Delilah Gonzales, a tenured professor at Texas Southern University, is devoted to early literacy. She operates under the tenet that "students do not need to reform to meet the needs of educators; educators must reform to meet the needs of their students." To create early childhood literacy learners, she thinks educators and families need to use approaches that are developmentally appropriate, grounded in research, and culturally relevant. Over the course of her more than 30 years in the field of early literacy instruction, Delilah has held positions as a researcher, college professor, national speaker, elementary principal, and teacher. She thus contributes to the discussion from both a practitioner and a researcher perspective. She is the executive director of the Emerging Learners Literacy Foundation, a group that advocates for early learners to have their own home libraries. Delilah graduated with a Doctor of Education in Instruction and Curriculum Leadership with a focus in Literacy from the University of Memphis. She also holds a Master of Science from the University of Memphis in Instruction and Curriculum Leadership with a focus on Early Childhood Education. Her bachelor's degree from the University of Tennessee at Martin is in elementary/early childhood education.