New assistant professor to join SOE in August
Nakisha Whittington, Ph.D., whose research interests include digital literacy practices of urban youth, will serve as assistant professor in elementary education.
The VCU School of Education welcomes Nakisha Whittington, Ph.D., as assistant professor in elementary education in the Department of Teaching and Learning.
Whittington will join SOE in August from Penn State University, where she recently earned her doctoral degree in curriculum and instruction. She earned her master’s degree in elementary education and teaching from Xavier University of Louisiana, and her bachelor’s degree in political science and government from University of Louisiana at Lafayette.
Whittington was named Holmes Scholar of the Month for June 2021 by the American Association of Colleges for Teacher Education. She credits her academic and professional success partly to her involvement in the Holmes Program. She served as the historian on the AACTE Holmes Council 2020-21.
Whittington’s research interests include digital literacy practices of urban youth. She has published several articles on effective instructional practices to meet the needs of diverse learners. She also served as a co-director for Penn State’s Summer Research Opportunities Program, Upward Bound instructor, reading specialist and editorial assistant for an educational research journal.
Whittington previously served as an early literacy specialist during the 2015-2016 academic school year at Children’s Literacy Initiative (CLI). CLI is a non-profit organization headquartered in Philadelphia that works with pre-kindergarten through 5th grade teachers to close the literacy achievement gap between disadvantaged children and their more affluent peers.
Prior to that, Whittington served as a first grade teacher from 2011 to 2015 at Fannie C. Williams Charter School in New Orleans.