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Faculty
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Liane Brouillette
Associate Professor
Department of Education
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Biography
Dr. Brouillette holds a Ph.D. in the Social Foundations of Education from the University of Colorado, Boulder, and a B.A. in Philosophy from Rice University. Her research interests include school reform and the distinctive nature of learning in the arts and humanities. Among her areas of expertise are qualitative and field-based research methods.
Recent Projects:
Charter Schools: Lessons in School Reform is an intensive study of seven schools in three states that looks at challenges school founders encountered, both in initiating their schools and in creating a school culture in keeping with their original goals. The focus of this study (results were published in book form by Lawrence Erlbaum Associates in 2002) is on the day-to-day struggles of those involved in starting a new school, as well as the differing organizational dynamics of teacher-founded, parent-founded, and institutionally-sponsored charter schools. Links between the charter school movement and earlier school reform initiatives are explored.
Geology of School Reform (SUNY Press, 1996) provided a look at how successive waves of reform have interacted within a single school district. The Cottonwood School District, comprised of two rural schoolhouses in the early 1950s, is followed through the exuberant experimentation in the 1960s (when Cottonwood was one of the fastest growing districts in the United States); the back-to-basics reforms of the 1970s; the ground-breaking years of the 1980s (when Cottonwood became a pioneer in the use of whole language and site-based decision making). Situating the district within its historical and social context,this study pointed to key factors that determined how each wave of reform was received.
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