Dr. Watts holds a B.A. from Brandeis University, an M.A. in English from the University of Virginia, and a Ph.D. in English from Bryn Mawr College. She holds certification from the State Board of Private Academic Schools to teach secondary-level English. She has taught English at Torah Academy and previously served as an assistant professor at La Salle University. Dr. Watts is an expert on the 20th century American Jewish writer Bernard Malamud and has published widely on his work. Her articles appear in a variety of journals, books and reference works, including Holocaust Literature (edited by S. Lillian Kremer), The Torah U-Madda Journal, thelehrhaus.com, Modern Jewish Studies, and Studies in American Jewish Literature. She also served as the bibliographer of the Bernard Malamud Society from 1994 to 2009, and, with Rabbi Tzvi Sinensky, won the inaugural Kohelet Prize for Interdisciplinary Studies in 2017.