Photo caption: Top row (l to r): Yemimah King, Daniel Blake and Tanja Burkhard; bottom row (l to r): Phillip Luck and Lori Civello.
The College of Education & Human Development welcomes five new faculty for the 2023-2024 academic year – faculty whose research, teaching and service make significant contributions to the college and its students.
Department of Early Childhood and Elementary Education
Yemimah King is an assistant professor in the Department of Early Childhood and Elementary Education and an affiliate faculty with the Center for Research on the Challenges of Acquiring Language and Literacy at Georgia State. King earned her Ph.D. in human development and family studies at Purdue University in 2022. Her research focuses on enriching parent-child interactions, learning environments and educational activity engagement to support early language and math development in young children who may experience educational opportunity gaps. She has published in various journals, including the Early Childhood Research Quarterly, Frontiers in Psychology and the Journal of Experimental Child Psychology.
Department of Educational Policy Studies
Daniel J. Blake is an assistant professor of higher education in the Department of Educational Policy Studies. He earned his Ph.D. in higher education at the University of Pennsylvania Graduate School of Education in 2020. Blake’s research focuses on organizational culture, policy and practice in higher education, with particular attention to how race, gender and disability shape career experiences in the academic workforce. His research has been published in outlets including the Journal of Higher Education, Journal of Women and Gender in Higher Education, Journal of Diversity in Higher Education, Journal of Faculty Development, Education Sciences, New Directions for Higher Education and Innovative Higher Education.
Tanja Burkhard is an assistant professor in the Department of Educational Policy Studies. She earned her doctorate in teaching and learning at The Ohio State University in 2017. Her research focuses on the deployment of critical qualitative methodologies to explore the intersections of racialization, (im)migration and gender in education. Burkhard recently published a monograph entitled, “Transnational Black Feminism and Qualitative Research: Black Women, Racialization and Migration.”
Phillip Luck is a clinical assistant professor in the Department of Educational Policy Studies. He completed his Ed.D. in school improvement from the University of West Georgia in 2009. With 28 years of experience in K-12 education, Luck has held various positions, including teacher, principal, program manager with the Georgia Department of Education, human resources director and leadership coach. His scholarly interests include K-12 leadership, student engagement and organizational culture and climate. He also focuses on addressing the issue of disproportionality, specifically involving African American male students.
Department of Learning Sciences
Lori Civello is an academic professional in the deaf education program in the Department of Learning Sciences. She holds a master’s degree from Sienna Heights University. Her current research interests include the cognitive process of interpreting and the occupational demands that interpreting professionals face due to institutional and systemic oppression.