Gail Verdi

About Gail Verdi

Dr. Gail Verdi is Chairperson & Professor of Bilingual, TESOL, World Languages and Coordinator of Kean\'s Graduate TESOL Program. Dr. Verdi established Kean’s Tomorrow’s Teachers program in 2017, a dual-credit program for high school students considering teaching as a career. She has grown the program to include 22 districts across New Jersey. Her research interests include literacy development, process writing, urban education, second language education, and the influence second languages and dialects have on student success. She has presented on these topics at local, national, and international conferences. She has taught elementary and early childhood ESL; composition at CUNY and NYU\'s Expository Writing Program as well as general education courses, language arts, and second language acquisition courses at both the graduate and undergraduate levels. Dr. Verdi was an Executive Board Member of NJTESOL/NJBE and chair of NJTESOL/NJBE’s Graduate Student Forum from 20••••12, a member of the New Jersey DOE State Program Approval Council (NJSPAC) from 20••••20, and the NJDOE Teacher Leadership Forum. She was the Lead Faculty member of the Building Teacher Leader Capacity Grant from 20••••18, and Co-Pi (with Mayra Bachrach and Patricia Morreale) on Kean\'s 20••••20 Google Grant titled,\"Improving the Outcomes of Hispanics in AP Computer Science\". She was also an advisory board member for a 20••••22 NSF Grant:\"Embedding Equitable Design through Undergraduate Computing Curriculum\" awarded to Dr. Patricia Morreale. She is currently Co-PI on a 1.2 million dollar NSF Noyce Grant awarded to Kean faculty in 2023:\"Culturally Responsive Education of STEM Teacher Candidates\" with Dr. Laura Lorentzen, Dr. Louis Beaugris, and Patricia McDermitt. She continues to serve on NABE’s Research and Assessment SIG as an Executive Board member.Her most recent publication is titled “Educating Educators to Integrate Inclusive Design across a 4-Year CS Degree Program” (with Letaw, L, Garcia, R, Morreale, P, Garcia, H, Noa, G.) published in 2024. Dr. Verdi received a Ph.D. in English Ed/Applied Linguistics and an M.A. in TESOL from NYU. She also has a B.A. in Elementary Education/Early Childhood from Seton Hall.

Experience

1. Professor

   Kean University

   Sep 2024 — Present · Union, NJ, US

Education

• Seton Hall University

  Bachelor's Degree, Early Childhood/Elementary Education

  1975 — 1979

• New York University

  Ph.D., English Education/Applied Linguistics

  1993 — 2000

• New York University

  Masters, TESOL

  1981 — 1983