Faculty in the NC State College of Education are engaged in literacy research, teaching and outreach activities that help translate scientific evidence into high-quality teacher preparation and reading, writing, and English language arts instruction for children in grades K-12.

Meet Our Faculty

Dennis Davis

Title: Professor
Ph.D.: Vanderbilt University
Dennis Davis focuses on upper-elementary literacy instruction with an emphasis on reading comprehension, assessment and intervention support for students when they have difficulties in reading.

Meet Dr. Davis

Jill Grifenhagen

Title: Associate Professor
Ph.D.: Vanderbilt University
Jill Grifenhagen focuses on academic language and literacy learning in early childhood classrooms (PreK-3rd grade) and teacher development and supports increasing teacher efficacy in these areas.

Meet Dr. Grifenhagen

Jill Jones

Title: Assistant Teaching Professor
Ph.D.: NC State University
Jill Jones focuses on teacher scaffolding in small-group reading instruction, intervention for students needing more support in reading, and effective literacy instruction in elementary classrooms.

Meet Dr. Jones

Devin Kearns

Title: Goodnight Distinguished Professor in Early Literacy
Ph.D.: Vanderbilt University
Devin Kearns studies the cognitive and neurobiological basis of reading and to help schools better implement multi-tiered systems of support to increase the literacy success of all students.

Meet Dr. Kearns

Jackie Relyea

Title: Associate Professor
Ph.D.: University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
Jackie Relyea focuses on literacy development of K-6 multilingual students and literacy intervention that emphasizes academic vocabulary and content knowledge development and reading engagement.

Meet Dr. Relyea

Hiller Spires

Title: Professor Emerita
Ph.D.: University of South Carolina
Hiller Spires focuses on digital literacies and related theories and practices that are being prompted by emerging technologies, including project-based inquiry, game-based learning, video as textual production and teacher education.

Meet Dr. Spires

Angela Wiseman

Title: Associate Professor
Ph.D.: University of Pennsylvania
Angela Wiseman focuses on children’s literature and family literacy, with a specific focus on the use of picturebooks and trauma-informed literacy.

Meet Dr. Wiseman

Carl Young

Title: Associate Professor
Ph.D.: University of Virginia
Carl Young focuses on new literacies and related theories and practices that are motivated by emerging digital technologies including social media as a tool for enhancing ELA content knowledge and digital video as narrative text and project-based inquiry.

Meet Dr. Young

How the College of Education Became Literacy Leaders

NC State’s College of Education aligns coursework and field experiences to prepare effective elementary education teachers equipped to address early literacy needs.

Learn more

Literacy news

More literacy stories

Pete Peterson ’26MAT: ‘The College of Education Prepared Me By Consistently Requiring Me to Connect Theory to Practice’

A classroom teacher in Elizabeth City, Peterson came to the College of Education to earn a Master of Arts in Teaching in Secondary English Education. As he prepares to graduate, he is grateful for the way the program helped him to connect theory to practice and for opportunities he had to contribute to research efforts.

Doctoral Student Xinyan Fu Receives AERA Vocabulary Special Interest Group Student Research Paper Award

Xinyan Fu, a doctoral student in NC State’s College of Education earning a Ph.D. in Teacher Education and Learning Sciences literacy and English language arts education concentration, has been awarded the American Educational Research Association (AERA) Vocabulary Special Interest Group (SIG) Student Research Paper Award.

Book Co-authored by Associate Professor Angela Wiseman Receives Award from AERA Semiotics in Education Special Interest Group

For more than a decade, NC State College of Education Associate Professor of Literacy Education Angela Wiseman has collaborated with researchers from around the country with a focus on visual qualitative research methods in literacy research. Now her work, alongside University of Maryland Professor Jennifer Turner and San Diego State University Professor Marva Capello, has been recognized by the American Educational Research Association (AERA) Semiotics in Education Special Interest Group (SIG).

Literacy Courses

Our faculty offer innovative courses for pre-service and in-service teachers and emerging researchers across several program areas.

Browse Our Courses