Information
Faculty
Danielle Dennis, Ph.D.
(University of Tennessee)
Assistant Professor
Dr. Dennis’ research agenda focuses on literacy assessment, educational policy related to literacy and teacher education, and teacher development. Her current work focuses on a longitudinal analysis of Florida’s mandatory third-grade retention policy. She is also examining the role of Professional Learning Communities in the Response to Intervention process. Dr. Dennis is the coordinator of the USF Partnership Schools and the Elementary Education Program Coordinator.
Susan Homan, Ph.D.
(University of Florida)
Emeritus Professor
Dr. Homan’s research expertise includes emergent literacy, adolescent struggling readers, and diagnosis. Her current research focuses on evaluating interventions for struggling readers. In particular, she received over $700,000 to study Tune Into Reading. She was the first recipient of the Marguerite Cogorno Radencich Award recognizing university faculty who are innovators and leaders in the field of reading education. In 2007, she was selected to receive the Outstanding Alumna Achievement Award from the University of Florida.
James R. King, Ed.D.
(West Virginia University)
Professor
Dr. King’s research interests include early and emergent literacies, digital and media literacies, text analysis, history of literacy, historical approaches to research, qualitative inquiry, queer theory in educational contexts. His current projects include an examination of early literacy policy in post-apartheid South Africa; the impact of visual literacies on instruction in composing processes; and the effects of online conversion in a reading master's program.
Janet C. Richards, Ph.D.
(University of New Orleans)
Professor
Dr. Richards’ current research interestsfocus on culturally responsive teaching and transdisciplinarity. Dr. Richards has published over 130 articles in scholarly journals and is currently working on her 10th book that offers strategies to promote 4-6th grade students self-regulated writing. She is the Senior Editor, Journal of Reading Education, the 2008 Landsdowne Visiting Scholar, University of Victoria, B. C. Canada, Literacy Scholar, and a member of the International Reading Association's Reading and Writing for Critical Thinking Project in Thailand, Romania, Pakistan, Azerbaijan, and Estonia.
Jenifer J. Schneider, Ph.D.
(The Ohio State University)
Associate Professor
Dr. Schneider’s research interests include writing development and writing instruction, multimedia composing, process drama, children’s literature, and qualitative research methodologies. Her current projects involve the study of multimedia and content-area composing within the context of preservice teacher education field experiences. She is also examining the role of performance ethnography and ethno-theatre as tools for developing reflexive practice.
Nancy Williams, Ph.D.
(Louisiana State University)
Associate Professor
Dr. Nancy Williams earned a Ph.D. in Curriculum and Instruction, Reading and Language Arts Education from Louisiana State University in 1989. She has been a faculty member at the University of North Carolina-Charlotte, the University of Houston, and was the chair of the Education Department of Cedar Crest College in Allentown, PA. Presently, Dr. Williams is an associate professor, coordinator of the masters programs, and advises Reading and Elementary MAT students in the Department of Childhood Education. Her research interests include preparation of literacy teachers and vocabulary teaching and learning. Her work has been published in The Reading Teacher, Action in Teacher Education, and in other journals and books about literacy and teacher preparation.
In addition to a long standing interest in vocabulary, Dr/ Williams’ current research focuses on transdisciplinary teaching and learning, teacher preparation as it relates to literacy, and affective accountability.