Mary Lou Fulton College for Teaching and Learning Innovation

MLFC Associate Research Professor Alexander Kurz has been recognized with the ASU Career Faculty Association's Entrepreneurial Research in the Workplace Award.

Kurz's research has led to the development of innovative tools and data resources that help educators, schools and community partners improve teaching, coaching and student outcomes. By translating research into practical solutions, his work creates impact both in the field and in the classroom.

His work reflects ASU's commitment to advancing research that strengthens the communities it serves.

Kurz was one of 10 MLFC faculty members nominated for recognition across teaching, research and service categories.

New! Preparing students for real life requires more than a good plan. It requires leaders willing to reimagine what school districts can become.

AASA and ASU’s Mary Lou Fulton College for Teaching and Learning Innovation are bringing together possibilities thinking, AI, and ASU’s Principled Innovation® framework, so the plans you build are bolder, deeper, and more connected to the students, families, and communities you serve.

Because the future of public education doesn’t emerge from the limits of today. It's built by leaders who refuse to stop at what already exists.
📅 October 28–29, 2026 | Tempe, Arizona

Possibilities Summit: Reimagining Strategic Planning with AI Learn to use AI and possibilities thinking to reimagine district strategic planning. A working summit for district leaders. October 2026 in Arizona.

Transforming educator preparation is not a technical challenge. It’s a systems challenge that requires leaders of educator preparation who understand that the future of learning will not emerge from incremental adjustments to legacy structures.

In her latest essay, MLFC Dean Carole Basile explores how the future of educator preparation depends on systems leaders who can align purpose, design and human development.

Read this essay and more in the Educator Preparation by Design series, which outlines how educator preparation can meet the needs of our current times: https://education.asu.edu/designing-education-future-learning/systems-leadership

The world educators are being prepared for has changed, and the role of the teacher educator must evolve with it.

Teacher educators are no longer simply instructors. Their work is expansive, relational and deeply consequential. They are:

• Designers of learning systems, equipped to facilitate collaborative inquiry and interpret AI-enabled design
• Connectors between universities and schools, theory and practice, candidates and communities
• Architects of preparation models that better reflect learning at both the cognitive and human development levels

In her latest essay, MLFC Dean Carole Basile explores the changing roles of teacher educators. Read this essay and more in the Educator Preparation by Design series, which outlines how educator preparation can meet the needs of our current times: https://education.asu.edu/designing-education-future-learning/roles-of-teacher-educators

Registration ends Wednesday! Be part of a timely conversation with national leaders and practitioners on how the youth-serving workforce contributes to driving economic mobility, expanding opportunity, and building more connected systems of support.

The youth-serving workforce — mentors, coaches, tutors, and youth development professionals — shapes how millions of young people learn, grow, and flourish in life. As AI reshapes career pathways and communities work to build stronger, more resilient local economies, how can we better support and strengthen this essential workforce?

The Youth-Serving Workforce: An Economic Engine for Communities Across the Country.
🗓 June 15, 2026 | 3–4:30 PM ET
📍 Join us in person: Barrett & O’Connor Center at ASU, in Washington, D.C. Spaces are limited, registration required.
💻Not local? No problem. Join online.

Register for the conference: https://na.eventscloud.com/youthservingworkforce
**Registration closes end-of-day June 10**

Hosted by Arizona State University’s Mary Lou Fulton College for Teaching and Learning Innovation, a leading college of education nationally, and home to the Youth-Serving Workforce Solutions initiative.

Readiness has long been treated as a threshold: you cross it, and you are a teacher. Before that moment, you are not. Readiness becomes measured by test scores, transcripts or time served, but what if readiness was instead defined as:

• A developmental arc
• Progress measured through feedback and evidence
• A fuller accounting of educator capabilities

In her latest essay, MLFC Dean Carole Basile explores what it means to rethink readiness.
Read this essay and more in the Educator Preparation by Design series, which outlines how educator preparation can meet the needs of our current times:

For decades, education has treated equity as an aspiration — something to be affirmed in mission statements, woven into coursework, or addressed through isolated initiatives. But what if equity were approached differently: not as an add-on, but as a design principle embedded within education systems, in ways such as:

• Creating flexible, work-embedded pathways
• Accounting for learner variability
• Moving from isolation to team-based preparation

In her latest essay, MLFC Dean Carole Basile explores equity as a structural design principle: Equity as a Structural Design Principle | Mary Lou Fulton College for Teaching and Learning Innovation.

Read this essay and more in the Educator Preparation by Design series, which outlines how educator preparation can meet the needs of our current times.

Financial confidence doesn’t happen overnight. It’s built over time. That’s why Horace Mann and Arizona State University’s Mary Lou Fulton College created three no-cost learning experiences designed for every stage of your teaching career.

• Just starting out? Learn the basics of budgeting, benefits and saving.
• Mid-career? Strengthen your retirement strategy and balance big goals.
• Nearing retirement? Plan your next chapter with confidence.

Wherever you are, you’ll gain practical strategies to help you make smarter financial decisions.

Invest in your future today: https://educatorhub.asu.edu/catalog/?page=1&college=Horace%20Mann

We’re proud to celebrate MLFC PhD candidate J’Shon Lee on being selected as a 2026 National Academy of Education (NAEd)/Spencer Dissertation Fellow.

Selected from a highly competitive pool of nearly 500 applicants, J’Shon is one of just 35 doctoral scholars nationwide chosen for this fellowship recognizing outstanding education research. The fellowship supports fellows with the writing phase of their dissertation
J’Shon’s dissertation is Teaching Where You Are: Storying Social Studies Teacher Relationship to Land. J’Shon, who is N’Dee (White Mountain Apache), is part of MLFC’s Learning, Literacies and Technologies PhD program. Learn more: https://naeducation.org/awardee/jshon-lee/

Congratulations, J’Shon, on this remarkable achievement.

From culturally responsive evaluation practices to mathematics learning, recess policy and literacy studies, faculty at MLFC are advancing research that supports education systems built for the diverse needs of learners and educators, not a one-size-fits-all model.

Explore the latest faculty scholarship and professional contributions in our May research roundup: https://education.asu.edu/about/news/may-2026-faculty-scholarship-and-recognitions