Dr. Paola Morgavi

Biography

Paola Morgavi holds a Laurea in Lettere from the University of Genoa, Italy, and a Master of Arts in Art Education from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. She is a certified OPI tester in Italian and has extensive expertise in world language education, curriculum development, and teacher training. Since 2012, she has served as the Director of the Italian Language Program at Northwestern University and co-authored the course “Advanced Training in Teaching Italian as a Foreign Language” with Elvira G. Di Fabio from Harvard University. Morgavi designed a workshop titled “Supporting Language Learners to Reach Higher Levels of Performance” for the American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Languages (ACTFL). Her involvement in higher education includes serving as co-chair of the AP Italian Language and Culture Development Committee from 2012 to 2016 and as Chief Reader for the AP Italian Language and Culture Exam from 2016 to 2020. She is actively engaged in professional communities and is involved with the Osservatorio della Lingua Italiana at the Consulate General of Italy in Chicago. Her research interests include the impact of technology on teaching and learning, and in 2023, she received an Educational Technology Fellowship at Northwestern to develop an application to help students learn and retain vocabulary. Morgavi is also recognized for her excellence in teaching, having been named to the ASG Honor Roll multiple times and received the Premio Dante from the American Association of Teachers of Italian (AATI) for her contributions to the Italian language teaching community at local and national levels.

Research Interests

Awards