Cantu appointed Dean of Education
August 24, 2006
KOKOMO, Ind.—Indiana University Kokomo has appointed D. Antonio Cantu, Ph.D., as dean of its Division of Education. Cantu served as Ball State University’s director of social studies education since 2002. He started at Ball State in 1998 as an assistant professor of history and was later promoted to associate professor. Cantu introduced the use of electronic student portfolios in the history department, to gather and manage data needed for future social studies teachers’ licensing. Proved successful, portfolios were eventually adopted in all BSU’s education disciplines.
While at BSU, Cantu also edited the International Journal of Social Education, and chaired the Indiana Department of Education team that wrote state academic standards for K–8 history. He has written seven books and curriculum monographs, including Teaching History in the Digital Classroom, co-authored with Wilson J. Warren. Cantu has also written numerous national lesson plans and educational guides for The History Channel’s “Save Our History” Educator’s Manual and the Wall Street Journal Classroom Edition.
Previously, Cantu taught at St. Louis (Mo.) and Arkansas State universities, chaired the social studies department at Ste. Genevieve (Mo.) High School from 1989–1998, and spent four years as a U.S. Army military intelligence officer stationed at Fort Knox, Ky.
As “a teacher of teachers,” Cantu said that he continually draws on lessons learned during his nine years in secondary education. Getting to know students and parents through teaching, coaching athletics, and advising, he said, gave him “a sense of community, which is an important component of any organization. IU Kokomo has that same caring, supportive environment. The focus is always on the students, as it should be.”
Cantu was instrumental in finalizing a three-year partnership agreement between the Division of Education and Sycamore Elementary School in Kokomo, for on-site courses matched with field experience in Sycamore classrooms.
The division’s future priorities, he said, include the final approval and implementation of a new B.S. in Secondary Education and an M.S. in Education. “I would like to see the division provide its students even more rich and diverse field experiences, through partnerships with several area schools and with increased opportunities to use technology, such as electronic student portfolios,” Cantu said.
Cantu’s wife, Sandy Cantu, teaches social studies at the middle school level. Their children—Derek, Dylan, and Deanna—share their parents’ love of visiting historic sites during vacation trips. Family members have collaborated to write and illustrate a children’s “history-mystery” book about the Confederate military vessel, the CSS Arkansas.
