Dr. Verónica N. Vélez
This seminar explores the research epistemology; rationale, appropriateness, and objectives of critical quantitative work within geospatial frameworks. This seminar includes asynchronous materials to help you prepare for step-by-step quantitative demonstrations in the synchronous session.
Her research is grounded in Critical Race Theory (CRT), Latinx Critical Theory (LatCrit), Radical Cartography, and Chicana Feminist Epistemologies. Influenced and inspired by these varied, but interrelated frameworks, she and her mentor, Dr. Daniel Solorzano at UCLA, developed Critical Race Spatial Analysis (CRSA), a framework and methodological approach that seeks to deepen a spatial consciousness and expand the use of geographic information systems (GIS) in critical race research in education. As a result of this work, Dr. Vélez is featured in the second volume of ESRI Press’s Women and GIS: Mapping Their Stories. In addition, she has published in multiple academic journals including Educational Forum, Harvard Educational Review, The High School Journal, Association of Mexican American Educators Journal, Educational Foundations, Seattle University Journal for Social Justice, Contemporary Justice Review, and Race, Ethnicity, and Education, and has contributed several chapters to edited anthologies. She recently co-edited a special issue in Race, Ethnicity, and Education on “QuantCrit,” a methodological subfield of CRT that troubles the decontextualized and color-evasive nature of quantitative research in education. Dr. Vélez is also a National Academies Ford Foundation Fellow and a Faculty Fellow with the American Association of Hispanics in Higher Education (AAHHE).