Three professors in the Department of Education Policy, Organization and Leadership have been invited to be inducted as an American Educational Research Association (AERA) Fellow: department head and Gutgsell professor James Anderson, William Trent, and Anne Haas Dyson. The three professors will be inducted on Saturday, April 14, during AERA’s annual meeting. In addition, Trent will give the prestigious Wallace Foundation Lecture at the association’s annual meeting, which will be held April 13-17 in Vancouver, British Columbia.

According to AERA, the purpose of the Fellows Program is to honor education researchers with substantial research accomplishments, to convey the association’s commitment to excellence in research, and to enable the next generation of emerging scholars to appreciate the value of sustained achievements in research. Fellows are nominated by their peers, selected and recommended by association’s Fellows Committee, and approved by the AERA Council, an elected governing group.

Fellows must display exceptional scientific or scholarly contributions to education research or make significant contributions to the field and be known both nationally and internationally. Only a select group of scholars are designated fellows: AERA inducted 31 scholars in 2011, 67 scholars in 2010, 44 scholars in 2009, and initially launched with 360 inaugural fellows in 2008.

In addition, Joseph Robinson, assistant professor in Educational Psychology, has been selected an Outstanding Reviewer for 2011 by the AERA for his exceptional contribution to AERA’s journals. Robinson was named an outstanding reviewer in 2010 as well. He serves on the editorial boards for two AERA publications: the American Educational Research Journal and the Educational Evaluation and Policy Analysis. He will be honored at an AERA reception for outstanding reviewers during the annual meeting.

AERA is the national interdisciplinary research association for approximately 25,000 scholars who undertake research in education.

(From left to right: James Anderson, William Trent, Anne Haas Dyson, and Joseph Robinson)