Dr. Mary Wells has spent a decade teaching Spanish at the both the middle and high school levels, bringing a deep commitment to culture and identity into her classroom. Whether working with L2 learners, where she uses culture as the entry point into language through comprehensible input approaches, or with heritage language learners, where she creates space for students to examine and affirm their own identities, she believes the classroom should be a place where every student feels seen in the language they are acquiring or reclaiming. As an experienced world traveler, she frames Spanish as both a global and local language, highlighting the richness of US Latino communities while also organizing international travel opportunities that bring the language to life for her students.

Dr. Wells earned her Ed.D in 2025 in Literacy, Culture, and Language Education from Indiana University with her dissertation entitled “Mi abuela lo dice así”: Navigating Language Ideologies with Secondary Spanish Heritage Language Learners. She has focused her advanced study and research on heritage language education, bilingual education, and Spanish language pedagogy.  She also holds a M.Ed from East Stroudsburg University, and a B.A. in Spanish from Temple University.  She is a seasoned conference presenter and active in the Pennsylvania State Modern Language Association.