Innovative Community Group Descriptions

Purpose: Innovative Community Groups (ICGs) serve the purpose of representing members’ concentrations of interest as they relate to the promotion of research, practice, policy, justice, equity, equality, diversity, and innovations associated with LRA’s welfare in particular and literacy and society writ large.

Chair of ICG: Chairs are elected by the ICG members who are also members in good standing. Each Chair shall serve a one-year term and may be re-elected.

Membership in ICGs: Membership in ICGs is open to all members in good standing.

Doctoral Students’ ICG

The Doctoral Students’ ICG works to: (a) support the professional growth of doctoral students who are members of the Literacy Research Association; (b) communicate the interests and concerns of doctoral students by acting as a liaison between the Executive Board and the Doctoral Students’ ICG membership; (c) encourage the active participation of doctoral students in the Literacy Research Association.

History ICG

The International ICG works to: (a) increase awareness of international literacy, research, activities, and ideas; (b) encourage contacts and collaboration between LRA and its members and literacy organizations and individuals from other nations; (c) increase availability of information about LRA to international members; (d) encourage international membership and participation in LRA.

Formative Experiments and Design-Based Research ICG

Formative Experiments and Design-Based Research ICG: The Formative Experiments and Design-Based Research ICG works to: (a) serve the needs and promote the interests of LRA members invested in formative experiments (FE) and design-based research (DBR) as a methodological approach to literacy research; (b) create a supportive, dialogic community of researchers confronting problems, issues, and challenges related to this approach and who wish to share their successes and failures, thus increasing collective wisdom and developing a network of resources; (c) clarify the parameters of this approach toward developing useful frameworks for conceptualizing, planning, conducting, and reporting FE and DBR; (d) develop and promote standards of rigor for designing FE and DBR and in collecting and analyzing data; (e) promote discussions about the fundamental purposes of literacy research, particularly the relation between research, practice, and the enhancement of human wellbeing.

Multilingual/Transnational Literacies ICG

The Multilingual/Transnational Literacies ICG works to: (a) create a community of scholars interested in how people become literate in a second or additional languages; (b) increase awareness concerning the importance of dual and multi-language literacy in the U.S. and around the world among the membership of LRA; (c) encourage interaction and contacts with organizations and scholars outside of LRA involved in research and scholarship on dual and multi- language literacy; (d) advocate research-supported policies and instructional practices that promote multi-language literacies.

Reading Clinic /Literacy Labs

(a) to serve as a supportive, dialogic community of practitioner/researchers confronting problems, issues, and challenges faced across sites; (b) to increase awareness of the many operational aspects of reading clinics/literacy labs, and provide assistance in fine-tuning administration and content; (c) to provide a forum for discussion of current topics and a safe space to brainstorm solutions to problems and avenues for advocacy; (d) to continually create a community of scholars who examine deep issues related to reading clinics/literacy labs, generate research questions, conduct collaborative research, and disseminate findings.