Vivian L. Gadsden

William T. Carter Professor of Child Development and Education

Learning, Teaching, and Literacies Division

Director, National Center on Fathers and Families
Associate Director, National Center on Adult Literacy
Co-Faculty Director, Penn Early Childhood and Family Research Center

Contact

Media Inquiries:
Contact Penn GSE Communications.

Education

Ed.D. (Educational Psychology and Policy) University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, Michigan, 1988
B.A. (Psychology and English) Fisk University, Nashville, Tennessee, 1978

Areas of Expertise

Literacy and at-risk youth
Fathers and families
Intergenerational learning
Parental engagement

Programs

Mid-Career Doctoral Program in Educational Leadership Ed.D.

Literacy Studies Ph.D.

Literacy Studies Ed.D.

Literacy Studies M.S.Ed.

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Biography

Professional Biography

Dr. Gadsden began her career teaching developmental English, reading, and educational psychology at Oakland and Wayne State Universities in Michigan. She also worked a research analyst in educational policy at Policy Studies Associates in Washington, D.C. Dr. Gadsden served for six years as associate director in the National Center on Adult Literacy. In 1994, she became the director of the newly founded National Center on Fathers and Families, an interdisciplinary policy research center focused on child and family well-being. At the University of Pennsylvania, she served as Education Graduate Group Chair from 1996 to 2004 and as Chair of the Faculty Senate in 2022-2023.

Dr. Gadsden serves and has served on national foundation boards and review committees, including the Buffett Institute, the Foundation for Child Development (for which she was Vice Chair of the Board), and the Spencer Foundation; Congressionally mandated review committees; and White House initiatives as well as local boards such as the Philadelphia Mayor’s Commission on Literacy. She also chaired The National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine’s Committee on Supporting Parents of Young Children, serving as lead author of the Committee’s report, Parenting Matters. Dr. Gadsden was co-editor of the journals Educational Researcher and Review of Research in Education (2009) and is general co-editor for the Review of Research in Education (2023 and 2025). She is a past President of the American Educational Research Association. A former Spencer Postdoctoral Fellow and Resident Fellow, Dr. Gadsden is a Fellow of the American Educational Research Association, the Reading Hall of Fame, the National Academy of Education, and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.

Research Interests and Current Projects

Dr. Gadsden’s research, scholarly interests, and writing focus on learning and literacies across the life-course and address issues of equity, access, and change for young children and families in historically marginalized communities. The work highlights the intergenerational and cross-cultural nature of learning, literacy, and identity within families and the relationship between family members’ beliefs and practices around learning, educational access, and educational persistence. Her conceptual framework, family cultures, focuses on the interconnectedness among families’ political, cultural, and social histories and racialized identities.

Her collaborative research projects draw upon interdisciplinary frameworks that examine early childhood development, parenting, and families; father engagement in urban settings; social factors affecting health and education; children of incarcerated parents; and intergenerational learning within African American and Latino families. Her study with youth, Youth Civic Engagement Research (YCER), engages young people in using research to promote community change.

She has served as principal investigator or co-investigator on grants from the Annie E. Casey Foundation, Ford Foundation, Mott Foundation, Spencer Foundation, National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, and National Institutes for Health. She was Co-Convenor for the Ethnography in Education Research Forum and Co-Faculty Director of the Penn Futures Project. Dr. Gadsden collaborates with Penn colleagues across schools to examine issues of health and educational disparities among children, families, and communities.

She has published widely across academic disciplines and fields. Her published works include books and articles on early childhood research; literacy and African American youth; incarcerated parents in the lives of children, families, and communities; and risk, equity, and schooling.

Publications

Selected Publications

Gadsden, V. L. & Genty, P. (Eds.) (in press). Incarcerated parents and their children. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum.

Wortham, S. & Gadsden, V. L. (2004). The complexities of “similarity” in research interviewing. Investigating classroom interaction: Methodologies in action. Working Papers in Educational Linguistics, 19, 1–32.

Gadsden, V. L., Davis, J. E., & Artiles, A. (Eds., 2009). Risk, equity, and schooling. Review of Research in Education, 33, vii-xi.

Gadsden, V. L. (2008). The arts and education: Knowledge generation, pedagogy, and the discourse of learning. Review of Research in Education, 32, 29–61.

