Deborah MacPhee, PhD, is a former first- and second-grade teacher, K–5 literacy coach, and director of the Borg Center for Reading and Literacy at Illinois State University (ISU). She is currently a professor of elementary literacy education and interim associate director and coordinator of undergraduate programs at the School of Teaching and Learning at ISU. She earned a bachelors and master’s in elementary education from the University of South Carolina Aiken and a Doctor of Philosophy in Language and Literacy from the University of South Carolina.
MacPhee has served and engaged with ILA over the years in a multitude of ways. She was published in Reading Research Quarterly and The Reading Teacher and presented at several of ILA’s international and regional conferences. MacPhee also served on the teacher as researcher grant committee, and most recently, had the opportunity to review for Reading Research Quarterly.
Her research critically examines discourses of literacy coaching, professional development school interactions, and metaphors in media on the science of reading. In 2023, she co-published her first book on literacy teaching and learning titled Learning to Be Literate: More than a Single Story.
