Tess S. Fotidzis, Ph.D.

Dr. Tess Fotidzis is a cognitive neuroscientist, literacy researcher, and research operations director whose work bridges education, neuroscience, language, and learning across the lifespan. Her research investigates how the brain acquires, processes, and constructs meaning from language, spanning oral language, reading, writing, and the neural bases of reading disabilities. She uses multimodal methods, including EEG, fMRI, behavioral assessment, computational modeling, and noninvasive brain stimulation, to study the organization of brain networks during naturalistic language comprehension and explore how brain-based approaches may support reading and learning outcomes.

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Dr. Fotidzis plays a central role in the design, coordination, and implementation of the lab’s human subjects research infrastructure. She leads day-to-day study operations, participant workflows, protocol implementation, research staff training, data collection systems, regulatory documentation, and quality assurance processes across complex behavioral, neuroimaging, and brain stimulation studies. Her work supports compliance with institutional, NIH, IRB, FDA, GCP, and human subjects research requirements, with particular attention to ethical study conduct, documentation, participant safety, grants compliance and management, and reproducible research practices.

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Her scientific contributions include study design, intervention development, protocol refinement, data collection, manuscript preparation, and authorship and co-authorship on peer-reviewed publications. She is especially interested in translational approaches that connect neuroscience, literacy, and education, and in building research systems that allow interdisciplinary teams to carry out rigorous, participant-centered science.

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Before transitioning into cognitive neuroscience and literacy research, Dr. Fotidzis spent 15 years as an educator and literacy instructional leader across elementary and middle school settings. Her work included coaching teachers, leading schoolwide paradigm shifts in literacy instruction, designing and implementing interventions, and redesigning visual arts curriculum to integrate literacy, language, and meaning-making. This experience continues to shape her research perspective and grounds her scientific questions in the realities of classrooms, learners, teachers, and educational systems.

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Across research and education, Dr. Fotidzis is drawn to the architecture of learning: how systems are built, how meaning is made, and how careful design and delivery can support human development, especially for individuals who struggle. Whether coordinating a clinical research protocol, mentoring students and staff, supporting participants, writing manuscripts, or building the practical workflows that keep a study moving, she brings a commitment to rigor, warmth, care, creativity, and real-world impact.

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Outside the lab, Dr. Fotidzis remains deeply connected to education, community, and the natural world. She volunteers weekly at her daughter’s school as a "Literacy Room Mom" and serves as a her daughter's Girl Scouts troop co-leader, supporting young girls' curiosity, confidence, creativity, and sense of responsibility to one another and the world around them. A lifelong animal advocate and environmental conservationist, she is passionate about protecting the Earth — its lands, air, waters, and the many species with whom we share them — and about helping nurture that love and stewardship in the next generation.

When she is not in the lab or volunteering, you can usually find Dr. Fotidzis and her daughter walking barefoot outside, hugging trees, collecting sticks, observing plants and animals, or spending time in the woods or near water. She also enjoys reading novels and comic books, playing video games, watching anime, woodworking, and spending time with the raccoons, possums, and other backyard friends who regularly visit her shed while she works on projects. Her favorite moments, however, are those spent with her daughter and their three beloved feline family members.

Recent Publications