Teaching Experience

• Business 062: Introduction to Business Communication
• Career Development 205 
• Career Development 405 
• College 148: Critical Thinking
• Ethics 625: Essential Ethics for Legal Professionals
• Ethics 532: Introduction to Ethics for Legal Professionals 
• English 510: Foundations of Professional Communication 
• English 227: Professional Writing 
• English 216: Technical Writing 
• English 135: Advanced Composition 
• English 112: Composition 
• English 092: Intermediate English 
• English 062: Introduction to Reading and Writing 
• English 032: Developmental Writing and Reading 
• English 017: Foundations of English 
• Humanities 427: Studies in Poetry 
• Humanities 421: Studies in Literature 
• Humanities 420: Contemporary Literature 
• Humanities 410: 20th Century History 
• Humanities 303: Introduction to the Humanities 
• Language Arts and Sciences 432: Technology, Society, and Culture
• Sociology 183: Culture and Society
• Speech 227: Interpersonal Communication 
• Speech 225: Introduction to Speech Communication 

• Civic and Community Engagement 201
• English 103: Critical Reading, Writing, and Thinking
• English 101: English Composition 
• English 104: Technical Writing
• English 096: Accelerated Preparation for College Reading and Writing 
• English 094: Introduction to Technical Reading and Writing 
• English 091: Introduction to College Reading and Writing 
• English 089: Essential Reading and Writing Skills 
• Noncredit Education 106: Teaching P5BL with Project-Based Learning  (a course for fellow teachers)
• Noncredit English 002: Essential Reading & Writing II
• Noncredit English 001: Essential Reading & Writing I
• Noncredit College Skills 002: Business Writing in the Technical Age

"Never forget that there is one small student sitting in the back of your classroom who is far superior to you in both heart and mind.”
~ Dr. Thia Wolf, Professor of English

“True teachers are those who use themselves as bridges over which they invite their students to cross; then, having facilitated their crossing, joyfully collapse, encouraging them to create their  own.”
~ Nikos Kazantzakis“

~~~~~~~~~~~~

MY TEACHING PHILOSOPHY

Responsible for creating learning-centered classrooms that help students by using high impact practices and results-driven teaching strategies, active and collaborative learning, and pragmatic and real-world assignments — these are the words that best describe my teaching philosophy because I have witnessed firsthand the massive shifts we have faced in higher education over the  years of my teaching career. As a college teacher, I have worked tirelessly to learn what it takes to teach my students how to become better critical thinkers, readers, and writers, as well as how to help them to develop within themselves true resilience, intrinsic motivation, and growth mindsets. Furthermore, teaching is not my job; instead, it is my vocation and my sacred duty to help a diverse and multi-generational student population rise to the challenges of thinking and solving problems across the disciplines and in their chosen professions. 

In other words, my teaching philosophy is one that is constantly evolving to adapt to the ever-changing world of higher education. When I first began my own life as a student at College of the Canyons at the age of 17, I never dreamed that all of these years later, I would become a teacher of English, one who now faces five generations of people from around the world who enter my classrooms of today. Because our world has changed so much, I know today that I must teach my students how to deal with both academic and real-world skills and learn how to utilize their prior knowledge that enables them to understand the “big ideas” (or schema) that is so crucial to their success in learning how to translate academic reading and writing into careers and professions.

I must, in other words, level the playing field for all of them, a challenge made harder by the fact that they come from nearly every conceivable status in terms of socio-economics, culture, race, ethnicity, sex, gender, language ability, disability (physical or mental), and age. Still, this diverse world allows us all to gain the skills we need to face our global economy and develop the wherewithal to connect to people who are vastly unlike ourselves.  Whether I am gazing at my computer screen and reading online discussion posts and assignments or standing in a classroom full of recent high school graduates, veterans, senior citizens, active duty members of the military, and returning adults, it is my task to help them all to learn to embrace new technologies and time-proven teaching strategies that are guaranteed to help them even if they doubt it at first and resist the necessary changes in attitudes, beliefs, and activities. It is a challenge that I absolutely embrace every single day of my life.

