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Kate Riedell successfully defended her dissertation, Understanding Curriculum, Instruction and Assessment within Eighth Grade Science Classrooms for Special Needs Students, in December 2016. Kate is now working as a Research Analyst at First 5 LA. Although we will miss her in our weekly meetings, we’re certain she has an immensely successful future ahead. Congratulations, Dr. Riedell!

Fourth-year PhD student (now PhD candidate!) Eve Ryan successfully defended her dissertation proposal this month. Eve will begin collecting her first wave of data in the upcoming months. Congratulations, Eve, and good luck as you begin your dissertation!

Our research group is excited to welcome three new students for this academic year. Marlen Quintero will join us to begin her PhD, and Carla Kekejian and Rak Qijun Yang will join our Master’s program. Good luck to everyone in the new school year!

Fifth-year PhD student Anne Blackstock-Bernstein was recently awarded the Prize in Memory of Leigh Burstein from UCLA’s Graduate School of Education & Information Studies. Anne will be honored at this month’s convocation in recognition of her achievement. Congratulations, Anne!

This spring, we congratulated Nathalie Karimian and Lichao Sun as they received their MA degrees. Both Nathalie and Lichao have decided to pursue their doctorates in the fall. Congratulations to both of them, and best of luck in this next step!

Congratulations to Anne Blackstock-Bernstein, Despina Pitsoulakis, Amy Woodbridge, and Alison Bailey for being awarded the prize for Best Poster at the 2016 Research and Inquiry Conference! Their poster, Elementary students’ written explanations: Comparisons across modalities and topics, compared the development of students’ oral and written language across grade levels, tasks, and EL status.

On May 14, GSE&IS and UCLA’s Confucius Institute co-hosted the first inaugural conference The Policy and Practice of Dual Immersion: Planning for the Secondary Years. This conference focused on issues of teacher recruitment and preparation, program models and curricular resources, and policies to support advancement for the increasing number of schools and districts facing challenges as their dual-language immersion students enter secondary school.

Videos of the conference speakers, as well as a final report, can be found on the Confucius Institute website.

Recipients of the Graduate Research Mentorship (GRM) and Graduate Summer Research Mentorship (GSRM) awards were recently announced by UCLA’s Graduate Division. Congratulations to Karla Rivera-Torres, recipient of a GRM fellowship for 2016-17, and to Amy Woodbridge, recipient of a GSRM fellowship for 2016 and a GRM fellowship for 2016-17!

Our research group has two new Master’s students this year – welcome Cindy Lee and Nathalie Karimian! Wishing you all the best as you start your degrees here at UCLA.