Ola Ozernov-Palchik

Dr. Ola Ozernov-Palchik is a Senior Research Scientist at Wheelock College of Education and Human Development at Boston University and a Research Scientist at the McGovern Institute for Brain Research at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology . She received her Ph.D. in cognitive science and child development from Tufts University. Dr. Ozernov-Palchik’s research focuses on the neurocognitive mechanisms of reading and language comprehension and how they vary across individuals and throughout development. She applies advanced cross-disciplinary methods — including adult and pediatric multimodal neuroimaging, randomized control interventions, psycholinguistic experiments, and longitudinal methods to understand the mechanisms in typical and atypical development. In addition to her research, Dr. Ozernov-Palchik served as the program director for the Mind, Brain, and Education Master’s program at Harvard Graduate School of Education from 2019 to 2022 and currently holds a position as a lecturer at HGSE. She has been an advocate both locally in her own school district and state, and nationally in support of universal screening for early literacy and evidence-based literacy instruction. Dr. Ozernov-Palchik is a recipient of the prestigious Early Career Award from the International Dyslexia Association, and she has published more than 30 peer-reviewed journal articles and presented at countless national and international conferences and meetings.