Dr. Rosemary Russ

Biography

Rosemary Russ is an Associate Professor in the Department of Curriculum and Instruction at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. She earned her Ph.D. in Physics from the University of Maryland, where she was involved in the Physics Education Research Group focused on K-16+ student learning in science. After completing her doctorate, she spent five years as a postdoctoral fellow in the Learning Sciences Program at Northwestern University, serving as a Research Assistant Professor. Since joining the University of Wisconsin-Madison in 2012, Dr. Russ has designed and studied learning environments aimed at supporting pre-service elementary teachers in addressing and understanding students' scientific ideas. In 2020, she began collaborating with the community organization EXPO (Ex-Incarcerated People Organizing) to educate local communities about the impacts of the carceral system and advocate for policy changes. Dr. Russ has focused her 20-year career on examining how knowledge is constructed across different contexts and populations, using a lens of epistemology to theorize interactions between participants and knowledge claims. Her research is supported by the National Science Foundation and other educational foundations, and she has published extensively in leading educational journals.

Research Interests