School exclusion, including suspension, expulsion, and dropout and alternative education. Race, class, and gender in education and participatory action research.
Activities and Honors:
Tara M. Brown is an Assistant Professor of Education at Brandeis University. She holds a doctorate in education from Harvard University and is a recipient of the Spencer Research Fellowship and the Jacobs Foundation Dissertation Fellowship. Tara is a former secondary classroom teacher, having worked in alternative education, particularly around issues of technological literacy. Tara’s current research focuses urban education and school discipline, exclusion, and dropout using participatory action research methodologies. Her most recent research is a two-year PAR project with students in an urban alternative school, focusing on the experiences of adolescents who are excluded from mainstream educational environments. The project also explores how to improve the schooling conditions of youth “at risk” for exclusion.
Selected Publications:
• Brown, T. and Galeas, K. (2010). Confronting “Limit Situations” in a Youth/Adult Educational Research Collaborative. In Schultz, B. (Ed), Learning from Students. Charlotte, NC: Information Age Publishing. (forthcoming).
• Brown, T. and Rodríguez, L. (2009). Editors’ Notes. In T. Brown & L Rodríguez (Eds.), Participatory Action Research with Youth, special issue of New Directions for Youth Development, Winter 2009. (forthcoming).
• Rodríguez, L. and Brown, T. (2009). From Voice to Agency: Guiding Principles for Participatory Action Research with Youth. In T. Brown & L. Rodríguez (Eds.), Participatory Action Research with Youth, special issue of New Directions for Youth Development, Winter 2009. (forthcoming).
• Brown, T., Clark, S., and Bridges, T. (2009). Youth Teaching Teachers: Bridging Racial and Cultural Divides Between Teachers and Students. In S. Hughes & T. Berry (Eds.), Living, Learning, and Teaching Race. Cresskill, NJ: Hampton Press. (in press).
• Brown, T. and Rodríguez, L. (2008). School and the Co-construction of Dropout. International Journal of Qualitative Studies in Education, 22(2), 221-242.
•Brown, T. (2008). Culture, Gender and Subjectivities: ICT Use and Access in a High School Library. Journal of Access Services 4(3/4).
•Brown, T. (2007). Lost and Turned out: Academic, Social and Emotional Experiences of Students Excluded from School. Urban Education, 42(5), 432-455.
