Sept
2013
Vol 5:1
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In This Issue
  • Diana Balgas shares how she intertwined the research required of this program with her work at CSUEB.  Jump to Article Summary
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Featured Articles

From Dr. Robert Gabriner, Director, Educational Leadership Doctoral Program, SFSU

Gabriner
 

This September issue continues our discussion of building bridges between the Educational Leadership program and educational institutions in the Bay Area.  Diana Balgas and Avani Patel, both third-year students, provide a look into their research projects which address critical issues in their institutions.  Diana discusses her work building a new student success program at CSU-East Bay, and Avani writes about her work with the Sequoia Union High School District to create equitable student assignments for students coming from the East Palo Alto Ravenswood District.  These stories demonstrate how the educational leadership program can make substantial contributions to our schools and colleges.  I hope to have more articles in future editions.

            The latest issue of the Journal of Transformative Leadership, a journal of the CSU educational leadership programs, is now available online and contains three articles including one by Dr. Tess Hansen, a graduate of the SFSU program.  Tess writes about pedagogical practices in African American learning communities in the community colleges.  There are also two reflective essays, one by Dr. Nancy Shulock and the other from Dr. Brice Harris, Chancellor the California Community Colleges.  The journal is worth a good read. 

            One of our own Ed.D. faculty, Dr. Robert Collins,  just completed a guest editorship of a special edition of The American Indian Culture and Research Journal on the topic "Reducing Barriers to Native American Student Success in Higher Education: Challenges and Best Practices".  You can access the special issue here

            Finally, we wish to extend congratulations to Dr. Darrick Smith who is now an assistant professor in the Educational Leadership program at USF, and Dr. Amy Lee, now the acting Dean of Ernollment Services at College of Alameda.           

            Please welcome our new student assistant, Agustina Cartagena, a math education major at SFSU.  She can be contacted at aguie34@sfsu.edu
Featured Articles

Crossing Boundaries: The Story of East Palo Alto and Sequoia Union High School District

AvaniPatel
By Avani Patel

Avani Patel discusses the seemingly arbitrariness of the school district boundary lines for the students from East Palo Alto and the misplacement of the transitioning 9th grade students in mathematics. 

 

After the release of that report, I started to think about a question that a group of students asked at our school when we shared the boundary map with them. The girls had been friends since kindergarten and they just learned they would be attending different high schoolsThey asked, "Why do they do that to us?" I knew that they did do that to them, but I still wasn't sure why, and quite frankly, it just wasn't right. 

 
 Avani Patel 

Avani Patel is the Academic Dean of a traditional K-8 public school, Costaņo School & the 49ers Academy in East Palo Alto. She is a third year student in the Educational Leadership Program at SFSU.  Her research focuses on evaluating best practices during the transitional years to and through high school.


 


Making It All Count!  Using Doctoral Coursework to Make Meaningful Contributions to Your Institutions, Organizations, and/or Communities

DianaBalgas
By Diana Balgas

In this article Diana Balgas describes the newly implemented GANAS program at California State University, East Bay (CSUEB) and its aim to assist newly arrived community college transfer students.  Balgas also discusses how the Ed.D Educational Leadership Program assisted her and her associates in developing the new program at CSUEB.

 

"My involvement in this project began shortly after I started my doctoral work at San Francisco State University.  In October 2011, a group of Latino/a university faculty, staff, and administrators launched the Latino Retention Task Force (L-Task Force) to study the current conditions of Latino/a student achievement, including common barriers, challenges, and best practices to better serve this growing student population. ...We sought to expand research and collaboration on the topic of Latino/a educational outcomes in post-secondary education. Our proposed work also included policy changes and pedagogical approaches.  As the only doctoral student on the L-Task Force, my assigned role, not surprising, was that of "researcher."  The strategy I employed was to weave L-Task Force related research into as many course assignments as I could."

 
 
 Diana Balgas

Diana Balgas is the Executive Director of Academic Support and Retention Services at Cal State East Bay. She is a third year student in the Educational Leadership Program at SFSU.  She has more than 18 years of experience in higher education, as an educator and administrator.  Her research interests include why race and class remain strong predictors of students' educational attainment, particularly in degree completion rates.