WHO I AM: sJ MILLER, Ph.D., ASSOCIATE PROFESSOR
JOB TITLE: URBAN TEACHER EDUCATION/SECONDARY ENGLISH AND LANGUAGE ARTS
WHERE I TEACH: UNIVERSITY OF MISSOURI, KANSAS CITY
OFFICE: Room 320, School of Education
EMAIL: sjmiller@umkc.edu
OFFICE PHONE: 816.235.2467
OTHER WAYS TO CONTACT ME:
LIKES: My cats, working out, social justice, art-house films, reading, teaching, NPR, building intentional communities, love.
RESEARCH INTERESTS:
THEORETICAL FRAMES:
Social justice, critical race theory, feminist theory, geospatial theory, spatiality and temporal theories, critical discourse analysis, anti-bullying theory/pedagogy, critical literacy
At the center of my research is social justice which cuts across theory, epistemology and pedagogy.
JOB TITLE: URBAN TEACHER EDUCATION/SECONDARY ENGLISH AND LANGUAGE ARTS
WHERE I TEACH: UNIVERSITY OF MISSOURI, KANSAS CITY
OFFICE: Room 320, School of Education
EMAIL: sjmiller@umkc.edu
OFFICE PHONE: 816.235.2467
OTHER WAYS TO CONTACT ME:
LIKES: My cats, working out, social justice, art-house films, reading, teaching, NPR, building intentional communities, love.
RESEARCH INTERESTS:
- Socio-spatial justice
- Preservice and inservice teacher dispositions
- Marginalized student literacies
THEORETICAL FRAMES:
Social justice, critical race theory, feminist theory, geospatial theory, spatiality and temporal theories, critical discourse analysis, anti-bullying theory/pedagogy, critical literacy
At the center of my research is social justice which cuts across theory, epistemology and pedagogy.
My
Teaching Philosophy
My pedagogy is framed by a deep commitment to social change
and social justice through constructivism, social activism, and liberatory
teaching practices. These theories lay the foundation for my teaching practices
and praxis which are student-centered. I teach to enable preservice student
teachers to develop a beginning teaching pedagogy by interrogating how their
prior experiences shape their belief systems and how those belief systems shape
their teaching practices and goals. I encourage preservice teachers to make
meaning of how their belief systems have shaped their eventual teaching
identities. Together we interrogate and deconstruct how we have been shaped by
hegemony and the institutions in which we are embedded and discuss how we can
reconstruct ourselves away from institutionalized thinking and practice. We do
so by examining how our own prejudices, and if gone unchecked, can escalate
into detrimental teaching patterns and practices. I assist my student teachers
in creating socially and culturally relevant lesson plans that will meet the
needs of the diverse learners with whom they will engage.
About Me
sj Miller is Associate Professor of Urban Teacher Education/Secondary English and Language Arts at the University of Missouri, Kansas City. sj was a high school English teacher for eight years in Santa Fe, New Mexico and is former Director of the Master of Arts in Teaching English at Indiana University of Pennsylvania, where sj taught for the past seven years. sj has published widely in journals and presented widely in state and national conferences on a variety of topics related to teaching young adult literature, anti-bullying pedagogy, challenging the gender binary, multimodal applications of popular culture in secondary classrooms, and cultivating socio-spatial justice dispositions with secondary preservice English teachers. Most notably, sj won the 2005 Article of the Year Award from the English Journal for “Shattering Images of Violence in Young Adult Literature: Strategies for the Classroom.” sj co-authored Unpacking the Loaded Teacher Matrix: Negotiating Space and Time Between University and Secondary English Classrooms which received the Richard A. Meade award from NCTE and co-authored Narratives of Social Justice Teaching: How English Teachers Negotiate Theory and Practice Between Preservice and Inservice Spaces, and Change Matters: Critical essays on moving social justice research from theory to policy. sj is the former co-chair of NCTE’s CEE (Conference on English Education) committee for Social Justice, and is currently, CEE Executive Committee member, AERA Division K: Section 4 co-chair, visiting column editor and writer- Assembly on Literature for Adolescents (ALAN), and consultant for the College Board serving in a number of capacities: AP English Literature Table Leader, and AP Grant Mentor--providing best practices to secondary Pre- and Advanced Placement English teachers. Most recently, sj helped draft the Beliefs Statement related to Social Justice in English education and helped pass the NCTE Resolution on Social Justice in Literacy Education. A co-authored book entitled Generation Bullied 2.0: Prevention and Intervention Strategies for our most Vulnerable Students is hot off the presses.
sj Miller is Associate Professor of Urban Teacher Education/Secondary English and Language Arts at the University of Missouri, Kansas City. sj was a high school English teacher for eight years in Santa Fe, New Mexico and is former Director of the Master of Arts in Teaching English at Indiana University of Pennsylvania, where sj taught for the past seven years. sj has published widely in journals and presented widely in state and national conferences on a variety of topics related to teaching young adult literature, anti-bullying pedagogy, challenging the gender binary, multimodal applications of popular culture in secondary classrooms, and cultivating socio-spatial justice dispositions with secondary preservice English teachers. Most notably, sj won the 2005 Article of the Year Award from the English Journal for “Shattering Images of Violence in Young Adult Literature: Strategies for the Classroom.” sj co-authored Unpacking the Loaded Teacher Matrix: Negotiating Space and Time Between University and Secondary English Classrooms which received the Richard A. Meade award from NCTE and co-authored Narratives of Social Justice Teaching: How English Teachers Negotiate Theory and Practice Between Preservice and Inservice Spaces, and Change Matters: Critical essays on moving social justice research from theory to policy. sj is the former co-chair of NCTE’s CEE (Conference on English Education) committee for Social Justice, and is currently, CEE Executive Committee member, AERA Division K: Section 4 co-chair, visiting column editor and writer- Assembly on Literature for Adolescents (ALAN), and consultant for the College Board serving in a number of capacities: AP English Literature Table Leader, and AP Grant Mentor--providing best practices to secondary Pre- and Advanced Placement English teachers. Most recently, sj helped draft the Beliefs Statement related to Social Justice in English education and helped pass the NCTE Resolution on Social Justice in Literacy Education. A co-authored book entitled Generation Bullied 2.0: Prevention and Intervention Strategies for our most Vulnerable Students is hot off the presses.
Newsworthy
Recent Resolutions by NCTE
Resolution on Confronting Bullying and Harassment
Resolution on Social Justice in Literacy Education
Interviews with the Press
Quoted in the KC Star: Common Core Standards
In Rush to Write, Students Leave Spelling, Grammar Behind
On National TV: Huffington Post-
responding to cyberbullying in California schools.
Amazing News From President Obama
AN INVITATION TO TEACH IN KANSAS CITY
Favorite Quotes
As Howard Zinn (2002) points out, educational practice is never neutral and the university is hardly benign in its various spheres of influence (e.g., the corporate, scientific, and military sectors of society) or its need to perpetuate business, governmental, and social practices, however corrupt or antidemocratic.
As MLK (1961) noted: "The Arc of the Moral Universe Is Long, but It Bends Toward Justice.”
As President Abraham Lincoln once said: "I have been driven to my knees many times by the overwhelming conviction that I had no place else to go."
Be the change you want to see in the world.
-Gandhi
