Laura Roop, director of the Western Pennsylvania Writing Project and faculty member at the University of Pittsburgh School of Education, is new to the region. She directed the Oakland (MI) Writing Project for eighteen years in separate stints, and served as director of outreach at University of Michigan School of Education. She began her professional career as a high school English teacher, and eventually worked as an intermediate school district consultant in two counties and as a professional development facilitator for the Michigan English Language Arts Framework Project, a federally-funded state standards effort. From 2009-2012, she followed a cohort of students assessed in the bottom quartile from ninth grade through college, designing summer programs and organizing trips and presentations under the auspices of the Algebra Project, a national network founded by civil rights organizer and mathematician Bob Moses.  On July 23, Dr. Roop was featured in the University of Pittsburgh Times (photo here credited to this article).  See more about the WPWP at https://www.wpwp.pitt.edu/.