Ultimately, I am of the firm opinion that I - as teacher of English - have a sacred obligation to roll up my sleeves and work together with my students to build a classroom learning environment that is conducive to meeting students where they are and helping them to get to where they want to go. Thus, over time, I have learned that I must be a learning-centered teacher, one who is also a teacher-researcher who learns every bit as much as do my students. We are partners in education. I must be both their coach and their judge, but I, too, must be willing to learn.  To do otherwise would be to commit the gravest of errors, for I must always remember that I do not know everything and that they, too, have life experiences and backgrounds that can help to enlighten me.  Like them, I must find the resilience to overcome all of the obstacles we face together, and no matter what their initial abilities or backgrounds may be, I must find the proper compassion, patience, understanding, and genuine passion within myself to ensure that every single of one of my students becomes successful at doing the things that many of them hate the most … become proficient at basic skills and rise to the challenges of academia, so that they may think and solve problems across the disciplines.

Furthermore, I believe that students can achieve far more than they realize if they are shown how their efforts can lead to the kinds of success that really matter — ensuring that it is their voices that can change the world around them and provide them with a better way of life. I have lived those values by creating various real-world, community-based learning assignments that require primary and secondary academic research and help them to utilize inquiry-based learning, design-thinking, and the core concepts of high performance teaming. Because learning is a process, the assignments in my classrooms are centered on 80% formative assessment and about 20% summative assessment, which means that my primary goal is to help my students to build on their successes and learn to embrace the learning process itself.  By working in collaborative settings such as pairs, small groups, and formal teams (but being individually graded), my students develop key teaming skills, understand the five stages of teams, and learn how to overcome the five dysfunctions of teams.

It is also by working together to achieve common academic and real-world goals that my students end up becoming friends who genuinely care about each other and stay together throughout their time at the college. That classroom environment based on partnership and community has also propelled my students into major academic and professional success. For example, my remedial and freshman composition students made front page news when they not only created a display to help prevent veteran suicide, but they also are now working on turning that event into a major motion picture, connected (via social media) with a company in Norway that wants them to serve as corporate spokesmen, and have become statewide leaders in a program of scholarly study that involves 14 California community colleges working in collaboration to embed civic engagement and service-learning in all California community colleges via the California Community College Foundation’s Civic Impact Project.

Whether they begin at the very lowest of basic skills classes or the most advanced graduate degree program my students enter my learning-centered and collaborative classrooms only to discover they have an intense desire to DO something about the world in which they live. Therefore, it is their passion to affect real change that allows them to become civic-minded people who are active voters and changers of the communities in which they live. It is their voices affect change locally and nationally, which is evidenced by the fact that my students have gained the attention of major network television news stations (ABC, NBC, CBS, and more) and other mass media outlets for their work on ending veteran suicide, writing actual legislation that has been carried by Congress, and becoming paid spokespeople for a water sports company as a result of their work on cleaning up local beaches. It is also as a result of their teamwork that my students not only conduct projects that help them land meaningful jobs, but they are also published writers of letters to the editor and as opinion page columnists in the local newspaper.

Most of all, my teaching philosophy is one that is founded on something my own favorite professor once taught me: I must always remember that there is always one silent student sitting in the back of my classroom who is far superior to me both in heart and mind. Helping that student to overcome the terror of working with others and discovering the joy of having a community of caring in which to thrive is why I am still here — 32 years later — striving every single day to become a better teacher. It is also why I try to live by the words of Marianne Williamson, who wrote:

"In every community, there is work to be done.
In every nation, there are wounds to heal.
In every heart, there is the power to do it."

I know that by helping my students to develop the sense of belonging in their academic community I will help them to help change the world around them.

