Cato College of Education

Counselors, therapists and scholars from across North Carolina recently traveled to UNC Charlotte for a conference on play therapy featuring the leading expert in the field.

The College of Education’s Multicultural Play Therapy Center hosted the five-day workshop. It featured discussions on the underlying theory of play therapy and provided practical tips for employing the technique, which allows young children to explore and deal with issues by expressing themselves through play in a controlled environment.

Math and science classes have long been the stuff of nightmares for many, but there is a movement under way to change that perception.

UNC Charlotte’s College of Education recently hosted one of the faces of that movement – Oakland University engineering professor Barbara Oakley, author of “A Mind for Numbers.” Her research delves into the neuroscience of learning in an approachable way. It explores topics ranging from the specific ways the brains focuses, to why people procrastinate and how to stop.

The answers to the big questions by their very nature provoke strong reactions. The debate over the right way to find those answers is no less contentious. Out of this landscape has emerged the discussion over the relationship between science and religion. Can they coexist? What role do they have in public policy? What should be taught in schools?

College of Education professor Spencer Salas is in India working with the U.S. State Department to train people to teach English in the capital New Delhi.

For three weeks, Salas will wind his way through Delhi’s most disadvantaged neighborhoods, working with secondary school instructors to improve the way they teach English.

A rowdy mob walked shoulder to shoulder with Dorothy Counts-Scoggins as she neared the doors of Harding High. Some yelled slurs, threw rocks or spat. It was the first day of class in 1957, and integration had started in Mecklenburg County. Counts-Scoggins was one of the first four black students to enroll at formerly all-white schools in Charlotte. In the years since, the area has been at times been a model for both what can go right, and at others for what can go wrong, when balancing a school district.

Bill Anderson, former executive director of the public education advocacy group MeckEd, is joining the University’s College of Education as special assistant to the dean for community relations.

Anderson, a veteran teacher, administrator and educational policy leader, has nearly four decades of experience. He completed a master’s degree in education from the University in 1989 and a doctorate in 2001.

At one time, news coverage centered on worries about video games’ negative influence on kids — but these days, they are making headlines because of the ways they are being used to help students learn.  An avalanche of research supporting video games’ ability to encourage academic development has driven momentum on this issue.

Many of North Carolina’s school superintendents are skeptical of the General Assembly’s education policies, according to a new UNC Charlotte survey.

The survey of 67 N.C. superintendents, published in the Journal of Applied Educational and Policy Research, examined attitudes on state and national educational concerns.  The study indicated “the most significant priorities that need to be addressed were teacher morale, inadequate funding and teacher pay.”

UNC Charlotte, in conjunction with numerous community partners including Central Piedmont Community College, will present the Dedication to Community Tour, from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m., Friday, April 10, in the Cone University Center.  

 The Dedication to Community Tour (D2C) is an international forum for the exchange of ideas in business and society. This year’s theme is “Empowering Dreams: Realizing the Future.”

Reading and elementary education professor Tracy Rock is a recipient of the 2015 UNC Board of Governors Excellence in Teaching Award.

This annual honor recognizes one professor at each of North Carolina’s public institutions. The 17 recipients were nominated by individual campus committees and selected by the Board of Governors’ Committee on Personnel and Tenure. Each award winner will receive a commemorative bronze medallion and a $12,500 cash prize; the honor will be presented formally during the spring graduation ceremony on each campus.