Professor Laura Ascenzi-Moreno, in collaboration with Faythe Beauchemin, associate professor at Boston College, received a $75,000 grant for the two-year project, Centering Multilingual and Multidialectal Students within Reading Policies and Curricula in an Era of the Science of Reading. The award runs from September 1, 2026, through August 31, 2028.
The project will bring together educators from New York and Massachusetts to examine how state-level Science of Reading policies and curricula are being implemented with multilingual and multidialectal learners. Through a research collaborative, the team will explore ways to ensure that reading instruction recognizes and builds upon the linguistic and cultural assets students bring to the classroom.
Ascenzi-Moreno said Brooklyn College is the perfect place to house this research and explore, alongside teachers, how to center multilingual and multidialectal children in foundational reading instruction.
“This project is based on the idea that educators need to recognize and honor the cultural and linguistic practices of young multilingual and multidialectal children in foundational reading instruction, said Ascenzi-Moreno. “Most often, teachers are asked to implement foundational reading instruction in English without attuning instruction to the needs of multilingual and multidialectal children. This project seeks to partner with teachers to identify meaningful shifts in reading instruction for these students.”
The research will contribute to a broader theory of change for creating more equitable reading policies and curricula. In addition to scholarly publications, the project will produce digital resources designed to help teachers and school leaders strengthen early literacy instruction for diverse student populations.
The award was made through the Spencer Foundation’s Racial Equity Special Research Grants program, which supports collaborative research aimed at understanding and addressing educational inequality. The highly competitive program funds projects that seek not only to document inequities but also to develop new approaches that promote more equitable educational opportunities.
The grant builds on Brooklyn College’s longstanding commitment to educational equity, teacher preparation, bilingual education, and research that improves outcomes for New York City’s diverse student communities.
Ascenzi-Moreno is a nationally recognized scholar in bilingual education and literacy instruction and serves as chairperson and bilingual program coordinator in Brooklyn College’s School of Education.