COMMITTEE MEMBERSHIPS:

• Lead Adjunct Member, College of the Canyons Academic Senate
• Adjunct Member, College of the Canyons Academic Senate Executive Committee
• Adjunct Member: College of the Canyons Curriculum Committee
• Member: College of the Canyons Professional Development Committee
• Member, College of the Canyons CETL Committee
• Member: College of the Canyons Affordable Student Housing Taskforce
• Co-advisor: College of the Canyons Civic Engagement Club
• Co-advisor: College of the Canyons Helping Us Become Club
• Member, Academic Senate California Community Colleges Chancellor's Office Flex Calendar workgroup  
• Member, California Community Colleges Institutional Effectiveness Partnership Initiative Partnership Resource Teams
• Steering Committee/Leader for “Advancing Evidence on Civic and Community-Based Engagement in Higher Education,” a new project designed to develop national baselines for student performance on civic outcomes, Association of American Colleges and Universities 
• Leader, Embedded Tutoring Program, College of the Canyons
• Member, College of the Canyons Civic Engagement Steering Committee 
• Member, College of the Canyons Scholarship Selection Committee 
• Member, English 104 Curriculum Revision Committee, College of the Canyons
• Member, English 096 Curriculum Revision Committee, College of the Canyons 
• Member, First Year Promise Steering Committee, College of the Canyons
• Member, Improving University Online Teaching Committee, DeVry University 
• Member, Canvas Pilot Group, College of the Canyons 
• Member, High Impact Hybrid English Classroom Practices Committee, DeVry University 
• Founder and Director of The Writing Center, DeVry University, Palmdale Center
• Academic Faculty Liaison to Campus Dean, DeVry University 
• Founding Member, College of the Canyons Alumni Association Development Committee
• Founding Member, College of the Canyons Alumni Association 

SERVICE (FACULTY TO FACULTY MENTOR AND FACULTY TO STUDENT MENTOR) 

• Mentor, Civic Engagement Club President and Vice President (formal program), College of the Canyons
• Mentor, Helping Us Become … (HUB) Club President and Vice President (formal program) College of the Canyons
• Mentor/Leader, Embedded Tutoring Program, Devon Cottrell, tutor, College of the Canyons
• Mentee, Faculty Mentorship Program, College of the Canyons (Mentors: Dr. Juan Buriel, Anthony Michangelides, Dr. Patty Robinson).
• Mentor, Canvas Mentor Program, Jessica Small, College of the Canyons 
• Mentor, Canvas Mentor Program, Lori Wood, College of the Canyons 
• Mentor, Canvas Mentor Program, Ted Icada, College of the Canyons
• College of the Canyons Mentor, Canvas Mentor Program, Laurisa Reyes, College of the 
• Canyons 
• Mentor, Canvas Mentor Program, Debora Masterson, College of the Canyons 
• Mentor, Veteran Student Mentorship Program, DeVry University Palmdale Center 
• Mentor, Returning Adult Student Mentorship Program, DeVry University Palmdale Center 
• Mentor, EOPS Student Mentorship Program, DeVry University Palmdale Center 
• Mentor, Antelope Valley College New Majority Mentorship Program (dedicated to ESL/ELL learners, EOPS students, disabled students, and minority students), Antelope Valley College

SELECTED LIST OF PRESENTATIONS AND PARTICIPATION 

• Presenter, “Embedded Tutoring and How to Use It in the Classroom, Academic Senate, College of the Canyons
• Presenter, “Embedded Tutoring and How to Use It in the Classroom, English Department Skillshare Workshop, College of the Canyons
• Presenter, “Patio Talks” - College of the Canyons 
• Presenter, “Faculty and Student Civic Engagement and Service-Learning Projects at College of the Canyons, Presentation at a Local Adult Living Community: Friendly Valley 
• Presenter, “The Importance of Volunteerism to Self and Society,” Civic and Community Engagement Student Leadership Academy Module 2, College of the Canyons 
• Master of Ceremonies (and organizer), “Meet the Candidates,” College of the Canyons 
• Keynote, “Civic Engagement in Action,” College of the Canyons 
• Presenter, “Meet the Candidates,” College of the Canyons 
• Presenter, “Student Service-Learning Projects,” College of the Canyons 
• Master of Ceremonies, “Coffee With A Congressman and State Senate and Assembly Staff,” College of the Canyons 
• Presenter, “Adobe In-Design Interactive PDF Portfolio Workshop,” DeVry University 
• Presenter, “SAT Preparation Workshop” - DeVry University 
• Presenter: “Scholarship Workshop For Returning Students, Recent High School Graduates, and Veterans,” DeVry University 
• Presenter, “Teaching Students How to Write Winning College Scholarship Essays,” DeVry 
• University 
