storyteller.
writer.
professor.
organizer.
facilitator.
Derron Wallace is a cultural sociologist of race, ethnicity, and education. He is the Jacob S. Potofsky Chair in Sociology and associate professor of sociology and education at Brandeis University, USA. He is also a research fellow at the University of Manchester, England. He is the recent recipient of a Fulbright Scholar Award and a National Academy of Education/Spencer Postdoctoral Fellowship. Derron is the author of the new book, The Culture Trap: Ethnic Expectations and Unequal Schooling for Black Youth published by Oxford University Press.
Prior to becoming an assistant professor, Derron worked as a Community Organizer with Citizens UK, as a Special Assistant to the Minister of Education in Rwanda, as a consultant with local educational authorities in London, and as a National Director at The Posse Foundation in the U.S.A. His community organizing work in Britain on youth safety, immigrant rights and fair housing has been featured in The Guardian, BBC Nightly News, ITV, BBC Radio and American Magazine.
Raised in a working class community in Waterford, Jamaica, Derron received his Ph.D. from the University of Cambridge, where he was a British Marshall Scholar and a Gates Cambridge Scholar.