Childhood Studies PhD Candidates

Vibiana Bowman
bowman@camden.rutgers.edu
Vibiana Bowman Cvetkovic has been a Reference Librarian at the Rutgers-Camden Paul Robeson Library since 1993. Currently also Web Administrator there, Vibiana is responsible for bibliographic services in Art/Art History, Childhood Studies, Education, Psychology, Religion/Philosophy, Honors, and Teacher Preparation. She has published journal articles and book chapters on a diverse array of topics, from plagiarism to virtual libraries, from Lifetime television for women to global Barbie. Her books include The Plagiarism Plague: A Resource Guide and CD-ROM Tutorial for Educators and Librarians (Neal-Schuman, 2004) and Scholarly Resources for Children and Childhood Studies: A Research Guide and Annotated Bibliography (Scarecrow Press, 2007). She holds a Master of Arts in Liberal Studies from Rutgers-Camden, a Master of Library and Information Science from Drexel University, and a Bachelor of Arts in Elementary Education from LaSalle College.

Vibiana is the past president of the American Library Association Library Instruction Roundtable; as Chair of Children and Childhood Studies section in the Mid-Atlantic Popular/American Culture Association; and as member of the editorial board for MP: A Feminist Online Journal. In 2005, she was selected by Library Journal as one of the "Library Movers and Shakers for 2005." Vibiana is pursuing her PhD in Childhood Studies to explore the intersection of children and popular culture, believing that popular culture is a social, cultural, and political force which shapes the lives of children and the concept of childhood.

Dianne Fabii
dfabii@camden.rutgers.edu
Dianne Fabii is a licensed and nationally certified private practitioner in Moorestown, NJ, providing career counseling and mental health services to children and adults. She is also the guidance counselor for DeMasi Elementary School in Evesham Township, where she counsels students, develops programs, works with Child Study Teams, and trains teachers, paraprofessionals, parents, and peer mediators. Dianne has also provided counseling and career development services in a wide variety of settings, including adult high school, universities, and individual companies. In prior positions, she served as the Regional Director for the International Foundation of Employee Benefit Plans, managing an extensive internship program, and as Director of Career Development Services for Peirce College in Philadelphia, where she managed cooperative education programs and placement services. She also has experience with special education programs. Recently, she created The Rose Foundation for Children, a non-profit organization that will be engaged in raising funds and providing grants for needy children both at home and in India. Dianne holds a Master of Science in Education and Health from St. Joseph's University, and a Bachelor of Arts in Special Education and Music from LaSalle University.

Her research interests in Childhood Studies stem from her charitable work in southern India, where she has been involved for the last eight years. She is curious about the influence of various dimensions of culture on child development. She intends to comparatively study the development and expression of emotional intelligence in Indian and American children, focusing on which socio-cultural and economic factors may influence the development of EI in children. Other areas of interest include studying the educational, healthcare, and social welfare systems that serve children in India, particularly children with special needs, children victimized by HIV/AIDS, and children who have been abandoned, orphaned, or otherwise deemed unworthy by virtue of the caste into which they were born.

Thomas Holmes
tholmes@rci.rutgers.edu
Thomas Holmes, ordained as a minister under the leadership and tradition of the Progressive National Baptist Convention founded by Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., is committed to a liberating missiology and currently serves as an associate pastoral leader in Beloved Community Church, Trenton, New Jersey.  He has also been a Rutgers University administrator for 26 years, holds a Masters in Public Administration from Rutgers-Newark in the School of Public Affairs and Administration, a Masters in Divinity from New Brunswick Theological Seminary, and an undergraduate degree from Rutgers College.  He has been a past Vice President for the New Jersey Association of Student Financial Aid Administrators, recipient of Rutgers AIFC outstanding faculty advisor award, founder of the SOZO Health Ministry team, and former youth pastor at Ebenezer Baptist Church in New Brunswick. His public policy research has focused on organizational collaboration with social service providers, educators, parents, policy-makers, and the community as a model for increasing parental involvement and academic achievement outcomes for ‘vulnerable urban youth’. As a founding member of the Doulos Agape Group, a not for profit youth empowerment organization, Thomas developed the planning model and wrote the grant proposal for their "Improve the Odds for Children Project."  Through his work with various youth from religious, educational and community organizations, Thomas witnessed how young people consistently used a ‘constructionist approach’ to build their perceptions of reality. He discovered that many urban youth lacked an understanding and appreciation of spirituality, while allowing the dominant culture to contaminate their internalized dispositions and belief systems which informed their collective identities.  Thomas, in his passionate research journey, is using an Afrocentric theoretical perspective and elements of the Bourdieurian framework for understanding cultural and social capital accumulation to explore how spirituality informs and influences the self identity formation of our vulnerable adolescent youth.

