Dear IRT Community,
I hope that your Fall has gotten off to a productive start! IRT had a busy Summer of advising, programming, and outreach.
With the launch of our new IRT Scholar cohort this past Summer, we were able to co-construct a curriculum that named the moment, built up scholar capacity, and took into account the shifting educational landscape as a result of the SCOTUS decisions. IRT has never been an organization to shy away from controversy and challenge but instead seeks out input and innovation. IRT Scholars know that they benefit from having diverse educators who are both mirrors and windows into who they are, what they stand for, and who they stand with. In turn, our scholars are eager to give back and provide support and solace for their communities across the PK-12 through the higher education pipeline.
I have long believed in the power of cohorts from my days directing the Donovan Urban Teaching Scholars Program and now on staff at IRT. We are not meant to educate in isolation but in the presence and mindset of being in community. Working alongside Heather Moore Roberson, IRT ’07, ’10, and Ryan Sermon, IRT ’10, as this year’s Summer Workshop (SW) Curriculum Coordinators, we enhanced the virtual Summer Workshop around 4 main pillars to include:
CAREER PATHWAYS – Examining different employment opportunities along the academic and non-academic routes. Essentially asking the questions; Where am I headed with my career and with future jobs?
THRIVING IN GRAD SCHOOL – Navigating approaches to the graduate school experience. Asking the fundamental questions; What does it mean to be in grad school? What strategies/skills are necessary to be successful?
SCOPE OF HIGHER ED – Surveying historical developments and philosophic bases, public policy issues at the state and federal level; types of institutions and their purposes; and characteristics of faculty, students, and curricula. The vital question being asked; What is the past, present, and future of higher education?
THEORIES OF INEQUALITY, OPPRESSION, AND SOCIAL STRATIFICATION – Using frameworks to examine power and oppression dynamics between diverse groups, providing insight into how salient identities serve to maintain and reinforce the lack of equity in educational policies, practices, and access to resources and opportunities. How does systemic oppression explain these disparities?
In being responsive to the virtual format that expanded access to all IRT Scholars as well as taking into account that most scholars were working, the IRT Curriculum Coordinators and SW faculty both led and co-led dynamic sixty-minute sessions utilizing themes from these four foundational pillars. Scholars and SW faculty met during the late afternoon/evening across multiple time zones during the month of July. SW faculty included IRT alums; Joe Baez, IRT’ 18, Guadalupe Barrientos, IRT’ 20, Aaron Benavidez, IRT’ 11, Yanil De La Rosa-Walcott, IRT’ 19, Khrysta Evans, IRT’ 18, Armando Martinez, IRT’ 19, Astrid Moises, IRT’ 08, Margaret Perez-Brower, IRT’ 11. ’15, and Toby Wu, IRT’ 09, ’21.
I want to offer my sincere appreciation to this year’s SW team! Your authenticity, depth of dialogue, and support of the scholars was exciting to participate in and bear witness to.
I also want to offer heartfelt thanks to the IRT team for their coordination and facilitation with our annual IRT Consortium of Colleges and Universities Deans and Administrators’ Meeting and Recruitment Fair. Scholars remarked that they were able to meet and engage virtually with Consortium administrators who not only answered their questions in depth but also pushed them to broaden their graduate school considerations. Appreciations to our growing Consortium!
As IRT shifts from the Summer Workshop to implementing its academic year components, we are looking forward to your continued support!
Aloha,
Catherine Wong
IRT Associate Director & Manager of Programs
Institute for Recruitment of Teachers 