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Recent Urban Studies Department Scholarship

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New CityLab Report

Urban Studies faculty and students have recently released a new CityLab report, Suspension in Worcester:  A Continuing Conversation.  

 Written by Dr. Thomas Conroy and Dr. Madeline Otis Campbell with Urban Studies students Dannielle Morrow and Jennifer Velez, the report explores the reasons behind a suspension disparity in Worcester Public Schools.  In that disparity, Latino students, who comprise 38% of the WPS population receive 53% of the total system suspensions.  The report solicited input from students, parents, teachers, and principals to better understand the story behind the statistics. 

The Vincent "Jake" Powers CityLab is a research instiute and archives housed in and managed by the Department of Urban Studies.  Its mission is to engage in informative projects with and for the people, groups, and organizations of Central Massachusetts about topics of interest to their lives and the world around them. 

Student To Present Paper at Conference

Kaitlyn Benoit, a junior Urban Studies/History major, will present a paper at the April 2014 Meeting of the New England Historical Association. 

The paper, entitled "Illusion Wrapped in Superficiality":  The Civil Rights Movement in Worcester, MA, came out of her Urban Studies coursework last semester and the title comes from a Martin Luther King, Jr. speech delivered in the Temple Emanuel in Worcester, across from Worcester State University. 

Katie will join 5 other WSU students from the History Department, and history professors Dr. Tona Hangen, Dr. Erika Briesacher, and Prof. Bruce Cohen in presenting papers at the conference.  For more see:  http://www.newenglandhistorians.org/
 

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