Diane Marano
dimarano@camden.rutgers.edu
Diane Marano has been the Assistant Prosecutor with the Camden County Prosecutor's Office since 1982, also serving as Section Chief of the Juvenile Unit since 1985. As Section Chief, she serves as a trustee of the Camden County Juvenile Aid Officers' Association; as a board member of the Camden County Firewatch Program, a group that works with juvenile firesetters; as chair of the Planning Committee of the Camden County Youth Services Commission, and as member of the At-risk Youth Council of the United Way of Camden County. She also served as an instructor at the Camden County Police Academy, and at various trainings through the New Jersey Attorney General's Office, the New Jersey Institute for Continuing Legal Education (ICLE), which provides continuing legal education for attorneys, and a Camden County Bar Association training on juvenile practice. Diane holds a Juris Doctor from Rutgers-Camden Law School and a Bachelor of Arts in History from the University of Pennsylvania. For many years, Diane has mentored Rutgers law students and interviewed high school students as part of their applications to University of Pennsylvania. She has also participated in the Hunter Moot Court Competition at Rutgers Law School as a volunteer judge for the moot court arguments. She finds it inspiring to continually work with students, as they are both enthusiastic and creative.

Diane joins the Childhood Studies program at Rutgers-Camden with an interest in and experience with juvenile justice issues. She is curious about the resiliency of young people in challenged circumstances, both in delinquent and non-delinquent populations. She would like to do research following up outcomes for juveniles after adjudication or waiver for homicide. She also maintains interest in gender-specific issues, suicide, and juvenile victims of human trafficking. The Childhood Studies program, in her view, is a way to broaden her interests as well as cultivate her prior ones.

William Marble
wmarble@camden.rutgers.edu
Currently Director of Early Childhood Education for the Gloucester City School District, where he supervises all aspects of the Early Childhood Program, William Marble has served as a professional educator in a variety of capacities. He has been Assistant Principal, teacher of science, and Director of the PreK-8 curriculum; in the latter capacity he developed and coordinated curriculum with the four elementary districts feeding Gateway Regional High School. From 2003-2006 he was the General Management Chair for the New Jersey Science Convention. He holds a Masters in Education from Wilmington College and a Bachelor of Arts in History from Rutgers University in New Brunswick.

Having worked with children of all ages as teacher, coach, mentor, and administrator, William has become intrigued by the way in which student learning is impacted by social, cultural, economic, and societal differences. He joins the Childhood Studies program to develop a comprehensive understanding of childhood, especially outside influences on children, for the purpose of improving educational practice.

Ines Meier
imeier@camden.rutgers.edu
Ines Meier is currently the co-owner of Smart Apple LLC, an educational consulting business, where she supervises and trains staff to score open-ended mathematics, science, writing, and reading tests for K-12. She both develops tests for K-10 levels and manages personnel and finances. Prior to her current position, she was the Administrative Manager for Overseas Strategic Consulting, where she coordinated USAID funded Public Education Programs, including establishing the non-profit International Center for HIV/AIDS Communication. With an avid interest in both children's health and cognitive development, she is currently working on her Master of Arts in Psychology at Rutgers-Camden. Her thesis investigates the role of emotions in public health messages. If emotions can be viable motivators to specific actions, public health messages could be tailored more efficiently toward their target groups. Ines holds a Bachelor of Arts in Psychology from Rutgers-Camden, and has studied Communications and German Literature at Goethe Universitaet in Frankfurt, Germany, herself a native of Germany. In 2006 she won the Charles Kaden Memorial Award at Rutgers.

