Greetings,
My name is Annis Brown and I am thrilled to be your AERA Graduate Student Council (GSC) Chair! I have served on the GSC for several years as the Division L representative, the Community Leader, Chair-Elect, and now as the Chair. I am currently a doctoral candidate at Michigan State University pursuing a degree in Curriculum, Teaching, and Educational Policy.
If this is your first time visiting the graduate student website, welcome! Please bookmark the site and check it frequently for updates. The GSC website is brimming with resources, tools, and information for graduate students. We publish a newsletter three times a year that specifically addresses the needs of graduate students. Our Division representatives also post graduate student information for each Division. You can even find out about fellowships, grants, and job opportunities on our resources and announcements pages. This web space has a lot to offer.
Graduate students are a vital part of the American Educational Research Association. Of the 25,000+ AERA members, over 7,000 are graduate students. We are key stakeholders in this organization!
Being an active member of AERA and the GSC has afforded me the opportunity to network with other graduate students and senior scholars, share my research interests and garner feedback, gain a broader view of the diverse ecologies in education and prepare for the workforce post graduation. I encourage you all to get involved in the GSC, your Divisions and Special Interest Groups (SIGS).
Serving as Chair will present opportunities for me to continue working with an outstanding group of graduate students who are serious about promoting and advancing the goals, mission, and initiatives of the GSC organization.
As Chair, I will focus on four primary initiatives:
- Support and provide leadership to the current GSC council and the entire AERA graduate student community,
- Increase graduate student membership and invite membership inclusion to achieve powerful synergy within the organization,
- Encourage an environment that invites new voices, embraces diverse perspectives, and new ways of addressing points that are pertinent to nearly all graduate students, and
- Move the organization to the next level by continuing the visibility of the GSC and expanding the services offered by the GSC.
If you have not joined our graduate student listserv, be sure to sign up. The listserv is a wonderful forum for dialogue about a variety of graduate student issues. You can also sign up for SIG and Division listservs. These forums are a great way to begin to familiarize yourself with some of the opportunities, issues, and conversations in AERA.
I am motivated by the diversity of experiences and interests exemplified within AERA’s graduate student network. Marshalling this diversity to enrich our scholarly experiences is an exciting prospect! I look forward to constructing sessions and colloquia at the 2011 Annual Meeting in New Orleans where we can learn from one another, push our ideas and theories to new heights, and strive to generate answers to some of our discipline’s toughest questions. I invite you to take advantage of the opportunities and resources provided by the GSC, both at the annual meeting and here within our web space. I also hope that you get seek to get involved in the GSC!
Sincerely,
Annis N. Brown
Chair
Michigan State University
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A Welcome Message from the GSC Chair-Elect
For AERA’s 2010 election I provided a brief biographical statement. The purpose was to inform voting AERA graduate student members about the candidates’ experience as education researchers and as members of the Association. In the biographical statement I wrote that my research foci were critical race theory and social justice curriculum. I also wrote that I was an active member of AERA, serving as a past divisional graduate student representative for Division K (Teaching and Teacher Education), and one of two campus liaisons at my university’s campus. Lastly, I wrote that I was a teacher in the Milwaukee Public Schools, the largest urban school district in the state of Wisconsin. I concluded my statement noting that “I am well versed with AERA and have been actively looking for additional ways to serve its members. I have many experiences that make me qualified to be GSC Chair-Elect; the most recent was participating in the creation of the Division K program in Denver for this year’s Annual Meeting. I am willing to work hard on your behalf.”
I want to thank everyone who exercised their right to vote in that process. Through graduate student involvement and participation the GSC continues to build upon one of many strengths, its numerical representation (over 7,000 graduate students are members of AERA). I refer back to my election statement here, because I feel that leaders need to deliver on what they say, especially since they are elected to their positions. Needless to say, I understand that graduate students come from all walks of life (I myself am married with two children under the ages of 3) and some may have more time than others for “extras.” However, I want to encourage all graduate students to be as involved as they can with the GSC and AERA. The key initiatives that I will be working on this year are similar to what I wrote in my autobiographical sketch:
- Work hard for graduate students;
- Support the current GSC Chair, Annis Brown, with her initiatives;
- Organize the GSC Resource Center at the 2011 AERA annual meeting in New Orleans, LA;
- Plan sessions that address graduate student requests, needs, and interests at the 2011 annual meeting; and
- Increase the role that graduate students play in AERA membership.
I have had a great and positive experience with AERA as a graduate student and it is my hope that you will too! I encourage you to get involved now by signing yourself up on the GSC listserv so that you will receive the latest GSC news. This will allow you to be as involved as you can or want to be. My hope is that you feel comfortable enough to email me, Annis, GSC, and/or the AERA leadership with your wonderful thoughts, comments, questions, and/or concerns. My email address is provided below. This will be as great of a year as we make it!
Nicholas Daniel Hartlep
Chair Elect (2010-2011)
University of Wisconsin at Milwaukee
nhartlep@uwm.edu
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