About Us

Jennifer Waddell currently serves as the Director of the Institute for Urban Education (IUE) and Sprint Foundation Endowed Professor in Urban Education at the University of Missouri Kansas City. In this role, she works collaboratively with Kansas City partner school districts and the community to prepare educators who are committed to social justice and educational equity.

Dr. Waddell has been with the IUE since its inception, first serving on the IUE Program Design Team and Executive Committee during the initial planning phases of the IUE. In 2005, when IUE launched, Dr. Waddell served as the IUE Associate Director and was responsible for the day-to-day operations of the IUE including IUE recruitment, curricular programming, IUE internships and school partnerships, and student support and mentoring. Dr. Waddell served in the role of IUE Associate Director until 2017, when she was named Director.

Dr. Waddell teaches courses in diversity, working with communities and families, curriculum design, effective instruction and teacher leadership. Both nationally and internationally, Dr. Waddell has presented her work around teacher preparation and educational equity in a variety of forums, including a session at the US Department of Education on preparing culturally competent teachers and professional presentations at conferences such as American Association of Colleges for Teacher Education, American Educational Research Association and Association for Educational Studies.

Dr. Waddell is active in research and scholarship pertaining to teacher preparation for diverse communities, social justice education, and diversity and educational equity. Dr. Waddell also serves the School of Education, Social Work and Psychological Sciences as the Director of Teacher Education, with a focus on leading programs that prepare culturally relevant and responsive teachers for Kansas City schools. Dr. Waddell’s faculty webpage contains more information about her role as a faculty member and leader within the School of Education and UMKC, including information about select publications.

A career educator, Dr. Poos is currently the Associate Director in the Institute for Urban Education (IUE). As Associate Director, Dr. Poos is responsible for teacher pathway programs, community partnerships and engagement, and student support. Dr. Poos has experience in both k-12 and higher education. Having started his career in education as a middle and high school social studies teacher, Dr. Poos then moved into school counseling before going into academia and higher education.

Dr. Poos has particular expertise in high school pipeline programming and teacher recruitment having spent the last 5 years involved in GYO design and implementation. As well, Dr. Poos’s research focuses on issues related to the historical and social context of schooling. In particular, Dr. Poos is interested in the history of urban education, urban teacher preparation, social justice education, and diversity and educational equity. Dr. Poos has written and published broadly in these areas and has presented his work around the country.

Dr. Poos has long been committed to work around equity and justice in education and the community at large. Most notably, Dr. Poos has been involved in Seeking Educational Equity and Diversity (National SEED Project: https://nationalseedproject.org/about-us/about-seed) programming and has served on the board of directors for the AdHoc Group Against Crime and currently sits on the board of directors for the Center for Conflict Resolution.

Sara R. Helfrich joined the School of Education, Social Work, and Psychological Sciences as Inaugural Dean in June 2023. Dean Helfrich comes to UMKC from The Patton College of Education at Ohio University where she most recently served as Interim Dean and Professor of Teacher Education. Her research interests include pre-service and in-service teacher self-efficacy related to teaching literacy, teacher preparation programming, and the role of partnerships in teacher education. She is co-editor of the book, Exemplary Clinical Models of Teacher Education and her research has been published in such journals as The Reading Teacher, Journal of Research in Reading, and Reading Psychology. She has presented at conferences for the American Association of Colleges for Teacher Education, National Association of Professional Development Schools, International Literacy Association, and Association of Literacy Educators and Researchers. Dean Helfrich lives in Kansas City with her husband, Chris Hayes, who serves as Chair of the Music Division in the UMKC Conservatory, and their yellow lab, Jackson.