Presented by Iheoma U. Iruka, Ph.D., Chief Research Innovation Officer & Director, HighScope Educational Research Foundation; Stephanie Curenton, Ph.D., Associate Professor, Boston University; and Kerry-Ann Escayg, Ph.D., Assistant Professor, University of Nebraska at Omaha

Sponsored by Gryphon House

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In this edWebinar, the lead authors of the newly released book, Don’t Look Away: Embracing Anti-Bias Classrooms, call all early education professionals to lean in as “sheroes” and “heroes” in the lives of children; early educators are potential change agents in children’s and families’ lives. The goal of this edWebinar is to ensure that participants understand and embrace anti-bias and anti-racist teaching approaches by creating affirming culturally-rich classroom environments that protect children from psychological trauma and heals them from the inside out. Viewers will learn how institutional racism is visited in the early childhood space and the roles of implicit bias, microaggression, and white privilege in undermining the excellence and learning of minoritized Black and brown children and those who teach them. Viewers will be armored with tools and strategies, but most importantly, partners in the fight to ensure that we deliver on the promise of education especially for those who helped to build it.

This recorded edWebinar will be of interest to preK through elementary teachers, school and district leaders, coaches, trainers, and childcare providers, owners, and administrators.

About the Presenters

Iheoma U. Iruka, Ph.D., is the Chief Research Innovation Officer and Director of The Center for Early Education Research and Evaluation at HighScope Educational Research Foundation. Dr. Iruka is engaged in projects and initiatives focused on how evidence-informed policies, systems, and practices in early education can support the optimal development and experiences of low-income and ethnic minority children, such as through family engagement and support, quality rating and improvement systems, and early care and education systems and programs. She has been engaged in addressing how best to ensure excellence for young diverse learners, especially Black children, such as through the development of a classroom observation measure, examination of non-traditional pedagogical approaches, public policies, and publications geared towards early education practitioners and policymakers.

Stephanie M. Curenton, Ph.D., is a tenured Associate Professor at the Boston University Wheelock College of Education & Human Development. She studies the social, cognitive, and language development of low-income and minority children within various ecological contexts, such as parent-child interactions, early childhood education programs, early childhood workforce programs, and related state and federal policies.

Kerry-Ann Escayg, Ph.D., is an Assistant Professor of Early Childhood Education at the University of Nebraska-Omaha. Dr. Escayg’s research focuses on anti-racism in early childhood education as well as children and race. As a social theorist, Dr. Escayg has utilized central tenets of Critical Race Theory, Black Feminist Thought, and Anti-racist Education to offer incisive exegeses on children’s racial attitudes, including strategies to promote positive racial identity among Black children; a research-derived protocol to assess how children express their racialized beliefs through play; and an anti-racist approach to U.S early childhood education. Her recent publications on anti-racism highlight and interrogate the ways in which whiteness, as a system of racial privilege, functions in early childhood contexts. Central to Dr. Escayg’s work is a commitment to racial equity in the early years and the holistic well-being of children of color, and Black children in particular.

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