Daily News

Elms College’s Center for Equity in Urban Education Welcomes Tyra Good

CHICOPEE — Elms College announced the appointment of Tyra Good as the college’s first faculty director of the Center for Equity in Urban Education (CEUE).

“I am pleased that Dr. Good, a nationally recognized educator, has joined Elms College to become our first full-time faculty director of the Center for Equity in Urban Education,” said Elms College President Harry Dumay. “In her work experience, she has addressed the persistent issue of learning gaps among students from various socioeconomic, race, and ethnic groups in the Pittsburgh area, and I look forward to working with her to decrease the achievement gap here in Western Massachusetts.”

Good has more than 10 years of experience teaching education, and, most recently, she was assistant professor of Practice in Education at Chatham University in Pittsburgh. In this new position, she is responsible for the strategic oversight and management of the college’s efforts to address this issue.

The CEUE was launched in September 2019 to increase the number and diversity of qualified teachers in the Chicopee, Holyoke, and Springfield school systems. In these school systems, the racial and ethnic composition of teachers is not representative of the students. This area also experiences an annual 800-teacher gap across K-12 schools, especially in specific roles such as special education, English-language learners, and STEM (science, technology, engineering, and math).

Through a partnership with philanthropists, school districts, and charter-school networks, and with a reimagined curriculum, Elms College and Good aim to increase the pipeline of teachers, including teachers of color, who are culturally prepared to inspire the students whom they teach.

“I am elated to be leading the CEUE with students, staff, faculty, school leaders, foundations, and community members, who are also committed to creating educational equity and justice,” Good said. “Through culturally responsive course work and experiential learning experiences, a graduate of the Center for Equity in Urban Education will have expertise in both content and cultural knowledge to teach and lead in an urban setting, as well as within rural and suburban settings.”

Good is the founder and chief academic consultant for GOOD Knowledge Connections and the founder of the Black Educators Network (BEN) of Greater Pittsburgh. The BEN is a strategic team of K-12, higher-education, and community educators working across school-district and community lines to help ensure the academic and personal success of African-American youth from underserved communities.

For her dedication and commitment to diversifying the teaching pipeline and preparing pre-service teachers to work in urban settings, Good has received myriad award recognitions. Most recently, she was awarded a 2019 National Deeper Learning Equity Fellowship through Big Picture Learning and Internationals Network for Public Schools.

Good received her bachelor’s degree in business management from Howard University, a master’s degree in teaching from Chatham University, and a doctorate in educational leadership and evaluation from Duquesne University.