Introducing the 2023 NCAPP Plenary Speakers

Elyse Eidman-Aadahl

Elyse Eidman-Aadahl is the Executive Director of the National Writing Project (NWP), a network of nearly 175 literacy-focused professional development and research communities located at universities across all 50 states, District of Columbia, Puerto Rico, and the U.S. Virgin Islands. Based at the University of California-Berkeley, the NWP leads nationally networked learning and research initiatives for educators working in K-12, university, and out-of-school settings. A recipient of the Hollis Caswell Award for Curriculum Studies, Eidman-Aadahl holds a Ph.D. in Curriculum Theory from the University of Maryland College Park.  Her scholarship includes studies of literacy and learning in the context of our new digital, networked ecology as well as research into how educators of diverse backgrounds research and reason together about this social transformation, literacy, equity, and agency for themselves, their subject areas, and their youth. She is a broadly published author and presenter, well-known for writing books such as Because Digital Writing Matters and Writing for a Change: Boosting Literacy and Learning through Social Action, and for leading large-scale practitioner-research projects.

Urik Halliday

Urik Halliday teaches AP Chemistry and Physics in the Chicago Public Schools. Prior to becoming a science educator, Halliday was employed by the Illinois Department of Public Health, working in its Chicago toxicology lab as an analytical chemist.  He earned a M.S.Ed. in Secondary Science Education from Illinois Institute of Technology, and a B.S in Chemistry from Illinois State University.  Halliday has been an active member of The POGIL Project since 2013.  During the course of his work with The Project, he has led several one-day workshops and three-day summer workshops and also presented sessions at numerous POGIL National Meetings and NCAPPs.  In 2017, Halliday was awarded the POGIL PEACH Award, given to a new practitioner who has made significant and enthusiastic contributions to The Project.  He served on the POGIL Steering Committee and is currently the chairperson of OPTIC—the Classroom Observation Protocol Working Group.

Elli Theobald

Elli Theobald is an Assistant Teaching Professor in the Department of Biology at the University of Washington. Prior to her current position, she worked as a middle school and high school teacher, completed her Ph.D. in Ecology, and transitioned to Discipline-based Education Research as a postdoctoral student. Currently, the heart of Theobald’s research program revolves around how to be a better teacher, with particular emphasis on how to achieve equity in college-level STEM classes. She uses quantitative and sometimes qualitative approaches to 1) describe inequities; 2) identify instructor and systemic practices that disrupt inequities; and 3) scale equitable practices to all classes in all STEM disciplines.