Wisconsin Center for Education Research • 8th June 2021

Re-Making the World of Education

Pancake-making robots. A mechanical horse. A life-sized mousetrap. No, these aren’t highlights from the latest episode of “Shark Tank.” But they are real-life inventions of a burgeoning community of artists, do-it-yourselfers and entrepreneurs known as “makers”...

26th July 2023

'Our Foods Are Beautiful!'

Food is life. Food sustains the body and feeds the spirit. With this knowledge as a framework, First Nations community partner YAKANAL, a New Mexico-based international program, is reconnecting Indigenous people to their land and traditional agriculture.

Wisconsin School News • 1st June 2021

We are listening!

A few years back, Jack Jorgensen and his colleagues were driving back to Madison from the Wisconsin Rural Schools Alliance (WiRSA) Conference in Stevens Point when they had an epiphany.

5th January 2023

Ke Kula ‘o Pi’ilani: A One-of-a-Kind Hawaiian Immersion School

On the island of Maui, Hawaiʹi, there exists a school like no other: Ke Kula ‘o Pi’ilani, the only private, independent, and nonprofit Hawaiian language and culture immersion school in the world. It is surrounded by the rising, lush-green cliffs of the ‘Īao Valley, and a powerful river flows through the island to the sea. It is the perfect setting for a curriculum focused on the four themes of fresh water, heavens, land, and ocean.

Spectrum Magazine • 18th February 2018

Living Biracial

Every kid, every day, whatever it takes. That's Rainey Briggs' motto. Thirty-seven-year-old Briggs ... is the only African American male elementary school principal in the Madison area.

Wisconsin Center for Education Research • 8th June 2021

Speaking Up for Special Students

Cha Kai Yang and Miguel Hernandez Bolanos are thrilled to be working at the University of Wisconsin‒Madison. It is a dream job for 22-year-old Bolanos, a lifelong Badger fan. For Yang, 19, the best part is earning a paycheck.

21st April 2020

Ed Neuroscience Lab Zeroes in on Math Learning

In 2012, Edward Hubbard, an assistant professor in UW‒Madison’s Department of Educational Psychology, created the Educational Neuroscience Lab to understand—through functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI)—how the physical changes that occur in children’s brains as they learn may help improve education practices.

Wisconsin Center for Education Research • 20th February 2018

STEMMing the Tide of Bias

Brett Woods knows all too well what racial bias feels like. “When I was in graduate school, it was made clear to me that the only reason I was there was because I was fulfilling an affirmative-action requirement,” recalls Woods, who is African-American.

Wisconsin Center for Education Research • 20th February 2018

Motion Meets Emotion: Dance Program for Underserved Girls

On a Saturday afternoon in early May, 75 excited schoolgirls took to the stage at historic Lathrop Hall on the University of Wisconsin‒Madison campus to dance their hearts out. “I’m famous!” shouted a 10-year-old after her performance.

Wisconsin Center for Education Research • 8th June 2021

MSAN Gives Voice to Minority Students

Guery Ulunque has come a long way since he first landed in the United States from Bolivia with his father and sister in 2008. The now-18-year-old senior at Yorktown High School in Arlington, Va., recalls his struggles.

5th January 2023

How a Colorado Herbalist is Growing Philanthropy

Emery Golson has loved to grow things ever since she was a young girl helping her mom in the family garden. “I think that experience really connected me with the earth,” she says. Now everything that the 31-year-old philanthropist, herbalist, wife, and mother of two has a hand in seems to blossom.

Wisconsin Center for Education Research • 20th February 2018

Going the Country Mile

Wisconsin attracts thousands of tourists year-round who make the trek to explore its scenic farmlands, and camp, canoe, ski, fish and hike its great outdoors. While visitors to Wisconsin’s rural and wilderness areas are plentiful, attracting teachers to its smaller cities and townships can be a challenge.

Field Day Lab • 12th October 2018

Video: Jo Wilder and the Capitol Case

I produced and edited this video that is downloadable from the PBS Wisconsin website.

11th June 2019

Our Founding 'Feathers'

History was never my favorite subject in school. When you’re young and your future is spread out in front of you like dazzling jewels, the last thing you want to focus on is the past. Who can keep all those dates and bloody wars straight, anyway? So imagine my surprise when I discovered in my daughter’s last year in high school how fascinated I was by U.S. history.

Indian Country Today • 28th February 2018

Indian Trail Trees: Hang a Left at Your Ancestral Roots

In 2002, a group of retired men began hiking together once a week in the Appalachian Mountains and started finding old, scenic trails they claimed nobody knew about.

5th January 2023

The Historic Malki Museum: ‘We’re COVID-Safe!’

Last year, a digital billboard off Highway 10 in Banning, California, not far from the Morongo Band of Mission Indians Reservation, flashed this reassuring message for three months: “Malki Museum: Celebrating Southern California Indian Culture for over 50 Years. We’re COVID-Safe!”

OC Family Magazine • 23rd February 2018

AWARD WINNER! The 'Other' Woman

Houston, we have a problem. Her name is Carolyn. Carolyn is my ex-husband’s girlfriend. They live together with her two pre-teens and most likely, they’ll marry. I’m OK with that part. You know what they say: “One woman’s junk is another woman’s treasure.”

Madison Magazine • 16th February 2018

The Newcomer's Guide to Madison

When you move someplace new, you're lucky if there is a moment of reassurance that yes, you're in the right place. For newcomers to Madison, that moment is likely to happen when ...

26th July 2023

Troubled Waters: What the Aleut Community is Doing to Restore Health to the Bering Sea

The Aleut Community of St. Paul Island (ACSPI) is a federally recognized tribe of more than 1,800 enrolled members from St. Paul Island in the Bering Sea. This rural Indigenous community is historically and culturally tied to the ecosystem of the Bering Sea, home to large numbers of mammals, birds, shellfish, and at least 419 species of fish.

OC Family Magazine • 3rd May 2020

Husbands Come and Go. But Dogs are Forever.

Then I had to face the truth. The REAL reason I didn’t want a cat was Higgins – my beloved Cocker Spaniel who died last year. Higgins had been a part of my life for as long as I can remember. The ex and I got him when we were dating. I was smitten from Day One. (With Higgins, that is.) He crawled out from the bottom of a puppy pile, this tiny fur ball with red, floppy ears, and stood in the middle of a milk bowl for a quick lap with his tiny tongue. SOLD!