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Margaret Beale Spencer to deliver the fourth annual AERA Brown Lecture in Education Research

WASHINGTON, October 15, 2007–Noted developmental psychologist, education researcher, and national expert on at-risk youth, Margaret Beale Spencer delivers the Fourth Annual Brown Lecture in Education Research in Washington, D.C. on October 18. This lecture was inaugurated by the American Educational Research Association (AERA) in 2004 to commemorate the 50th anniversary of Brown v Board of Education. The Lecture points to the crucial role of research in the advancement of equality and equity in education.

The 2007 AERA Brown Lecture takes place in the amphitheater of the Ronald Reagan Building and International Trade Center at 6:00 p.m. It is a public lecture.

Margaret Beale Spencer is Board of Overseers Professor of Education and Psychology at the University of Pennsylvania Graduate School of Education. Spencer’s address, “Lessons Learned and Opportunities Ignored Post-Brown v. Board of Education: Youth Development and the Myth of a Colorblind Society,” explores skin color bias in the United States. Drawing upon a wealth of research, Spencer speaks of color bias as a continuing social issue that deserves careful scrutiny as a health hazard. To maintain the myth of a colorblind society, she maintains, appears counter productive to the point of being wasteful if it averts the use of strategies needed by youth to cope with racial stereotypes.

Spencer’s research focuses on resiliency, identity, and competence formation of African-American, Hispanic, Asian-American, and Euro-American youth. This emphasis on multi-ethnic youth evolves from her longstanding interest in the development of African-American, particularly male, children and youth who grow up in low-economic resource families and communities.

AERA President William F. Tate, Edward Mallinckrodt Distinguished University Professor in Arts and Sciences, Washington University in St. Louis, will preside at the Brown Lecture. The 2007 Brown Selection Committee was chaired by Kris Gutierrez, University of California-Los Angeles (UCLA), and also included Eva L. Baker, UCLA; Felice J. Levine, AERA; Pauline Lipman, University of Illinois-Chicago; Cynthia Tyson, The Ohio State University; and George L. Wimberly, AERA.

Editor’s Note: A webcast of the Brown Lecture will be posted on the AERA Web site: www.aera.net in the weeks following the event. Further questions may be directed to AERA Communications at 202-238-3200, extension 235, or by e-mail to Helaine Patterson (hpatterson@aera.net).

The American Educational Research Association (AERA) is the national interdisciplinary research association for approximately 25,000 scholars who undertake research in education. Founded in 1916, AERA aims to advance knowledge about education, to encourage scholarly inquiry related to education, and to promote the use of research to improve education and serve the public good.

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