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PhD Student
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Andrea Cons
PhD Student
Department of Education
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Biography
Andrea grew up in Spokane, Washington and earned her Bachelor’s degree in Secondary English Education from Eastern Washington University. After completing her degree, she moved to Long Beach and began her career as a high school English teacher. Andrea taught both ninth and tenth grade Language Arts for seven years and was Chairperson of the English department during her final two years of teaching. During this time, Andrea earned her Master’s degree in English, specifically Twentieth Century American Literature from California State University, Long Beach. It was this experience that interested Andrea in pursuing a Ph.D. in Education.
Andrea is currently a member of the inaugural Ph.D. in Education cohort at the University of California, Irvine where her focus is in the Language, Literacy, and Technology specialization. Her research interests include: academic literacy and writing (grammatical, syntactic, and linguistic features) multiliteracies, twenty-first century literacy skills, English language learning, the achievement gap between English language learners and native speakers of English, discourse analysis, linguistics, and teacher education.
Upon completing her Ph.D., Andrea plans on becoming a University professor in a teacher education program. She hopes to prepare future secondary teachers of English to teach not only content specific knowledge, but the academic literacy skills required of students in higher education. Since the eighth grade when Andrea first realized she wanted to be a high school English teacher, she has never looked back. Her passion for teaching and learning is what drives Andrea to accomplish her goals. She loved being in the classroom at the secondary level, but felt that her impact on students was limited; instead, she wanted to reach beyond the walls of her classroom and impact the lives of even more students. This desire to do more for education led her to pursue her Ph.D. in the hopes of reaching more students through preparing future classroom teachers that would one day be responsible for the education of these very students. Andrea remains optimistic about the future of education.
Andrea’s hobbies include reading and writing poetry, playing volleyball, snowboarding, and spending quality time with friends and family. Her family has been her biggest support system. On October 8, 2007, Andrea’s older brother David passed away unexpectedly just five days after his 31st birthday. David had been Andrea’s biggest supporter and had offered her encouragement and advice over the years. He had been her best friend, confidante, and fellow teacher. His love of teaching was a constant inspiration to Andrea as she worked her way through school. Andrea remembers the day she told David she had been accepted to UCI’s Ph.D. in Education program. He was so proud of her. David continues to inspire her every day. Andrea dedicates her degree to her big brother David who was, and still is, her own personal cheering section. Thank you David for a lifetime of believing.
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