For her doctoral research in Childhood Studies, she is working with the Technical University in Darmstadt, Germany to develop a collaborative project. Her colleagues in Germany have implemented a philosophy for children program with partnering schools. One program in particular, "Kant for Children," utilizes Immanuel Kant's principal questions (such as "Who am I?") to encourage children to think critically and independently, as well as to improve their ability to formulate thoughts and enhance learning skills. Ines seeks to further develop this program and implement qualitative and quantitative measures for program evaluation. Not only would she like to evaluate the impact of training in philosophical thinking for grades 5 - 8, but she would also like to develop measures that compare different education systems, thereby better assessing this Kantian approach.

Marilou Rochford
rochford@rce.rutgers.edu
Marilou Rochford is an Associate Professor with Rutgers University, and family and community health sciences educator for Rutgers Cooperative Extension (RCE). Marilou provides a comprehensive education and research program for RCE, with an emphasis on human development, nutrition, and food safety. She has created innovative programming that incorporates nutrition and food safety training into parenting education classes. She is nationally recognized for her work with children and fathers ("Me and My Dad"), and has also focused her efforts on grandparents who are raising grandchildren, tackling bullying (youth violence), and caring for the caregiver. In October 2004, she was named Parent Educator of the Year by Parenting Press Magazine, and in 2007 she earned the Distinguished Service Award from the National Extension Association of Family and Consumer Sciences. Marilou holds a Master of Arts in Educational Administration from Rowan University, and a Bachelor of Arts in Home Economics Education from Montclair State University.

Most recently, Marilou has spearheaded a major childhood obesity initiative for Family and Community Health Sciences and Rutgers Cooperative Extension. She developed, facilitated, and piloted the first Children's Health Summit: Fighting Back Against Childhood Obesity. Under her guidance, there have been eight more successful Children's Health Summits across the state with two more planned for 2007 and 2008. Since 2003, she has presented numerous papers on "Helping Kids and Families Cope: Dealing with the Emotional Impact of Childhood Obesity and Finding Workable Family Solutions." She hopes to expand this research interest in the Childhood Studies program at Rutgers-Camden. Childhood obesity is on the rise in this country and has been identified as a major health threat in the US. As a result, there are tremendous challenges facing children and their families. Parents have been identified as key players, figuring largely in the solution to this problem. Marilou is most interested in the social stigmatization of overweight and obese youth, along with the role of the parent: how parents contribute to the problem, how to address the issues surrounding this problem, how these issues vary through history, and how arming parents with knowledge may be the key to finding solutions.

Lara Saguisag
malasa@camden.rutgers.edu
Lara Saguisag is the author of numerous picture books and poetry for children, including Children of Two Seasons: Poems for Young People (Anvil, 2007), Cat Eyes (Lampara, 2006), Tonyo's Wishes (Milflores, 2003), and There's a Duwende in My Brother's Soup! (Lampara, 2001). She has also published literary criticism on children's books as well as a translation of Bertday ni Guido (Lampara, 2001). With a particular expertise in international children's literature, she has participated in, presented papers at, and studied at several conferences concerning the topic, including in Manila and London. She holds a Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing from The New School (New York), a Master of Arts in Children's Literature from Hollins University (Roanoke, VA), and a Bachelor of Arts in English from the University of Philippines, where she also served for several years as an Instructor in the Department of English and Comparative Literature.

