Fundamentals of Literacy Instruction & Assessment, Pre K-6

Martha Hougen, Ph.D. is the principal investigator of the College and Career Readiness Initiative: English/Language Arts Faculty Collaborative. Hougen's recent work focuses on improving preservice teacher education by providing university teacher educators with ongoing professional development and collaborative opportunities. She has worked with struggling readers as a general and special education teacher and administrator and as a university faculty member. She consults with state departments, universities, and school districts across the country on teacher education, reading, and special education. Susan M. Smartt, Ph.D., is Senior Research Associate, National Comprehensive Center for Teacher Quality, Vanderbilt University. She also teaches reading courses and provides consulting and professional development services to states and local school districts. Stephanie Al Otaiba, Ph.D., is a professor of teaching and learning at Southern Methodist University. A former special education teacher, her research focuses on early literacy interventions for students with or at-risk for disabilities, Response to Intervention (RTI), and teacher training. She is the author or coauthor of more than 130 articles and chapters. Dr. Al Otaiba is serves on the executive board of the International Dyslexia Association and is the Editor of the Journal of Learning Disabilities.. Suzanne Carreker, Ph.D., CALT-QI, joined Lexia Learning in 2015 as Principal Educational Content Lead, where she spearheaded the curriculum design of a groundbreaking reading program for struggling adolescent readers. Her career includes 28 years at Neuhaus Education Center, a nonprofit organization in Houston, Texas. She co-edited the fourth edition of Multisensory Teaching of Basic Language Skills (Paul H. Brookes Publishing Co., 2018) with Judith Birsh. In 2018, Dr. Carreker was the recipient of the Margaret Byrd Rawson Lifetime Achievement Award from the International Dyslexia Association for her commitment to excellence and advocacy for people with dyslexia. Christie Cavanaugh, Ph.D., is a clinical faculty member in the department of Specialized Education Services at the University of North Carolina Greensboro and serves as the edTPA Coordinator for all programs offering initial teaching licensure. Her areas of expertise are grounded in special education, reading instruction, and oral language development. She has worked with reading research centers and supported schools, districts, and state departments of education to implement practices and develop professional development materials for enhancing reading instruction and intervention at the elementary levels and language development for early childhood and elementary grades. Dr. Cavanaugh has published and presented nationally and internationally on language, reading, and Multi-Tiered Systems of Support. She also serves as an educational services consultant in literacy for CORE (Consortium on Reaching Excellence in Education). Stephen Ciullo, Ph.D., . Dr. Ciullo is an associate professor of special education at Texas State University. He earned his doctorate from the University of Texas at Austin. His research focuses on improving writing and reading outcomes for students with learning disabilities. Dr. Ciullo also conducts research to support the content-area literacy instruction of educators who teach students with learning disabilities. He was previously a special education teacher in New York. Darcy Dycha, M.Ed., began her teaching career in an inner city school in Canada. Working for a large school district, she established herself as a leader in literacy instruction with funding from the Alberta Initiative for School Improvement. After moving to the United States, Ms. Dycha worked at the state level for Texas Reading First and then for the Texas Literacy Initiative. Currently, Ms. Dycha works for the Childrena (TM)s Learning Institute at The University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston as a senior project manager where she researches, develops, and provides professional development for educators working with children from birth to grade 12. Susan M. Ebbers, M.S., taught middle and elementary grades for 15 years before moving into administration, curriculum writing, and research. Her doctoral studies focused on vocabulary development, morphological awareness, and the development of literacy. Her curricular materials are published by Voyager Sopris Learning. Her childrena (TM)s literature is published by Rowe Publishing. Jan Hasbrouck, Ph.D., is a researcher, author, and trainer working with schools in the United States and internationally. She worked as a reading specialist and coach for 15 years and later became a professor. Dr. Hasbrouck is the author and coauthor of several books and reading programs, and her research in reading fluency, academic assessment and interventions, and coaching has been widely published. She continues to collaborate with researchers on projects related to assessment and intervention. Heather Haynes Smith, Ph.D., is an associate professor at Trinity University in the Department of Education. She earned her doctorate in special education from the University of Kansas. She teaches courses on reading, learning disabilities and behavior disorders, and special education. Dr. Smith previously worked in education as an elementary teacher, Ka "12 literacy coach, state and national technical assistance provider, and program coordinator on research and dissemination grants. Her research interests include inclusion, integrating academic and behavior supports and social/emotional learning for students with learning disabilities, and practices to improve courses and teacher preparation. Kristie Hotchkiss, M.S., has 32 years of teaching experience with at-risk populations as a reading specialist. At the University of Texas at Austin she worked as the project coordinator for the College & Career Readiness Initiative and at the Vaughn Gross Center on the Texas Adolescent Literacy Academies project., Natalie G. Olinghouse, Ph.D., is an associate professor in the Educational Psychology Department and a research scientist in the Center for Behavioral Education and Research at the University of Connecticut. She has written publications for research and practitioner audiences on writing instruction and assessment, reading and writing connections, individual differences in writing, and the role of vocabulary in written composition. She is particularly interested in developing reliable and valid writing assessment and scoring methods. Dr. Olinghouse teaches graduate courses in the areas of student assessment, writing instruction and assessment, and academic/professional writing. She also provides consultation to states and districts on improving writing instruction and assessment to better meet studentsa (TM) needs. Dr. Olinghouse has 12 years of special education teaching experience with students with mild to severe disabilities in Michigan and Florida. Joshua Wilson, Ph.D., studies ways to improve the teaching and learning of writing and how automated writing evaluation software programs may be used to achieve those goals. A former special education teacher, Dr. Wilson is particularly interested in improving writing achievement for students with or at risk for learning disabilities. He regularly partners with school districts that are piloting automated writing evaluation, supporting districtsa (TM) efforts to study the resulting outcomes on writing instruction and learning.