Heidi Anne E. Mesmer

Heidi Anne E. Mesmer, Ph.D., is a Professor in Literacy in the School of Education at Virginia Tech. She has studied beginning reading materials, text difficulty, and struggling readers since 1999. Her research has appeared in Reading Research Quarterly, The Educational Researcher, Elementary School Journal, and Early Childhood Research Quarterly. She has written and directed eight grants aimed at improving reading instruction in K-5 classrooms. Dr. Mesmer is the author of several books including Letter Lessons and First Words: Phonics Foundations that Work (Heinemann, 2019), Alphabetics for Emerging Learners: Building Strong Reading Foundations in PreK (2021). Teaching skills for complex text: Deepening reading in the classroom (Teachers College Press, 2016) Her research has been supported by a National Academy of Education/Spencer Foundation, and an American Educational Research Association/Institute of Education Sciences grant. She is the recipient of the Outreach Award, from the College of Liberal Arts and Human Sciences at Virginia Tech, and the Promising Scholar Award, from the School of Education, Virginia Tech. In 2014, she delivered The George Graham Lecture in Reading at the Curry School of Education, University of Virginia. She is regularly called upon by states and professional organizations to deliver lectures in her area of expertise (e.g., International Literacy Association, State of Maryland)