Ideas In Action

  • New Peabody Graduates Fill Teaching Roles in Nashville’s Lowest-performing Middle Schools

    New Peabody Graduates Fill Teaching Roles in Nashville’s Lowest-performing Middle Schools

    Lanette Waddell Fourteen students with a commitment to improving teaching in urban middle schools were the first to graduate May 11 from a two-year master’s program offered at Vanderbilt’s Peabody College in partnership with Metropolitan Nashville Public Schools. The Teaching and Learning in Urban Schools program was instituted in 2010,… Read More

    Nov 16, 2012

  • Sengupta Receives NSF CAREER Award

    Sengupta Receives NSF CAREER Award

    Pratim Sengupta Pratim Sengupta has received recognition – and funding – for research he hopes will reshape elementary, middle and high school science as we know it. Sengupta, assistant professor of learning sciences and science education at Vanderbilt’s Peabody College of education and human development, has won a prestigious… Read More

    Nov 16, 2012

  • Peabody’s Flores Co-develops Brief for U.S. Supreme Court in Support of University of Texas Diversity Policies

    Peabody’s Flores Co-develops Brief for U.S. Supreme Court in Support of University of Texas Diversity Policies

    Vanderbilt University’s Stella Flores was one of 21 researchers nationwide who developed an amicus brief summarizing key research on affirmative action in anticipation of the case, Fisher v. University of Texas, scheduled to go before the U.S. Supreme Court in October. The document was submitted by the Civil Rights Project… Read More

    Nov 16, 2012

  • Parent-led Discussion Enhances Children’s Learning From Television

    Parent-led Discussion Enhances Children’s Learning From Television

    Children learn more from television viewing when parents participate as they would during book reading, new research from Vanderbilt finds. Read More

    Nov 16, 2012

  • Students Displaced by School Closures Need High-quality Alternatives

    Students Displaced by School Closures Need High-quality Alternatives

    Ron Zimmer Closing schools can have negative effects on displaced students, but these ramifications can be counteracted if students are moved to schools that are substantially higher-performing. A new study from the RAND Corporation, Vanderbilt University’s Peabody College and Mathematica Policy Research finds that closing low-performing schools does not necessarily… Read More

    Nov 16, 2012

  • Study Reveals Effects of Different Teaching Styles on Learning New Words

    Study Reveals Effects of Different Teaching Styles on Learning New Words

    Researchers at Peabody College are studying how people learn new words in hopes of determining optimal interventions for children who struggle with reading. A new educational neuroscience study offers clues on reading and plasticity in the brain that could lay the foundation for more targeted investigations of what types of… Read More

    Nov 16, 2012

  • Former Teachers’ Return to Classroom Feeds Workforce; Gender Differences Prevalent

    Former Teachers’ Return to Classroom Feeds Workforce; Gender Differences Prevalent

    Former teachers may be an important source for the teacher labor supply, with as many as 30 percent of this population re-entering the field at some point, but who is most likely to return to the classroom after a hiatus? New research from Peabody College examines what factors affect teachers’… Read More

    Nov 16, 2012

  • Sustaining, ‘Scaling Up’ Effective Practices of Urban High Schools Focus of Research

    Sustaining, ‘Scaling Up’ Effective Practices of Urban High Schools Focus of Research

    Tom Smith The National Center on Scaling Up Effective Schools at Peabody College announced in September the next phase of their partnership with Broward County Public Schools to study and “scale up” effective practices of these Florida high schools. As part of an ongoing, five-year study funded by the U.S. Read More

    Nov 16, 2012

  • Peabody Again Ranked Top Graduate Education School

    Peabody Again Ranked Top Graduate Education School

    Vanderbilt’s Peabody College of education and human development maintained its No. 1 national ranking for the fourth consecutive year in the U.S. News & World Report annual ranking of graduate schools of education. Peabody has topped the rankings, selected through statistical indicators and expert opinions, since 2009. Its administration/supervision and… Read More

    Nov 16, 2012

  • Faculty Notes and Honors

    Faculty Notes and Honors

    Ellen Goldring Kimberly Bess, assistant professor of human and organizational development, won the 2012 Harold Love Outstanding Community Involvement Award from the Tennessee Higher Education Commission. Laurie Cutting, Patricia and Rodes Hart Associate Professor of Special Education, was appointed to the Language and Communication Study Section of the Center for… Read More

    Nov 16, 2012

  • Three Peabody Faculty Members Named AERA Fellows

    Three Peabody Faculty Members Named AERA Fellows

    Richard Lehrer The American Educational Research Association in March selected three Peabody College faculty members to be AERA Fellows. Lynn Fuchs, Richard Lehrer and Joseph Murphy are among 36 scholars nationwide named to the 2012 class in recognition of their exceptional scientific or scholarly contributions to education research or significant… Read More

    Nov 16, 2012

  • Murphy Wins Lifetime Achievement Award for Scholarship In Educational Administration

    Murphy Wins Lifetime Achievement Award for Scholarship In Educational Administration

    Joseph Murphy Vanderbilt University professor Joseph Murphy won The 2011 Roald F. Campbell Lifetime Achievement Award from the University Council for Educational Administration (UCEA). The Campbell Award recognizes senior professors in the field of educational administration whose professional lives have been characterized by extraordinary commitment, excellence, leadership, productivity, generosity and… Read More

    Nov 16, 2012

  • About Ideas in Action

    About Ideas in Action

    Dean Camilla P. Benbow camilla.benbow@vanderbilt.edu Editor Kurt Brobeck, Director of Communications
 kurt.brobeck@vanderbilt.edu Contributors Camilla P. Benbow, Kara Furlong, Greer Kelly, Melanie Moran, Jim Patterson, Bill Snyder, Jennifer Wetzel Photography Daniel Dubois, Steve Green, Wolf Hoffmann, Jenny Mandeville, Anne Rayner, John Russell, Ting… Read More

    Nov 15, 2012

  • Peabody Welcomes New Faculty for 2012-13

    Peabody Welcomes New Faculty for 2012-13

    Melissa Gresalfi Department of Leadership, Policy and Organizations Gary Henry, professor of public policy and education, coming from UNC-Chapel Hill Rachel Robinson, lecturer, coming from Innova8tive Consulting and Hospital Corporation of America Kay Stafford, lecturer, coming from Metropolitan Nashville Public Schools Department of Psychology and Human Development Joe Rodgers,… Read More

    Nov 15, 2012

  • Dean’s Message

    Dean’s Message

    A new academic year finds Vanderbilt’s Peabody College advancing its agenda of intellectual innovation, rigorous research, and translation of our efforts into practice. In particular, this fall we are excited to launch a new doctoral program in educational neuroscience—the nation’s first. Peabody researchers are collaborating with scholars drawn from throughout… Read More

    Nov 14, 2012

  • Dean’s Message

    Dean’s Message

    Fall 2011 finds Vanderbilt’s Peabody College deeply engaged with critical issues confronting both educators and schools of education. On questions of policy, educational neuroscience, or learning and instruction, the Peabody faculty is making valuable contributions to discovery, dissemination and public discourse. We are similarly involved with questions about the role,… Read More

    Nov 4, 2011

  • About Ideas in Action

    About Ideas in Action

    Dean Camilla P. Benbow camilla.benbow@vanderbilt.edu Editor Kurt Brobeck, Director of Communications
 kurt.brobeck@vanderbilt.edu Contributors Camilla P. Benbow, Melanie Moran , Jim Patterson, Courtney Taylor, Jennifer Wetzel Photography Mary Donaldson, Daniel Dubois, Steve Green, Wolf Hoffmann, Lauren Owens, John Russell, Adam Waterson Illustration… Read More

    Nov 3, 2011

  • Teacher Compensation ‘Incredibly Inefficient,’ New Research Finds


    Teacher Compensation ‘Incredibly Inefficient,’ New Research Finds


    Matthew Springer Teacher salaries are largely set by schedules which are neither performance related nor market-driven and have significant consequences on school staffing and workforce quality, new research from the National Center on Performance Incentives at Peabody College finds. “We know the way in which we currently compensate K-12 public school teachers… Read More

    Nov 3, 2011

  • Understanding Causes of Mortality Among Infants With Down Syndrome

    Understanding Causes of Mortality Among Infants With Down Syndrome

    An analysis of the amount, timing and causes of infant mortality among newborns with Down syndrome is the focus of new research by Vanderbilt Kennedy Center investigators Robert Hodapp and Richard Urbano and recent Peabody graduate and Kennedy Center trainee, Samantha Goldman. The findings, reported in the Journal of Intellectual Disability Research, conclude infants with Down… Read More

    Nov 3, 2011

  • Vanderbilt Partners With Fort Worth to Aid Low-Performing Students

    Vanderbilt Partners With Fort Worth to Aid Low-Performing Students

    Thomas Smith Fort Worth Independent School District is the latest partner in a national center at Vanderbilt University’s Peabody College that aims to identify programs, practices, processes and policies that make some high schools more effective at reaching low-performing students.

 Fort Worth Independent School District, or FWISD, officially joined the… Read More

    Nov 2, 2011