Alfred W. Tatum
Provost and Executive Vice President for Academic Affairs, MSU Denver
Dr. Alfred W. Tatum, provost and executive vice president for academic affairs of Metropolitan State University of Denver, is a leading authority and one of the nation’s prominent education scholars of African American boys’ literacy development. He is a literacy theorist and pragmatist who regularly leads community engagement and literacy initiatives involving African American boys. He has authored or coauthored 75 academic papers and publications on the topics of adolescent literacy, texts and identity, and the literacy development of African American boys, including three books. He authored the award-winning book Teaching Reading to Black Adolescent Males: Closing the Achievement Gap, Reading for Their Life: (Re)building the Textual Lineages of African American Males, and Fearless Voices: Engaging a New Generation of African American Adolescent Male Writers. His recent scholarship focuses on nurturing advanced levels of literacy development for students in the United States.
For more than 10 years, Tatum served on the national reading committee for the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP). He was on the board of directors of the two major literacy associations, Literacy Research Association and the International Literacy Association. He currently serves as vice president of the Literacy Research Association.
