News Bureau

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. - Reality television series such as "Intervention" that claim to provide unflinching portraits of addiction and treatment don't accurately depict either one, and, at worst, the shows' focus on the most extreme cases may deter some viewers from seeking help, according to a new study by researchers at the University of Illinois.

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. - Kindergartners who listen to stories about their similarities with children who have disabilities and engage in activities with peers who have special needs are more socially accepting, develop better communication skills and are less likely to engage in bullying behaviors, according to a new study by two special education professors.

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. - For the U.S. to achieve President Barack Obama's goal of having the largest proportion of college graduates in the world by 2020, educators, policymakers and families will need to address the barriers that discourage minorities from pursuing higher education. A new study by Lorenzo DuBois Baber, a professor of higher education at the University of Illinois, sheds light on the unique challenges facing African American and Latino males.

A Minute With™... Chris Roegge, the executive director of the Council on Teacher Education

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. - Illinois leads other states in the U.S. in ensuring that at-risk young children are provided with early childhood education, according to a new study by a researcher in the School of Social Work at the University of Illinois.

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. - A gap in reading and math scores still exists in lower grades, with boys continuing to outpace girls in math, and girls ahead of boys in reading, two University of Illinois education professors say.

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. - One of the tests used in diagnosing prostate cancer is so stigmatized within Latino culture that men may be risking their lives to avoid it, according to a new study by researchers at the University of Illinois. Complex cultural and gender beliefs about manliness and sexuality that discourage Latino men from seeking health care - and stigmatize the digital rectal exam as emasculating - could explain why some men don't seek care until the cancer has progressed, diminishing their chances for recovery.

A Minute With™... educational psychology professor Philip Rodkin

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. - While social media such as Facebook and Twitter have transformed the way people communicate, educational practices haven't kept pace, relying on outdated, limited tools such as standardized tests that don't reflect the profound changes precipitated by the Web. An interdisciplinary team of experts at the University of Illinois is developing software that they believe will transform the practice of writing assessment - and potentially eliminate cumbersome proficiency testing such as that mandated by state and federal agencies as a result of the No Child Left Behind Act.

A Minute With™... sociologist Asef Bayat and education professor Linda Herrera

CHAMPAIGN,Ill. - Charter schools as agents of change in American education will be the focus of a March 15 symposium at the Illini Center in Chicago that will feature scholars who have varying perspectives on the issue.

CHAMPAIGN,Ill. - New teacher induction and mentoring will be the focus of the Illinois New Teacher Collaborative's sixth annual conference.

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. - A new study by researchers at the University of Illinois indicates that mothers with chronic substance abuse problems are more likely to make progress in recovering from addiction - and to reunite with their children in state custody - if they receive residential treatment plus community-based transitional services.

CHAMPAIGN,Ill. - The College of Education at the University of Illinois recently announced a restructuring that is expected to better support collaborative research and teaching by merging three departments. The merger also is expected to help the college maximize resources, be more competitive in obtaining external funding and address high-impact research and policy initiatives on the state and national levels. The restructuring, which took effect Jan. 1, created a department - called Education Policy, Organization and Leadership - from the former departments of educational policy studies, educational organization and leadership, and human resource education.

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. - President Barack Obama, in his 2011 State of the Union address, said that postsecondary education is critical to the U.S. economic recovery, and reiterated his goal that 55 percent of 25-34 year-old Americans hold associate degrees or higher degrees by 2025.

CHAMPAIGN,Ill. - Parents of preschoolers who want to explore and ask questions about the opportunities available at the new Booker T. Washington Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics magnet elementary school in Champaign are invited to a panel discussion Feb. 16 (Wednesday) on the University of Illinois campus.

A Minute With™... Jennifer Delaney, a professor of educational organization and leadership

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. - African American college students who have internalized a positive racial identity - yet feel connected to other social groups - report higher levels of psychological well-being than peers who have externalized or conflicted racial identities and spurn cultural inclusivity, according to a new study by researchers at the University of Illinois.

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. - A new study by researchers at the University of Illinois indicates that children who spend in excess of 30 hours per week in non-relative care through the age of 4 1/2 may be exposed to a social environment that popularizes aggression, leading some children to become more physically aggressive than peers who spend less time in nonmaternal care.

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. - With employers increasingly reluctant to supply references for former employees in order to avoid legal liability, the creation of a centralized reference pool for workers may make labor markets in the U.S. more efficient, a University of Illinois expert in labor and employment law says.

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. - A researcher at the University of Illinois is counting on a unique computer program to make it easier and more enjoyable for elementary school students who are at risk of academic failure to learn basic addition and subtraction facts.

CHAMPAIGN,Ill. - Maryann Romski, an expert in language disorders in children, will give the annual Goldstick Family Lecture in the Study of Communication Disorders at the University of Illinois on Thursday (Oct. 28).

Juggling the demands of being a faculty member, as well as trying to find time for yourself and family and friends can seem overwhelming. "The Joyful Professor" (Henschel Haus, 2010), by Barbara Minsker, a professor of environmental and water resources systems engineering, provides tips for balancing the many roles of researcher, teacher, coach and mentor, while maintaining a healthy personal life.

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. -Among the UI campus's largest non-white ethnicities, Korean American students arrive at college hoping to realize the liberal ideals of the modern American university, in which individuals can exit their comfort zones to realize their full potential regardless of race, nation or religion. In her new book "The Intimate University: Korean American Students and the Problems of Segregation" (Duke University Press, 2009), Nancy Abelmann, a professor of anthropology and of East Asian languages and cultures, explores the tensions between these liberal ideals and the particularities of race, family and community in the contemporary university.

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. - Nationally known and emerging authors, illustrators, poets and storytellers will engage with their young readers and readers young at heart during the second Youth Literature Festival. The festival, to take place Oct. 9 at Krannert Center for the Performing Arts on the University of Illinois campus, celebrates the ways in which written works enrich the lives of young people and promotes reading as a fun activity.

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. - High schools need to work with community colleges to align their curricula better and to reduce the number of students who need to enroll in remedial courses, according to a University of Illinois expert who studies community college education policy.

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. - Colleges and universities are under siege from an array of economic, political and cultural forces that are dramatically changing higher education as we know it - but not for the better, according to Cary Nelson, a professor emeritus of English at the University of Illinois.

A Minute With™... Carolyn Shields, a professor of education

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. - A sink-or-swim mentality for socializing new employees will ultimately only drain organizations of their best talent over time, according to new research by a University of Illinois expert in workplace dynamics.

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. - Brendesha Tynes, a professor of educational psychology and of African American studies at the University of Illinois, has been awarded a $1.4 million grant to study the effects of online racial discrimination. The grant is from the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development.

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. - Images from racial theme parties that are posted on social networking sites such as Facebook and MySpace not only elicit different reactions from different people based on their race and their attitudes toward diversity, they also represent an indirect way to express racist views about minorities, according to published research by a University of Illinois professor who studies the convergence of race and the Internet.

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. - An approach to teaching young children the principles of writing and literacy that prohibits them from borrowing from our common cultural landscape is a problematic one, according to a University of Illinois professor who studies childhood learning and literacy development.

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. - Despite growth in recent decades, unionization of higher education faculty remains contested, and its modern concerns can be traced back to the 1910s and 1920s, according to a University of Illinois expert in historical issues involving faculty work and faculty workers.

A Minute With™...  Mary Kalantzis, the dean of the College of Education

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. - The lack of affordable, high-quality on-campus day care programs that cater to undergraduate students who double as parents is a stealth issue that has the potential to harm both the student-parent and the child, says a University of Illinois expert in early childhood education.

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. - What we learn from our siblings when we grow up has - for better or for worse - a considerable influence on our social and emotional development as adults, according to an expert in sibling, parent-child and peer relationships at the University of Illinois.

A Minute With™... education professor Christopher Lubienski

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. - A new study co-written by a University of Illinois expert in math education suggests that incorporating technology in high school-level geometry classes not only makes the teaching of concepts such as congruency easier, it also empowers students to discover other geometric relationships they wouldn't ordinarily uncover when more traditional methods of instruction were used.

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. - The impact of text messaging on the decline of formal writing among teens has been debated in pedagogical circles ever since cell-phone ownership became an adolescent rite of passage in the mid-2000s. But according to a University of Illinois expert in media literacy, not only are critics who argue that texting is synonymous with literary degradation wrong, they also often overlook the bigger role that texting and its distant cousin, "tweeting," could play in education and research.

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. - The underlying similarities between teaching, research and music can be a powerful metaphor for education and qualitative inquiry, according to a University of Illinois professor of education.

A Minute With™... education professor Jennifer A. Delaney

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. - The current generation of college students and teachers need to be as culturally fluent with people from different cultures as they are with their own, a soft skill that has become an essential part of life in the 21st century, a University of Illinois expert on teacher education says.

A Minute With™... educational psychology professor Dorothy Espelage

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. - Whether they're found in a museum or a textbook, historical narratives about traumatic events such as war and genocide are better left to older students, who have typically developed a more refined historical consciousness, says a University of Illinois professor who studies and teaches historical instruction.

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. - Mothers and fathers play different roles and make different contributions to a child's upbringing, but a father's influence upon a child's academic success later in life is felt the most when he's involved from the very beginning, says a University of Illinois expert in early childhood education.

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. - In the years immediately following the Civil War, the question of education for newly emancipated slaves in Mississippi centered on whether schools should seek to educate blacks as citizens or train them as subsistence laborers. While many whites favored the laborer option, those who had been freed wanted schools established by and for themselves as a means of achieving independence, equality and political empowerment - in essence, full citizenship, says Christopher M. Span, a professor of educational policy studies at the University of Illinois.

A Minute With™... Debra Bragg, a professor of higher education

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. - A market-based approach to increasing school choice actually leads to fewer educational opportunities, particularly for disadvantaged students in urban areas, according to a University of Illinois expert in education.

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. - Popular culture may have an uncharitable attitude toward community colleges, but a University of Illinois expert in education says they are an underfunded community asset and an invaluable resource for first-generation college students, low-skilled adult workers and immigrants aspiring to enter college, and downsized workers and mid-career changers transitioning to a recession-proof career.

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. - Interactive Web-based science tutorials can be effective tools for helping elementary school teachers construct powerful explanatory models of difficult scientific concepts, and research shows the interactive tutorials are just as effective online as they are in face-to-face settings, says a University of Illinois expert in science education.