March 2025

The opening plenary at the 2025 Annual Meeting will explore the future of higher education, particularly schools and departments of education, in an era of political polarization when their core functions are increasingly scrutinized and under attack. The opening session will be held on Wednesday, April 23, from 6:10 p.m. to 7:40 p.m. MT, in the Bluebird Ballroom at the Colorado Convention Center.

The session will feature panelists AERA Past President (2020–21) Shaun R. Harper (University of Southern California), Danielle Holley (Mount Holyoke College), Bryan Brayboy (Arizona State University), OiYan A. Poon (University of Maryland, College Park), and Sarah Willcox (Scholars at Risk, New York University). AERA President Janelle T. Scott (University of California, Berkeley) will moderate.

“This opening session is especially relevant and important given the assault on research integrity and academic freedom at the national, state, and local levels,” said AERA Executive Director Felice J. Levine. “The nation’s higher education institutions play a vital role in educating and fostering a healthy, free, and prosperous diverse democracy. How we as a field and as a nation respond to this crisis will have long-lasting ramifications.”

The panelists will discuss how recent federal actions and state legislative bans on teaching critical race theory and related subjects have undermined academic freedom and challenged the core research of many education scholars. Additional information on this session and other major lectures at the 2025 Annual Meeting is available on the AERA website.