Gadsden, V. L. (2017). Family literacy. In N. Hornberger & B. Street (Eds.), Encyclopedia of language and education. New York: Springer, pp. 181–195.

Gadsden, V. L. (2007) Critical issues in research and practice on fatherhood. In W. Darity (Ed.), International encyclopedia of the social sciences. Thomson/Macmillian Publishers.

Gadsden, V. L. & Fuhrman, S. (2007). Reflections on educational equity in post-Katrina New Orleans. The children Hurricane Katrina left behind: Schooling context, Professional preparation, and community politics. In S. P. Robinson & M. C. Brown (eds.), Publication for the American Association of Colleges for Teacher Education. New York: Peter Lang Publishing, 73–88.

Gadsden, V. L. (2006). African American families: Culture and literacies in life-course perspective. Book-length volume to be submitted to Teachers College Press.

Gadsden, V. L. (2006). The adult learner in family literacy: Gender and its intersections with role and context. In A. Belzer & H. Beder (eds.), Defining and improving quality in adult basic education: Issues and challenges. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum.

Gadsden, V. L., Ray, A., Jacobs, C. Y., Gwak, S. (2006). Parents’ expectations of their children’s early literacy. In R. T. Jimenez & V. O. Pang (eds.), Race, ethnicity, and education: Language, literacy, and schooling. New York: Praeger.

News & Media

Penn GSE News

Penn GSE scholars shine in Education Week’s 2025 RHSU Edu-Scholar rankings

Eight Penn GSE faculty feature prominently in the rankings, which celebrate the most influential education researchers in the nation.

January 8, 2025

Penn GSE professors named to 2024 RHSU Edu-Scholar Public Influence Rankings list

A new year means a new version of the RHSU Edu-Scholar Public Influence Rankings, with the 2024 edition announced yesterday by Education Week. Nine researchers from the University of Pennsylvania made the annual 200-member list, which was created by Rick Hess of the American Enterprise Institute (AEI) to gauge the public impact of ed scholars’ contributions.

January 5, 2024

Vivian Gadsden elected to the prestigious American Academy of Arts & Sciences

The Child Development and Education Professor is one of five Penn faculty being recognized this year for significant contributions to academia, policy and research.

April 19, 2023

Penn GSE professors named to Education Week's 2023 Edu-Scholar Public Influence Rankings list

Eight University of Pennsylvania-affiliated researchers are ranked in the top 200 nationwide – and all eight are associated with Penn GSE.

January 5, 2023

Gadsden to deliver AERA Distinguished Lecture

Ebony Elizabeth Thomas and Yasmin Kafai will also lead sessions at AERA’s annual meeting.

April 9, 2021

Penn GSE scholars on Education Week's list of influencers in education

Six researchers from Penn GSE have made Education Week’s 2020 Edu-Scholar Public Influence Rankings list.

January 8, 2020

Penn Futures Project announces new leadership

Penn GSE's Vivian Gadsden and Penn Nursing's Terri Lipman will lead the collaborative project's next phase.

February 20, 2018

Vivian Gadsden elected to National Academy of Education

Gadsden is a renowned expert in literacy and at-risk youth, fathers and families, intergenerational learning, and parental engagement.

March 2, 2017

In the Media

Penn’s Grad School of Education cultivates a pipeline

Dean Pam Grossman, Vivian Gadsden, and Ed Brockenbrough discuss how Penn GSE advocates for equity and inclusion as it builds a pipeline for future students. “Having a diverse set of teachers, a diverse set of leaders is incredibly important in inspiring the next generation to imagine themselves in those roles,” said the Dean.

Diverse Issues in Higher Education | August 21, 2019

Awards & Honors

Vivian Gadsden, Carter Professor of Child Development and Education and Co-Faculty Director of the Penn Futures Project, and Katherine Barghaus, Executive Director of the Penn Child Research Center and of the Penn Futures Project, have been awarded $79,471 from Casey Family Programs to help support a multiphase partnership initiative between Penn Child and Penn Futures and the Philadelphia Department of Human Services and Office of Children and Families. This initiative aims to better understand the child welfare system and the outcomes it produces. The contract will help support the phase of the initiative aimed at learning from the lived experiences of the people in the child welfare system, both those served and those who serve.

Posted on September 12, 2020

Journal Editorial Boards

Review of Research in Education

Co-Editor-in-Chief, 2023 and 2025

Literacy Research: Theory, Method, and Practice

Editorial Board