Academics

Dana Mitra receives Fulbright Senior Scholar Award

UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. -- Dana Mitra, an associate professor of education at Penn State, has received a Fulbright Senior Scholar Award to conduct research in Bangalore, India, in the spring of 2012.

Mitra will complete her Fulbright award with the National Institute for Advanced Study in Bangalore. Her research will focus on youth participation in schools and nongovernmental organizations. The research will build upon her current work on student voice and youth participation in U.S. schools. “I am looking forward to examining this issue in a very different national context,” she said.

According to Mitra, the United States is the only country that has not indicated that it will ratify the United Nations’ Convention on the Rights of the Child (UN CRC).

“Within this convention is language that youth have a right to participate in decisions that affect their lives,” she said. “Based on the UN CRC, we are seeing a strong endorsement of youth participation globally and especially in the work of non-governmental organizations. It will be interesting to conduct youth participation work in a country that endorsed the UN CRC.

Mitra joined the Department of Education Policy Studies in January 2003 as an assistant professor. Originally from Pittsburgh, she earned a doctorate in policy analysis from Stanford University’s School of Education. Prior to attending graduate school, she worked as an elementary-school teacher in the Washington, D.C. area. In addition to student voice and youth participation and development, her research interests include education policy, school reform, school-community collaboration, qualitative methods, urban education, and social policy.

The Fulbright Scholarship Program was founded in 1946 under legislation introduced by the late Senator J. William Fulbright to build mutual understanding between the people of the United States and the rest of the world.

Dana Mitra, associate professor of education at Penn State. Credit: Penn StateCreative Commons

Last Updated January 9, 2015

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