Laura Chávez-Moreno

Laura Chávez-Moreno is an award-winning, qualitative social researcher and assistant professor in the Departments of Chicana/o & Central American Studies and Education at the University of California, Los Angeles. Prof. Chávez-Moreno researches, writes, and teaches about Chicanx/Latinx education.  She works at the intersections of education, pedagogy, language, literacy, and ethnic studies, particularly Chicanx/Latinx Studies.

Dr. Chávez-Moreno’s multiple award-winning book, How Schools Make Race: Teaching Latinx Racialization in America, is available at all major book sellers and has been featured in multiple podcasts and popular media.

Her research has been published in top-tier journals such as Review of Educational Research, Educational Researcher* (2022; 2025), American Educational Research Journal, Research in the Teaching of English, and Journal of Teacher Education (2015, 2021). Her research has been recognized with prestigious awards from organizations such as the American Educational Research Association and the National Academy of Education/Spencer Foundation and she was a fellow of the 2020–2022 cohort of NCTE Research Foundation’s Cultivating New Voices among Scholars of Color. In 2023, she received the Alan C. Purves Award from the National Council of Teachers of English for her article, “The continuum of racial literacies: Teacher practices countering whitestream bilingual education,” published in Research in the Teaching of English. This annual award honors the article deemed most significant in advancing the field. Recently, she was awarded the 2025 Early Career Award from the Critical Race Studies in Education Association and the 2026 American Sociological Association Section on Sociology of Education’s The Anna Julia Cooper Award, awarded every two years to an early career scholar to acknowledge exceptional research and/or service in efforts to address racial equity within the field of education.

Prof. Chávez-Moreno is sought after as a speaker by school districts, university organizations, and teacher preparation programs. She draws from her research and extensive teaching experience across a variety of educational levels—including elementary, secondary, tertiary, teacher education, and older-adult education. She worked as a high school teacher of Spanish in the School District of Philadelphia for five years, wrote district curriculum, and served on boards of community organizations. She is a member of the UC Faculty Association (affiliated with AAUP) and has been a long-time member of the American Federation of Teachers (through UCAFT, UW-Madison Teaching Assistants’ Association, and the Philadelphia Federation of Teachers). She grew up in Douglas, Arizona, and Agua Prieta, Sonora, México.

For an updated bibliography, please visit Chávez-Moreno’s Google Scholar webpage.

Chávez-Moreno, L. C. (2018). A review of “Stamped from the Beginning”: On a definitive history of anti-Black racism. Education Review, 25, 1-5. doi: 10.14507/er.v25.2407

Chávez-Moreno, L. C. (2025). Conceptualizing Latinx vis-à-vis Race in Education Research. Educational Researcher. https://doi.org/10.3102/0013189X251336178

Chávez-Moreno, L. C. (2025). How Schools Make Race: Teaching Latinx Racialization in America. Harvard Education Press. https://hep.gse.harvard.edu/9781682539224/how-schools-make-race/

Chávez-Moreno, L. C. (2024). Examining race in LatCrit: A systematic review of Latinx critical race theory in education. Review of Educational Research, 94(4) 501-538. https://doi.org/10.3102/00346543231192685

Chávez-Moreno, L. C. (2024). Toward a relational racialization lens in education: addressing critiques of CRT’s race theory. International Journal of Qualitative Studies in Education, 38(2), 211–227. https://doi.org/10.1080/09518398.2024.2365196

Chávez-Moreno, L. C. (2024). A Literature Review of Raciolinguistics in Dual-language Bilingual Education: A Call for Conceptualizing Racialization. In J. Friere, C. Alfaro, & E. de Jong (Eds.), The Handbook of Dual Language Bilingual Education (pp. 254–265). Routledge. 10.4324/9781003269076-20

Chávez-Moreno, L. C. (2023). A raciolinguistic and racial realist critique of dual language’s racial integration. Journal of Latinos & Education, 22(5), 2085-2101. http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/15348431.2022.2086555

Chávez-Moreno, L. C. (2022). Critiquing racial literacy: Presenting a continuum of racial literacies. Educational Researcher (51)7, 481-488. https://doi.org/10.3102/0013189X221093365

Chávez-Moreno, L. C. (2022). The continuum of racial literacies: Teacher practices countering whitestream bilingual education. Research in the Teaching of English, 57(2), 108-132. Recognized with the 2023 Alan C. Purves Award.

