Mica Pollock

Associate Professor of Education

Profile

Mica Pollock, an anthropologist of education, studies how youth and adults discuss and address everyday issues of diversity and opportunity in schools. In each research project, Pollock offers stakeholders concrete recommendations for working together more successfully. Pollock’s first book, Colormute: Race Talk Dilemmas in an American School (winner of the 2005 AERA Outstanding Book Award) helped readers understand and navigate six core American struggles over talking (and not talking) in racial terms in schools. Pollock's next book, Because of Race: How Americans Debate Harm and Opportunity in Our Schools (2008), examined four pervasive debates over the opportunities provided students of color in U.S. schools, and proposed ways of pursuing educational opportunity more successfully. To further assist educator inquiry, Pollock organized 70 scholars to create a professional development tool entitled Everyday Antiracism: Getting Real about Race in School (2008), which invites educators to discuss and evaluate concrete strategies for navigating the race issues that arise routinely in classrooms and schools. Winner of a 2008 Outstanding Book Award from the Gustavus Myers Center, Everyday Antiracism is being used to spark positive educator inquiry in schools and districts across the country. Pollock is now working with educators, families, young people, and technology experts to pilot The OneVille Project, which will support entire cities (beginning with Somerville, MA) in real time, fine-grained inquiry into ways of improving young people’s everyday educational experiences. Finally, Pollock is designing a virtual Center that will use new media to empower the public to explore everyday ways of increasing young people’s local opportunities to learn. Pollock previously taught high school in California and worked in the U.S. Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights. She is a grateful parent of two, and an avid cellist.

Degrees

• Ph.D., Stanford University