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Sonia Nieto

Researcher, teacher, lecturer, and writer, Sonia Nieto is Professor Emerita of Language, Literacy, and Culture in the School of Education, University of Massachusetts, Amherst. She has taught students at all levels from elementary grades through graduate school, and she continues to speak and write on multicultural education, teacher preparation, and the education of Latinos and other culturally and linguistically diverse student populations. Her book Affirming Diversity: The Sociopolitical Context of Multicultural Education (5th ed, 2008, with co-author Patty Bode), is widely used in teacher preparation and inservice courses throughout the nation and beyond. Other books include The Light in Their Eyes: Creating Multicultural Learning Communities (1999), and What Keeps Teachers Going? (2003), as well as three edited volumes, Puerto Rican Students in U.S. Schools (2000), Why We Teach (2005), and Dear Paulo: Letters From Those Who Dare Teach (2008). In addition, she has published dozens of book chapters and articles in such journals as Educational Leadership, Multicultural Education, Theory into Practice and The Harvard Educational Review, including an invited article for the 75th anniversary issue in 2005. ‘

Dr. Nieto serves as Trustee or Advisor on several regional and national boards that focus on educational equity and social justice, including the Center for Applied Linguistics (CAL), Facing History and Ourselves (FHAO) and Educators for Social Responsibility (ESR), as well as on the editorial advisory boards of numerous educational journals. She is Editor for the Language, Culture, and Teaching Series for Routledge Publishers. Her many awards for scholarship, advocacy, and activism include the 1989 Human and Civil Rights Award from the Massachusetts Teachers Association, the 1996 Teacher of the Year Award from the Hispanic Educators of Massachusetts, the 1997 Multicultural Educator of the Year Award from the National Association for Multicultural Education, the Excellence in Education Award from Boricua College, the 2003 Críticas Journal Hall of Fame Spanish Language Community Advocate of the Year Award, and the 2005 Outstanding Educator from the National Council of Teachers of English. Dr. Nieto has received several awards from AERA, the American Educational Research Association, including the 2006 Enrique T. Trueba Lifetime Achievement Award for Scholarship, Mentorship, and Service, the Distinguished Career Award from the Committee on Scholars of Color in Education (2006), the Senior Scholar Award for Research on the Social Context of Education from Division G (2006), the 2008 Social Justice in Education Award, and the Division K (Teacher Education) Legacy Award.

Dr. Nieto was an Annenberg Institute Senior Fellow from 1998-2000 and she was awarded a month-long residency at the Rockefeller Foundation’s Bellagio Center in Italy in 2000. In addition, she has received three honorary doctorates, one in Humane Letters from Lesley University in Cambridge, Massachusetts (1999), another in Intercultural Relations from Bridgewater State College, Massachusetts (2004), and a third in Humane Letters from DePaul University (2007). She is married to Angel Nieto, a children’s book author and former public school teacher, and they have two daughters and 11 grandchildren.