New faculty
The Lynch School this year welcomes three new assistant professors: Gabrielle Oliveira, who explores the effects of immigration on education; Andr茅s Castro Samayoa, who studies big data and diversity in postsecondary education; and Jon Wargo, who investigates the intersection of literacy, technology, and cultural studies.
Gabrielle Oliveira
Assistant Professor, Teacher Education, Special Education, and Curriculum and Instruction Department
S茫o Paulo, Brazil, native Gabrielle Oliveira studies the intersection of immigration and education. For her Ph.D. dissertation in anthropology and education at Teachers College, Columbia University, she conducted a three-year ethnography of 鈥渢ransnational motherhood,鈥� interviewing undocumented mothers based in New York City, the children who come with them or who stay behind in Puebla, Mexico, and the children鈥檚 caretakers in Mexico (most often grandparents). Among her most striking findings: girls who remained in Mexico performed much better in school than any other group of children. As Oliveira explains it, they 鈥減erceive academic achievements as a way to stay emotionally connected with their mothers.鈥�
Oliveira, who also holds a Master鈥檚 in International Affairs from Columbia, has also begun to study the schooling of incarcerated Latino youth. She will teach Social Context of Education in the spring semester. New York University will publish her first book, Transnational Care Constellations, in early 2018.
Andr茅s Castro Samayoa
Assistant Professor, Educational Leadership and Higher Education Department
El Salvador native Andr茅s Castro Samayoa studies 鈥渉ow we create communities where all people feel like they belong.鈥� For Samayoa, that sense of belonging emerged when he was an undergraduate science major at Harvard and took a class on gender and sexuality. That led him to use a Gates Scholarship to pursue a Master鈥檚 in Multidisciplinary Gender Studies at Cambridge University, an experience that sparked a continuing interest in studying historically disenfranchised minorities. For his Ph.D. dissertation at the University of Pennsylvania, 鈥淭he Architects and Architecture of Knowledge,鈥� Samayoa examined how changes in the descriptions of ethnic categories over time have affected both student demographic data in higher education institutions and the way administrators and faculty at these institutions think about social identities. He鈥檚 currently co-principal investigator of two longitudinal studies focused on diversifying the teaching profession at both the K鈥�12 and collegiate levels.
In his first year, Samayoa will be teaching Organizations and Administration in Higher Education and Diversity in Higher Education.
Jon Wargo
Assistant Professor, Teacher Education, Special Education, and Curriculum and Instruction Department
鈥淚f I were to summarize my research in a tweet,鈥� says education technologist Jon Wargo, 鈥淚鈥檇 say I study how writing moves, in multiple senses of the word.鈥� His work examines both how digital writing is circulated and can connect marginalized students with supportive communities, and how it affects students鈥� learning and psyches. For his Ph.D. dissertation at Michigan State University, 鈥淐onnective Composition(s) and Sitings of Selves,鈥� Wargo explored how LGBT youths expressed their identities and how they overcame discrimination through their online writing. Wargo鈥檚 other research projects include Sounding Out Equity, an ongoing examination of how different sounds affect the classroom experience from kindergarten through college.
A native Hoosier, Wargo studied English and gender studies at Indiana University before teaching first grade in Denver. He is teaching Advanced Qualitative Research for Ph.D. students and Teaching Reading for undergraduates this fall.