Chair and Associate Professor
Dr. Alan Brown is Associate Professor of English Education at Wake Forest University. He is a former high school English teacher and basketball coach who now serves as department chair and English education coordinator in the Department of Education. He is the inaugural director for the Wake Forest Center for Literacy Education and co-PI for Winston-Salem TEACH, a five-year, $4.7 million U.S. Department of Education Teacher Quality Partnership (TQP) grant, a collaboration among Wake Forest University, Winston-Salem State University, Salem College, and Winston-Salem/Forsyth County Schools. Dr. Brown teaches undergraduate and graduate courses on topics including action research, adolescent literacy, arts integration, educational leadership, English methods, secondary education, and young adult literature. His scholarly interests include critically examining the culture of sports in schools and society while connecting contemporary literacies to students’ extra-curricular interests. He is the co-author of Reading the World through Sports and Young Adult Literature (NCTE, 2024), co-editor of Developing Contemporary Literacies through Sports (NCTE, 2016), and has published in numerous education and sport journals. Dr. Brown organizes the Skip Prosser Literacy Program, a collaboration between Wake Forest Athletics and the Department of Education, and he leads the Paisley IB Magnet School Sports Literacy Program, a weekly program for seventh- and eighth-grade boys that supports youth through academic, social, and community engagement.
Academic Appointments
Chair, Department of Education
Associate Professor
Program Coordinator, English Education
Director, Center for Literacy Education
Member, Graduate School Faculty
Education
Ph.D., The University of Alabama, 2012
M.A.Ed., Wake Forest University, 2005
B.S., Appalachian State University, 2003
Past Professional Experiences
Bryant/Groves Faculty Fellow, Wake Forest University
Secondary Education Program Director, Wake Forest University
English Teacher, Southwest Guilford High School, Guilford County Schools
Basketball Coach, Southwest Guilford High School, Guilford County Schools
University Liaison, Clinical Master Teacher Program, The University of Alabama
University Supervisor, Secondary Education Program, The University of Alabama
Instructor, Department of Curriculum & Instruction, The University of Alabama
EDU 101: Issues & Trends in Education: Sport, Education, & Society
EDU 222: Integrating Arts and Movement into the Elementary Curriculum (with Prof. Christina Soriano (Theatre & Dance)
EDU 223: Theatre in Education (with Dr. Brook Davis, Theatre & Dance)
EDU 231: Adolescent Literature
EDU 354/654: Content Pedagogy (English Methods)
EDU 364L/664L: Student Teaching Internship: English
EDU 365: Professional Development Seminars
EDU 368: Professional Experiences in Education
EDU 715: Action Research
EDU 716: Professional Growth Seminar: English
EDU 758: Educational Leadership
Brown, A., & Rodesiler, L (Eds.). (2016). Developing Contemporary Literacies through Sports: A Guide for the English Classroom. National Council of Teachers of English.
Schaedel, S., & Brown, A. (2022). Activist poetry in the secondary ELA classroom. English Journal, 112(12), 103-105.
Rodesiler, L., & Brown, A. (2022). Online and underground: Reconceptualizing a professional learning experience in times of change. English Leadership Quarterly, 44(4), 4-6.
Brown, A., & Wilson, E. K. (2021). Classroom teaching and athletic coaching: Connecting social positions through interrole symbiosis. Journal for the Study of Sports and Athletes in Education, 15(1), 1-26.
Rodesiler, L., Lewis, M., & Brown, A. (2021). Portrayals of youth sports coaches in the movies. In K. Garland, K. S. Dredger, C. Beach & C. Leogrande. (Eds.), Stories of sport: Critical literacy in media production, consumption, and dissemination. (pp. 49-69). Lexington Books.
Brown, A., & Parker Moore, D. (2020). Lizzie, Mamie, & Mo’ne: Exploring issues of racism, classism, and sexism in baseball. Study and Scrutiny: Research on Young Adult Literature, 4(2), 57-78.
Brown, A., Sieben, N., & Gordon, Z. (2019). Interest in teaching, coaching, and careers in education: A survey of university student-athletes. Teaching and Teacher Education, 83(1), 168-177.
Brown, A., Thomas, R., Thompson, H., Wooten, K, & Mitchell, J. (2023, June). Exploring the intersections of college and university literacy education centers. Roundtable presentation at the bi-annual meeting of the English Language Arts Teacher Educators (ELATE), Atlanta, GA.
Brown, A., & Mitchell, J. (2022, November). What do we want for our children?: Considering the trials and tribulations of youth sports through letter writing. In A. Brown & L. Rodesiler (Chairs), The intersection of literacy, sport, culture, and society. Roundtable presentation at the annual meeting of the National Council of Teachers of English (NCTE), Anaheim, CA.
Brown, A., & Parker Moore, D. (2021, November). Examining baseball culture through critical literacy, historical analysis, and intersectionality. In A. Brown & L. Rodesiler (Chairs), The intersection of literacy, sport, culture, and society. Roundtable presentation at the annual meeting of the National Council of Teachers of English (NCTE).
Brown, A., Sieben, N., & Gordon, Z. (2021, April). The acculturation of teacher-coaches: Examining initial pathways into careers in education. Roundtable presentation at the annual meeting of the American Educational Research Association (AERA).
Brown, A. (2020, November). Beartown by Fredrick Backman. In A. Brown, J. Mitchell, H. B. Wiley, & L. Schneider (Chairs), Eight great contemporary novels in which place and self converge. Presentation at the annual meeting of the National Council of Teachers of English (NCTE), Denver, CO.
Brown, A., Rodesiler, L. et al. (2019, July). Considering the past, present, and future of graduate study in English language arts teacher education. Panel discussion at the bi-annual meeting of the English Language Arts Teacher Educators (ELATE), Fayetteville, AR.