As her creative work benefits from her research, she intends to study the field of children's literature in the Childhood Studies program. She is particularly interested in themes of subversion in picture books, graphic novels, fantasy, and poetry for children. She is also looking into attitudes toward consumerism and colonialism in the institution of children's literature, wishing to examine how consumer culture affects the creation and distribution of children's books. Intrigued by the culture of childhood in her home country, the Philippines, she hopes to research how the child is simultaneously positioned as subject and reader in children's literature. She seeks to eventually aid in the development of programs meant to make literature more accessible to children in the Philippines. Thus the subjects of media, poverty, and literacy will also feature in her research agenda at Rutgers-Camden.

Deborah Valentine
dvalenti@camden.rutgers.edu
Deborah Valentine comes to Rutgers-Camden from her recent position as Research Associate at St. Joseph University's Child Development Lab, where she designed and implemented methods to evaluate the United Way Early to Learn School Readiness Initiative, assessing the effectiveness of innovative methods for improving early childhood programs in the Philadelphia region. In her prior positions, she planned curriculum and trained neighborhood caregivers, teachers, and tutors; helped implement the Keystone Stars Child Care Quality Initiative; directed the Summit Children's Program in the Mount Airy neighborhood of Philadelphia; and directed a satellite program of the Parent Infant Center located in a West Philadelphia homeless shelter. A member of various associations for the education of young children, she has presented trainings on nurturing staff and on children at risk. She holds a Master of Arts in Educational Ministries from Wheaton College, where she focused her studies on urban and African American education and history, and a Bachelor of Arts in Elementary Education, also from Wheaton.

Her research interests in Childhood Studies emerge from her experiences with interventions that improve early childhood programs to better meet the needs of children, staff, and parents, particularly in underserved neighborhoods with non-majority cultures. While quality early childhood environments are critical to all aspects of the development of children, Deb is particularly interested in social and emotional development. Factors such as gender, class, and cultural differences may impact the quality of social-emotional care, especially for those who present challenging behavior patters. She would like to engage in both continued program evaluation and historical research as it relates to early childhood, urban education, and African American history. What is the historical basis of current practices and structures? Deborah feels that answers to this question will serve as a foundation for analyzing the effectiveness of current practices in contemporary contexts. She also intends to circulate her research to the general public and thereby increase community understanding of a field that has historically been undervalued.

Marla DeMesquita Wander
mwander@camden.rutgers.edu
An Adjunct Professor of Psychology at Camden County College, Marla Wander teaches courses in Basic Psychology, Child Psychology, Developmental Psychology, Educational Psychology, and the Psychology of Personality and Adjustment. She has also consulted on the CLEP Human Growth and Development Test administered by the Educational Testing Service, and assisted with teaching Educational Studies and Psychology at both the University of Delaware and Villanova. She has presented papers and published articles on children's memory; recall of words, story structure, and imagery; and structural level processing. She holds a Master of Arts in Educational Psychology from the University of Delaware, a Master of Science in Psychology from Villanova University, and a Bachelor of Arts in Psychology from Arcadia University.

She enters the Childhood Studies program at Rutgers-Camden with a research interest in children's developing cognitive skills: their reasoning, language, and judgment, as applied to life's events. She intends to link cognitive and language competence with wellness-enhancing interventions. How can children utilize their language and cognitive skills proficiently in familiar or unfamiliar situations? In her prior research, Marla investigated the way in which a story script can guide children's understanding of stories. Can story scripts be developed to support social skills in non-story situations? As she values socially relevant research, Marla hopes to apply her research questions to adolescents who are confronted by new situations and challenged by life's transitions.

Caroline Feliciano de Waters
cfeliz@camden.rutgers.edu
Since 1992, Caroline Waters has been a Senior Counselor for the Educational Opportunity Fund Program at Rutgers-Camden, where she advises and recruits students, supervises the transfer process, facilitates partnership with state representatives and career planning services, and both translates and assists with the transition process of Latina/o students and their families. She thus brings to Childhood Studies fifteen years of experience in both program administration and parent collaboration. Before working with college students, she was a Case Manager for the Reach Program in Camden, counseling and servicing Aid to Families with Dependent Children (AFDC) recipients and their families in making the transition from welfare to a work environment. In that capacity, she also translated and referred clients to job training, financial aid, ESL programs, childcare, transportation, and housing, providing a liaison between clients and the Camden community. She holds a Masters in Public Administration from Rutgers-Camden and a Bachelor of Arts in Psychology, with a concentration on Early Childhood Development and Human Sexuality, also from Rutgers-Camden.

