Select Funding Briefs

Jennifer Cromley, Collaborators Awarded $2M Grant from U.S. Department of Education

Educational Psychology professor Jennifer Cromley is part of a team of researchers who have been awarded nearly two million dollars in funding from the U.S. Dept. of Education’s Institute for Education Sciences for their project PRISM: Promoting Reading Comprehension and Learning With Multimodal Science Texts.

Jennifer Cromley, Cherie Avent part of $800K NSF Grant For Collaborative Project with Grainger College of Engineering

Cromley co-PI, along with Cherie Avent, evaluator, and an assistant professor of Educational Psychology received an $800K NSF Grant for a project titled Developing Equity-Minded Engineering Practitioners (DEEP). The project is being conducted with Rashid Bashir, PI and Dean of the Grainger College of Engineering, and Morgan State University.

Perry, Bosch, Bates awarded $1.5M NSF Funding

Examining Elementary Mathematics Teachers’ Behaviors with an Online Professional Learning Platform: Improving Lurkers’ Learning Outcomes is a three-year research project led by Educational Psychology professor Michelle Perry, PI, and co- PIs assistant professor Nigel Bosch, Educational Psychology, and alumna Meg Bates (DPI’s IWERC). Collaborators from the University of Chicago and New York University are additional co-PIs. The project will use a large-scale virtual learning community for elementary teachers to investigate how different participation profiles influence teachers’ professional learning.

Krist, Hug Awarded Nearly $1M from NSF’s Division of Research on Learning

Curriculum & Instruction assistant professor Christina (Stina) Krist, PI, and teaching professor Barbara Hug, co-PI, are leading a team of researchers developing A Professional Development Model for High School Teachers to Adapt Curricula Toward Students’ Knowledges and Resources thanks to a four-year, nearly $1M grant from the National Science Foundation. Their project brings together education researchers, high school science teachers, research scientists, and community-based organizations as co-design teams to modify science curriculum materials to be justice- and community-oriented. Building on existing partnerships between education researchers and 11 science teachers in two districts in Illinois, project teams will engage in cycles of curriculum analysis and adaptation over the course of three years.

Asif Wilson PI on ‘Communiversities’ Research Project Funded by the Mellon Foundation

Curriculum & Instruction assistant professor Asif Wilson, is the PI on a research project chosen in the final round of the Humanities Without Walls consortium’s Grand Research Challenge, funded by the Mellon Foundation. His project, titled Communiversities as Education without Walls: Building Coalitions for Liberatory Education through the Humanities is one of seven multi-institutional, interdisciplinary projects that have been awarded $150,000.

Additionally, Wilson, is part of a team awarded a $2 million Andrew W. Mellon Foundation Ethnic Studies Future Initiative grant to digitize historical Black history documents and archival collections and make them classroom-accessible.

Michele Schutz Receives $2.5M Grant from the Department of Education

Michele Schutz, assistant professor, Special Education received $2.5 Million in grant funding from the U.S. Department of Education for the project, EMPOWERing Transition-Aged Youth with Visual Impairments: Equipping More Professionals for Work and Education in Rural Communities. Schutz will be co-PI of the project, along with colleagues from Vanderbilt and Baylor. “The transition from high school to adulthood is complex for all students,” says Schutz, “School and adult service systems often fall short of providing experiences, resources, and linkages critical for successful transitions to those with disabilities, particularly those with low-incidence disabilities like blindness and visual impairment.

Curriculum & Instruction Professor Gloriana Gonzalez and Alumnus Saad Shehab Awarded $1.375M NSF Grant

Curriculum & Instruction professor Gloriana Gonzalez, PI and Curriculum & Instruction alumnus Saad Shehab, co-PI, were awarded a new grant from the National Science Foundation for their project, Engaging Teachers in Integrating Human- Centered Design for Geometry Problem-based Instruction. The $1.375M award is in collaboration with the campus’ Siebel Center for Design, where Shehab serves as associate director of assessment and research.

Paul Bruno Awarded NSF Grant to Lead Study on Impacts of Policy on Computer Science Participation and Teacher Prep

The National Science Foundation has awarded a team led by Education Policy, Organization & Leadership assistant professor Paul Bruno, PI, nearly $500K for a three-year project examining Collaborative Research: Impacts of State Policy on Computer Science Participation and Teacher Preparation. Associate professor Colleen Lewis of the Grainger College of Engineering’s Department of Computer Science joins Bruno as co-PI on the project, along with Tuan Nguyen of Kansas State University.

Professors Luc Paquette and H. Chad Lane Receive NSF Grant for Gameplay with Machine Learning Project

NSF awarded nearly $700K to Curriculum & Instruction’s Luc Paquette, PI, and H. Chad Lane, Professor of Educational Psychology, Computer Science, and Curriculum & Instruction, and co-PI on Collaborative Research: Advancing the Science of STEM Interest Development through Educational Gameplay with Machine Learning and Data-driven Interviews.

The integration of digital games into STEM education has been an active area of research for quite some time, but details about how students’ interactions with educational games may or may not reflect their interest is more difficult to obtain. This project will use a Minecraft-based simulation environment to advance understanding of how educational digital games can support the development of enduring STEM interest.

Meadan-Kaplansky Receives $2M Institute of Education Sciences Grant

Hedda Meadan-Kaplansky, professor, Special Education received a $2 million Institute of Education Sciences grant. The study will be conducted with Dr. Sarah Douglas, PI, at Michigan State University. Education at Illinois’ IT Partners will also be involved in this project assisting in developing the digital learning platform. This project aims to develop and test the Family Telepractice AAC Modeling Intervention (FamTAM). Family members are critical communication partners for children who use augmentative and alternative communication (AAC). Evidence suggests that children who use AAC experience the best outcomes when family members are well-trained and highly engaged in AAC use.