Missy  D.  Cosby, PhD

​I believe in the importance of resilience. What I do not believe in is ignoring structural systems that require more resilience of some than others.
​~Dr. Beronda Montgomery
My name is  Missy D. Cosby and I am an assistant professor in mathematics education  in the College of Education, Health, and Human Sciences at the University of Tennessee . Prior to my work in the academy, I taught high school mathematics full-time for 15 years and continued part-time as a mathematics teacher throughout my doctoral studies for a total of 21 years in the high school math classroom. My time spent in K-12 teaching  greatly informed my research interests and understanding about the sociocultural and sociopolitical nature of mathematics teaching and learning in school settings. Broadly, my research interests center on the interaction between social identities and content learning identities such as mathematics or science identities. I am largely interested in how power related to race and gender are at play in ways that impact access to the development of robust mathematics and science identities. I engage a range of traditional and novel qualitative methods in conjunction with Black feminist and intersectional frames to study the mathematics and science learning experiences of Black girls and young women.

Personally, I am a mother,  reader, plant mama,  and "reality" television consumer.  I am the latter only because I am interested in how humans interact, react, respond, learn, change, and grow in a variety of social contexts. 

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