Stella Erbes Pepperdine University, USA

Stella Erbes earned her Ph.D. in Educational Psychology and Masters Degrees in Education and Spanish from the University of California at Santa Barbara. Her 16 years of teaching experiences span both the elementary and secondary levels as well as the public, private, and homeschooling sectors. Currently, she is an Assistant Professor of Teacher Education at Pepperdine University, where she teaches courses in Educational Psychology and Secondary Teaching Methods, and supervises student teachers. Although she enjoyed teaching in the K-12 classroom, Stella decided to begin a career in teacher education in 2002 so that she could support beginning teachers as they entered the world of teaching by sharing practical knowledge gained from her wide array of experiences. Stella’s research interests focus on beginning teacher support, teaching methodologies, and undergraduate research experiences. Her research has been presented at internationally recognized conferences like the annual meeting of the American Educational Research Association. It is her hope that K-12 classrooms and research in higher education can partner together more closely to connect theory and practice in valuable ways so that both classroom teachers and university professors can be well informed of the current issues and trends in today’s schools.