Kathleen Collins
Ph.D. Specialty Area: Language, Literacy, and Learning Program. Now, Language, Literacy and Culture Program.
Present Position: I am currently an Assistant Professor of Literacy Education at the University of San Diego.In addition to teaching credential, Masters, and Doctoral courses in Literacy, I am currently engaged in two ongoing research projects. Drs. James Collins at SUNY at Buffalo and Elizabeth Dutro at Cleveland State University and I are engaged in revising our book manuscript, Putting Them in Their Places: What Literacy Teachers Need to Know about How We Position Kids (and Ourselves) for Success and Failure. Additionally, I am working with Dr. Sally Yard, USD professor of Art, and a group of local artists in a project the utilizes a multiple literacies framework to investigate role of the arts in supporting children's literacy development.
Dissertation Topic: My research interests lie at the intersection of literacy, culture, and school achievement. My dissertation study examined the role of contextual, interactional, and interpersonal factors in shaping student performance and achievement. In doing so, it argues against deficit notions of ability. This work will be published as a book, Ability Profiling and School Failure: One Child's Struggle to be Seen as Competent, by Lawrence Erlbaum Associates (release date June 30, 2003).
Prior to coming to the SOE: Prior to coming to the School of Education at University of Michigan, I was a high school English teacher at Potomac Senior High School in Dumfries, Virginia.
What I Learned in the Program: Doctoral studies at the University of Michigan enabled me to take a scholarly approach to the study of educational problems that I had long been passionate about.
