Enrique (Henry) Suárez Awarded 2022 NAEd/Spencer Postdoctoral Fellowship

Enrique (Henry) Suárez, assistant professor of math, science and learning technologies in the College of Education, has been selected a 2022 National Academy of Education (NAEd)/Spencer Postdoctoral Fellow. The fellowships, intended to fund researchers whose projects address critical issues in the history, theory or practice of formal or informal education at the national and international levels, include a stipend of $70,000.

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Suárez, whose project is titled “More Than Words: How Emergent Bilingual Students Laminate Multiple Semiotic Resources When Investigating Justice-Oriented Natural Phenomena,” is one of just 25 researchers selected for this year’s fellowship. His work will investigate translanguaging – a theoretical and pedagogical lens for understanding how bi-/multilingual speakers flexibly leverage their full semiotic repertoires – to explore how bilingual students in elementary grades investigate phenomena and co-construct knowledge, particularly when interacting with their material environments. This methodological approach encourages drawing on students’ full communicative abilities to support science learning, rather than assimilating them into dominant forms of knowing and communicating.

Part of Suárez’s research will involve partnering with elementary school teachers to design science learning activities that are justice-oriented. These activities will also promote bilingual students’ sophisticated translanguaging practices. The findings from Suárez’s research will further inform how to design justice-oriented science education for bi-/multilingual children, while also disrupting the deficit-based science pedagogies that frame these students’ ways of communicating as insufficient and inappropriate.

“For me, this fellowship represents a great opportunity to develop mutualistic relationships with local elementary school teachers and make science education more equitable, especially for bi-/multilingual young children,” Suárez says. “Moreover, this award is a recognition of the scholarship I’ve developed here at UMass, which aims to disrupt oppressive language ideologies in science learning environments.”

More information about the NAEd/Spencer Postdoctoral Fellowship program can be found on the NAEd website.