Professor Emeritus

Judi Fonzi brings extensive experience as a teacher, teacher educator, and researcher to the Warner School. Her research focuses on systemic reform, professional development, and teacher leadership. She has served as the principal investigator for a $3 million National Science Foundation (NSF) funded project, Preparing Highly Qualified STEM Teacher Leaders for Urban Schools, which aims to increase mathematics and science leadership capacity in the Rochester City School District.

Fonzi has also served as co-principal investigator for a $1.95 million U.S. Department of education funded project, Western New York Collaboration for ELL Success (Project CELLS), through which the Warner School partners with the Mid-West Regional Bilingual Education Resource Network, the Rochester City School District, and Monroe 2-Orleans, Wayne-Finger Lakes and Genesee Valley BOCES to increase the number of highly qualified teachers certified in Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages (TESOL). In addition, Project CELLs provides professional development to K-12 teachers, counselors and administrators to support ELL student achievement.

Fonzi has been published in several professional journals, including the National Science Foundation, Journal of American Geriatrics Society, Journal of Deaf Studies and Deaf Education Advance Access, Journal of Mathematics Teacher Education, and the Journal of Research in Mathematics Education.

Lucia French joined the Warner faculty in 1982 as a developmental psychologist investigating language development, learning, and cognition. Her research explores the relationship between language and cognitive development during the preschool years, with emphasis on the roles of social interaction and prior knowledge. French previously directed the certification program in early childhood education at the Warner School.

French, a former Spencer Fellow, is the author of Young Children's Understanding of Relational Terms: Some ifs, ors, and buts (Springer-Vertag, 1985). She has also published more than 30 articles in research journals and other articles in publications for early childhood educators.

Based on her research, French has developed a science-based preschool curriculum to foster language development, learning, cognition, and school readiness. The ScienceStart! curriculum capitalizes on children’s natural curiosity about the world around them to build the cognitive and social skills and knowledge needed for healthy development and academic success. She is engaged in numerous projects in the community to develop, field-test, and expand the curriculum, with funding from the National Science Foundation and the United States Department of Education. French’s groundbreaking work, on which she has collaborated extensively with doctoral students, has been featured in Education Week.

Logan Hazen served as a professor in the Warner School’s higher education program for 14 years. His responsibilities included teaching courses in higher education, serving as the program director for higher education, establishing and supervising higher education internships, advising higher education master’s and doctoral students, and recruiting adjunct faculty for the higher education program. He also served as the Warner School’s director of student services for six years.

Prior to joining the Warner School faculty, he spent nearly three decades in senior-level student affairs positions. Following leadership positions in the west, including at the University of Southern California for eight years, Hazen spent 17 years leading the University of Rochester’s residential living programs. Professionally, he has been involved in the leadership at local, regional, and national levels for a variety of student affairs professional organizations. He helped found and led two national higher education-based technology organizations.

Hazen taught at the graduate and undergraduate levels at Western Washington University, the University of Southern California, Canisius College, and the University of Rochester. His graduate teaching interests included introduction to student affairs administration; issues in student affairs and higher education; residential life in student affairs and the university; student affairs administration; and “how universities work.” He advised more than 180 master’s thesis projects each year, advised or co-advised five program evaluation doctoral dissertation cohorts, and served as an independent chair, committee member, or advisor for more than 60 successful doctoral dissertations.

His research and practice interests included the impact of residential living on student development; alcohol use, knowledge, and behavior in college women; residential student alcohol use and abuse; the impact of technology on college student development and community; measurement of student satisfaction with college residential living experiences; the administration of residential life and student affairs; and the integration of student and academic affairs. He has a continuing interest on the master’s and doctoral graduate experience and critical support services.

Frederick Jefferson is a behavioral scientist who serves as the University Intercessor and has extensive experience in the teaching and practice of organizational change, with an emphasis on understanding the influence of human diversity on the change process. He consults with individuals and groups and conducts training on a wide variety of topics. They include: managing diversity, integrating affective and cognitive education and clarifying values taught in classrooms, developing theoretical and teaching models for enhancing positive identity development among Black youth and young adults, and anti-racism and anti-sexism.

Jefferson joined the University of Rochester in 1973, serving first as director of the department of special student services and the educational opportunity program and later as assistant to the president for university and community affairs. He joined the Warner School faculty in 1985 and served as director of the institute for urban schools and education from 1996 to 1999.

He is the recipient of several awards for his service to the community, among which are the James McCuller Award for Excellence sponsored by Action for a Better Community, Inc. (1995), and the Hannah G. Solomon Humanitarian Award made by the National Council of Jewish Women, Rochester, New York (1989). His extensive community involvement ranges from serving on the board of directors of the American Red Cross to participating in the planning and administration of the Gateways Music Festival, an annual event that showcases the talents of Eastman School of Music musicians who are members of minority groups.

Howard Kirschenbaum joined the faculty of the Warner School in 1997 and chaired the Department of Counseling and Human Development from 2000-06. He has taught secondary English and history; undergraduate and graduate courses in educational psychology, counseling and human relations; and education and psychology at Temple University, the New School for Social Research, and SUNY Brockport. He had given presentations and workshops around the U.S. and in 14 foreign countries.

Kirschenbaum is the author of 25 volumes on a variety of subjects and has been a national and international leader in the fields of values and character education, humanistic education, and Carl Rogers and the person-centered approach to counseling and psychotherapy. His books include the definitive biography, The Life and Work of Carl Rogers (American Counseling Assn., 2009), Values Clarification in Counseling and Psychotherapy (Oxford Univ. Press, 2013), Wad-Ja-Get? The Grading Game in American Education, 50th Anniversary Edition (Univ. of Michigan Press, 2020), and his newest work: Coming of Age in the Baby Boom: A Memoir of Personal Development, Social Action, Education Reform and Adirondack Preservation (Kindle Direct Publishing, 2020).   

Website

Tyll van Geel joined the University faculty in 1972 and later was named the Earl B. Taylor Professor and chair of Educational Leadership. He was named an Emeritus Professor in 2007. His research includes legal and applied ethical issues in education.

Van Geel is the co-author of A Teacher's Guide to Education Law (Routledge, 4th. ed., 2010), a book that provides a concise introduction to topics in education law that are most relevant to teachers. He is also co-author of Educational Law: An Introduction for Administrators and Policy Makers (Lawrence Erlbaum, 2nd ed., 2000), a popular textbook used in the preparation of education leaders and a very accessible resource for the modern educational administrator. He also authored Understanding Supreme Court Opinions (Longman, 6th ed., 2008) and numerous articles and chapters in publications for the academic and legal communities, as well as for professional educators. He is currently working on a book on democracy and education.

Van Geel is leading a project, funded by the Dewitt-Wallace Reader’s Digest Foundation, to strengthen decision-making as a critical component of educational leadership training. He is a former Guggenheim Fellow, Spencer Fellow, and Fulbright-Hays Fellow. He is also an attorney.