LLSS Centers
American Indian Language Policy Research and Teacher Training Center
Institute for American Indian Education (IAIE)
Latin American Programs in Education (LAPE)
Multicultural Education Center
LLSS Teaching Institutes and Projects
Academic Literacy for All Project
High Desert Writing Project
Native American Language Teacher's Institute
Spanish Summer Immersion Institute for Bilingual Teachers
UNM/APS ESL Endorsement Summer Institute
LLSS Centers
American Indian Language Policy Research and Teacher Training Center
Director: Dr. Chris Sims
Program Manager: Dr. Carlotta Penny Bird
Telephone: 505-277-0537
Location: Hokona Hall, Room 216
The Center aims to serve as a local and national center of collaborative research that examines major policy issues affecting the survival and maintenance of American Indian languages. The Center also provides a venue for building an international dialogue about language issues that extends to other indigenous languages of the Americas. Developing and providing native language teacher training programs and technical assistance support for American Indian tribes engaged in language maintenance and preservation initiatives is another key aspect of the Center's outreach and service. For more information about the center, click here.
Institute for American Indian Education (IAIE)
Coordinator: Dr. Kathryn Manuelito, kathrynm@unm.edu
Program Manager: Geneva Becenti
Telephone: 505-277-7781
Administrative Assistant: Pearlene Tate
Location: Hokona Hall, Room 250
The Institute for American Indian Education, IAIE, was created in response to New Mexico's overwhelming need to improve American Indian student retention and achievement in schools. Since its inception in 2003, more than 80 American Indian students have graduated or are on track to graduate with degrees in education. We have a 90% retention rate and 67% graduation rate for our students.
Additionally, the UNM College of Education American Indian/First Nations faculty, which is the largest group of American Indian/First Nations faculty at any College of Education in the country, conduct outreach, workshops, and seminars in the area of curriculum development, preparation for teacher licensure tests, American Indian charter school development, and American Indian language revitalization and instructional planning.
Latin American Programs in Education (LAPE)
Director: Dr. Rebecca Blum-Martinez, rebeccab@unm.edu
Telephone: 505-277-9677; Fax: 505-277-8362
Location: Manzanita Hall, Room 118
The Latin American Programs in Education (LAPE) is a longstanding, internationally recognized program that has fostered positive relationships between UNM and Latin American educational institutions. Presently LAPE is developing diplomados in English for university and other higher education institution faculty who are teaching English. LAPE is also involved in a Trilateral Research Study, sponsored by the OAS which aims to contrast and compare teacher preparation in three countries. The other participating institutions are Simon Frasier University in Vancouver, Canada, and the Universidad Pedagogica Nacional in Mexico City.
LAPE is also developing agreements with several Mexican universities where our students and professors can have international experiences, and where Mexican educators can come to UNM. Furthermore, LAPE hopes to develop similar agreements with Ecuadorian universities and facilitate closer ties between indigenous organizations in Ecuador and IAIE.
Multicultural Education Center
Director: Dr. Leroy I. Ortiz, leroyo@unm.edu
Project Assistant: KwangJong Park, bell@unm.edu
Telephone: 505-277-8961; Fax: 505-277-8362
Location: Manzanita Hall, Room 118
The Multicultural Bilingual Education Center engages in a variety of initiatives that support that COE's long tradition of working with diverse cultures. One of our main goals is to help recruit more students into the college, especially those who with diverse backgrounds, and give them the multicultural preparation they need to be effective teachers in New Mexico's school systems.
We achieve that goal by collaborating with other departments to develop multicultural education program that provide mentoring, continuing education and guidance for teachers. The center funds these programs and provides financial and programmatic support for Bilingual Education and TESOL (Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages) through a series of grants.
LLSS Teaching Institutes and Projects
Academic Literacy for All Project
The Academic Literacy for All Project, funded by a five-year grant from the U.S. Department of Education, is designed to help secondary content-area teachers learn how they can facilitate the language and literacy development of their English Language Learners while they are teaching content material. Teachers from schools in Albuquerque and Los Lunas participate in professional development seminars and become teacher educators at their school sites. UNM faculty participate in a two-week summer institute with these teachers to collaboratively work on understanding the needs of English Language Learners and ways that both pre-service teacher education and in-service professional development can help teachers meet those needs. For more information contact Holbrook Mahn at hmahn@unm.edu.
High Desert Writing Project
The High Desert Writing Project is Albuquerque’s site of the National Writing Project, a project that has served K-16 teachers of writing for over thirty years. All National Writing Project sites focus on the core missions of improving the teaching of writing and the use of writing across the disciplines by offering high-quality professional development programs for educators in their service areas, K-16 and across the curriculum. The High Desert Writing Project offers summer institutes for teachers, as well as summer camps for children and youth. Go the the High Desert Writing Project website for more information.
Native American Language Teacher's Institute
This one-week institute is restricted to speakers of Native languages who are preparing to teach or are responsible for teaching language in tribal language programs or in school settings. The course is especially recommended for native speakers who are interested in teaching language in an immersion setting. This course will focus on methodologies and strategies that support effective oral language teaching, principles of second language development for Native language learners, with a special emphasis on planning and applying principles to appropriate oral language teaching activities. Students will be expected to participate in interactive activities with other Native speakers and demonstrations of Native language teaching by “veteran” Native language immersion teachers. There will be ample opportunities for discussion and sharing or creative ideas for language teaching.
Spanish Summer Immersion Institute for Bilingual Teachers
The Spanish Summer Immersion Institute for Bilingual Teachers is the result of a partnership between the NMPED’s Bilingual and Multicultural Education Bureau and the Department of Language, Literacy, and Sociocultural Studies in the College of Education. The aim of the Institute is to provide teachers with the opportunity to use their Spanish in an academic setting while learning necessary instructional, historical, linguistic, and cultural information. The Institute plays an instrumental role in helping bilingual teachers in New Mexico prepare for and pass La Prueba, the state-mandated assessment for teachers in Spanish. For more information, please contact Dr. Rebecca Blum-Martinez at 505-277-4972 or rebeccab@unm.edu.
UNM/APS ESL Endorsement Summer Institute
Since its founding in 1999, the UNM/APS ESL Endorsement Summer Institute has helped over 750 in-service and pre-service teachers acquire their TESOL endorsements. The six-week institute, in which students take three UNM courses toward their endorsement, also features six elementary classes in which institute participants gain teaching experience with ESL students who are recruited from the neighborhoods around La Mesa Elementary School, where the institute is held. An application form and a more detailed description of the institute are available here. For more information contact Holbrook Mahn at hmahn@unm.edu.