Josh Goldman

Josh Goldman's thinking, as well as his academic pursuits, synthesizes his twin commitments to education and to social justice. The former was honed as a master's student in Peabody's elementary education program. He says he got the latter from his parents. "My mom taught Head Start and helped administer a community art center, and my father, who's a law professor, has always been involved in social causes. My temple is also big on social justice."

Goldman's personal role models include Cornell West, Abraham Joshua Heschel, and Goldman's rabbi, Susan Talve. The Hebrew phrase, tikkun olam, meaning, "healing the broken world," looms large in his own vision for social justice.

Josh grew up in St. Louis, received his bachelor's degree in philosophy and theology from St. Louis University in 2000, and headed for Nashville and Vanderbilt. After receiving his M.Ed. in education with teacher licensure from Peabody in 2002, he returned to St. Louis where he taught at the Forsythe School for a year before pursuing a second master's degree at Washington University's George Warren Brown School of Social Work.

In 2003, Josh started a summer reading program for at-risk students in St. Louis's Adams Elementary School. The program has now grown to include after-school and weekends, as well as summer. The program, called Succeeding with Reading, serves 85 low-income students and is staffed by professional teachers who use literacy improvement plans and lots of individual attention to boost reading skills. The program also gives students new books to take home and is currently giving away 4,000 new books each year.

Josh's commitment to integrating education with social justice remains firm. Succeeding with Reading has expanded to include seven schools in the Access Academies system and Josh is working on introducing the program to St. Louis public schools.

"We've seen test scores rise," he says, "and we are expanding the program to include math as well."

In the meantime, he relishes the experiences of his last several years, which he describes as "intense yet transformative." The same could be said of the experiences he hopes to offer to others.

Joshua Goldman

• M.Ed., Elementary Education, 2002
• Current Title: Director, Succeeding with Reading, Access Academies; St. Louis, MO
• Favorite Peabody Memory: "Long conversations with my professors--a few of whom I am still in contact with."