She enters the Childhood Studies program at Rutgers-Camden with an interest in researching how culture impacts the decision-making processes of children, and in turn, how those decisions determine the course of their lives in adulthood.

Nyeema C. Watson
ncwatson@camden.rutgers.edu
Nyeema C. Watson is the Associate Director of the Center for Children and Childhood Studies at Rutgers-Camden, where she works with faculty across the disciplines to develop and execute projects and opportunities for research exchange and outreach. She serves as campus-community liaison for various projects from children's book author visits to coordinating Childhood Studies conferences and speakers, and supervises finances and donor relationships. She has been instrumental in building the Childhood Studies academic program by coordinating faculty discussions and curriculum design, marketing, hiring, and admissions.

She was appointed by Governor Richard J. Codey and reappointed by Governor Jon Corzine to the Camden City School Board where she has served for the past three years. Previously was a career counselor at the University of Pennsylvania before becoming a program development specialist at the New Jersey Department of Education where she worked on policies for afterschool programs in urban school districts and alternative education programs. It was at the Department of Education where Nyeema began to take an interest in policy development for programs and services that impact minority, and low-income children. Nyeema holds a Bachelors of Arts in Psychology and Afro-American Studies from Rutgers-Camden and a Masters of Education from the University of Pennsylvania in Psychological Services.

Nyeema is a native of Camden and enters the Childhood Studies Program at Rutgers-Camden with an interest in researching images and representations of minority children and how representations of minority children impact education and social policy decision making.

Incoming Class 2008

Roslyn Blyn-LaDrew

Roslyn’s interests in childhood studies extend far beyond the Celtic realm. She has been collecting children's books since she was a child, and while she was an undergraduate she started adding to her collection childhood memoirs and autobiographies. She is particularly interested in Victorian England, young adult fantasy, childhood in developing countries, folklore adaptations for children, and folklore collected from children. She is also interested in written and visual images of ethnicity, especially from the 1960s and 1970s, as well as, of course, works in languages such as Irish, Scottish Gaelic, or Welsh. As the Celtic languages are currently undergoing remarkable renaissances, bouncing back from near extinction, she is also watching the role of children in language maintenance and preservation. In some areas, because of intensive revival efforts, the percentage of children speaking one of the Celtic languages is actually higher than the percentage of adults. One additional dimension to her background is her own childhood experience living in India, where she was one of a handful of American students in a large Indian school and thus experienced firsthand the plurality of diverse childhoods.

Patrick Cox

Patrick Cox’s strong interest in literary and cultural theory stems from his experience in both practical study with, and theoretical studies of, children’s literature and childhood. He holds a Bachelor of Arts in Cultural Studies and Comparative Literature from the University of Minnesota. In the Minneapolis Public School system, he taught a range of literacy courses over a sixteen year period, from early literacy skills to advanced literature courses. He has written plays for children, including “One Act,” “After the Tornado,” and an adaption of “The Wizard of Oz,” and they have been produced in over a dozen cities. He has also acted in numerous children’s theatre productions and collaborated with children on many playwriting projects in various venues, including supervising the Young Playwright’s Summer Conference at The Playwright’s Center in Minneapolis.

Patrick’s interest in childhood studies encompasses cultural constructions of childhood and children’s literature. He wishes to study how cultural ideas of motherhood and childhood intersect, particularly in the fields of children’s literature, pedagogical theory, storytelling practices, and performance studies.

