I am a Professor in the Department of English at Ball State University. I earned my Ph.D in Applied Linguistics with a Certificate in Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages (TESOL) at the University of Pittsburgh. I also earned a Certificate in Learning Sciences from the Pittsburgh Science of Learning Center, a collaboration between scholars at the University of Pittsburgh and Carnegie Mellon University. I earned my B.A. in Elementary Education and Psychology at Carlow University. 

My scholarship and teaching bridges linguistics and pedagogy. My main research focus is the language development of adult learners of English as seen in oral language performance (speech). I also investigate the related topics of measuring linguistic performance, topic effects, and assessment. Find out more about my research here.

I teach undergraduate and graduate courses in linguistics and TESOL. Find out more about my teaching here.

My professional service often has an element of assessment (evaluation), including serving on a Fulbright National Screening Committee and as a manuscript reviewer for journals across a range of readerships. Find out more about my service work here. Here’s my current curriculum vitae CV_Vercellotti_NOV_2022.

I’m a native speaker of the Western Pennsylvania Dialect of American English. I have added features of other Midlands dialects to my idiolect. 

Here’s how I pronounce my name [meɹilu] [vɚsəllɑɾi].