Pamela A. Mason

Pamela A. Mason, Ed.D. is a senior lecturer on education, a co-chair of the Teaching and Teacher Leadership program, the chair of the Literacy and Languages concentration, and director of the Jeanne Chall Reading Lab at the Harvard Graduate School of Education. Her professional and research interests encompass the role of culturally sustaining pedagogy in promoting literacy achievement, the interaction of text complexity and background knowledge, qualitative and quantitative literacy assessment, and the efficacy of the roles of reading specialists and literacy coaches. Mason has extensive experience as a reading/language arts curriculum coordinator, and she also was an effective elementary school principal, serving in both urban and suburban districts in the Boston area.

Mason collaborates with colleagues nationally and globally on preparing reading specialist teachers and literacy coaches, developing the capacity of school leaders as literacy advocates, and evaluating school-wide literacy programs.

Mason is active in the International Literacy Association, serving on the Commission on ILA Standards and Recognition, and in the National Council of Teachers of English, serving on the Committee Against Censorship. For the Literacy Research Association, she is the co-chair of the STAR (Scholars of color Transitioning into Academic Research institutions) mentoring program and a member of the Nominating Committee. Mason is a past president of the Massachusetts Association of College and University Reading Educators and the Massachusetts Reading Association. She is a member of the Board of Trustees for Cathedral High School (Boston), for GrubStreet (a creative writing center), and for the WGBH Educational Foundation, as a trustee emerita.