Texas Tech University

Julie Smit, Ph.D.

Associate Professor
Curriculum & Instruction

Email: julie.smit@ttu.edu

Phone: 806-834-8938

Office: Education 319

Vita

Julie Smit is an Associate Professor of Language, Diversity, and Literacy Studies in the Department of Curriculum and Instruction at Texas Tech University. Her research interests involve literacy and learning as a collaborative effort, in which students, families, and teachers work together to generate, negotiate, and build on understandings. Dr. Smit has developed two lines of inquiry for research. The first line of inquiry involves exploring knowledge advances of adolescent readers as they utilize their transactions with narrative fiction to reflect and develop sophisticated understandings of the self, others, and the social world. The second line of inquiry involves engaged scholarship with local schools to develop meaningful impact on writing instruction for K-12 students. This research has led to receiving the 2020 President's Excellence in Engaged Scholarship Award which recognizes excellence in exemplary and sustained partnerships and the impacts the research has on the community.

 

Dr. Smit has been involved in creating learning opportunities for graduate students to become engaged scholars, responsive teachers, literacy coaches, and educational leaders. She is the co-faculty advisor of the Education Graduate Student Organization, member of the college-wide Doctoral Advising Hub, and co-founder of the Llano, Estacado Writers Alliance. For the past three years, she has been leading an annual summer retreat for doctoral students to become confident and competent literacy researchers. She also organizes the practicum component of the Language and Literacy Masters program in which graduate students provide literacy intervention to K-12 students.

 

Dr. Julie Smit, Ph.D.

Education

  • Ph.D., 2015 - University at Albany, State University of New York, Albany, NY 
    Doctor of Philosophy in Reading
    Dissertation: Eighth Grade Girls' Knowledge Building with Narrative Texts
  • M.S., 2004 - College of Saint Rose, Albany, NY
    Childhood Education, Grades 1-6.
    Reading Specialist Certification
  • B.S., 2001 - Queens University, Kingston, ON, Canada 
    Honors in Chemistry

Areas of Expertise

  • Dialogic and Learning Communities
  • Design-Based Research
  • Engaged Scholarship
  • Leadership and Literacy Coaching
  • Reading and Writing Development and Pedagogy (Elementary level)
  • Response to Intervention
  • Young Adult Literature

Selected Publications

Maina, F., Smit, J., & Serwadda, A. (2021). Professional development for rural STEM teachers on data science and cybersecurity: A university and school districts' partnership. Australian and International Journal of Rural Education, 31(1), 30-41. https://journal.spera.asn.au/index.php/AIJRE/article/view/291  

*Smit, J., & Millett, S (2021). Professional learning for secondary teachers of non-academic disciplines: A case study on the experiences of a Junior Reserve Officer's Training Corps instructor. The Teacher Educator. https://doi.org/10.1080/08878730.2021.1892250

*Smit, J., Jones, E., Ladick, M., Lesley, M. (2021). Socialization of doctoral students into academic writing: The Llano Estacado Writers' Alliance. In A. Zimmerman, Preparing Students for Community-Engaged Scholarship in Higher Education. Hershey, PA: IGI Global.

Smit, J. (in press). How fantasy speaks to adolescent readers: the development of gender equity, heroism and imperfection, and good and evil from an exploration into Rick Riordan's Percy Jackson & the Olympians and Heroes of Olympus series. Study & Scrutiny: Research on Young Adult Literature.

Lesley, M., & Smit, J. (2020). Teaching as we learn: Mentoring Graduate Students in Engaged Scholarship. In A. Zimmerman, Preparing Students for Community-Engaged Scholarship in Higher Education. Hershey, PA: IGI Global.

Smit, J. (2019). What matters for eighth-grade female readers: Experiences and consequences of sustained reading engagement. TheALAN Review, 47(1), 41-53.

Johnston, P., Dozier, C. & Smit, J. (2016). How language supports adaptive teaching through a responsive learning culture. Theory Into Practice, 55(3), 189-196.

Smit, J. (2016). The effect of empathy in guiding the knowledge building of eighth grade girls as they reflect upon their experiences with literature. Scientific Study of Literature, 6(1), 59-86.

Dozier, C., & Smit, J. (2013). Building writing communities and partnering with families: Multiple perspectives from a writing practicum. In E. Ortlieb & E. J. Cheek (Eds.),  Advanced Literacy Practices: From the Clinic to the Classroom (1st ed., Vol. 2, pp. 161-179). Bingley, UK: Emerald Group Publishing Limited.