Ebony Terrell Shockley

Dr. Terrell Shockley is the College of Education's former Executive Director of Educator Preparation and current Associate Dean for Educator Preparation and Undergraduate Studies. Given her international reputation and stellar external reviews, she was also recently promoted from Associate Clinical Professor to Clinical Professor for the Department of Teaching and Learning, Policy and Leadership, the most senior rank in the University of Maryland's rigorous professional track career ladder.  She provides collegewide oversight for educator preparation and supervises assessment, recruitment, school partnerships, and accreditation. During the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, she initiated, coordinated, and launched UMD's EdTerpDialogues to provide a space for the community to engage in discussions about critical issues in online learning, wellness, and social justice. From 2012 to 2020, Dr. Terrell Shockley directed the Master's Certification (MCERT) Program for graduate students seeking an M.Ed. and certification in art education, dance education, elementary education, English education, mathematics education, physical education, science education, social studies education, Teachers of English for Speakers of Other Languages (TESOL), and world languages education. Under her leadership, the MCERT program appeared on the National Education Association's website as a featured teacher residency model: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jfWrNWbdyjs and 100% of the MCERT teacher candidates seeking positions as classroom teachers receive jobs each year. Prior to 2012, she served as a PK-12 educator and instructional specialist as she holds certifications in administration and leadership, secondary science, ESOL, special education, and literacy.

From 2012 to 2020, Dr. Terrell Shockley served as the first Diversity Officer for the College of Education.  As Diversity Officer, she created the COE's diversity website, designed and implemented a robust Diversity Plan, and led several initiatives. These initiatives include but are not limited to: developing and supporting a vast portfolio of courses centering inclusion and social justice, advocating and securing a separate space in the College for nursing young children, leading and organizing a joint event with the Graduate Student Organization on building community, collaborating with other Diversity Officers at UMD to form an ATP and AEP Diversity Charge, participating in the development of policies around climate survey data, and leading in critical conversations (and book reviews) to build awareness about the impact of systemic racism, specifically after the tragic deaths of the late Lt. Richard Collins, III, and George Floyd. She also joined and remains an active member of the UMD Diversity Education Task Force.

Dr. Terrell Shockley researches culturally and linguistically diverse, marginalized, and under-represented learners who identify as Black, Latina/o/x, and/or Native American (BLNA) and their experiences in STEM, literacy, and exceptional education contexts. Specifically, she is a counter-narrativist and STEMinist conducting qualitative and quantitative research on access to rigorous and culturally responsive instruction, counter-examples to stereotypical-deficit-laden performance gaps,  challenges with language bias,  and opportunities for equity in education. She is the author of The Pilot, a children's book and counter-narrative that encourages readers to consider stereotypes of women in STEM fields. Dr. Terrell Shockley presents The Pilot to audiences throughout the United States and abroad in English, Spanish, and French.

Dr. Terrell Shockley's scholarship reaches international audiences. Her international travel and study include Belgium, Canada, Cuba, the Dominican Republic, England, France, Germany, Guatemala, Holland, Italy, Jamaica, Mexico, Morocco, Panama, Portugal, Spain, and Switzerland. She integrates these experiences into her investigations and clinical practice. She is a member of the Comparative International Education Society (CIES) and shared her research on Cuban contexts during a panel presentation with the President of the Cuban Pedagogical Association during the 2017 CIES conference in Atlanta, Georgia. Since then, she has presented her STEM and literacy research around the globe, including to hundreds of educators and the Prime Minister of Education, during the G.E.T. Summit in Kingston, Jamaica, in 2023. As a regular scholar of Cuban and US comparative studies,  she received an invitation to join the Editorial Board of Transformación Journal, a journal published by the University of Camagüey in Camagüey, Cuba.  She is the first and only professor in the U.S. to serve on the journal's board. Dr. Terrell Shockley has presented her research as an invited speaker to the Cuban Pedagogical Association's Conference since 2017 in cities nationwide. She returned to the University of Camagüey for a 2024 presentation and to exchange ideas with the Cuban Pedagogical Association. She is featured in the local news there.

Dr. Terrell Shockley is a member of the American Educational Research Association (AERA) and first began presenting at AERA at the 2012 conference in Vancouver, Canada. She organizes presentations each year for AERA and is the current Middle Level Education Research Editor of The Chronicle and Awards Chair for the Research for Black Education Special Interest Group. In 2016, she chaired a research panel and presented with her colleagues "Let Girls Lead: Girls as Critical Thinkers, Designers, and STEAM Researchers." In 2017, she chaired a symposium with her graduate students and colleagues entitled, "Intersections of Race, Color, Gender, Culture: U.S. Researchers Examining Access and Opportunity in Cuba." In 2018, she invited her Cuban and U.S. colleagues to join her on a collaborative panel, "Dreams, Possibilities, and Necessities in U.S. - Cuba Relations: Language, Policies, Resources, Resilience, Trust, and Position." In 2019, she composed a panel with her colleagues from P-12 and other institutions, "WOKE Educational Leaders in the Era of Alternative Facts," in Toronto, Canada. The paper that she co-authored for the 2020 conference, "Decolonizing the 'critical': Working with stakeholders to dismantle whiteness in qualitative education research," did not occur due to COVID-19. She and her mentees presented via Zoom for the 2021 AERA conference, "A Call to Action for a Changing World: The Positionality of Accountable STEM Researchers." Her research teams presented two different topics for the 2022 conference. The title of the STEM paper for 2022 was "Research as Ceremony. Contemplative Pedagogy and Indigenous Knowledge, A Global, Inclusive, Responsive STEM Education." The literacy presentation for 2022 was entitled "Exploring Academic Spaces for Equitable Practices-Elementary Education Dispositions Toward African American Language." For 2023, her co-authored AERA paper title was "Decolonizing Computing: Centering Indigenous, Women of Color Epistemologies in Ancestral Computing for Re-Villaging." For 2024 - 2026, Dr. Terrell Shockley will serve as a council member of the Middle Level Education Research SIG of the conference.  The 2024 panel that she chaired featured mentees and colleagues, "Showcasing Black Brilliance," took place during the Philadephia, PA AERA Conference. 

