Gloria Allen
Instructor, School of Education
University of South Carolina-Aiken

Gloria Allen serves as the coordinator of the Central Savannah River Area Mathematics and Science Center, part of the Mathematics and Science Unit for the S.C. Department of Education. Through Allen’s efforts, the Science and Mathematics Center works with seven other regional centers statewide to provide training and support for more than 200 school-based curriculum coaches. Allen and her staff are in the schools weekly working with the coaches, teachers and school administrators to ensure students of South Carolina get the best possible math and science education.

Jennifer Altieri
Associate Professor of Literacy Education
The Citadel
Charleston

Jennifer Altieri played a key role in revising The Citadel’s masters program in literacy.  She developed the International Reading Association report enabling the program to be nationally recognized and has assumed a lead role in the preparation for a forthcoming accreditation review. Her scholarship has received national recognition through presentations at the annual meetings of IRA, the National Council for Teachers of Mathematics, the National Reading Conference, and publications in national journals.  She serves on editorial boards for refereed journals, reviews national conference proposals, and on an IRA standards review committee. She also consults for an area schools. 

Gloria Swindler Boutte
Professor, College of Education,
University of South Carolina-Columbia

For more than two decades, Gloria Swindler Boutte’s research, scholarship, teaching and service have focused on families and students of color and school/community/home coalitions. Boutte is the author of Multicultural Education: Raising Consciousness and Resounding Voices: School Experiences of People From Diverse Ethnic Backgrounds. She has received more than $1 million in grants and has published more than 40 articles on educating students of color. Additionally, she has presented nationally and internationally on curriculum, instruction and diversity issues. Boutte is the founder and principal investigator for the statewide Center of Excellence for the Education and Equity of African American Students.

Kathy Laboard Brown
Associate Professor of Educational Leadership
The Citadel
Charleston

Kathy Laboard Brown serves on state reviews team for public schools requiring technical assistance and conducts study groups for second year principals for the SDE School Leadership Executive Institute. She is the counselor for The Citadel chapter of Kappa Delta Pi and is involved in The Citadel’s Values and Respect Program. She also serves as the executive director for the South Carolina Association of Teacher Educators and is a program reviewer for Education Leadership Constituent Council.

Vivian I. Correa
Professor, Clemson University
Clemson

Vivian I. Correa offers expertise in early childhood, multicultural and special education.  She has worked on more than 21 funded projects totaling more than $5.5 million. Her research and teaching has an impact on the education of culturally diverse students and their families and on the preparation of early childhood and special education teachers in the area of multicultural education. In South Carolina, her focus is on the educational needs of young children and families in predominately rural and culturally diverse areas.  She wants to assure that pre-service teachers understand the unique needs of diverse children and families, especially Spanish-speaking populations.

Angela Crespo Cozart
Associate professor
School of Education, Health and Human Performance
College of Charleston
Charleston

Angela Crespo Cozart prepares pre-service high school teachers in all content areas, but specifically teachers for English for Speakers of Other Languages. As a non-native English speaker herself, Cozart has a passion for helping the immigrant population become bilingual and bicultural. In 2001, she planned South Carolina’s first ESOL conference, bringing together teachers, administrators, businesspeople and political leaders from throughout the state, stakeholders in the issues of English acquisition and immigrants/immigration. Working with ESOL representatives from the State Department, she also developed the state’s first Certificate Program in the area of ESOL. Cozart has been researching the lives of immigrant children with the goal of producing a book on the issues of loss, separation, death, language acquisition, culture and schooling in the lives of immigrant children.

Lorraine DeJong
Associate professor of education
Furman University

Lorraine DeJong came to Furman in 1995, where she is an associate professor of education and coordinator for the Early Childhood Program. She earned her undergraduate and master’s degrees from Cornell University and a Ph.D. in child development from Florida State University. Her engagement with students begins in a human development course, which includes daily conversations and weekly written reflections about what students learn as they apply developmental concepts to teaching in a service learning classroom. Her methods classes include cooperative learning, debates, role playing and problem solving exercises to help students evaluate teaching practices. Through a culminating practicum, DeJong provides weekly written and oral reports to candidates as they apply theory to instruction with a real class of learners.

Patricia F. First
Professor of educational leadership
Clemson University
Clemson