Speakers

2023 Conference Speakers

Conference speakers include:

Dr. Christi Bergin (Ed.S, Ph.D. Stanford University) is Associate Dean of Research and Innovation in the College of Education and Human Development at the University of Missouri. She is a leading expert in Prosocial Education, which is the deliberate attempt of educators to build students’ prosocial behavior. Such behavior involves including others, treating others with dignity, trying to understand the perspective of others, encouraging others, apologizing, expressing gratitude, cooperation, and collaboration. Prosocial Education helps students become competent team members which facilitates STEM learning and later STEM careers. Dr. Bergin leads multiple research projects funded by the U.S. Dept of Education. She has published, “Designing a Prosocial Classroom” (Norton) and Child and Adolescent Development in Your Classroom (Cengage). She is co-founder of the Network for Educator Effectiveness with over 285 member districts. She consults with many teachers and schools on promoting prosocial behavior in students and elevating teaching effectiveness. She is an officer in the Social-Emotional Learning group in the American Educational Research Association.

Dr. Roni Ellington has spent the last 25 years cultivating herself as a nationally recognized transformative transdisciplinary scholar, researcher, STEM leader, and professional development expert. Trained as a mathematics educator, Dr. Roni Ellington has authored several scholarly articles on STEM education, parental involvement, STEM professional development and navigating the STEM pipeline, particularly for minority students. Dr. Ellington is a leading expert on how to cultivate student’s success in mathematics and STEM related disciplines. She is currently an Associate Professor of Mathematics Education and the former Coordinator of the Graduate Programs in Mathematics Education at Morgan State University. She has also worked as a high school mathematics teacher, mathematics lecturer and mathematics education consultant. She is the owner of the Transforming STEM Network, an organization committed to providing transformative education models to schools and school districts that promote diversity and inclusion in STEM-related disciplines and is co-owner of Evoklife, a well-being company that develops transformative programs for individuals and corporations in maximizing their productivity without sacrificing their wellbeing. Through her work in Evoklife, she has worked with many corporations to promote diversity, equity and inclusion and transforming company culture.

Her research has been featured in The Negro Educational Review, Journal of Negro Education CBE-Life Sciences Education, Equity and Quality in Mathematics Education and Progress in Education, Volume II, Interdisciplinary Journal of Problem Based Learning, the American Evaluation Journal and Problems, Resources, and Issues in Mathematics Undergraduate Studies (PRIMUS). Ellington has presented her research at various national and local conferences including the annual meeting of the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics (NCTM), the American Educational Research Association (AERA), and the National Association of Science Teachers (NSTA).  She has also authored several book chapters on equity and diversity in STEM education, culturally responsive teaching in undergraduate STEM education, and transformative practices in mathematics and STEM education.

Dr. Ellington has been featured as a TEDx Baltimore Speaker in 2013 and her moving and thought-provoking talk on the future of STEM education was so well received that she was highlighted as is one of the featured speakers on the TEDx website. Her authenticity, wisdom, and straight talk about what is needed to transform STEM education from exclusive to inclusive inspired a standing ovation. She has been featured speaker for several conferences and programs including the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics (NCTM) regional conferences, the Texas Science Leadership Association National Conference, University of Maryland, Baltimore’s (UMB) Black History Month celebration, and the Mathematical Association of America.

Her research, teaching and innovative frameworks on rethinking STEM education inspires and ignites global audiences. She has given talks at various local and national conferences presenting her transformative framework for STEM education and her work promoting diversity, equity and inclusion in the STEM pipeline. Her message has been well-received, and she is sort after speaker and scholar.

She is currently a principal Investigator on several NSF funded projects including the SEMINAL grant with is focused on incorporating culturally responsive teaching into university mathematics classrooms, the Maryland Collaborative of Research in Urban STEM Education, and the STEM Context Matters Project. She also served as Co- PI on the Bessie Coleman Project, using computer modeling and flight simulations to create STEM pathways. Her collaboration with the American Institutes for Research (AIR) has just been awarded an NSF grant of close to 5,000,000 dollars to build and administer a research hub for current and future NSF principal investigators in the ECR BCER programs.     Each of these projects are designed to equip faculty, students, and STEM teacher leaders in ways that forward research and practice in STEM education and promote inclusivity and innovative research in STEM education.

Dr. Ellington has written several articles on mathematics and STEM education, and she is a co-author of the book Capitalizing on Culture: Successful Patterns of Parental Participation for African American Students, which highlights the ways in which parents can use their own human and social capital to advocate for their children and help foster their success in STEM related disciplines. She has just completed a book chapter reflecting her transformative framework for STEM education. She recently served as a co-editor and contributor on the book Fostering Computational Thinking among Underrepresented students in STEM.  She currently working on a book that helps schools, school districts and non-profit organizations implement this framework into their STEM focused programs.

Dr. Socorro Herrera is a professor in the Department of Curriculum and Instruction, College of Education at Kansas State University and serves as the Executive Director of the Center for Intercultural and Multilingual Advocacy (CIMA). She is certified in elementary education, bilingual education, and school counseling. As an international keynote speaker, district consultant, and trainer of trainers, she has collaborated with teachers across the country and the world to chart new paths to academic success for culturally and linguistically diverse (CLD) learners. Her research focuses on the role that personal histories of the learner, family, and teacher play in literacy development and culturally responsive, sustaining pedagogy; math and reading strategies; and teacher preparation for diverse classrooms. Dr. Herrera has authored 10 textbooks and numerous articles for publication in journals such as Bilingual Research Journal, Journal of Hispanic Higher Education, Journal of Research in Education, Journal of Latinos and Education, Journal of Curriculum and Instruction, International Journal of Multicultural Education, Teacher Education Quarterly, and Urban Education.