Dr. Judy Schaffer is an Assistant Professor of Curriculum and Instruction at Texas A&M University-Central Texas, where she serves as the B.S. in Education Program Coordinator and Program Lead for the CBF Raising Texas Teachers Scholarship. She earned her Ph.D. in Curriculum and Instruction from Texas Tech University, with a focus on literacy, curriculum, and teacher education. She also holds master’s degrees in Educational Administration and Technical Communication and Rhetoric.

Her scholarship examines how teacher candidates develop instructional judgment through writing, lesson design, and engagement with the professional genres of teaching. Drawing on teacher education, curriculum studies, literacy, and rhetoric and writing studies, she studies how candidates learn to interpret standards, use lesson planning templates, read scripted curriculum, and justify instructional decisions. Her work positions lesson plans, curricular materials, reflections, and classroom artifacts as more than required assignments. They are sites where future teachers learn what counts as teaching, what counts as evidence, and how professional judgment develops.

Her professional background spans K–12 and higher education. She has served as an elementary and secondary classroom teacher, instructional coach, testing coordinator, and literacy interventionist. In higher education, she has taught at Texas Tech University and the University of Mary Hardin-Baylor and has supported teacher candidates as a clinical supervisor for Western Governors University. She has also contributed to curriculum development as a writer with Texas Tech University and the TEKS Resource System, experience that informs her understanding of the texts and tools teachers use to plan, enact, and evaluate instruction. In addition, she has served for more than two decades as a reviewer and grant team facilitator for federal education programs with the U.S. Department of Education and the Department of Defense Education Activity.

At Texas A&M University-Central Texas, Dr. Schaffer teaches undergraduate and graduate courses in teacher preparation, including methods, foundations, theories of learning, instructional decision-making, literacy development, and assessment. Her teaching emphasizes inquiry-based instruction, standards alignment, community-engaged learning, and purposeful writing as a tool for professional reasoning. As a Service-Learning Fellow, she integrates coursework with real-world educational contexts and supports teacher candidates in moving beyond assignment completion toward thoughtful instructional decision-making.

Her scholarly work has appeared in Literacy Practice and Research, and she has presented at national conferences on writing, curriculum, artificial intelligence, and teacher education.