Rev. Bayard Faithfull; adaughter, Coby Keller; and two grandsons.

C A L E N D A R O FE V E N T S

September 20, 2007Reed StevensAssociate Professor in Educational Psychology, University of Washington

Based on his comparative research of cognitive activity in classrooms,workplaces, and science museums,Dr. Stevens is exploring new ways toconceptualize cognition and experi-menting with new ways to organizelearning environments.

September 20, 2007Nessa Wolfson Colloquium Fall 2007Rebecca Freeman FieldFounder/Director, Language EducationDivision, Caslon Publishing and Consulting

A specialist in bilingual education,English as a second language, andworld language education in the Unit-ed States and internationally, RebeccaFreeman Field has conducted action-oriented research in bilingual schoolsand communities since 1986.

SAVE THE DATE !

October 19-21, 2007Homecoming 2007Root for the Penn Quakers take onthe Yale Bulldogs!

January 17-19, 2008Executive Doctorate in Higher Educa-tion Management Alumni Weekend

Keep in touch......at the Penn GSE Alumni & Friends website

http://www.gse.upenn.edu/alumni_friends/


Recently Penn GSE got the surprise news that a long-ago alumna had left the School a multi-million legacy—

one of the largest in its history—that would help ensure thata GSE education won’t be out of reach to the next generationof educational leaders.

Dr. M. Elaine Duffy Stinner Ed’45 GrEd’51, who died in Ft.Lauderdale, Florida, in August 2006, made a surprise bequest toendow graduate student scholarships here. She was the widow ofanother GSE grad, John M. Stinner GEd’49, who passed away in 2001.

Dr. Stinner devoted her life to education. First as a science major in theSchool of Education and later as a graduate student, she dedicated herselfto teaching. Her doctoral dissertation, which focused on curriculum devel-opment, is ample evidence that, like her alma mater, she believed that thehighest purpose of scholarship is the improvement of practice.

By all accounts, she was an exemplary student—and a genial youngwoman. Professors praised her “unusual intellectual ability,” “unquestion-able scholarship,” and “superior initiative and originality.” They also noticedher affability, describing her as “a woman of charm and poise,” with a“ready smile and sympathetic understanding.”

After graduating, Dr. Stinner went on to a career that enabled her toapply her scholarship to the real world. She worked as a science teacher ofgifted students at Dobbins Vocational-Technical School in Philadelphia,where she was considered one of the “top teachers,” and later at Chel-tenham Township High School in nearby Wyncote. At Cheltenham, she initi-ated a college-level biology class and provided key support for the Mathe-matics Science Seminar for gifted students.

Reflecting the strength of her commitment to education, Dr. Stinner’ssurprise bequest is directed to endowing student scholarships at GSE. Thisgenerous gift will enable the School to increase its financial aid offerings,thereby helping to ensure that highly qualified students from all back-grounds have the opportunity to attend the School.

With this gift, she extends her legacy of service to education by enablingthe next generation of idealistic young people to devote their lives to thevital work of teaching in and improving the nation’s schools.

Just as Elaine Duffy Stinner did.

In the Fall 2007 issue of Penn GSE News, we’ll be telling our readersmore about Dr. Stinner’s extraordinary gift and the need it addresses.

GSE Alum Leaves a Legacy

Breaking News

Dr. M. Elaine Duffy Stinner,Ed’45, GrEd’51, who died in Ft. Lauderdale, Florida onAugust 29, 2006, made a surprise bequest to endowgraduate student scholarships at Penn GSE.

Here are some of the benefits:

• Supplement retirement income and support a cause you love

• Guaranteed annuity income for lift

• Highly attractive annuity rates

• Part of your annuity income will be tax-free

• Capital gains tax savings on appreciated property you donate

• A tax deduction now for your gift

• The remaining principal goes to the area you supportwhen the contract ends

Not yet retired? Consider a Penn Deferred Payment GiftAnnuity. You choose the date you want to begin paymentsand benefit from guaranteed supplemental income.

THE RETIREMENT GIFT ANNUITY MAY BE THE RIGHT ANSWER FOR YOU.

Retirement Gift Annuity

Nonprofit OrganizationU.S. Postage

PAIDPermit No. 2563Philadelphia, PA

3700 Walnut StreetPhiladelphia, Pennsylvania 19104-6216

www.alumni.upenn.edu/giftplanning

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For more information contact

Brian Sagrestano, JD, CFREOffice of Gift Planning800.223.8236 or [email protected]

Annuitant Age at Gift Age 65 Age 70 Age 75 Age 80 Age 85

Annuity Rate 6.0% 6.5% 7.1% 8.0% 9.5%

Charitable Deduction* $10,328 $11,068 $12,021 $12,982 $13,686

Annual Payment $1,500 $1,625 $1,775 $2,000 $2,375

Deduction will vary slightly with changes in the IRS Discount Rate. Assumed rate 6.2%

Sample Rate Chart for a $25,000 Gift Annuity on a Single Life

PLEASE NOTE: Charitable Gift Annuities are not investments or insurance and are not regulated bythe insurance department of any state.

Documents

ANDY PORTER STEPS IN - Penn GSE · Madlyn K. Abramson Ed’57 GEd’60 Dr. Benjamin M. Ashcom Gr’74 Dr. Reina Marin Bassini CW’72 GEd’72 Dr. Patricia Cayne CW’60 Susan Frier