STAR Program Co-Directors
STAR (Scholars of color Transitioning into Academic Research institutions) Mentoring Program
In 2008, the Ethnicity, Race, and Multilingualism (ERM) Committee proposed the creation of a pipeline for promising emerging scholars of color who will continue the strong tradition of leadership, research, and service within our organization and who will commit and dedicate themselves to addressing issues of racial, ethnic, and linguistic diversity within our organization and within the literacy field. This resulted in the establishment of the STAR (Scholars of color Transitioning into Academic Research institutions) program—a selective mentoring program for scholars of color who are beginning their careers as literacy researchers. The objectives of the STAR program are to:
Help instill a strong professional stance within scholars of color,-
Increase their knowledge of our organization’s rich history and traditions,
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Inspire them to continue its legacy of scholarship, leadership, and service, and
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Increase the pool of viable scholars of color who have been mentored by our organization.
The STAR program is a 2-year cohort model for six scholars of color in the first two years of a tenure-track literacy appointment who are then matched with senior scholars of color in our field. As part of the STAR program, fellows and mentors participate in a series of mentoring and research sessions at the annual conference. Fellows also present at a STAR Research Showcase session at the conference in their first year of the program and in an alternative session the second year.
Since 2009, the STAR program has mentored ten cohorts of emerging scholars of color who are committed to conducting research on the literacy education and development of students from racially, ethnically, and linguistically diverse backgrounds; who have the capacity to successfully navigate the tenure and promotion process at predominantly White research institutions; and who are active and productive leaders within our organization and in the literacy profession.
Cohort Ten:
2026 - 2028
Jordan Bell
Mentor: Aria Razfar
Dr. Jordan Bell is an Assistant Professor of Urban Education and an award-winning educator specializing in Black Studies, English, and Teacher Education. His teaching and scholarship are grounded in critical perspectives that examine race, culture, and educational equity. Jordan earned his Ph.D. in Urban Education from the CUNY Graduate Center. His research focuses on Critical Race Theory, BlackCrit, Culturally Responsive and Sustaining Education (CRSE), Healing Centered Engagement, and Racial Literacy. His scholarship explores two major areas: developing educators’ and students’ racial literacy to navigate and engage in a multicultural world, and understanding how to create Black Educational Spaces that center Black students’ healing and well-being. Jordan is a recipient of a Spencer Foundation Grant and was named a 2022–24 Cultivating New Voices for Scholars of Color Fellow by the National Council of Teachers of English. His work has been published in leading journals, including Comparative Education Review and Equity & Excellence in Education.
Andrew Del Calvo
Mentor: Cati de los Rios
Dr. Andrew O. del Calvo is an Assistant Professor of Urban Teacher Education at the Rutgers Graduate School of Education. His work explores justice-oriented social studies teacher education and asset-based approaches to civic literacy teaching and learning, with a particular focus on writing in secondary social studies classrooms.
Dr. del Calvo’s scholarship seeks to create a bridge between social studies learning and students’ lived experiences and identities. He builds this bridge by co-designing and investigating learning experiences for teachers and students, using an interdisciplinary approach that draws on literature from teacher education, history education, literacy studies, sociolinguistics, and critical social justice studies in education. His research program is oriented around three main questions: 1) How do early-career social studies teachers develop as practitioners of culturally sustaining writing instruction?; 2) How can youth voices be integrated into teacher education to support novice social studies teachers in learning to enact justice-oriented instruction?; and 3) How can social studies teachers support students in writing civically engaged histories that connect the past, present, and self?
Previously, Dr. del Calvo was a high school social studies teacher in New York City public schools. His experiences as a classroom teacher continue to inform his research program and his focus on supporting teachers in realizing their own visions for justice-oriented social studies teaching.
Amber Lawson
Mentor: Alice Lee
Amber Lawson is an Assistant Professor of Reading and Literacy Education at Bowling Green State University. She holds a Ph.D. in Curriculum, Instruction, and Teacher Education specializing in Language and Literacy and Urban Education from Michigan State University. Her research interests focus on culturally responsive foundational literacy instruction centering children who self-identify as Black, Brown, and People of Color in kindergarten through second grade and creating space for them to use their identities, home languages, and lived experiences that are racially and culturally influenced as strengths and assets to support their learning. Additionally, she supports pre-service and in-service early childhood educators in incorporating culturally responsive strategies into various components of literacy instruction. With two years of teaching kindergarten and four years of teaching first grade in the Detroit Public Schools Community District, Lawson’s experiences as an early elementary teacher play a vital role in her research and teaching.