Chávez-Moreno, L. C., Villegas, A. M., & Cochran-Smith, M. (2022). The experiences and preparation of teacher candidates of color: A literature review. In C. Gist & T. Bristol (Eds.), Handbook of Research on Teachers of Color & Indigenous Teachers, p. 165-180. American Educational Research Association. PDF

Chávez-Moreno, L. C. (2022). Race reflexivity: Examining the unconscious for a critical race ethnography. In S. May & B. Caldas (Eds.), Critical Ethnography, Bi/Multilingualism, Race(ism) and Education, p. 91-107. Multilingual Matters. PDF

Pacheco, M., & Chávez-Moreno, L. C. (2021). Bilingual education for self-determination: Re-centering Chicana/o/x and Latina/o/x student voices. Bilingual Research Journal, 44(4) 522-538. doi: 10.1080/15235882.2022.2052203

Chávez-Moreno, L. C. (2021). Dual language as white property: Examining a secondary bilingual-education program and Latinx equity. American Educational Research Journal, 58(6) 1107-1141. doi: 10.3102/00028312211052508

Chávez-Moreno, L. C. (2021). Racist and raciolinguistic teacher ideologies: When bilingual education is “inherently culturally relevant” for Latinxs. The Urban Review, 54(4) 1-22. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11256-021-00628-9

Chávez-Moreno, L. C. (2021). The problem with Latinx as a racial construct vis-à-vis language and bilingualism: Toward recognizing multiple colonialisms in the racialization of Latinidad. In E. G. Murillo, Jr., et al. (Eds.), Handbook of Latinos & Education (2nd ed., pp. 164-180). Routledge. PDF

Chávez-Moreno, L. C. (2021). U.S. empire and an immigrant’s counternarrative: Conceptualizing imperial privilege. Journal of Teacher Education, 72(2) 209-222. https://doi.org/10.1177/0022487120919928

Chávez-Moreno, L. C. (2019). Researching Latinxs, racism, and white supremacy in bilingual education: A literature review. Critical Inquiry in Language Studies, 17(2) 101-120. doi: 10.1080/15427587.2019.1624966

Chicanx/Latinx education

Critical race & ethnic studies in education

Relational racialization

Intersection of racialization, language, literacy, and education

Racial literacy

Bilingual education

Urban schooling

Teacher education, teaching, & pedagogy

Sociopolitical & cultural contexts of teaching & learning

Qualitative research methodologies

PhD, University of Wisconsin-Madison; School of Education; Curriculum & Instruction

Graduate Certificate, Boston College; School of Education; Curriculum & Instruction

MA, University of Michigan-Ann Arbor; School of Education; Literacy, Language, & Culture

BS in Education, Northern Arizona University; College of Education; Spanish, Secondary-level Education, and Latin American Studies

Undergraduate

• Latinxs & Public Education
• Critical Race & Ethnic Studies in Education
• Latinx Literacies
• 10B – Introduction to CCAS

Graduate

• Critical Race Theory & Latinxs
• Teaching & Learning Racialization

Prof. Chávez-Moreno is deeply committed to mentorship, emphasizing support for students from underrepresented backgrounds and/or those dedicated to social justice causes. Among her many service activities, she has mentored undergraduate and graduate students through several organizations, including the Hispanic Scholarship Fund.

Dr. Chávez-Moreno welcomes applications from prospective graduate students who are interested in developing lines of research with these or similar topics:

• how education makes Latinidad
• the specificity of the Latinx racialized category in education
• teachers’ racial-literacy practices
• teaching of critical race & ethnic studies in secondary classrooms
• using a relational racialization lens in education research
• advancing critical race theory in education research
• examining imperial privilege
• and other areas where she can employ her expertise to advise students in their independent research projects

Dr. Chávez-Moreno especially welcomes applications from prospective graduate students who have experience as secondary-level classroom teachers or other similar practitioner experience. Please read Dr. Chávez-Moreno’s publications for information on her research expertise