Chair
Professor of Educational Studies
Anita Chikkatur (she/her/hers) attended public middle and high schools in New York City and identifies deeply as a New Yorker. Her research broadly focuses on how educational institutions can be supportive and resource-full environments for everyone (students, teachers, and staff) so that no one has to be individually resilient or exceptional. From 2018-2025, she supported federally funded participatory action research (PAR) projects in several Minnesota schools, collaborating with youth, parents, teachers, and administrators. You can find more information about these projects and general resources about PAR here (also available in Hmong, Spanish and Somali). Anita is a member of The Spoilers Collective, a group of academics of color, who produce a podcast called “The Drip” where they discuss books by authors of color.
Anita’s Spring 2026 office hours
Tuesdays 10:00 am to 11:45 pm (on Zoom) and Wednesdays 2:00 pm to 4:00pm (in person). Please sign up here for an office hour slot.
Faculty
Deborah Appleman is the Hollis L. Caswell Professor of Educational Studies at Carleton College. Professor Appleman taught high school English for nine years before receiving her doctorate from the University of Minnesota. She has been a Visiting Professor at Syracuse University and at the University of California-Berkeley. She is the author of more than a dozen books on literacy education, including Critical Encounters in Secondary English: Teaching Literary Theory to Adolescents, (winner of the Richard A. Meade Award); Adolescent Literacy and the Teaching of Reading; Teaching Literature to Adolescents, Uncommon Core; and Reading Better, Reading Smarter. Her 2019 book, Word No Bars Can Hold: Literacy Learning in Prison, draws from her experiences teaching creative writing and literature classes in a high security prison for men, where she has continually taught since 2007. Her most recent book, Literature and the New Culture Wars, (Norton, 2022) examines current political challenges in the teaching of literature. At Carleton, Professor Appleman has taught courses such as Educational Psychology, Culturally Sustaining Pedagogy, and Teenage Wasteland. She was Carleton’s second Posse mentor and has served on a variety of elected committees including College Council, chair of the Faculty Affairs Committee, the Faculty Personnel Committee and chair of the Admissions and Financial Aid Committee. She has served as chair of the department of Educational Studies, and Director and Associate Director of the American Studies program.
Professor Appleman is on sabbatical for the 2025-2026 academic year.
Jeff Snyder is a historian of education who studies the modern United States. His work examines questions about national identity, intellectual freedom and the purpose of public education in a diverse, democratic society. His teaching focuses on past and present educational policy and school reform movements, paying particular attention to how schools serve as key battlegrounds in the “culture wars.”
Snyder has a keen interest in issues of academic freedom and free expression, especially as they relate to liberal arts education. He was a Fellow with the University of California National Center for Free Speech and Civic Engagement during the 2022-2023 academic-year, along with his Carleton colleague Amna Khalid. They focused on threats to academic freedom in Florida, the state at the epicenter of the movement to ban “woke indoctrination” from public school classrooms. Based on interviews Snyder and Khalid conducted with Florida faculty members, they submitted an amicus brief supporting the plaintiffs who are challenging Florida’s Stop WOKE Act.
Snyder is the author of the book Making Black History: The Color Line, Culture, and Race in the Age of Jim Crow. It shows how the study and celebration of the Black past became a pillar of African American life during the Jim Crow era, intersecting with the development of segregated Black schools, the Harlem Renaissance, and the civil rights movement.
Snyder’s articles, essays, and book reviews have appeared in academic journals such as History of Education Quarterly, Schools, and Teachers College Record. He is a frequent contributor to newspapers and magazines, including The Chronicle of Higher Education, The New Republic, and The Washington Post. His work has been cited in The Atlantic, The New York Times, and The Wall Street Journal, among other media outlets.
A Carleton alumnus, Snyder majored in psychology and minored in educational studies. He holds an EdM in Learning and Teaching from the Harvard Graduate School of Education and a PhD in the History of Education from New York University. Before pursuing graduate studies, he taught English to Speakers of Other Languages to students of all ages and ability levels in the Czech Republic, France, China, India, Nepal, and the United States.
Snyder co-hosts a podcast and accompanying blog called Banished, which explores higher education, free expression, and the culture wars.
Jeff’s Spring 2026 office hours
Mondays 11:00 am to 12:00 pm, Wednesdays 12:00 pm to 1:30 pm and by appointment. Please sign up here for an office hour slot.
Dr. Ziye Wen’s research examines practical applications of education technologies to design experiential learning experiences that promote students’ digital citizenship. Her work aims to inform how we can prepare students to become engaged, productive members of society through their engagement in digital spaces.
Ziye’s Spring 2026 office hours
Tuesdays and Wednesdays 2:00 pm to 4:00 pm and by appointment. Please sign up here for an office hour slot .
Staff
Callie graduated from the College of St. Benedict in 2023 where she majored in Social Sciences and Educational Studies and minored in History. She previously worked as an Advancement Associate at DeLaSalle High School in Minneapolis. She is also currently a part of the Event Support team for Homespun Events which puts on art fairs around the Twin Cities. Living in Minnesota all of her life, Callie grew up in Blaine and now resides in Rosemount.
In her role as the Administrative Assistant for Educational Studies, Callie helps to manage the general day-to-day functioning of the department. This includes areas such as logistics, operations, department events, social media, communications, purchasing, and supervising student employees and advisors.