Yvette Regalado
Mentor: Marianna Souto-Manning
Grounded in her identity as an Indigenous Latina practitioner-scholar-activist, Dr. Regalado is deeply committed to advancing cultural and language pedagogy in literacy instruction. Her research focuses on disrupting and dismantling the educational deficit narratives surrounding BIPOC students in K-16 classrooms. Her research uses counterstorytelling to advocate for student success, restorative literacies, and Indigenous pedagogy. Additionally, Dr. Regalado has 14 years of experience teaching in the K-12 classroom, seven of those years were as a reading specialist and dyslexic coordinator.
Along with her academic endeavors, she facilitates Coahuiltecan language and Ways of Knowing classes and serves as an educator in the Tānko Institute: Xinachtli Pedagogy. Dr. Regalado is dedicated to revitalizing our local Indigenous language in collaboration with the Indigenous Cultures Institute. Moreover, she is a director of curriculum and instruction for Catch the Next, a nonprofit that supports first-generation college students. Her work creates counterspaces that promote a sense of belonging and unity. She is a Cultivating New Voices Among Scholars of Color Fellow, Institue for Teachers of Color Committed to Racial Justice Fellow, and Catch the Next Leadership Fellow.
Barrett Rosser
Mentor: Jennifer Turner
Dr. Barrett Rosser is an Assistant Professor of Teacher Education and Professional Development at Morgan State University. After teaching for over a decade, she earned her Ed.D. in Reading/Writing/Literacy from the University of Pennsylvania. Rosser’s research sits at the intersection of Black feminisms, practitioner inquiry, and literacies. She explores how teachers adopt an inquiry stance to engage critically with their practice and how Black girls use their literacies to practice love in order to inform humanizing educational learning experiences. Dr. Rosser is a recipient of the AERA Out-of-School Time Emerging Scholar Award, and the AERA Shelby K Wolf Literature SIG Outstanding Dissertation Award. Her work has been published in English Journal and Excellence and Equity in Education, and her research has been supported by grants from the Spencer Foundation, the McDonnell Foundation, and the National Endowment for the Humanities.
Thilina Wickramaarachchi
Mentor: Guofang Li
Thilina Wickramaarachchi is an Assistant Professor of Education at Western New Mexico University, specializing in literacy learning and curriculum studies. He earned his PhD in Curriculum and Instruction with an emphasis on literacy education from the University of Wyoming, where he also worked at the Literacy Research Center and Clinic supporting research and clinical literacy instruction. With nearly fifteen years of experience in education, he has taught and supported learners across various contexts in both Sri Lanka and the United States. His professional background includes university teaching, language instruction, curriculum development, and research on knowledge construction, literacy practices, and learner experiences. Grounded in a commitment to educational equity and culturally responsive pedagogy, Thilina’s work centers on understanding how learners generate and interpret knowledge in literacy-rich environments. He is the recipient of the J. Michael Parker Award (2024) from the Literacy Research Association for his work on student-generated funds of knowledge.
Mario Worlds
Mentor: Alfred Tatum
Dr. Worlds is an Assistant Professor of Literacy and Reading Education at California State
University, Fullerton. As a former middle school Language Arts and Reading teacher, his
scholarship explores the intersections of literacy, education, and incarceration. His research
examines literacy practices within carceral institutions and explores how these insights can
inform equitable literacy instruction in K-12 classrooms. He is particularly interested in using
literacy and young adult literature (YAL) as tools to disrupt the school-to-prison pipeline by
fostering critical literacy, engagement, and educational opportunities for Black boys and other historically marginalized youth. Dr. Worlds earned his Ph.D. in Curriculum and Instruction with an emphasis in Language and Literacy Education from the University of Florida.
Jiadi Zhang
Mentor: Maria Paula Ghiso
Jiadi Zhang, Ph.D. is an Assistant Professor at the University of Missouri–St. Louis. Her research lies at the intersection of bi/multilingualism, literacy education, and teacher education, with a particular focus on translanguaging, culturally sustaining pedagogies, heritage education, and critical literacy. She collaborates with teachers and students in both mainstream and community-based educational settings to examine how culturally sustaining language and literacy practices foster bi/multilingual learners’ identities, agency, and academic success. As a multilingual and transnational scholar, Dr. Zhang is committed to preparing teachers to leverage their linguistic and cultural assets, lived experiences, and professional expertise to create inclusive, engaging classrooms that immerse students in literacy practices grounded in critical inquiry and global perspectives. Her scholarship has been published in both research and practitioner-oriented journals, including The Reading Teacher, Teaching and Teacher Education, Bilingual Research Journal, Journal of Multilingual and Multicultural Development, and Literacy Research: Theory, Method, & Practice.
