The NAEd Annual Meeting & Fellows Retreat is an opportunity to connect with members, learn of the work of our NAEd/Spencer fellows, and receive updates on current and new initiatives. This year, we featured plenary sessions on Challenges in Higher Education, the IES Reading for Understanding Initiative, and Journalism and Education. Finally, our annual meeting dinner featured an address by NAEd President Michael Feuer.

Recordings of our plenary sessions are now online.

Plenary Session I:
U.S. Higher Education: Democracy and Diversity in a Global Context

Today’s institutions of higher education have become increasingly diverse, including by race, ethnicity, nationality, sex, and socioeconomic status. Panelists will discuss how our institutions of higher education are addressing the challenges that come with this diversity as well as how they are meeting the educational needs of today’s student body. Panelists will also address the traditional role of U.S. higher education as reinforcing civic and democratic ideals, and the implications and complications of this role given a diversifying college population.

Panel Speakers
Michael McPherson, Chair, Spencer Foundation

Alexander Astin, University of California, Los Angeles
James A. Banks, University of Washington, Seattle
Julie Posselt, University of Southern California

Plenary Session II:
Reading for Understanding (RFU): What Have We Learned?

In 2010, the Institute of Education Sciences (IES) invested $120 million in grant funding across six teams (each at the $20 million level for a five-year period). The separate RFU teams engaged in thematically connected projects that built on new and traditional theories of reading in order to improve deep reading comprehension. In addition, the project teams were charged with designing new reading interventions and assessments across grade spans. Altogether, the six teams included over 130 researchers and have published over 200 articles. The panelists will begin to discuss what has been learned from the RFU initiative, as well as where we should go from here.

Panel Speakers
Marshall “Mike” Smith, Chair, Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching

Susan R. Goldman, The University of Illinois at Chicago
P. David Pearson, University of California, Berkeley
Catherine Snow, Harvard University

Plenary Session III:
Journalism and Education: Communicating Our Work

Today’s media coverage looks very different than it did even 10 years ago. As we witness the fast-paced news cycle and proliferation of information on the internet and social media, how do education researchers ensure that their research is reported and subsequently used to inform education policy and practice? Panel experts will discuss this changing landscape, including the challenges to education reporting and how researchers can better assist journalists in ensuring that coverage includes relevant research.

Panel Speakers
Jack Jennings, Moderator, The Center on Education Policy

Debbie Cenziper, The Washington Post
Erik Robelen, Education Writers Association
Holly Yettick, Education Week