Anti-Bias Education: About the Authors

Louise Derman-Sparks is an internationally respected anti-bias educator. Author (with the ABC Task Force) of Anti-Bias Curriculum: Tools for Empowering Young Children, the original edition of the current volume, she has coauthored additional books with Dr. Carol Brunson Day and Dr. Patricia Ramsey. Derman-Sparks and Olsen Edwards (along with Ramsey) have also coauthored What If All the Kids Are White? (new edition being released April 2011). She speaks throughout the United States and abroad. Louise has a lifelong commitment to building a more just society for all people. Her children Douglass and Holly, now grown, were her inspiration. A Pacific Oaks College faculty member for 33 years--when its mission and pedagogy reflected anti-bias education principles--Louise is retired. She served on the NAEYC Governing Board during 1998-2001.

Julie Olsen Edwards began her early childhood education career working as a family child care provider as a way to stay home with her new baby. She went on to work for Head Start, teach in private and public preschools and parent cooperatives, and teach kindergarten and reading in elementary schools, and work with the community teen mother program. For 38 years, Julie was on the faculty of Cabrillo College's early childhood education department, served as program chair, and was founding director of the campus Children's Center. A lifetime activist for children and families, she continues to write, teach, and consult on issues of equity, diversity, and anti-bias; emerging literacy; and family life and empowerment. She served on the NAEYC Governing Board during 2003-2007.In addition to Anti-Bias Education, she has also coauthored What If All the Kids Are White? with Derman-Sparks and Dr. Patricia Ramsey. For more information, visit Julie Olsen Edwards.

 Contributor

Merrie Najimy teaches math and science in primary school in Concord, MA. She began teaching elementary school in 1991 and is dedicated to integrating anti-bias, multi-cultural education into her daily curriculum and interactions with children. She has been a teacher trainer through programs such as Peacable Schools and the SEED project. She has served as a building rpesentative and president of her local teachers union, the Conocrd Teachers Association, and as president of the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee.