People currently working in (and recently graduated from) our research group:
Michelle Perry is full professor in the Department of Educational Psychology, with affiliate status in the Department of Psychology and in the Beckman Institute for Advanced Science and Technology at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. Currently, she also serves as a Dean's Fellow for Faculty Development in the College of Education.
She has appointments in both the Developmental Science and the Cognitive Science of Teaching and Learning divisions of the Department of Educational Psychology. Her research is focused on the acquisition of mathematical and scientific concepts and the contextual factors—including instruction—that support their acquisition. She's the one in the middle, flanked by 2 students who earned their doctoral degrees under her direction: Marc McConney (Adjunct Professor at the City College of Chicago and The Chicago School for Professional Psychology) and Leigh Mingle (now at Ensemble Learning).
She has appointments in both the Developmental Science and the Cognitive Science of Teaching and Learning divisions of the Department of Educational Psychology. Her research is focused on the acquisition of mathematical and scientific concepts and the contextual factors—including instruction—that support their acquisition. She's the one in the middle, flanked by 2 students who earned their doctoral degrees under her direction: Marc McConney (Adjunct Professor at the City College of Chicago and The Chicago School for Professional Psychology) and Leigh Mingle (now at Ensemble Learning).
Kate Curry, M.S., M.A. is a doctoral student in the Developmental Sciences Division in the Department of Educational Psychology. Her research focuses on how elementary school teachers view students' self-concepts and their motivation as learners. She is especially interested in developing effective professional learning opportunities for teachers to help them create classroom cultures that implement growth mindset-supportive teaching practices.
Karle Flanagan, Ph.D. is Associate Teaching Professor of Statistics here at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. She has taught introductory statistics and data science to over 30,000 students over the past ten years at UIUC. She has won the College of Liberal Arts & Sciences' Award for Excellence in Undergraduate Teaching by Instructional Staff and the campus-level award for Excellence in Undergraduate Teaching. Her research interests include online education and improving the teaching and learning of statistics and data science.
Amos Jeng, M.S. is a doctoral student in the Developmental Sciences Division in the Department of Educational Psychology. His research primarily focuses on learning-oriented interactions in educational settings. He is especially interested in understanding and improving college students’ experiences with help-seeking and help-giving in introductory STEM course settings, as well as placing these interactive behaviors in a cultural context.
Hana Kearfott, M.A., M.S. is the Research Project Coordinator and plays a crucial role in all of the projects from this team that investigate mathematics teaching and learning. She has two masters' degrees: one in Education from Truman State University and one in Teaching English as a Second Language (TESL) from the University of Illinois. She had several years of classroom teaching experience before joining our research team.
Tiffany Reyes, M.S., is doctoral student in the Cognitive Science of Teaching and Learning Division in the Department of Educational Psychology. Her research interest concerns how body-based interactions facilitate student learning of mathematics and how teachers can effectively engage students in embodied learning. Her aim is to help design educational spaces and practices that emphasize the grounded nature of cognition and capitalize on learning that comes with the body.
Hannah Valdiviejas Cohn, Ph.D. completed her doctorate in the Cognitive Science of Teaching and Learning Division in the Department of Educational Psychology. Her research interests involve the educational experiences of minoritized students in STEM subjects, with the goal of developing racially conscious research and practice that enhances their academic experiences. She is currently examining graduate students’ racialized coping strategies that relate to self-regulated learning in the online and in-person STEM space, specifically at predominantly White institutions (PWIs). She is currently an SRCD Congressional Fellow.
Grace Yun completed her master's degree in the Cognitive Science of Teaching and Learning (CSTL) division of Educational Psychology at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. Her research interests included looking at the role of gesture in immersive technology (e.g., simulations, digital video learning environments) to enhance STEM learning especially for those who are minority, low-income, and first-generation students. She is now the Assistant Director for Health Professions Advising and Graduate School Preparation at the Career Center, University of Illinois.
Email: [email protected]
Email: [email protected]
Recent former students (since 2016)
Shereen Beilstein, Ph.D. is a Research Specialist at the Illinois Workforce and Education Research Collaborative (IWERC). While at Illinois, she was first a graduate student and then a postdoctoral scholar on our NSF project in the Developmental Science division of Educational Psychology. Her dissertation won the Doctoral Dissertation Prize from the Jean Piaget Society for the Study of Knowledge and Development and she also received the Outstanding Student Medal at the Doctoral Level from the College of Education. She investigated the impact of video-based teacher commentary and learning in a virtual learning community devoted to elementary mathematics education and, in a separate series of studies, how young children rely on and take up the affordances of concrete materials and gestures when learning about fractions.
Genevieve Henricks Keyser, Ph.D. is now Assistant Professor of Psychology at St. Louis University. At Illinois, she was a graduate student and then a postdoctoral scholar working on our IES-funded project (IES R305A180211). Her dissertation focused on how students underrepresented in STEM fields find success in the online space, and how the online space seems to provide an equal playing field for women in STEM courses. She was the recipient of the Sandra Goss-Lucas award in the Department of Psychology for Outstanding Graduate Instructor in Psych 100.
Victoria (Tori) Jay, M.A. is a doctoral student in Developmental Psychology at the University of Wisconsin. They completed their master's degree at the University of Illinois and worked with us on several projects while at Illinois. Broadly, Tori is interested in numerical cognition and STEM education.
Jeanne Brunner, Ph.D. completed her doctoral degree in August 2016 and is now an Assistant Professor at UMass-Amherst. Her early research focused on the use of multiple strategies in the teaching of mathematics in fifth-grade classrooms. As a former science coordinator for an elementary school, she has a long-standing interest in elementary science classrooms. Her dissertation investigated ways of supporting elementary science teachers in teaching nature of science through the use of trade books.
Neet Priya Bajwa, Ph.D. completed her doctoral degree in May 2016 and is now an Assistant Professor at Illinois State University. Her research interest focuses on several interrelated issues in the development of number and arithmetic concepts in young children, including use of reasoning strategies, representational models, and mathematical contexts in fostering meaningful learning of elementary school mathematics. She is also interested in exploring the affordances of the digital platform to support effective learning of mathematical concepts. Her dissertation focused on ways in which an interactive game-based application might help young learners understand mathematical equivalence.
Shuai Wang, Ph.D. completed his doctoral degree in Fall 2016. He is now Associate Professor at Shanghai Jiao Tong University and previously was a Research Scientist at SRI. He has broad interests in statistics and STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics) Education.
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