Dr. Laura M. Jiménez

Center Director 
Senior Lecturer and Associate Dean of Equity, Diversity & Inclusion
Boston University Wheelock College of Education & Human Development
My scholarship focuses on the ways educators can and should teach anti-oppression with and through children’s literature. As a result of being in teacher education, my work also encompasses Whiteness, intersectionality, and growth through radical honesty and inclusion. 
I am a White presenting Latina lesbian and so I represent both the colonized and the colonizer. I represent the LGBTQIA community as an out and vocal lesbian. In my allyship, I try to support and uplift marginalized voices by consistently attending to the representation of people, history, and communities and the ways oppressive bias acts to uphold racist, misogynist, homophobic, ableist, and Eurocentric norms. 
I am a founding member of the editorial board of Research on Diversity in Youth Literature and I co-authored Lee and Low’s 2019 Diversity Baseline 2.0 survey. My work has been published in The Lion and the Unicorn, Reading Teacher, Journal of Lesbian Studies, Teaching and Teacher Education, and the Journal of Literacy Research, as well as other peer reviewed journals. In addition, I am a member of the We Are KidLit Collective, and a regular contributor to See What We See review database on Social Justice Books website.

Dr. Kristin McIlhagga

Associate Center Director
My scholarship focuses on anti-oppression pedagogies in K–12 and postsecondary classrooms. I draw on culturally and historically responsive pedagogies, intersectionality, and critical whiteness studies to consider ways that educators can actively counter explicit and implicit oppressive practices inherent in formal education systems.
 
As a white, straight, cis-woman who represents the nearly 80% of teachers in US K-12 classrooms, I recognize my privilege means that I have caused harm as an oppressor, whether intentional or not; and that I will cause harm again. I come to this work with humility and urgency.
 
Before coming to Boston University, I was an assistant professor at Oakland University in Rochester, Michigan as well a Lecturer at Wayne State University in Detroit, Michigan. I have presented at Annual Conferences of National Council of Teachers of English, Children's Literature Association, Literacy Research Association, and Michigan Reading Association. My work has been published in The Michigan Reading Journal and The Journal of Education