Anandini Dar

Anandini enters the PhD program in childhood studies with the experience of working and studying about children in India and globally, respectively. She is interested in interrogating issues of policy and child protection, as well as in understanding and recording notions of childhood both globally and specifically in India. She wishes to analyze forms of child protection, whether offered by state or nongovernmental organizations, and determine whether they exist in tandem with the child-rearing practices adopted in the rural settings of North India. She hopes to employ a comparative cross-cultural analysis to answer these challenging questions, ultimately identifying gaps between policies and the sociological realities of children. Her other interests include the children of minority groups and of Indian immigrants in America.

Brian D. Gallagher

An attorney since 1994, in 1997 Brian D. Gallagher became the first person in this country to hold a Master of Laws in ChildLaw. Prior to earning this degree from the Loyola University Chicago School of Law, Brian was the first attorney to earn a Fellowship to study ChildLaw at Loyola, and he served as Loyola’s inaugural Editor-in-Chief of the Children’s Legal Rights Journal. He has published seven articles addressing children and the law in various law journals. His most recent, which he co-authored with Rutgers Law Professor J.C. Lore, appeared in the U.C. Davis Journal of Juvenile Law and Policy in the summer of 2008.  His work has been cited by various courts, both state and federal.  Many legal periodicals have cited his work as well, including those published by Harvard, The University of California, and Vanderbilt. In addition to his degree from Loyola, Mr. Gallagher holds a Juris Doctorate from Seton Hall University School of Law and a Bachelor of Science from the University of Scranton.

In addition to his legal work, Mr. Gallagher has been a member of the Board of Directors of the National Runaway Switchboard, and he has directed various youth groups affiliated with the Roman Catholic Church. For a number of years he served as an assistant prosecutor in Camden, where he handled matters concerning child abuse, neglect, and domestic violence. He spent one year cross-sworn as an Assistant United States Attorney, handling violent offenses involving handguns. He is the father of three-year-old Fiona Danielle Gallagher, and he has completed three marathons. He has been an adjunct professor at Loyola University Chicago School of Law and Camden County College, as well as a guest lecturer at Rutgers Law School-Camden. His primary research interest includes the manner in which the U.S. Constitution shapes the everyday lives of American children.

Jane Shattuck Mayer

Jane Shattuck Mayer has successfully run her own business, More Than Words, since 1985. A freelance publishing consultancy, her company provides clients with a wide range of services including writing, editing, and production of all types of media. She has also taught writing to and coached career engineers, management consultants, and church ministerial staff. She has received two Awards of Merit in editing from the Society for Technical Communications; her poem, "Absence of Fear," was published by the New York Poetry Foundation. Jane volunteers as coordinator of Kingdom Kids, a children's education program of the recovery ministry at her church, and she is a homeschooling mother. Jane is a graduate of Phillips Academy, Andover, and she holds both a Bachelor of Science degree from the Medill School of Journalism at Northwestern University and a Master of Arts degree in children's literature from Simmons College.

In pursuing a PhD in childhood studies, Jane plans to focus on how children interact with books in today’s multimedia culture. She is particularly interested in children's use of literature, especially the subset of gifted/asynchronous children. She plans to explore the questions of whether literature can bridge the gaps between gifted children's internal and external worlds and what role literature plays in twenty-first-century childhood. Her special area of interest is exceptionally/profoundly gifted girls.

Marianne Modica

Originally from Queens, New York, Marianne Modica has lived in the Valley Forge, Pennsylvania area for the last fifteen years. When first arriving in Pennsylvania, she directed a small cooperative play school while developing a bachelors and associates degree program in early childhood education at Valley Forge Christian College (Phoenixville, Pennsylvania), where she has taught for the past twelve years. She teaches early childhood development, foundations and methods, educational technology, and multicultural education; she also supervises college students in practicum and student teaching experiences. Interested in children’s literature, she is actively pursuing writing in the field.

Her interests in childhood studies remain varied, but her experiences in the field of multicultural education have led her to think deeply about racial identity and the changing face of racism in white America. She anticipates dissertation research that will combine her interests in children’s literature with her own writing for children.

Last updated September 14, 2009