Richard (Dick) Anderson is an internationally recognized scholar in the field of education. After receiving his doctoral degree in educational psychology from Harvard, he worked at Harvard, New York University, Rutgers, and New Jersey public schools before landing his permanent faculty position at the University of Illinois in 1963. He is founder of the Center for the Study of Reading and Director since its inception in 1976.
Anderson is author of over 200 books and articles that have targeted several areas of reading, comprehension, thinking, and education. His book Becoming a Nation of Readers is one of the most widely read books of all time in the field of literacy. Dick’s current research interests include intellectually stimulating classroom discussions, children’s development of reasoning, comparative study of the role of phonological and morphological awareness in learning to read alphabetic and nonalphabetic languages, and children’s visual-orthographic representation of Chinese characters. Anderson is also professor of psychology at Beijing Normal University and president of China Children’s Books.
Professor Anderson has served as president of the American Educational Research Association (AERA) and chairman of the National Academy of Education-National Institute of Education Commission on Reading. He has received numerous awards, including election to the National Academy of Education, twice being named winner of AERA’s Palmer O. Johnson Award for an outstanding educational research paper, AERA’s Sylvia Scribner Award for significant advances in understanding of learning and instruction, AERA’s Distinguished Contributions to Educational Research Award, the Oscar O. Causey Award from the National Reading Conference for career long excellence in reading research, the William S. Gray Citation of Merit which is the highest honor of the International Reading Association, and the Edward L. Thorndike Award from the American Psychological Association for distinguished contributions to the psychological study of education.
Dick Anderson has mentored an extraordinary number of students and researchers. An organization was launched 4 decades ago (The National Consortium for Instruction and Cognition) that is still active today and comprises Anderson’s students and their progeny.
Individuals Honoring Richard C. Anderson
Linda Baker, The University of Maryland, Baltimore County
Irene-Anna Diakidoy, University of Cyprus
Morton Ann Gernsbacher, University of Wisconsin-Madison
* Arthur C. Graesser, University of Memphis
John Guthrie, University of Maryland, College Park
May Jadallah, Illinois State University
Aini M. Ma’rof, Universiti Putra Malaysia
Danielle S. McNamara, University of Memphis
Edward M. Nussbaum, University of Nevada, Las Vegas
P. David Pearson, University of California, Berkeley
* Ralph Reynolds, University of Nevada, Las Vegas
Wolfgang Schnotz, University of Koblenz-Landau
* Neil Schwartz, California State University, Chico
Edward Smith, Columbia University
* The FABBS Foundation would like to thank Dr. Arthur Graesser, Dr. Ralph Reynolds, and Dr. Neil Schwartz for nominating Dr. Anderson for this honor and for leading the effort to spread the word about his nomination.
