Erin Spring

Dr. Erin Spring, PhD

Pronouns: she/her

Positions

Associate Professor

Werklund School of Education, Specialization, Language and Literacy

Contact information

Phone number

Office: 403.210.6896

Location

Office: EDT1016

Background

Educational Background

Doctor of Philosophy University of Cambridge, 2014

M.Phil University of Cambridge, 2010

Bach of Education Queen's University, 2008

B.A. (Hons) English, Trent University, 2007

Biography

Dr. Spring is an Associate Professor in the Werklund School of Education at the University of Calgary. She holds a BA (Honours) in English from Trent University and a B.Ed from Queen’s University. Erin was a classroom teacher in London, UK, before returning to graduate studies. She earned an MPhil and PhD from the Faculty of Education at the University of Cambridge. Between 2014-2017 she was a Postdoctoral Fellow in the Institute for Child and Youth Studies at the University of Lethbridge. Broadly speaking, Erin’s interdisciplinary research focuses on young people’s literacies, texts, and cultures.

Professional Appointments

  • (2023). Director of Student Experience, Community-Based Undergraduate Programs in Education, Werklund School of Education, University of Calgary, Alberta, Canada.
  • (2021). Associate Professor with tenure, Werklund School of Education, University of Calgary, Alberta, Canada (as of July 1st).
  • (2017). Assistant Professor, Werklund School of Education, University of Calgary, Alberta, Canada (as of July 1st).
  • (2014 – 2017). Postdoctoral Fellowship, Institute for Child and Youth Studies, University of Lethbridge, Alberta, Canada.
  • (2016). Full time Instructor, Academic Writing Department, University of Lethbridge, Alberta, Canada (Fall term).
  • (2014). Sessional Instructor, English Department, Trent University, Ontario, Canada (Winter).

Present Affiliations

Other Professional & Community Affiliations

Research

Areas of Research

Scholarly Activity

Drawing on a range of methodological approaches, including reading discussion groups, photo-elicitation, and map-making, Erin’s research seeks to understand the ways in which young people make sense of their identities through reading, writing, and art. Her research projects are united thematically by a shared investment in stories and storytelling as a way of articulating identity development, with a particular focus on the influence of place. Her ongoing objective as a settler scholar is to collaborate with communities, including schools, to ask and answer questions that matter to them, facilitating social change, building capacity, and promoting student wellbeing.

Interests:
  • Case study research
  • Children's literature
  • Conversation and discourse analysis
  • Cultural studies
  • Diversity
  • Environmental education
  • Identity development
  • Indigenous education
  • Land-based education
  • Literacy
  • Education for reconciliation

Participation in university strategic initiatives

Courses

Course number Course title Semester
EDUC 311 Language and Literacy, Learning in the Classroom 2020
EDUC 420 Issues in Learning & Teaching 2021
EDUC 435 Literacy, Language and Culture 2017, 2018, 2020
EDUC 450 Diversity in Learning 2021
EDUC 460 Specialization 1: K-12 English Language Arts Summer 2021
EDUC 520 Interdisciplinary Learning Fall 2018
EDUC 530 Indigenous Education Fall 2017, Fall 2018
EDER 619.99 Establishing Inclusive Environments Summer 2020
EDER 669.22 Literacy and Globalization Winter 2017
EDER 692.13 Collaboratory of Practice: Literacy Winter 2017, 2018
EDER 768.07 Multiliteracies Summer 2018
EDER 768.08 New Literacies and Digital Media Summer 2019
EDUC 313 (Course design) Indigenous Literary Arts as a Doorway to Decolonizing Pedagogy and Practice: Starting with Story. Co-designed with Dr. Aubrey Hanson. Summer 2021
EDUC 580 (Course design) Indigenous Literary Arts as a Doorway to Decolonizing Pedagogy and Practice: Starting with Story. Co-designed with Dr. Aubrey Hanson. Summer 2021
EDER 669.22 (Course design) Literacy and Globalization Winter 2018

Projects

Connecting resilience to places and spaces in adopted homelands.

2022 – 2027

  • Principal Investigator: Dr. Rahat Zaidi (UCalgary)
  • Co-Investigators: D. Kim Lenters, Dr. Sylvie Roy, Dr. Subrata Bhowmik
  • Sponsorship Details: Insight Grant ($214,109)
  • Funding Agency: Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada

 


The impact of COVID-19 on the wellness of international students in Alberta high schools.

2021 – 2024

  • Principal Investigator: Dr. Yan Guo
  • Co-Applicants: Dr. Erin Spring, Yingling Lou
  • Funding Details: Alberta Education Partnership Grant ($50,000.00)
  • Other Details: Collaboration with Calgary Board of Education

Culturally responsive literacy: Student and teacher engagement with text in Rocky Cree Nation.

2019 – 2022

  • Principal Investigator: Dr Erin Spring
  • Funding Details: University Research Grants Committee Seed Grant ($15,000)
  • Funding Agency: University of Calgary

“Oo’mahn’istay Iikakimaaks: You’ve got a story - next steps to a new beginning”. Welcoming Indigenous students to campus.

2021

  • Team: Dr. Erin Spring, Dr. Aubrey Hanson (Werklund); Angela Houle, Patricia McCallum (Calgary Catholic School Division)
  • Funding Details: Werklund School of Education ($10,000)
  • Funding Agency: University of Calgary

Books to build on: Indigenous literatures for learning.

