Julie Esparza Brown, EdD is a professor of Special Education at Portland State University where her teaching, research, and publications focus on the intersection of language, dis/ability, race, and culture, and she is a passionate advocate for equity in education. Prior to joining PSU, she worked in public schools as a special, bilingual, and bilingual special education teacher and a school psychologist. Dr. Brown recently completed a four-year term as an elected school board member for the largest school district in Oregon.  Currently, she is Principal Investigator of a personnel preparation grant through the Office of English Language Acquisition to prepare diverse special educators and to improve literacy outcomes for multilingual students.  Dr. Brown recently completed work as Principal Investigator on a model demonstration grant funded through the Office of Special Education and Rehabilitation Programs that investigated culturally and linguistically responsive literacy interventions within an MTSS framework for English learner students at-risk for or with disabilities (projectlee.org). Her current co-authored book, Supporting English Learners in the Classroom: Distinguishing Language Acquisition from Learning Disabilities (Haas & Brown, 2019) is available through Teachers College Press.