Misty Sato Ph.D., assistant professor in Curriculum and Instruction and Tim Lensmire Ph.D., associate professor in Curriculum and Instruction, have just published an article in the January 2009 edition of Phi Delta Kappan titled "Poverty and Payne: Supporting teachers to work with children of poverty." Kappan is the professional education journal of Phi Delta Kappa, a professional education organization of more than 50,000 members worldwide. The article grew out of a talk given through the Department of Curriculum & Instruction Diversity Dialogue series.

Sato & Lensmire argue that the work of Ruby Payne, who published a widely-used book about teaching children of poverty (a book frequently referenced by educators in Minnesota), is based on deficit thinking about children and their capacity to learn and relies on a model of teacher professional development that will not bring about the changes we need in classroom teaching. Ruby Payne provides a response to their criticisms.