Teacher
“The function of real education is to awaken our energy and make it explode.”
My primary passion is to teach and to foster learning. I have been teaching since I was 21 years old as a graduate assistant at the University of Colorado at Boulder. Since then, I have taught thousands of students in a variety of courses. From teaching introductory courses to the field of human communication, exploring the details of interpersonal communication and health care, and taking students abroad to countries such France and Costa Rica, my goal is to cultivate in students the ability to communicate positively and to learn more deeply across the lifespan.
I have earned many accolades for my teaching, including winning the Excellence in Teaching Award in 2011 from the College of Professional Studies at the University of Arkansas at Little Rock. I am also a Distinguished Teaching Fellow for the Academy for Teaching and Learning Excellence, for which I also served as a co-director for three years. More importantly, students experience transformative learning. In course evaluations, students write that my teaching creates “a life changing self-discovery,” fosters “new ways of thinking, and ultimately learning “how I can be and make a difference.”
The Indian thinker Krishnamurti once said that “The function of real education is to awaken our energy and make it explode.” That’s how I approach my role as a teacher and what I hope to create wherever learning takes place.
Undergraduate Courses
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First Year Experience (Study Abroad to Costa Rica)
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Speech Communication
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Introduction to Communication Research
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Interpersonal Communication
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Interviewing
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Communication Ethics
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Researching Lived Experience (Study Abroad in Paris, France)
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Positive Communication
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Capstone
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Positive Communication in Health Care (Bridge course)
Graduate Courses
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Human Communication Theory
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Interpersonal Communication Theory and Contexts
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Communication Ethics and Character