Mary Jo Pollman
Professor emerita, Metropolitan State University of Denver
Mary Jo Pollman is professor emerita of early childhood at Metropolitan State University of Denver (MSUD). She received her PhD in early childhood education from Florida State University. A former lab school teacher at Florida State University as well as a kindergarten, 1st-, and 3rd-grade teacher, Dr. Pollman taught for 30 years in higher education and continued her study of early childhood education in Australia, Italy (Reggio Emilia), Japan, Germany, and Canada. She has spent the last 4 years developing Arts–STEM curriculum and teaching children in a primary afterschool program through a MSUD 21st Century College Readiness Center Program grant, a partnership between MSUD and the Denver Public School’s Office of College and Career Readiness. Her curriculum titles include Thinking and Inventing Like Leonardo da Vinci, Art + Math + Science = Creativity, I am a Scientist, and The Missing Fruits and Vegetables. At the national level, Dr. Pollman has been vice president in charge of membership of the National Association of Early Childhood Teacher Educators and a member of the professional development panel of the National Association for the Education of Young Children. Dr. Pollman is a past president of the Presidents’ Council of the Association for Childhood Education International. She is a past president of the Alabama Association of Early Childhood Teacher Educators and the Colorado Association of Childhood Education International. She is currently a member of the National Association for the Education of Young Children, National Science Teachers of America, the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics, and their state affiliates. She has been an Arts–STEM presenter at NSTA, NAEYC, and ACEI conferences, as well as at the Cal Tech STEM Conference, Head Start Region 8 Conference, Froebel USA Conference, and the Rocky Mountain Early Childhood Conference. Additionally, she has been an Arts–STEM consultant and presenter in Chicago Public Schools preschools; Humboldt School District preschools in Prescott, Arizona; and four school districts in Colorado. Dr. Pollman has written articles in the STEM field and was a contributor to the 2016 SAGE Encyclopedia of Contemporary Early Childhood in the area of Spatial Development.
