The Editor

Hi. I’m Dr. Sandra Deshors. Across classrooms and continents, I have dedicated my career to helping students find their voice. From teaching young children their first words in French to guiding Ph.D. candidates through the complexities of academic writing, my career has been devoted to supporting learners at every stage of their journey.

I began as a French teacher in Brighton, UK, where I taught at the primary and secondary school levels, and quickly discovered a passion for making complex ideas accessible to all learners. That passion grew into a truly international career spanning France, the United Kingdom, and the United States.

With over two decades of teaching experience, I advanced from school and university classrooms to becoming a core faculty member in Michigan State University’s prestigious Second Language Studies Ph.D. program and MA TESOL program. Along the way, I have supervised Master’s and Ph.D. projects, helping emerging scholars navigate the very challenges that inspired Writing from the Ground Up.

My path has also been shaped by extensive research. I have served as a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Montpellier III, a visiting scholar at UC Santa Barbara, and faculty at New Mexico State University before joining Michigan State University. My scholarship has consistently engaged with language learning, usage, and innovation, resulting in an extensive body of work that establishes my credibility as both a researcher and mentor. While I am no longer affiliated with MSU, I continue to build on decades of teaching and research centered on language learning, global Englishes, and corpus linguistics.

Beyond my own research, I have contributed to the field through editorial leadership, co-editing volumes that advance the study of learner language and global Englishes, including Multidimensional Perspectives on Interlanguage: Exploring may and can across learner corpora, Corpus Linguistic Perspectives on Linguistic Innovations in Non-native Englishes, and Modeling World Englishes: Assessing the Interplay of Emancipation and Globalization of ESL Varieties.

This unique combination of international teaching, extensive research, advanced supervision, and editorial experience culminates in Writing from the Ground Up. The workbook distills years of cross-cultural teaching and scholarly mentoring into a practical, supportive guide that empowers graduate students to assemble, refine, and share their own original research with confidence.