CUE Co-Director and Rossier School of Education Professor Estela Mara Bensimon has assembled the critical, constructive, and thought provoking ideas around race and racism of higher education scholars in a special issue of the Review of Higher Education: Critical Perspectives on Race and Equity. Gregory Anderson, dean of the Morgridge College of Education at the University of Denver, and Liliana Garces, a professor at the George Washington University, whose contributions to the affirmative action amicus brief are before the Supreme Court, are among the authors.
The special issue is an outcome of CUE's ASHE Institutes for Equity and Critical Policy Analysis, which, with support from the Ford Foundation, mobilized a generation of scholars to engage in critical policy analysis. Over 100 scholars participated over two years, catalyzing new networks, ideas, and cultural practices.
Other contributors, all of whom were institute participants, include Michelle Espino of the University of Georgia (author of "Seeking the 'Truth' in the Stories We Tell: The Role of Critical Race Epistemology in Higher Education Research"); Shaun R. Harper of the University of Pennsylvania ("Race without Racism: How Higher Education Researchers Minimize Racist Institutional Norms"); and Edlyn Vallejo Peņa of California Lutheran University ("Inquiry Methods for Critical Consciousness and Self-Change in Faculty").
The article by Dr. Garces examines "Racial Diversity, Legitimacy, and the Citizenry: The Impact of Affirmative Action Bans on Graduate School Enrollment." Dean Anderson, who supported the development of the institutes during his tenure as project officer at the Ford Foundation, takes a long view and assesses the work ahead in "Equity and Critical Policy Analysis in Higher Education: A Bridge Still Too Far."
Rossier School doctoral student Robin Bishop co-edited the volume and, with Dr. Bensimon, wrote the introductory article, "Why 'Critical'? The Need for New Ways of Knowing," available on the CUE website. Other articles can be found at The Review of Higher Education, which is available on line to subscribers at colleges and universities across the country.