2019 – 2023

  • Principal Investigators: Dr. Aubrey Hanson and Dr. Erin Spring (UCalgary)
  • Funding Details: Taylor Institute for Teaching and Learning, University of Calgary ($10,000); ii’ taa’poh’to’p Intercultural Capacity Grant ($10,000); Werklund School of Education Advancing Intercultural Capacity Grant ($2,500)
  • Funding Agency: Taylor Institute for Teaching and Learning, Werklund School of Education, and University of Calgary

In the News


Understanding Indigenous students’ perceptions of well-being: A case study in equitable urban education.

2019 – 2023

  • Principal Investigator: Dr. Erin Spring
  • Co-Applicant: Dr. Aubrey Hanson
  • Partner: Calgary Catholic School Division
  • Funding Details: Partnership Grant ($50,000)
  • Funding Agency: Alberta Education

Nanatawi Kiskihtamowin: Remembering the knowledge that nurtures us.

2019

  • Principal Investigator: Dr. Mavis Reimer
  • Co-applicant: Dr. Erin Spring
  • Funding Details: Indigenous Research Capacity and Reconciliation Connections Grant ($50,000)
  • Funding Agency: Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada

Pita'Sinaki: Art share for reconciliation.

2017 – 2019

  • Partnerships: Calgary Board of Education, Bob Edwards Middle School, cSpace Calgary, The Alberta Civil Liberties Research Centre
  • Funding Agency: The Alberta Civil Liberties Research Centre, Alberta Association for Multicultural Education

The intersections of literacy and wellness: A rural Alberta case study.

2017 – 2019

  • Principal Investigator: Dr. Erin Spring

Six seasons of the Asiniskow Ithiniwak: Reclamation, regeneration, reconciliation.

2015 – Present

  • Principal Investigator: Dr Mavis Reimer (University of Winnipeg)
  • Co-applicant: Dr. Erin Spring
  • Funding Details: Partnership Grant ($2,500,000)
  • Funding Agency: Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada

Publication

  • Six seasons of the Asiniskow Ithiniwak. (n.d.). Six seasons of the Asiniskow Ithiniwak: Reclamation, regeneration, reconciliation. https://sixseasonsproject.ca

Raising spirit: The Opokaa’sin digital storytelling project.

2015 – 2017 

  • Principal Investigator: Dr. Jan Newberry (University of Lethbridge)
  • Co-applicant: Dr. Erin Spring
  • Community Parner: Opokaa’sin Early Intervention Society
  • Funding Details: Policy Wise for Children and Families ($40,000); The University of Lethbridge’s Office of Research and Innovation Services Standard Research Grant ($20,000); Community Foundations of Lethbridge ($10,000); Community Future’s Treaty 7 Grant ($7,000)

In the News


The Blackfoot adolescent reading project.

2014 – 2016

  • Principal Investigator: Dr. Erin Spring
  • Collaboration: Kainai Blood Tribe
  • Funding Details: The Institute for Child and Youth Studies, University of Lethbridge (Postdoctoral Fellowship); IBBY Canada’s Frances E. Russel Grant ($1000), Children’s Literature Association’s Diversity Grant.

In the News


“Our Torontos are different places”: a qualitative, multiple case study, designed to investigate the interconnections between young adult fiction and young adult readers’ constructions of place, within and beyond the text.

2010 – 2014

  • Principal Investigator: Dr. Erin Spring
  • Funding Details: Cambridge Commonwealth Trusts; Smuts Memorial Fund; Faculty of Education, University of Cambridge; Homerton College, University of Cambridge.

Awards

  • Nominated for a Governor General’s Innovation Award alongside my colleagues Dr. Aubrey Hanson and Anja Dressler, Governor Generals. 2023
  • Awarded the Taylor Institute for Teaching and Learning’s Indigenous Ways of Knowing Award alongside my colleague Dr. Aubrey Hanson, University of Calgary. 2021
  • Nominated for a Governor General’s Innovation Award alongside my colleagues Dr. Aubrey Hanson and Anja Dressler, Governor Generals. 2021
  • Awarded Werklund School of Education’s Early Career Researcher Award, University of Calgary. 2021
  • Nominated for a University of Calgary Office of Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion Award alongside Dr. Aubrey Hanson for our work on the Innovative Initiatives in First Nations, Métis and Inuit Education within Undergraduate Teacher Education project, University of Calgary. 2020
  • An edited collection that I contributed a chapter to was awarded the International Research Society for Children’s Literature’s Academic Book Prize, International Research Society for Children’s Literature. 2019
  • Nominated for the United Kingdom Literacy Association (UKLA) Brenda Eastwood Award for good practice in teaching for diversity and inclusion, United Kingdom Literacy Association (UKLA). 2019
  • An edited collection that I contributed to was nominated for the United Kingdom Literacy Association (UKLA) Academic Book Award. It was awarded runner-up, United Kingdom Literacy Association (UKLA). 2019
  • Nominated for the University of Calgary Office of Diversity, Equity, and Protected Disclosure Diversity Award for my work with Werklund’s Indigenous Youth Forum. Nominated alongside my colleagues Dr. Armando Precaido Babb, Shirley Pepper, and Anthony Hamp, University of Calgary. 2019
  • Awarded the Children’s Literature Association Diversity Research Grant, Children’s Literature Association. 2017
  • Awarded the International Board Frances E. Russell Grant to initiate and encourage research in young people’s literature in all its forms., International Board of Books for Young People. 2014
  • Awarded a Postdoctoral Fellowship, Institute for Child and Youth Studies, University of Lethbridge. 2014
  • Awarded the United Kingdom Literacy Association (UKLA) Student Research Prize for an outstanding dissertation and original scholarship in literacy education, United Kingdom Literacy Association (UKLA) . 2014

Publications

In the News

Media: