RE•CENTER STAFF
Dr. Catherine Kramarczuk Voulgarides
(she her)
Principal Consultant on Racial Inequity in Special Education
She is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Special Education at the City University of New York (CUNY), Hunter College, and is a Faculty Associate at Hunter College's Roosevelt House Public Policy Institute. Dr. Voulgarides is a qualitative and mixed methods researcher, and her publications, research, practice-based work, and career have focused on understanding the relationship between federal disability policy, compliance, and patterns of racial inequity in special education outcomes. Her work seeks to understand the ways in which federal, state, and local disability policies and educational practices both afford and constrain educational opportunities for youth labeled with a disability at their intersections (race, disability, language, immigration, gender, and so forth).
She has written numerous pieces for academic and public audiences related to the topic, including a book on the topic that won a national award from the American Sociological Association's (ASA) Disability and Society section in 2020. She has also published in a wide variety of peer-reviewed journals. Dr. Voulgarides' work has been funded by the William T. Grant Foundation, the Spencer Foundation, the American Educational Research Association's (AERA) Education Research Service Project program, and by CUNY-Hunter College. She has served in leadership roles for AERA, ASA, and the Society for the Study of Social Problems.
She currently serves as PI on a Spencer Foundation Conference Grant that will bring together 18 up-and-coming junior scholars with select mentors to define a visionary future for research on racial equity in special education in December of 2022 to be held at the Roosevelt House. She has a robust record of innovative scholarship related to the historical oppression and marginalization of youth labeled with a disability and educational policy.
She has worked in the field of education for over a decade in multiple capacities, including as a special education teacher, a senior research associate, and a project associate on a state-funded technical assistance special education racial equity project.
Selected Publications:
