Two Pitt Professors Named 2010 Fellows of the American Educational Research Association

"PITTSBURGH-Suzanne Lane, professor in the University of Pittsburgh's School of Education, and Margaret G. McKeown, clinical professor in Pitt's School of Education and senior scientist in Pitt's Learning Research and Development Center (LRDC), have been named 2010 American Educational Research Association (AERA) Fellows. They are being recognized for their exceptional scientific or scholarly contributions to educational research or significant contributions to the field through the development of research opportunities and settings that are nationally and internationally recognized.

The new Pitt fellows-to be inducted at AERA's annual meeting in Denver, Colo., in May-join five Pitt faculty and researchers who were inducted into the inaugural class of AERA fellows in 2008.

Lane has been a faculty member in the University's Department of Psychology in Education since the fall of 1986. Her research focus is on educational measurement and testing, particularly design, validity, and technical issues related to large-scale assessment and accountability systems, including performance-based assessments. A member of the National Council on Measurement in Education and AERA, Lane served as the council's president from 2004 to 2005 and AERA's vice president of Division D, Methodology, from 2000 to 2002. She also is a member of the American Psychological Association's Division of Evaluation, Measurement, and Statistics and the Psychometric Society. Lane is on the editorial boards of numerous education-measurement journals, is a member of the U.S. Department of Education's National Technical Advisory Council, and also served as a member of the Joint Committee on Revision of the Standards for Educational and Psychological Testing. She has been the principal investigator on several large grants examining the validity of large-scale assessment systems. Her articles have appeared in such publications as the "Journal of Educational Measurement, Applied Measurement in Education, Educational Assessment," and "Educational Measurement: Issues and Practices."

Lane earned a B.A. degree in psychology at State University of New York at Plattsburgh in 1980 and an M.Ed. degree in measurement and statistics and a Ph.D. degree in research methodology, measurement, and statistics at the University of Arizona in 1982 and 1986, respectively.

At LRDC in various research capacities since 1977, McKeown has been an LRDC senior scientist since 2002 and a professor in the University's Department of Instruction and Learning since 2007. She has pursued two major lines of research at Pitt-the development of vocabulary as it influences reading comprehension and the comprehension students achieve from school texts. McKeown is a member of AERA, the International Reading Association, the National Reading Conference, and the Society for the Scientific Study of Reading. She was editor of the Teaching, Learning, Human Development section of the "American Educational Research Journal" from 2001 to 2004 and vice president for Division C, Learning and Instruction, of AERA from 1998 to 2000 and is on the editorial board of and reviews for several journals. McKeown also is a member of the National Assessment of Educational Progress Reading Standing Committee. She has authored or coauthored numerous journal articles, book chapters, and books, including coauthoring with Pitt professor emeritus of education Isabel Beck and Pitt assistant professor of education Linda Kucan "Bringing Words to Life: Robust Vocabulary Instruction" (Guildford Press, 2002). McKeown's honors include being named to the International Reading Hall of Fame in 2008, receiving a Pitt Innovator Award in 2007, and being awarded a National Academy of Education Spencer Fellowship in 1988.

McKeown earned a B.S. degree in elementary education at Skidmore College in 1972, an M.S. degree in education at Cornell University in 1977, and a Ph.D. degree in education at Pitt in 1983. Before her career in research, McKeown taught elementary school.

AERA inaugural inductees from Pitt were William W. Cooley, professor emeritus in the Department of Administrative and Policy Studies; James Greeno, visiting professor of education at Pitt and the Margaret Jacks Professor of Education Emeritus at Stanford University; Alan Lesgold, professor and dean of the School of Education and professor of psychology and intelligent systems; Lauren Resnick, University Professor of Psychology and Cognitive Science, senior scientist and project director in Pitt's Learning Research and Development Center (LRDC), and former director of LRDC; and Janet Schofield, senior scientist at LRDC and professor and social program chair in the Department of Psychology.

Founded in 1916, AERA works to improve the educational process by encouraging scholarly inquiry related to education and evaluation and by promoting the dissemination and practical application of research results. AERA is an international professional organization with the primary goal of advancing educational research and its practical application. Its more than 26,000 members are educators, administrators, directors of research, counselors, evaluators, graduate students, behavioral scientists, and persons working with testing or evaluation in federal, state, and local agencies.

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