About Me

I am an associate professor in childhood  education at Fordham University’s Graduate School of Education.  I graduated Phi Beta Kappa from the Johns Hopkins University.  After teaching in California with Teach For America, I earned a PhD in Reading Education and a Masters in English Education from the University of Virginia.  In 2006, I served as director of the University of Virginia’s McGuffey Reading Center.  I am a prolific researcher and writer; I have written four books and numerous articles in top-tiered educational journals.  I hold over twenty years of teaching and clinical reading experience. 

​I hold advisory roles in the following literacy organizations:

• Elementary Advisory Board Member, Penguin Random House

• Ambassador, Freadom USA

• Staff, The Windward Institute

• Board of Directors, Five Steps to Five

I am an active member of the following professional organizations.

• ​​​Literacy Research Association (LRA)

• International Reading Association (IRA) - Special Interest Groups:  Professors of Reading Teacher Educators) and Organization of Teacher Educators in Reading

• American Educational Research Association (AERA)

• International Dyslexia Association (IDA)

• Association of Literacy Educators and Researchers (ALER)

• National Council of the Teachers of English (NCTE)