Mariana Castro

Mariana Castro is a Curriculum Designer & Instructor for the Discussion Project. She serves as Co-Director for the Multilingual Learning Research Center at the Wisconsin Center for Education Research (WCER), a center committed to the improvement of educational outcomes for diverse student populations and to foster collaborations across academic disciplines and practitioners. She is also affiliate faculty in the Education Policy Studies Department. She brings more than 35 years of experience in education as a former science teacher, a language specialist and a bilingual educator. Throughout her career, she has engaged in curriculum and instruction, teacher preparation and professional learning in the areas of science, language development and bilingual education. In her research, Mariana integrates her background as an educator, her passion for working with multilingual children, youth and their teachers, and her commitment for social justice. Over the last 14 years, her work has also involved policy work related to the education of multilingual learners, including the development of language proficiency standards in Spanish and English. Mariana has a Ph.D. in Curriculum and Instruction at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and a M.S. from the University of Wisconsin-Whitewater. She currently serves as the principal investigator for research related to the integration of language with core teaching practices, curriculum and instruction in dual language immersion programs, and preparing future and current teachers to help multilingual students.