The University of Maryland recently announced that 82 projects across campus will receive a total of $5.25 million through the university’s new set of Research Resilience Initiatives. Eight College of Education projects are among the awardees, receiving a total of $409,079.
The Research Resilience Initiatives position UMD’s research enterprise for sustainable future growth, as the evolving federal funding landscape has created challenges for the UMD community, including terminated or paused contracts and grants, as well as near- and long-term uncertainty about future funding prospects. The awards are funded by both UMD and the University of Maryland Strategic Partnership: MPowering the State, a collaboration between UMD and the University of Maryland, Baltimore (UMB).
The awards were presented through two programs and a total of five tracks. College of Education faculty, students and centers received awards in all five tracks.
The Preserve, Pivot & Grow Program has two tracks, for strategic institutional investments, and faculty members and lab groups. The first track supports at-risk institutional capabilities that are essential to UMD’s research and education missions, as well as institutional initiatives seeking to pivot to new and sustainable sources of funding. This track issued seven awards totaling $2.4 million across six colleges. The second track provides short-term funding to enable a principal investigator and/or lab group members to sustain operations impacted by a loss or reduction of funding, or pivot their portfolio to better position them for new and sustainable funding sources. This track funded 18 projects with $900,000 across eight colleges.
In addition, the MPower Early Scholars Investment Fund has three distinct funding tracks for new scholars (junior tenure-track faculty, graduate students and postdoctoral fellows) from disciplines impacted by the evolving federal funding environment. The fund provides short-term, high-impact support to protect emerging researchers and sustain the scholar pipeline, strengthen Maryland’s research future, preserve institutional competitiveness and reinforce UMB-UMD collaboration. A total of $1 million was awarded to 20 junior tenure-track faculty across nine colleges, $750,000 to 31 graduate students across seven colleges and $225,000 to six postdoctoral fellows across five colleges.
The following College of Education faculty, students and centers received Research Resilience awards.
Preserve, Pivot & Grow Program: Strategic Institutional Investments
The UMD School Improvement Network 2026 ($106,845)
The Center for Educational Innovation and Improvement
The UMD School Improvement Network 2026 leverages the Center for Educational Innovation and Improvement’s faculty expertise in improvement science and applied school system leadership to bridge the gap between research and K-12 practice and empower regional education leaders to systematically address education challenges. The Network 2026 members receive access to a number of professional learning opportunities including webinars, workshops, courses, microcredentials, the School Improvement Leadership Academy, the Central Office Leadership Academy and more.
Preserve, Pivot & Grow Program: Faculty Members and Lab Groups
Utilizing Artificial Intelligence to Create Inclusive Classrooms ($35,000)
Melanie Killen, Distinguished University Professor
This award will fund the completion of an artificial intelligence (AI)-powered Teacher App to provide teachers with immediate feedback and coaching regarding their teaching strategies to promote students’ social and moral reasoning. The app supports teachers as they implement Reflect2Engage, a school-based program Killen and her team developed for creating inclusive classrooms. Through the program, children ages 8-11 watch online peer inclusion scenarios, followed by a teacher-led classroom discussion. The team plans to distribute the program to schools within and beyond Maryland.
MPower Early Scholars Investment Fund: Junior Tenure-Track Faculty
Piloting a Routine-Based “Choose Your Own Adventure” Math Intervention for Latino Families ($50,000)
Jimena Cosso, assistant professor
Through a series of structured co-design sessions, Latino families of preschool-aged children will actively contribute to shaping the content, format and cultural relevance of a bilingual math toolkit, ensuring that activities reflect their everyday routines, language practices and lived experiences. This collaborative development process prioritizes families as knowledge holders and designers, resulting in materials that are both culturally responsive and practically usable. The co-designed toolkit will serve as the foundation for a family-centered math intervention (“Choose Your Own Adventure,”) providing a scalable, adaptable model for supporting early math learning in home contexts.
Promotive Experiences that Support Early Neurodevelopment and Learning ($50,000)
Rachel Romeo, assistant professor
This award will support the completion of a longitudinal study of preschoolers’ linguistic, cognitive and brain development, aiming to understand mechanisms of risk and resilience embedded in children’s early experiences. It will also help pilot a novel neuroimaging add-on to an existing intervention study with families with infants, generating pilot data to better understand promotive experiences that enhance well-being in early childhood development.
Rest and Restoration Among Graduate Students of Color in Higher Education and Student Affairs Programs ($50,000)
Christopher Travers, assistant professor
Inspired by Tricia Hersey’s 2022 book, “Rest is Resistance: A Manifesto,” this research project explores how graduate students of color in higher education and student affairs programs engage in rest and restorative practices amidst the demands of the academy and grind culture in student affairs.
Supporting Bilingual Emotional Literacy for Spanish-Speaking Bilingual Infants and Toddlers with Disabilities in Early Intervention ($50,000)
Veronica Kang, assistant professor of special education
This project will pilot a tiered professional development model for early intervention providers to support behavior and social-emotional development of bilingual toddlers with developmental delays or disabilities. This award will enable collaboration with Vanderbilt University to adapt Toddler Talk, an evidence-based social-emotional and language support model, as well as partnerships with 100 providers and 20 community group session leaders in Maryland to co-develop, fine-tune and validate parent coaching materials and observation measures.
MPower Early Scholars Investment Fund: Graduate Students
Supporting When Not Supported: Teachers Navigating Education for Refugees in Uganda ($29,734)
Pascal Andebo, Ph.D. candidate in international education policy
Teachers of refugees play critical roles as educators, counselors, mentors and motivators. Yet teachers working with refugees in low- and middle-income countries, where over 70% of the world’s refugees live, often work under precarious conditions with limited or no support. Their voices are also largely absent from research and policymaking. How do these teachers support their learners while receiving limited or no support themselves? This study investigates this issue in Uganda, which hosts about 1.9 million refugees, and aims to reinforce teachers’ voices and actions.
MPower Early Scholars Investment Fund: Postdoctoral Fellows
From Beliefs to Outcomes: How Latine Caregiver Attitudes About Bilingualism Shape Dual Language Learners’ School Readiness ($37,500)
Alexus Rodriguez, postdoctoral associate
This project investigates how Latine caregivers’ attitudes toward bilingualism shape their home language practices, and in turn, their preschoolers’ language and executive functioning. Findings will inform evidence-based guidance to combat misinformation about bilingual development and support Spanish-English dual language learners in reaching their full academic potential.
