Samuel Berlow

As a school board president, father, coach, and CEO, Berlow has seen how information design can affect the transfer of information. Researching what parameters influence speed and comprehension has been an interest to Sam ever since his children started to read. In order to help his children read more efficiently, he would print out reading assignments in different sizes and in different fonts to see if it would help his kids.

Catherine Bordeau

Catherine is a content developer and instructional designer focused on readability and language learning in education.

Cara Cannon, MS

Cara is a research assistant at the University of Central Florida focusing on human factors and readability in the medical and aviation fields.

Dave Crossland

Dave is lead operations manager for Google Fonts, and has commissioned thousands of fonts from hundreds of designers for dozens of writing systems, plus font editors, educational resources and live events. The way type design combines visual culture, language, technology, business, history – and its ubiquity – make this field something he finds endlessly fascinating.

Stephanie Day, PhD

Stephanie is a research scientist in the Virtual Readability Lab at the University of Central Florida. She received her Ph.D. in Developmental Psychology at Florida State University. Her research centers on examining links between children’s learning difficulties, individual differences, the classroom environment, and achievement. Stephanie has over 16 years of experience managing large-scale research studies focused on building technology to improve literacy outcomes for students in elementary school and is leading the TRC readability education research in K-12 populations

Jonathan Dobres, PhD

Jon’s background in advanced data analytics and scientific communication and extensive experience investigating a wide array of user experience issues includes past work investigating the impact of typographic design. Passionate about data science and statistical analysis, Dr. Dobres often combines large, disparate data sources into a cohesive story or developing custom software tools for analytical purposes. His publication record includes high quality research in the fields of visual perception, interface design, and related areas.

Marjorie Jordan

Marjorie is a global high-tech industry leader with a track record of developing multi-disciplinary teams to deliver on high-impact strategic priorities. Her interest in the intersection of technology and reading led her to found Readability Matters, a tech-for-good non-profit engaging cross-sector organizations to deliver personalized reading environments, empowering everyone everywhere to achieve more.

Mert Küçük

Mert is one of the developers of the VRL in Pavlovia platform. He is a PhD Candidate at Izmir University of Economics studying brain oscillations, aging, and visual perception.

Hilary Palmén, PhD

Hilary (she/her) is the Lead User Experience Researcher on the Google Fonts team. Hilary has worked at Google for 3 years and recently joined the Google Fonts team to help improve global literacy. Hilary’s previous roles have included Design Director for Honeywell’s Build Solutions, Lead Researcher in Microsoft, and Higher Scientist in the UK Ministry of Defence.

Veronica Penkova, MSc

Veronica Penkova is a graduate student at the University of Glasgow who assists with readability test implementation in Pavlovia, Prolific, and Qualtrics. She is interested in readability in children and implementing accessibility user research.

Rick Treitman

Rick is currently Entrepreneur-in-Residence for Document Cloud – specializing in Education. Rick’s work as EIR involves early-stage development of tools and solutions for Adobe’s customers. Current projects include readability controls in Acrobat, working with non-profits such as Readability Matters, and establishing and working closely with the Virtual Readability Lab at the University of Central Florida.

Shelley Rodrigo, PhD

Rochelle (Shelley) Rodrigo is the Senior Director of the Writing Program; Associate Professor in the Rhetoric, Composition, and the Teaching of English (RCTE); and Associate Writing Specialist (Continuing Status) in the Department of English at the University of Arizona. She researches how “newer” technologies better facilitate communicative interactions, specifically teaching and learning. As well as co-authoring three editions of The Wadsworth/Cengage Guide to Research, Shelley also co-edited Rhetorically Rethinking Usability (Hampton Press). Her scholarly work has appeared in Computers and Composition, C&C Online, Technical Communication Quarterly, Teaching English in the Two-Year College, EDUCAUSE Quarterly, Journal of Interactive Technology & Pedagogy, Enculturation¸ as well as various edited collections. In 2021 she was elected Vice President (4-year term including President) of the National Council of Teachers of English and won the Arizona Technology in Education Association’s Ruth Catalano Friend of Technology Innovation Award, in 2018 she became an Adobe Education Leader, in 2014 she was awarded Old Dominion University’s annual Teaching with Technology Award, in 2012 the Digital Humanities High Powered Computing Fellowship, and, in 2010 she became a Google Certified Teacher/Innovator. 

Ben Wolfe, PhD

Dr. Benjamin Wolfe is an Assistant Professor in Psychology at the University of Toronto Mississauga, where he is a Director of the Applied Perception and Psychophysics Laboratory (APPLY). Prior to joining the faculty at the University of Toronto, he was a Postdoctoral Associate at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology from 2015-2020, received his Ph.D. in Psychology from the University of California, Berkeley in 2015, and his B.A. in Psychology from Boston University in 2008. 

Dr. Wolfe’s interests in readability are grounded in his work on information acquisition and eye movements, asking how we gather the visual information we need for myriad tasks under conditions of time pressure. This work exists in a use-inspired framework, drawing on applied, practical tasks as a way to understand the underlying visual mechanisms. He is particularly interested in using tools from vision science to help improve reading for all readers. 

Joanna Lewis, PhD

Dr. Joanna Lewis is an assistant professor at the University of Northern Colorado. She received her Psychology Ph.D. in 2018 from the University of Central Florida as an NSF GRFP fellow. Her work focuses on the blending of interdisciplinary topics regarding visual attention, anxiety, distraction from technology, usability, cybersecurity, and education.

Dr. Lewis has focused on translating the benefits of individualized typography to new contexts, specifically to mathematical operations. Additional work explores the potential positive outcomes of applying typography recommendations within the classroom to improve digital literacy, particularly for first generation students.

Dave Miller, PhD

Dave Miller earned his doctorate in communication research from Stanford University, where he studied human-computer moral conflict and the human factors challenges of interaction with partially-automated systems. Subsequently he taught at Cornell University and led research focused on enhancing reading performance at the University of Central Florida. Prior to this, he studied persuasive interface design at New York University, earning a master’s degree from the Gallatin School of Individualized Study, and worked with the Persuasive Technology Lab and the Center for Design Research at Stanford University. He holds a bachelor’s degree in human-environment relations with minor in psychology from Cornell University, and has worked in human factors consulting on projects as diverse as revising the design of Disney character suits and character actor choreography to reduce injury risk, optimizing baggage handling operations, collaborating on the design of barcode scanners, and enhancing hospital infection control procedures.