Tomoko Takahashi, EdD, LHD Provost & Vice President for Academic Affairs Dean of the Graduate School Professor of Linguistics and Education Phone: 949-480-4047 Fax: 949-480-4062 Email: tt@soka.edu

Tomoko Takahashi, Ed.D., joined Soka University, Calabasas in 1992. In February 1994, she was appointed as Soka University of America's first Dean of the Graduate School to direct the Master of Arts degree program in Second and Foreign Language Education. In May 2002, she was appointed as SUA's first Provost to serve as the Chief Academic Officer (CAO) of the University, overseeing both the graduate and undergraduate academic programs. She also serves as the University's Accreditation Liaison Officer (ALO) and teaches in the graduate program as Full Professor of Linguistics and Education.

Takahashi received her BA in English with magna cum laude from Albertus Magnus College in 1977. She subsequently entered Columbia University for graduate studies in applied linguistics, earning her doctorate in 1984. She continued her post-doctoral research at Columbia while teaching applied linguistics and training graduate-level students to become language teachers.

Takahashi has published more than twenty books including scholarly books in English and Japanese on language learning, cross-cultural communication, and lexico-semantics; thirteen co-authored textbooks for Japanese learners of English, eight of which have been translated into Chinese and Korean; and Japanese translations of Rosa Parks: My Story, Quiet Strength, and Dear Mrs. Parks. Her research interests include second language acquisition, particularly lexico-semantic transfer and pragmatic transfer, and cross-cultural communication. Her research has been widely published and cited in scholarly journals and books in the field of applied linguistics. She has also published numerous articles in magazines and journals for English learners in Japan, and is a well-respected translator of Japanese and English.

Takahashi serves on the Board of Trustees of Albertus Magnus College in New Haven, CT; she received the Albertus Alumni Association Award for Outstanding Professional Achievement in 2002 and the Doctor of Humane Letters Honoris Causa in 2006. Takahashi is an active supporter of the annual "Pathways to Freedom" program organized by the Rosa and Raymond Parks Institute for Self-Development. She has also served as a curriculum/educational consultant for publishers and organizations such as ALC Press in Tokyo and "Japan Hands - Educational Task Force" of Japan Society in New York, and as a dictionary editor for Benesse Corporation in Tokyo.