Valerie F Taylor

My research agenda is focused on secondary literacies and teacher development and retention. One research team I work with at UT Austin, the THRIVE team led by Dr. Beth Maloch and Dr. Melissa Wetzel, is studying a responsive and systematic approach to mentorship of early career teachers (ECTs) and how this approach affects the learning of both mentors and the ECTs they work with, including the retention of both groups. My previous experience being a mentor myself and coaching mentors, as well as my work on this research team, have reinforced my belief in the power of such programs for both mentors and the ECTs they work with. Through this work and other collaborative research projects at UT, I have learned the value of delving into data with colleagues as we negotiate meaning-making.
In my own dissertation, On Being and Becoming Writers and Teachers of Writers, guided by Dr. Allison Skerrett, I have appreciated the opportunity to negotiate meaning alongside a group of teachers (n=5) in a local high school. In this ethnographic case study, I have worked with teachers over the course of four semesters, developing a partnership as we explored questions about the teachers’ identities as writers and the relationships between those identities and their work teaching high school writers. I have also examined the nature of collaboration between a university researcher and inservice teachers and among the teachers as part of a professional learning community.