Photo courtesy of my dear friend/photographer/aspiring business mogul, Sydney Taylor from Taylor Made Photo KC.
I am a Southern California native which means I have a high tolerance for traffic and a low tolerance for cold. While working on my undergraduate degree at UC Davis, I worked as an intern in a 4th grade classroom and that was where I began to see a career in education as a good fit for me. I was drawn to the energy and joy of working with children, and I was intrigued by the dichotomy of the implied promises and stark realities of the public education system.
After completing my credential program at UC Irvine, I worked in the classroom for 8 years: first as a substitute teacher, then as a language teacher in Shibukawa, Japan, and most recently as a 5th grade teacher for six years at Kennedy Elementary School in Madison, Wisconsin (Go Cougars!). During this time, my views on education evolved and changed and I was eager to learn more about how my skills may fit into the bigger picture of the field. In 2013, I began a master's program in Educational Psychology at UW Madison while continuing to work, and I began exploring leadership positions at my school site, mainly in educational technology and social justice practices.
After completing my credential program at UC Irvine, I worked in the classroom for 8 years: first as a substitute teacher, then as a language teacher in Shibukawa, Japan, and most recently as a 5th grade teacher for six years at Kennedy Elementary School in Madison, Wisconsin (Go Cougars!). During this time, my views on education evolved and changed and I was eager to learn more about how my skills may fit into the bigger picture of the field. In 2013, I began a master's program in Educational Psychology at UW Madison while continuing to work, and I began exploring leadership positions at my school site, mainly in educational technology and social justice practices.
Bascom Hill at the University of Wisconsin, Madison from a classroom field trip in 2017.
In 2017, I made the decision to leave the classroom for the time being in order to pursue my PhD. I packed up my belongings, donated my winter coat and enrolled at UC Santa Barbara, where I am currently a 3rd year student in the education policy group. I know that the combination of classroom experience that I bring, along with the research skills that I am learning now, will position me to leverage a greater impact in creating equitable, effective systems in education that support children, families and communities.
Storke Tower at UC Santa Barbara, September 2019.
My research interests lie in better understanding how our communities intersect with schools and classrooms. I use mainly quantitative methods to understand correlations, relationships and causal mechanisms between policies and school outcomes. I have experience working with large-scale datasets, as well as local data from a single community partner. Additionally, I am experienced in using GIS to add a spatial aspect to social science research. Sharing the work I do with my colleagues and learning from others is very important to me, and I have been fortunate to share work within the UCSB community, as well as at conferences in the field of education research, from Reno to Tokyo, and a few places in between. I've also been fortunate to have the support of my home institution, UCSB, in the form of the Graduate Opportunity Fellowship (2020-21) as well as CTERIN (California Teacher Education Research & Improvement Network) and the Fulbright Program (2020-21).
Using GIS to analyze California's population density.
When I am not working, I enjoy spending time with family, reconnecting with my home state, reading YA dystopian fiction, traveling and watching reality TV where people are actually kind to each other. While I do miss being in the classroom, words cannot express how grateful I am to not have to supervise recess or the lunchroom anymore.
My first academic conference at AEFP in Kansas City.