Jia Zhu
Associate Professor of Mandarin Chinese
Irby 207 C
(501) 852-2332
Dr. Zhu is originally from Chengdu, China, where she had four years’ college English teaching
experience. She got her M.A. in English as a Second Language (ESL) at University
of Arizona and another M.A. in Teaching Chinese as a Foreign Language (TCFL) at
University of Iowa before getting her Ph.D. in Second Language Acquisition from
University of Iowa.
Currently, Dr. Zhu is a tenured associate professor of Chinese at the School of Language and
Literature. Since joining UCA in 2011, she has helped establish the Chinse major program
at UCA, which is the only degree program in Chinese in the state of Arkansas. Dr. Zhu has also
been an ACTFL Full OPI (Oral Proficiency Interview) Rater of Chinese since 2015. Her
research interests are language classroom interaction, discourse analysis, second language
pedagogy, curriculum design and development, and teacher education.