Elfrieda "Freddy" Hiebert (born 1948) is an educational researcher whose work examines literacy, learning, early childhood development, teacher development, writing and children's literature. The main thrust of her work addresses literacy learning among at-risk youth in American classrooms. Currently, she is the CEO and President of TextProject, Inc., an agency that is dedicated to bringing beginning and struggling readers to high levels of literacy through a variety of strategies and tools, particularly through using science and social studies texts, used for reading instruction.

Elfrieda "Freddy" H. Hiebert received her B.A. in history from Fresno Pacific College, her M.Ed. in Elementary Education from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, and her Ph.D. in Educational Psychology from the University of Wisconsin-Madison. She started her career as a classroom teacher for the Clovis (CA) Unified School District before entering graduate school. From 1979-1985, she was on the faculty of the University of Kentucky. During her tenure at the University of Kentucky, she spent a year as a visiting associate professor at the Center for the Study of Reading at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign (1984) where she served as the director of staff for Becoming a Nation of Readers: The Report of the Commission on Reading which, in 1985, was published under the auspices of the Center for the Study of Reading and the National Academy of Education. In 1987, she assumed a professorship at the University of Colorado-Boulder and, in 1994, moved to the University of Michigan. From 1997-1999, she directed the Center for Improvement of Early Reading Achievement (CIERA) at the University of Michigan that included researchers Susan B. Neuman and Nell K. Duke as well as others from Michigan State University, University of Virginia, University of Southern California, and the University of Minnesota. From 2005 to 2010, she was an Adjunct Professor at the University of California, Berkeley. In January 2011, she founded and became CEO/President of TextProject, Inc.

Among the awards that Hiebert has received in recognition of her contributions as a researcher and educator are the School of Education Alumni Achievement Award from the University of Wisconsin-Madison (2000), William S. Gray Citation of Merit award for outstanding contributions to the field of reading from the International Reading Association (2008), election to the Reading Hall of Fame (2008), and selection as a Fellow of the American Educational Research Association (2011).