Dr. Davidson recently joined AIR as Principal Literacy Specialist and Researcher in the Policy and Practice division in International Education.  Before coming to AIR, she held the position as the Team Lead for the Reading Team in the E3 Office of Education at USAID. Prior to joining USAID, she was a senior consultant in literacy where she provided support for and contributed to the design on projects funded by USAID and the World Bank in early literacy in countries in Sub-Saharan Africa, S.E. Asia, and the South Pacific.  She has designed, implemented, and consulted in the development of reading interventions and early grade reading assessments in multiple languages, developed coaching models and pre-service professional development modules in teaching children how to read in more than 13 countries. She has published articles in peer-reviewed journals, and has designed impact evaluations for reading interventions.  

Prior to her international work, Dr. Davidson worked as a national consultant to the states for Reading First, and designed and directed several intervention studies in early literacy. As a tenured faculty member at Western Washington University, she developed and taught graduate and undergraduate courses in general education and special education on reading methods, assessment, writing, and early language and literacy acquisition. She also taught graduate courses and conducted research as a faculty member at the University of Maine and the University of Utah. She earned a master’s degree in school and community psychology from Central Florida University and earned her Ph.D. from the University of Washington in special education.