Dr. Leah Durán is an Associate Professor in Curriculum and Instruction. A former bilingual teacher, her scholarship sits at the intersection of bilingual education, (bi)literacy, language policy and early childhood education. She is interested in advancing our understanding of young children’s biliterate development, working with teachers to design asset-based curriculum and instruction, and preparing teachers to work effectively in culturally and linguistically complex settings.
Dr. Durán’s work has been published in journals such as Research in the Teaching of English, Reading Research Quarterly, International Multilingual Research Journal and the Journal of Early Childhood Literacy. She has been recognized with the Literacy Research Association’s Arthur Applebee Award for Excellence in Research on Literacy, a Spencer/National Academy of Education Postdoctoral Fellowship, and the College of Education’s Maria Urquides Laureate Award.
Community-engaged projects include co-directing Salas de Libros (an intergenerational literacy initiative based on Mexico’s Programa Nacional de Salas de Lectura) and “We the people”: Migrant Waves in the Making of America” (a summer institute for K-12 teachers).