MFFP was pleased to sponsor Tiffany Flowers’ visit to IU Bloomington this summer. She received both her B.S. in Psychology and her M.T. in Early Childhood Development at Virginia Commonwealth University.  “I actually minored in sociology,” she said, emphasizing that social science informed much of her academic work even then.

 One advanced course Flowers took while working towards her M.T. at Virginia Commonwealth was most influential in her emerging field of study.  It dealt with home/school/community collaboration, taught by Professor Doris White.  “That’s what got me interested in the Social Foundations of Education Program at the University of Iowa,” she said, where she eventually moved to pursue a second Master’s degree.  She was surprised that White’s course, which covered family literacy programs and issues of cultural diversity, and which Flowers thought was both unique to, and the best course in, the education program, was not as well-received by other students.  She pointed out that VCU is located in an urban area, and that most of the other students were from suburban or rural, and largely Caucasian communities; this fact might account for their discomfort imagining to teach in a city.  The irony is that teacher shortages often occur in urban areas where student demographics are vastly different from the majority of the primary education teachers certified by universities.  Flowers is taking up this subject in a paper.

 The work she did during her most recent graduate program at the University of Iowa, while completing her M.A. in Social Foundations of Education, helped prepare her for research like that she is doing for this conference paper, as well as others currently in production.  She had the good fortune to work with such professors as Dr. Katrina Sanders and Dr. Lewis Hilton.  One particularly significant course, entitled “20^th Century Development in American Education” explored how schools have changed since the Supreme Court Brown decision.

 Flowers plans to get a Ph.D. in Curriculum and Instruction, perhaps focusing contemporary educational segregation in future research, specifically grouping and tracking in elementary schools.  “Because it’s not something that is a huge research area right now,” she said, pointing out that most people don’t realize that tracking–which is considered a form of illegal discrimination–and grouping, are widely practiced and actually begin in kindergarten, creating disparities in childhood development not easily remedied.

 This summer she worked with Martha McCarthy, Chancellor Professor in Educational Leadership and Policy Studies, on a paper and on creating an undergraduate course on legal issues in education.  “She’s taught me her research style,” Flowers said, adding that McCarthy has been an influential and kind mentor.  “The work I’ve done with her has been really helpful to me on my own work as well.”  This fall she is busy preparing for several conference presentations scheduled for the near future.  She’ll be giving a paper, “Black Girls and Educational Research K-12" for the Southern University at New Orleans’ Race, Class, and Gender Conference, and will present another paper for the American Education Studies Association annual conference at Montreal.