Lauren Lunsford
Professor & Senior Capstone Coordinator
College of Education, Belmont Formation Collaborative
Biography
Lauren Brook Lunsford, Ph.D., serves as the University Coordinator for Belmont’s Senior Capstone program, a role she also held from 2011–2014 and has now returned to lead once again. In this position, she supports assessment and faculty development for this culminating element of Belmont’s BELL Core general education curriculum. In addition to her work with Senior Capstone, she has been an active faculty member in the BELL Core, teaching First Year Seminars, Interdisciplinary Learning Communities, and Senior Capstone courses that emphasize reflection, integration, and civic engagement. Her leadership at Belmont has also extended beyond the BELL Core through key roles such as Associate Dean of the College of Liberal Arts and Social Sciences (2014–2022) and Chair of the Institutional Review Board (2013–2015).
A Professor of Education at Belmont since 2006, Dr. Lunsford brings her expertise in literacy and special education to both undergraduate and graduate classrooms. She earned her B.A. in Psychology from the University of Virginia and both her M.Ed. and Ph.D. in Special Education from Vanderbilt University, grounding her teaching in a strong academic foundation. Her courses prepare future educators to support students with diverse learning needs, with particular emphasis on identifying and addressing reading difficulties and fostering effective collaboration in schools. Her scholarship in these areas has been widely shared through publications and national presentations, including the International Dyslexia Association and the Arizona Council for Exceptional Children, where she has contributed to advancing the conversation around literacy, dyslexia, and special education practice.
Dr. Lunsford has also been highly successful in securing external grant funding, bringing in more than $2.2 million to support Belmont initiatives. This includes a $1.97 million state-funded grant in mathematics teacher preparation and multiple interdisciplinary grants, each totaling over $74,000, which forged meaningful collaborations between disciplines. These interdisciplinary projects connected education, science, and the humanities in creative ways—such as integrating cooking and gardening into literacy and math instruction—to prepare classroom teachers to work together across subject areas and better support student success.