• Presenter, various workshops for the campus Writing Center (peer review workshops, individualized and group critical thinking techniques, close reading, annotating reading, 
• beginning and advanced research techniques ,“bootcamps” (grammar, punctuation, mechanics, sentence variety, logical fallacies, inductive and deductive reasoning, scholarly methods of citation, plagiarism avoidance, team building basics, growth mindset, and other topics related to undergraduate and graduate university student critical reading, writing, and thinking needs -DeVry University Writing Center, Palmdale Campus 
• Presenter, “Grammar and the Teaching of Grammar: Utilizing Underlying Syntactic Grammar (USK) For High Impact Undergraduate and Graduate College English Instruction,” DeVry University 
• Presenter, “Best Practices For Educating Veteran Students in University English and Humanities Classrooms,” DeVry University 
• Presenter, “Best Practices For Incorporating Diversity in University English and Humanities Classrooms,” DeVry University 
• Presenter, “Integrating Diversity in the Upper Division Humanities Classrooms: Minority and Cultural Diversity Literature That Opens Hearts and Minds,” DeVry University 
• Participant and Panelist, “The Developmental Writing Classroom: Sweathogs" and "The 
• English as a Second Language Classroom: The Story, the Students, and their Sentences,” The English Council of California Two Year Colleges 
• Presenter, “Improving English Instruction For Learning Disabled Students,” Antelope Valley College 
• Participant and Panelist, “Areas for Curriculum Expansion: Opportunities in Literature,” The English Council of California Two Year Colleges 
• Presenter, “Grammar and the Teaching of Grammar: Utilizing Underlying Syntactic Grammar (USK) For High Impact Community College English Instruction,” Antelope Valley College 
• Presenter, “Maximizing The Right Brain in the Creative Process,” Antelope Valley College 
• Presenter, “Improving Remedial English Reading and Writing,” Antelope Valley College 
• Presenter, “Grammar and the Teaching of Grammar: Utilizing Underlying Syntactic Grammar (USK) For High Impact Community College English Instruction,” Los Angeles Mission College 
• Participant and Panelist, “Areas for Curriculum Expansion: Opportunities in Literature,” The English Council of California Two Year Colleges 
• Presenter and Participant, 13th Annual Rhetoric Seminar on Current Theories of Teaching Composition, Purdue University 
• Participant, “Reading Outcomes Study,” Learning Assessment/Retention Consortium of 
• California/California Association of California Community Colleges Statewide Conference 
• • Participant, “Writing Outcomes Study,” Learning Assessment Retention Consortium (LARC)/ CA Association of California Community Colleges Statewide Conference 
• Participant, Third Annual Pacific Coast Writing Centers Association Conference

SELECTED LIST OF MEMBERSHIPS & COMMUNITY SERVICE 

• Volunteer, Los Angeles County Air Show, Lancaster, CA 
• Member, League of Women Voters, Antelope Valley Chapter 
• Member, National Council of Teachers of English 
• Volunteer, Antelope Valley Hope on the Go, Lancaster, CA 
• Volunteer, SommerHaven Ranch International, Lancaster, CA 
• Volunteer, All Nations International, Lancaster, CA 
• Volunteer, Antelope Valley Disaster Relief Network, Lancaster, CA 
• Volunteer, NeepUganda (an international NGO based in Lancaster, CA) 
• Volunteer, Antelope Valley Committee on Aging 
• Member of founding Advisory Board, Antelope Valley Champions Youth Build, Lancaster, CA 
• Member of Advisory Board, Alternatives to Violence Project Antelope Valley Chapter, Lancaster, CA 
• Coach, Upward Basketball Program, Youth After School Program, Lancaster, CA 
• Executive Director and Volunteer, St. Joseph Manor For Women and Children, Littleneck, CA 
• Volunteer, Tender Heart Mommy, Inc., Antelope Acres, CA 
• Executive Director & Volunteer, The Golden State Veterinary Medical Association 
• Founding Advisory Board Member, Antelope Valley Champion Youth Build 
• Advisory Board, Antelope Valley Chapter of the Alternatives to Violence Project (A.V.P.A.V) 
• Member, Lancaster School District Superintendent’s Advisory Council 
• Member, Parkview Middle School Site Council 
• Member, Parkview Middle School Parent Teacher Student Association 
• Founder, Greater Antelope Valley Community Coalition (G.A.V.C.C.) 
• Consultant/Contractor, Edwards Air Force Base's Office of Environmental Management and Edwards Air Force Base Top Three organizations as central environmental hub for the greater Antelope Valley Region
• Alpha/Beta Tester, QuickBooks Premier and QuickBooks Customer Manager software for Intuit, Inc.