In addition to the scholarship that she disseminates via AERA, Dr. Terrell Shockley holds membership in several other organizations. As a member of the National Women's Studies Conference, she presented a paper on a panel entitled, "Not Your Mules: Women of Color in the Academy" at the 2018 conference. At the 2020 American Association of Colleges of Teacher Education (AACTE) conference in Atlanta, she and her team organized a panel, "Diversity, Recruitment, Collaboration, and Resources." She is also a member of the National Association for the Research of Science Teaching (NARST) and was a featured Keynote Speaker for the Maryland TESOL Association conference in November 2020. In 2021, she served as an invited panelist for the Maryland TESOL conference, and, in 2023, she co-authored papers for the Sheltered Instruction Observation Protocol (SIOP®) conference, the International TESOL conference, and the National Association of Bilingual Educators (NABE conference). Prior to membership in these organizations, Ebony was a member of the International Society for Technology Educators (ISTE) and the Maryland Society of Educators of Technology (MSET). She held the position of Professional Development Chair of MSET for four years. Beyond her conference exchanges and conference proceedings, her work also reaches families, communities, policymakers, educators,  and academic audiences, via local news, Maryland Public Television, the Maryland State House, and peer-reviewed journals, such as, the Journal of Negro Education, Pedagogies: An International Journal, Middle School Journal, Reading and Writing, The Reading Teacher, and Science and Children. She received a nomination to the State Professional Standard Education Board from the Maryland Association of Colleges of Teacher Education and Governor Moore's Office. She is now Vice Chair of the Board.

Dr. Terrell Shockley is the recipient of the 2015 College of Education Teaching Award, the 2018 College of Education Service Award, the 2019 Office of Multi-ethnic Student Education Service Award for Faculty, and the 2019 Provost's Excellence Award. In 2021, she and her research team received the Audubon Nationalist Taking Nature Black Award, and in 2022, she was nominated for Outstanding Mentor Award. Referred to as "Dr. E" by her students, she is a Principal Investigator for Provide Educational Access to Research & Learning in GeoSciences (PEARLS), an NSF-funded project for $384,413 to increase the number of underrepresented groups in science. She is a Co-Investigator for the research project, An Efficacy Study of Toggle Talk, an Institute of Education Sciences grant, funded for $3,447,480 to study linguistic diversity in Black communities and schools. She is a Principal Investigator of GAANN: UMD GROW (Generating a Research Outstanding Workforce), a United States Department of Education-funded grant for $447,750.00 composed jointly with colleagues in the Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering.  In 2021, she received $795,651.00 of NSF- funding as a Co-PI of ACT (Accessible Computational Thinking in Elementary Science Classes within and across Culturally and Linguistically Diverse Contexts), collaborating with other researchers from both UMD (Dr. Diane Ketelhut, PI) and Arizona State University (Dr. Brian Nelson, PI). That same year, she helped compose CRAFT (Culturally Responsive Affective-Focused Teaching) (Dr. Julie Brown, PI), funded for $917,755.00 by the National Science Foundation with colleagues at the University of Florida, where they study and support the dispositions of secondary mathematics and science teachers. Dr. Terrell Shockley is the Lead Consultant for CRAFT. Her UMD colleagues, along with scholars at Morgan State University, are awaiting a decision for a $4.8 million NSF award, and she is a Co-PI on a recent (2024) Spencer Vision Award, "Transforming Education Systems: Promoting Teacher Diversity Through Culturally Responsive Pathways." 

Dr. Terrell Shockley holds a bachelor's degree in biology and graduate degrees in Curriculum & Instruction, Reading, Instructional Technology & Leadership, and Minority & Urban Education; she is a proud #HBCU graduate of Florida Agricultural & Mechanical University (FAMU) and a member of Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority, Incorporated ®. Both experiences changed her life for the better. Founded at Howard University in 1908, Alpha Kappa Alpha is the first sorority for Black women. She and other members chartered a graduate chapter in the College Park, Maryland area in 2019 (Alpha Alpha Lambda Omega). In 2021, she received Alpha Kappa Alpha North Atlantic Region's Wilma Holmes Tootle award. In 2023, she received the Alpha Kappa Alpha North Atlantic Region's Silver Soror of the Year. The North Atlantic Region is comprised of more than 16,000 members and 140 graduate and undergraduate chapters in Connecticut, DC, Delaware, Eastern New York, Eastern Pennsylvania, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, New Jersey, Rhode Island, and Vermont. The sorority presents the Wilma Holmes Tootle Award to a Graduate member who has demonstrated outstanding examples of educational advancement in the field of education or in an associated field. The sorority presents the Silver Soror award to a member who reaches Silver Star status and is a significant contributor. Dr. Terrell Shockley is a life member of Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority, Incorporated ®.