February 15, 2023
Join us for our 2023 diversity speaker series "Teaching in the Age of Book Bans"
Teaching in the Age of Book Bans: Supporting Educators and School Leaders with Controversial Topics
Thursday, March 16, 2023, 4:00 pm
Speight 203
Are you nervous to teach controversial topics in the classroom? Do you want to better understand how educators can resist political pressure and ensure intellectual freedom? Do you need strategies to support teachers and school leaders engaged in this type of work? The College of Education Diversity Committee invites you to a Speaker Series, Teaching in the Age of Book Bans. We are excited to announce that the keynote speaker is Dr. Emily Knox. Drs. Christiana Kfouri and Rachelle Savitz join Dr. Knox to present a range of experiences, ideas, and expertise in supporting educators and school leaders.
Dr. Knox’s research interests include information access and intellectual freedom and censorship. Her most recent book, Foundations of Intellectual Freedom, was published by ALA Neal-Schuman in 2022. Her previous book, Book Banning in 21st Century America, is the first monograph in the Beta Phi Mu Scholars’ Series. Dr. Knox serves on the board of the National Coalition Against Censorship. She is also editor of the Journal of Intellectual Freedom and Privacy.Dr. Knox currently serves as an Associate Professor in the School of Information Sciences at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.
Dr. Kfouri’s teaching and research interests lie in the exploration of social literacy practices of diverse learners; New Literacies Studies with teachers and multicultural/multilingual students, Culturally Sustaining Pedagogical (CSP) instruction and teacher practices, Literacy Social Practices of newcomer students, Social Literacy Practices and Identity, Varieties of Positioning Theory with teacher and student interactional literacy practices, Hybrid Identities, Critical Race theory (CRT), Community Cultural Wealth. She currently serves as an Assistant Professor in the Department of Literacy Studies, English Education and History Education at ECU.
Dr. Savitz values learning with and from others as she explores critical literacy, culturally sustaining literacy pedagogy, trauma-sensitive practices, and teacher self-efficacy related to disciplinary literacy and equitable literacy materials and curricula. She has published in numerous journals and has two books in print with another book coming out later this year (Trauma-sensitive literacy instruction: Building student resilience in English language arts classrooms). She currently serves as an Associate Professor in the Department of Literacy Studies, English Education and History Education in the College of Education at ECU.