Who We Are
Who We Are
 
SIG Officers
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Matt Omasta, Chair

Chair  5/1/2024 - 4/30/2026 

Matt Omasta is Professor and Chair of the Department of Theatre at Miami University of Ohio. The author of many books and articles related to the arts and education, he has been recognized with the Founders Award from the Educational Research Association; the Johnny Saldana Outstanding Professor of Theatre Education Award, Lin Wright Special Recognition Award, and Research Award from the American Alliance for Theatre & Education (AATE); as well as Teacher of the Year, Mentor of the Year, and Outstanding Undergraduate Research Mentor Awards from Utah State University. Dr. Omasta teaches courses in drama pedagogy, theatre for young audiences, applied theatre, and theory history, literature, theory, and criticism.  Dr. Omasta is an active leader in national organizations and has served on AATE’s Board of Directors, the American Society for Theatre Research’s Executive Committee, and as Chair of the American Educational Research Association (AERA)'s Arts & Learning Special Interest Group.

matt@mattomasta.com

 

Joy G. Bertling, Immediate Past Chair

Immediate Past Chair 5/1/2024 - 4/30/206

Joy G. Bertling is Associate Professor of Art Education at the University of Tennessee and principal investigator on The Data Visualization Project, a project funded by the United States Department of Education. Her research engages with critical place-based art education and other arts-based ecopedagogies including how they can intersect with data visualization practices. She has published articles in various peer-reviewed journals including Studies in Art Education, International Journal of Education through Art, International Journal of Education & the Arts, and Art Education. Her recent research article, “A Portrait of Environmental Integration in United States K-12 Art Education,” was published in Environmental Education Research. In addition to serving as Immediate Past Chair of the American Educational Research Association’s Arts and Learning Special Interest Group, she currently serves as founding chair of the National Art Education Association’s Ecology and Environment Interest Group. She also currently serves on the editorial boards of Art Education and Arts Education Policy Review.

jbertlin@utk.edu 

Sarah Travis, Program Chair

Program Chair 5/1/2024 - 4/30/2026

Dr. Sarah Travis is Assistant Professor and Program Chair of Art Education in the School of Art and Design at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign and a former K-12 art teacher from New Orleans. Dr. Travis uses narrative, phenomenological, and arts-based inquiry methods to critically examine issues around identity and experience and to explore how art education can be an active process of resistance to oppression that is also a pathway for joyful, creative, and collaborative agency. She has published journal articles in Art Education, Studies in Art Education, The Urban Review, International Journal of Education & the Arts, Journal for Cultural Research in Art Education, and Journal of Curriculum and Pedagogy. Dr. Travis is Co-Editor of the journal Visual Arts Research, published by University of Illinois Press. In addition, she is co-editor of the books Pedagogies in the Flesh: Case Studies on the Embodiment of Sociocultural Differences in Education (Palgrave, 2018) and Experiments in Art Research: How Do We Live Questions Through Art? (Routledge, 2024).

 

Brittany Harker Martin, Research Awards Chair

Research Awards Chair  5/1/2023 - 4/30/2025

Brittany Harker Martin (or Dr. Britt) is a seasoned Arts Educator specialized in teaching art, dance, drama, literature, and music, with over 25 years of experience integrating the arts into the core subjects through her process of collective creation. As a tenured, Associate Professor at the University of Calgary (Alberta, Canada), she teaches undergraduates specialized in arts education, and graduate students in educational leadership. As a scholar, she investigates relationships between arts, brain, and mind through a transdisciplinary lens that draws on arts-based methodologies, psychometrics, and neuroscience; while also extending her frameworks on Socially Empowered Learning, Artistic Intelligence (AQ), and Brain Smoothies (her art-based exercises that promote mental health). As such, she is an Associate Member of the Mathison Centre for Mental Health Research & Education, and the Hotchkiss Brain Institute and serves on the Fine Arts Council of the Alberta Teachers Association. Past collaborators include: Stanford’s Gardner Centre, the Rozsa Foundation, Alberta Health Services, Creative Kids Museum, Spark Science Centre, the Royal Conservatory of Music, and Harvard’s Leadership Institute.

 

Mary McAvoy, Secretary/Treasurer

Secretary/Treasurer 5/1/2023 - 4/30/2025

Mary McAvoy is an associate professor in the School of Music, Dance, and Theatre. Her research and creative practice focus on histories of theatre and drama in educational contexts; performance pedagogy and activism (particularly in US labor movements); educational theatre/drama, theatre teacher preparation, and teaching artistry; radical and experimental performance in youth cultures; and arts education policy.

She is the author of Rehearsing Revolutions: The Labor Drama Experiment and Radical Activism in the Early Twentieth Century (University of Iowa Press - Studies in Theatre History and Culture; 2019 Choice Outstanding Academic Title; George Freedley Memorial Award Finalist), the co-author of Drama and Education: Performance Methodologies for Teaching and Learning (Routledge) and co-editor of The Routledge Companion to Drama and Education and Youth and Performance: Perceptions of the Contemporary Child (OLMS). Her articles have appeared in Youth Theatre JournalThe Journal of American Drama and TheatreArts Education Policy Review, and various edited collections. She serves on the editorial board and has guest edited for multiple journals. She has also presented intensives and professional development in theatre teaching and theatre arts curriculum integration in the US, Russia, and China. 

She teaches courses in theatre history, research methods, and theatre teaching methods preK-16+ in both the undergraduate and graduate theatre programs. In addition, she directs the theatre education teacher certification programs and serves as the faculty coordinator for community engagement programming connected with the Music, Dance and Theatre season. She is also a director and dramaturge.

mmcavoy@asu.edu

 

Minki Jeon, Graduate Student Representative

*Bio forthcoming*