Dr. Jill T. Tussey's career in literacy education has provided a variety of experiences in curriculum and instruction across K-12, undergraduate, and graduate courses. Her areas of interest include student engagement and motivation with targeted focus on digital literacy, poverty impacts, and social-emotional learning. Service leadership is important to Dr. Tussey and can be clearly seen in her current work as the Division Chair for Literacy, TESL, and Early Childhood at Buena Vista University. She has authored and edited books, chapters, and journal articles. Additionally, she has presented at local, state, national, and international settings over a variety of literacy topics.

Dr. Michelle Metzger's experiences include working as a classroom teacher, adjunct professor, professional development facilitator, research coordinator, and department chair. Her research interests include spatial thinking, problem solving, critical thinking, and STEM learning. As a National Ongoing Assessment Project Facilitator, Dr. Metzger believes in teaching math for understanding through modeling, which takes her to various places across the United States engaging teachers in deep mathematical thinking within a professional development setting. She believes students must hold math in their hands before they can hold it in their heads, hence the need for visualization and conceptual understanding.