irene h. yoon

irene h. yoon, ph.d. (she/her), is an associate professor of Educational Leadership & Policy in the College of Education. Starting from the point of radical love and critical hope, her research is concerned with leadership and teaching in school organizations that contribute to equity, justice, and empowering learning environments for teachers and young people. In particular, she is interested in dignity and belonging across the interactions of race, class, gender and sexuality, and disability, in both teacher learning and schoolwide cultures and structures. Because her research is relational and collaborative with participants, dr. yoon also writes about "non-traditional" qualitative research methodologies. She and her co-authors have published in American Educational Research Journal, Race Ethnicity and Education, Teachers College Record, Journal of Educational Administration, the International Journal of Qualitative Studies in Education, Educational Studies, Berkeley Review of Education, Journal of Cases in Educational Leadership, Frontiers in Education--Leadership in Education, Journal of Educational Administration, Educational Management Administration and Leadership, and in numerous edited books. 

The link between dr. yoon's research and prior work is developing professional learning and partnerships to best design and implement policies in efforts to achieve equitable school outcomes and learning. Previously, at the Utah Education Policy Center (UEPC), dr. yoon was the project lead for external School Support Teams to schools in Title I program improvement. In this role, she provided technical assistance and leadership coaching on school improvement to school administrators and teacher leaders (such as instructional coaches). She also served as qualitative researcher for the UEPC's evaluation projects and program improvement efforts. dr. yoon started her career managing policy-practitioner-university partnerships for the National Commission on Teaching and America's Future in Washington, DC, and has two decades of experience providing technical assistance and leadership support to policymakers and system leaders in education. dr. yoon earned her Ph.D. in Educational Leadership and Policy Studies from the University of Washington Seattle, and has a B.A. in English from Williams College.