Research Spotlight: Dr. Isela Almaguer
Q & A with Dr. Isela Almaguer, Endowed Chair in Education and Professor in the Department of Bilingual and Literacy Studies
What are your research interests and research achievements?
My research and scholarly activities are deeply rooted in aspects concerning bilingual students such as literacy and biliteracy development of bilingual students and culturally relevant teaching and learning frameworks that empower and maximize student success through counter deficit perspectives. I am also interested in implementing effective pedagogical practices in multicultural education harnessed in the importance of connecting to cultural capital as a learning principle, largely to counter deficit narratives. I am deeply involved in literacy and language issues impacting Latino students and communities. My scholarship is anchored in Sociocultural theoretical underpinnings and an unwavering belief in the principles of social justice by viewing the intersectionality of language, culture, and literacy important to the cultural realities of children, families and communities along our borderlands. My research projects collectively impact bilingual learners such as my Houston Endowed Chair in Education research seeking to recognize intersectionalities that exist within multiculturally empowering teaching and learning frameworks that magnify and extend reading and literacy research and contribute to literature in the field.
How does your work align with UTRGV’s and CEP’s strategic plans?
What resonates to me as a principle goal for both UTRGV and CEP is student academic success. My research aligns to this as it is anchored in implementing effective culturally relevant pedagogical practices for bilingual students’ literacy and biliteracy development and success. It also aligns with the college’s mission of developing multi-culturally responsive and sustaining education professionals who challenge the status quo and serve as change agents who make a difference by promoting social justice, embracing diversity in its broadest definition, and pursuing lifelong learning while leading though evidence-based decision making. It is important that we prepare our students as educational advocates to further impact the future throughout their career. This principle clearly resonates throughout my research and is engrained in my scholarly achievements.
What are your current projects?
Currently I am working on several research projects and grants that collectively impact bilingual learners through effective pedagogical practices and advocacy for ELLs and recent immigrants. My Houston Endowed Chair research seeks to recognize intersectionalities that exist within multiculturally empowering teaching and learning frameworks that magnify and extend the field of reading and literacy research. Another research project is Project SOAR: Spanish Opportunities that Accelerate Reading that is rooted in academic success through identification of existing language cross connections between Spanish and English and which acknowledges continued advocacy founded on social justice principles. I have also sought external grant funding and am collaborating with researchers and colleagues on the National Science Foundation (NSF) Civic Innovation Challenge Grant. Collectively, these research projects significantly impact our university, our college and Latino students and communities.