Julie Vu

The Saginaw Chamber of Commerce in February named Julie Vu as the Educator of the Year for her contributions to the district’s English Language Arts & Reading program.

Vu, a doctoral candidate in Curriculum Studies at TCU, has served as the Eagle Mountain Independent School District’s ELAR curriculum specialist since 2014. Before joining EMS ISD, Vu served as an instructor at TCU, where she taught courses in adolescent literature, educational philosophy and worked closely with the New Media Writing Studio to facilitate professional development for local area teachers.

Vu’s work with the district to develop a K-12 ELAR curriculum and the implementation of universal assessment in ELAR classrooms complements her dissertation that explores teacher knowledge and supporting 21st-century literacy practices in the K-12 classroom.

TCU English professor Sarah Robbins, who is co-chairing Vu’s dissertation committee with Dr. Fran Huckaby of the College of Education, is impressed with Vu’s ability to draw on teachers’ experiential knowledge to envision new possibilities for teaching with modern technologies.

“I’ve co-presented twice with Julie at the National Council of Teachers of English annual national conference,” said Robbins. “On both occasions, she drew a large and appreciative audience into an interactive session that left all participants energized about new approaches they could take back to their classrooms, along with enriched conceptual frameworks for developing their own ideas.”

Vu earned both her bachelor’s degree in English and Master of Arts from Austin College. She was named Teacher of the Year by South Tarrant County’s Chamber of Commerce in 2006 and recognized as an Outstanding North Texas Teacher by the Dallas Mavericks’ Board of Trustees in 2009. She has served as a featured speaker at multiple national education conferences and had her work published in the Journal of Adolescent and Adult Literacy.

Curriculum Studies is a distinct program that prepares qualified students to engage in high-quality original scholarships, to assume faculty positions at the college and university levels, to take leadership positions at district and state-level education agencies, to assume curriculum positions in informal learning environments and to take on positions of influence in educational advocacy.