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2021 Harold W. McGraw, Jr. Prize in Education honorees boast transformative accomplishments, Penn ties
Michael Golden, Pam Grossman, Suzanne McGraw, and Harold McGraw.

From left: Michael Golden, executive director of Catalyst @ Penn GSE; Pam Grossman, dean of the University of Pennsylvania Graduate School of Education; Suzanne McGraw; and Harold McGraw III, former chair, CEO and president of The McGraw Hill Companies.

2021 Harold W. McGraw, Jr. Prize in Education honorees boast transformative accomplishments, Penn ties

Often regarded as the “Nobel Prize of Education,” the McGraw Prize is awarded annually to leaders who are pushing beyond the boundaries of the current education landscape and revolutionizing the field.

From Penn GSE

A conversation with guest lecturer, historian, and best-selling author Jill Lepore
three people sitting on a stage

Best-selling author Jill Lepore (center), a Harvard history professor and staff writer at The New Yorker, spoke about teaching the U.S. Constitution during an era of constitutional crisis in a conversation at Penn with Graduate School of Education dean Pam Grossman (right) and School of Law dean Theodore Ruger. (Image: Jane Lindahl)

A conversation with guest lecturer, historian, and best-selling author Jill Lepore

Best-selling author Jill Lepore, a Harvard history professor and staff writer at The New Yorker, spoke about teaching the U.S. Constitution during an era of constitutional crisis in a conversation with Graduate School of Education Dean Pam Grossman and Law School Dean Theodore Ruger.
Teaching beyond September 11
Drawing of five people, one wearing a hijab, another wearing a turban, with the word JUSTICE written at the bottom.

Image: Nadia Hafid/Penn GSE

Teaching beyond September 11

Penn GSE’s Ameena Ghaffar-Kucher says the lessons of 9/11 offer a chance for students to examine how the event has shaped much of the last two decades, in America and around the world.

From Penn GSE

  • Arts, Humanities, & Social Sciences

    • Understanding the pandemic classroom

    In the latest episode of Penn Today’s ‘Understand This ...’ podcast series, Caroline Watts of the Graduate School of Education and Philip Gressman of the School of Arts & Sciences discuss the return to the classroom.
    Masked students at desks

    Welcome to the fall semester’s first episode of the “Understand This ...” series, a Penn Today podcast. This podcast series is designed as a journey to understand how to solve problems of the day—and of our time—by uniting minds from different disciplines. This episode is both a reflection on what students and educators have experienced in learning during the course of the COVID-19 pandemic, plus an examination of how lessons from the pandemic can be applied to a return to in-person classroom settings.

    Joining for the conversation is Caroline Watts, senior lecturer in the Graduate School of Education and director of School and Community Engagement at GSE, as well as Philip Gressman, a professor of mathematics in the School of Arts & Sciences. Watts is team leader for GSE’s Project for Progress, addressing West Philadelphia students’ school readiness and teachers’ instructional capacity and mental health needs. Gressman, meanwhile, reshaped the teaching of calculus during the pandemic to fit the needs of students, with a focus on inclusive and equitable teaching. Together, they talk about their experiences as educators during the early days of the pandemic, lessons learned, and how the classroom might look and feel different in the coming months.

    6:56: Gressman discusses recognizing the scope of the problem at the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, identifying the need for education to adapt, and time spent on adapting a calculus curriculum for remote learning.

    13:30: Watts talks about what worked well in the transition to remote learning and what didn’t—plus, new forms of feedback for instructors.

    16:18: Watts discusses the ongoing Project for Progress in West and Southwest Philadelphia summer schools, what we gained from the experiences of the past 18 months, and the “joy” of students and teachers being reunited.

    21:20: “Quote Break” 27:40: Gressman highlights the need to be accommodating in this extraordinary moment in teaching, as well as what to consider taking out of the classroom when balancing synchronous and asynchronous learning.

    31:58: Watts: “A model I’ve learned for life is to be prepared to adapt and be flexible.”

    View Transcript

    Follow the “Understand This ...” podcast on Apple Music.

    Credits

  • Writers

    Brandon K. Baker

  • Photographers

    Eric Sucar

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  • Understand This...
    • In a California district, Latinx students with Latinx teachers attend more school
    self-assured high school student in classroom

    In a California district, Latinx students with Latinx teachers attend more school

    While the teaching workforce continues to be heavily dominated by white teachers, in particular white women, the academic and social-emotional benefits for students of color of having a teacher who is their same race have been widely documented. Less studied is the impact that having a same-race teacher has on attendance.

    From Penn GSE

    Collaborating with communities: Vivian Gadsden works to help children and families
    Vivian Gadsen stands at the front of a classroom speaking to students.

    Vivian Gadsden, the William T. Carter Professor of Child Development and Education, is lifting up the voices of families and educators to help the City of Philadelphia develop a new definition of child well-being. (Image: Ryan Collerd)

    Collaborating with communities: Vivian Gadsden works to help children and families

    The Graduate School of Education professor speaks to how she is collaborating with students, parents, educators, and the City of Philadelphia to imagine and build a brighter future through education.

    What won’t the infrastructure plan do? Repair our crumbling schools

    What won’t the infrastructure plan do? Repair our crumbling schools

    Nell Williams, a Ph.D. student in the Graduate School of Education, wrote an op-ed in support of the Biden administration’s infrastructure plan, which allocates funds to repair school buildings. “As the infrastructure plan undergoes further negotiation in the House and Senate, I urge policymakers note the gaping hole that was left when most U.S. schools went virtual last year,” she said.

    A post-pandemic wave of teachers leaving the workforce, and other trends
    Teacher wearing face mask standing alone in a school hallway.

    A post-pandemic wave of teachers leaving the workforce, and other trends

    Penn GSE’s Richard Ingersoll has published a new report looking at who is at work in America’s classrooms, and finds that many trends he has tracked since publishing his first study continue to hold true, and in some ways have deepened.

    From Penn GSE

    How project-based learning can prepare students for the 21st century
    A group of educators in training work on a project building a tower of wooden sticks on a table.

    Students in a project-based learning certificate program class collaborate to find a solution to a problem. (Image: Courtesy of Penn GSE)

    How project-based learning can prepare students for the 21st century

    Penn GSE dean Pam Grossman and peers argue in a new book that project-based learning, a method of instruction that identifies a project or problem that students work on, should be at the center of American public education.

    From Penn GSE