TC Today - Teachers College Columbia University

TC President Susan Fuhrman with Peace Corps Director Aaron
Williams in April.
Bravo, Peace
Corps Fellows
The Teachers College
Peace Corps Fellows
Program, which prepares
returning Peace Corps
Volunteers for teaching in
high-needs New York City
schools, was honored with
a proclamation from Mayor
Michael Bloomberg at its
25th anniversary in April
2011. The proclamation also
praised TC Trustee Elliot
Jaffe and his wife, Roslyn, for
their longstanding support of
the program.
The festivities, held on
TC’s campus, also marked
the 50th anniversary of
the national Peace Corps
policy by Department
Program, and included
remarks by Aaron Williams,
Peace Corps Director. TC’s
Teachers for East Africa
program, through which,
during the early 1960s, the
College prepared teachers to
serve in Kenya, Uganda and
Tanzania, was the precursor
to the Peace Corps.
Fuhrman Leads
Hill Briefing
TC President Susan
Fuhrman moderated a
Congressional briefing
in February about the payoffs
of long-term investment in
education research. The briefing
was cosponsored by the
Education Deans Alliance,
the National Academy of
Education (NAEd) and
the American Educational
Research Association
(AERA). It was attended by
Congressional staff people,
TC is launching a new Department of Education Policy and Social Analysis (EPSA) to serve
as a central academic hub for the College’s education policy work across all phases of educational
and human development, with both a national and global focus. EPSA will accept
graduate students beginning Fall 2011. • The new department’s core areas of expertise
will include early childhood education, charter schools and vouchers, home
schooling, K–12 education reform, higher education policy, law and education,
and the role of nonschool factors (such as demographic change,
public health, and human services) in affecting education
achievement and equity. • EPSA will be chaired by Jeffrey
Henig, Professor of Political Science and Education,
and will house four master’s and doctoral programs:
Economics and Education, Politics and
Education, Sociology and Education, and
Leadership, Policy and Politics.
policymakers and officials
from the U.S. Department y
of Education.
Fuhrman, President of
the NAEd and past Vice
President of the Educational
Policy and Politics division
of AERA, moderated a panel
of internationally regarded
education researchers who
discussed the significance of
their work and the payoffs
of having sustained funding
from a single source for longterm
education research.
María Torres-Guzmán
Four TC Faculty
Honored by AERA
María Torres-
Guzmán, Professor
of Bilingual
Education, has received
the American Educational
Research Association
(AERA) Bilingual Education
SIG Lifetime Achievement
Award. Torres-Guzmán was
recognized for her “longstanding
excellence in scholarship
related to bilingual
education,” her “commitment
6 T C T O D A Y l s p r i n g 2 0 1 1
Photograph (top) by Heather van Uxem; photograph (Bottom) by lisa farmer
Illustration by Doriano Solinas