Nonie K. Lesaux, Ph.D.

Nonie K. Lesaux, Ph.D., is Marie and Max Kargman Associate Professor of Human Development and Urban Education Advancement at the Harvard Graduate School of Education. Dr. Lesaux leads a research program that focuses on the reading development and difficulties of children from linguistically diverse backgrounds; her developmental and instructional research has implications for practitioners, researchers, and policy-makers. Dr. Lesaux's current research includes a longitudinal study of Spanish-speakers' English reading comprehension and a study evaluating the effects of academic language instruction in urban middle school classrooms with large numbers of struggling readers. Previous research includes a study investigating language-minority learners' reading development from kindergarten through fourth grade and an interdisciplinary study that examines the interaction among kindergartners' health and well-being, social competence, socioeconomic status, and language and cognitive processing skills known to be critical for reading development.

Dr. Lesaux's program of research is supported by research grants from several organizations, including National Institute for Child Health and Human Development, William T. Grant Foundation, William and Flora Hewlett Foundation, and the Spencer Foundation. From 2004-2006, Dr. Lesaux was Senior Research Associate of the National Literacy Panel on Language Minority Youth and contributing author to three chapters in that national report. In the spring of 2007, Dr. Lesaux was named one of five WT Grant scholars, earning a $350,000 five-year award from the WT Grant Foundation in support of her research on English-language learners in urban public schools.