Professional Biography
Christopher G. Pupik Dean is a Senior Fellow in the Teaching, Learning, and Leadership Division and the Director of the Urban Teaching Apprenticeship Program. In addition to his role as a program director, Dr. Pupik Dean is a Co-PI on a large research project focused on studying the impact of an innovative design for teacher learning on teachers' capacity to lead project-based classroom instruction. He also teaches in the Mid-Career Doctoral Program in Educational Leadership and teaches courses on ethics in education.
Dr. Pupik Dean earned his bachelor’s degree in Education, Theory, and Policy from the Pennsylvania State University’s Schreyer Honors College and his master’s degree and Ph.D. in Education, Culture, and Society from the University of Pennsylvania. Before enrolling at Penn GSE, Dr. Pupik Dean taught 9–12 science in Henderson and Durham, North Carolina.
Research Interests and Current Projects
Dr. Pupik Dean’s research interests focus on teacher education, citizenship education, and ethics. His current research focus is on a study of teacher learning around the Core-Practices of Project-Based Learning. This study focuses on understanding the learning experiences that teachers encounter through their engagement in Penn GSE’s Project-Based Learning certificate program. His work on this topic has appeared in Phi Delta Kappan (2019). Dr. Pupik Dean also studies citizenship education and questions of ethics. Recent work in this area has focused on the role of the humanities in human development and an effort to uncover the implicit learning theories that guide humanists in their educational practice. His work on this topic has been reported in the Teachers College Record (2020).
Selected Publications
