Tom started his University career at The University of Waikato in Hamilton, New Zealand after gaining a doctorate at The University of Minnesota. In 1990, he won an Associate Professor position at The University of Auckland and in 2000, gained a personal chair in Education. From 2000-2003, He was co-head of the School of Education at The University of Auckland. In 2006, Massey University invited him to join them as a Professor of Literacy Education and he remained in that role until April 2018. In April 2019, he gained the title of Professor Emeritus.

He has authored or co-authored more than 170 publications including 24 books and has served on editorial boards of many journals..

He has taught or co-taught in a range of areas including the reading process, literacy difficulties, psychology of reading, language, literacy and cognition, developmental psychology, human development, and research methods.Tom has supervised more than two dozen theses and dissertations.

He served ILA in the past as President of the Waikato Reading Association, as a member of the ILA publications committee, and as reviewer for The Reading Teacher and Reading Research Quarterly.

University Reading Clinic: For ten years, he directed on a voluntary basis an after- school University reading project with private sponsorship attended by many hundreds of pupils needing help with learning to read and spell. For five years, during summer semester he co-taught at a local elementary school a University undergraduate course for teachers and trainee teachers where children with reading difficulties received daily lessons from our students.