Biography

Paul Shaker is a career educator who has served as teacher, teacher educator, and dean in five of the United States, in Asia, and in Canada at Simon Fraser University of British Columbia where he is professor emeritus and immediate past dean. An alumnus of Ohio State, Shaker has sought to advance our social democratic legacy in public schools and higher education through scholarship, leadership and media activism. He has developed and directed independently funded projects such as Friends of Simon, an outreach to immigrant and refugee children that provides university students as after school and online tutors, currently reaching several hundred BC children and youth. Shaker also for six years hosted Your Education Matters, a television program widely cablecast in British Columbia that is a venue for qualified educators to speak on a range of education topics (see www.youreducationmatters.ca) Professor Shaker is an ongoing member of the Great Schools Project, an initiative to help reform BC school evaluation practices, and a research advisor to the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives, Vancouver. Shaker is a fellow of the National Education Policy Centre (University of Colorado/Arizona State University). Shaker has been honored for his leadership by the Association of BC Deans of Education, the BC Teachers Federation, the United Way of the Lower Mainland (BC),  the Association of Mexican-American Educators (Fresno, CA) and Fresno Unified School District. Three institutions have recognized his undergraduate teaching. Scholarly recognition includes his appointment in Kuwait as a Fulbright Senior Scholar for evaluation; the American Association of Colleges for Teacher Education Outstanding Writing Award for Teachers and Mentors; and the American Educational Research Association Division K Award for Exemplary Research in Teaching and Teacher Education for the coauthored book Reclaiming Education for Democracy: Thinking Beyond No Child Left Behind.

Paul Shaker’s writing and speaking center on the application of contemporary theory to education politics and policy and to the enrichment of meaning in schools and in teacher education. He has been particularly active in defending the integrity of professional educators and their values, including as they pertain to self- and social-realization. Shaker draws on developmental and depth psychological perspectives. He works toward education renewal that honors the democratic social contract at the heart of our public schools.