Lixia Cheng

Lixia Cheng is a 2014 PhD graduate of the Second Language Studies/English as a Second Language (ESL) program at Purdue University. Prior to this full-time position at PLaCE, Lixia had worked for almost four years in the Oral English Proficiency Program at Purdue, as a graduate testing coordinator and research assistant. During her graduate studies, she also taught a range of ESL/English for Academic Purposes courses including GS490: Reading, Writing and Speaking for International Students; English 106i: First-Year Composition for International Students; and English 620: Classroom Communication in ESL for Teaching Assistants. In addition, she carried out her project of designing and implementing a short-term course on Pragmatics and ESL Communication for international graduate students and spouses, funded by a Bilsland Strategic Initiatives Fellowship from the Graduate School. Thanks to her previous training in linguistics, she had the privilege of being a graduate lecturer in the Introduction to Linguistics course, teaching Purdue undergraduate students majoring in Elementary Education or English Education. Before coming to the US to pursue her PhD, Lixia had been a full-time English language lecturer at Southeast University in Nanjing, China for three years. In her free time, Lixia enjoys working on her research related to ESL teaching and assessment, doing acrylic paintings for decorating her office and sunroom, and driving her children and their friends to extracurricular activities.