Donna Alvermann is a University of Georgia-appointed Distinguished Research Professor of Language and Literacy Education. Formerly a classroom teacher in Austin, TX, and New York, her research focuses on adolescent literacy instruction and youth-initiated forms of engagement with all kinds of texts both in and out of school.

She has coauthored and coedited such books as Content Reading and Literacy: Succeeding in Today’s Diverse Classrooms (sixth edition); Reconceptualizing the Literacies in Adolescents’ Lives (second edition); Bridging the Literacy Achievement Gap, Grades 4–12; and Adolescents and Literacies in a Digital World.

Immediate past editor of the International Reading Association’s Reading Research Quarterly and past president of the National Reading Conference (NRC), Dr. Alvermann codirected the National Reading Research Center from 1992–97. In 1999, she was elected to the Reading Hall of Fame.

Dr. Alvermann is the recipient of NRC’s Oscar S. Causey Award for Outstanding Contributions to Reading Research, NRC’s Kingston Award for Distinguished Service, the College Reading Association’s Laureate Award, and the Herr Award for Contributions to Research in Reading Education. In 2006, she was awarded the International Reading Association’s William S. Gray Citation of Merit.