Keynote speaker
Jamila Lyiscott
This year, we are honored to have Dr. Jamila Lyiscott, a social justice advocate and researcher, as our keynote speaker for the 2023 AETA Conference. Jamila Lyiscott aka, Dr. J, is an aspiring way-maker, a community-engaged scholar, nationally renowned speaker, and the author of Black Appetite. White Food: Issues of Race, Voice, and Justice Within and Beyond the Classroom. She currently serves as an Associate Professor of Social Justice Education at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, where she is the co-founder and co-director of the Center of Racial Justice and Youth Engaged Research. Dr. J is most well known for being featured on TED.com where her video, ‘3 Ways to Speak English,’ has been viewed over 5 million times. Dr. J is the recipient of the AERA Outstanding Public Communication of Education Research Award, the AERA Scholar-Activist & Community Advocacy Award, and the CIES Ernest D. Morrell Emerging Scholar Award. She has been invited to keynote at 100s of institutions nationally and internationally.
Dr. J’s scholarship and activism work together to explore, assert, and defend the value of Black life globally. Her research examines the liberatory capacity of literacies in the lives of youth of color, racial healing, youth-led research, and the capacity of African Diasporic cultures to transgress white coloniality. Dr. J serves as co-editor of the journal of Equity & Excellence in Education, and holds faculty fellowships at the University of Notre Dame, and Teachers College, Columbia University. In her active efforts to disrupt the bounds of the academy, she has also been featured in Spike Lee’s “2 Fists Up,” on BBC Radio, NPR, Cosmopolitan, NowThis, and many other media outlets nationally and internationally.
AETA is grateful to The UA College of Education and AZ Humanities for Sponsoring Dr. Lyiscott's visit.
Featured ScholaR
Curtis acosta
AETA's Equity, Diversity & Inclusion Committee is proud to announce Dr. Curtis Acosta as the inaugural speaker for the EDI Mentoring Program. Prior to his current role as assistant professor in language and culture in education, Curtis Acosta was a high school teacher for nearly 20 years, where he developed and taught Chicanx/Latinx literature classes for the renowned Mexican-American Studies program in Tucson. He is an award-winning educator who was named one of the “Top 10 Latinos to Watch in US Politics” by the Huffington Post. His work was featured in the documentaries Precious Knowledge and Dolores, as well as The Daily Show with Jon Stewart. He is the founder of the Acosta Educational Partnership, a consultation firm that helps educators create culturally sustaining and humanizing educational practices in their classrooms, schools, and communities. Acosta received his Bachelor of Arts from Willamette University in Salem, Oregon, and later obtained a Master of Arts degree and Ph.D. in Language, Reading, and Culture from the University of Arizona.
Featured author
Monica brown
Fronteras:
Bilingual Children’s Book Explores Castro Twins
Humble Beginnings To Political Rise
Listen: Texas Public Radio
