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Professional Biography
I am currently an Associate Professor in the Department of English at North Carolina State University, where I teach undergraduate and graduate courses in business and technical communication. I have been at NCSU since 1996. You can download a detailed curriculum vitae (in pdf format) that details my academic career.
Life before NCSU
I completed my masters (1991) and doctoral (1996) degrees in Communication and Rhetoric in the Department of Language, Literature, and Communication at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute. The years I spent at Rensselaer were among the most important in my life: I not only learned a lot, but I made life-long friends among faculty and fellow grad students and met a number of Rensselaer alumni. Two of those alumni, Carolyn Miller and Steve Katz, were colleagues here at NCSU (also known as "Rensselaer South"), which made the move to North Carolina much easier. We were joined in 2002 by another alum, Jason Swarts. The picture of the four of us (shown on this page) appeared in the alumni magazine. Steve has sinced moved on to Clemson, and we miss him badly!
Prior to my time at Rensselaer, I spent thirteen years in television and advertising, working at tv stations in Albany, NY; Sacramento, CA; and Norfolk, VA. After working in a variety of positions, including promotion manager and account executive, I left to form a small advertising agency, also in Norfolk. For two years, my partner, Kathy Kellner, and I provided media planning and production services for accounts both large (Sentara Health Services) and small (Colonial Dry Cleaners).
Although I enjoyed that work, I kept thinking that there was something more interesting (and less stressful) that I should be doing. In 1988 I decided to take my first (and only) sabbatical to figure out what the something was. On a trip to visit friends in Albany, I chanced to meet my favorite professor from my undergraduate years, Dr. Harry Staley of the University at Albany (which called itself SUNYA when I was a student). He suggested I go to graduate school, and the rest is history. Of course, his idea was that I should attend Albany and get advanced degrees in literature! Sorry, Harry! (Well, not really. I love what I do.)
Research
At Rensselaer my research soon found a focus in the study of writing in public and private organizations. My dissertation investigated the mechanisms by which newcomers were socialized to organizational conventions for writing. Another chance meeting, this time with Dr. Jimmy Killingsworth of Texas A&M, led to my dissertation being accepted for publication in the book series he was then editing, ATTW Contemporary Studies in Technical Communication. The Dynamics of Writing Review came out in 1998.
I mined my dissertation data for three additional publications, two articles in the IEEE Transactions on Technical Communication (June and September, 1998) and one in The Journal of Business Communication (October 1998). Since that time I have worked on a variety of small projects (on topics such as service learning and ethnographic research methods) and one major project: with Lee Odell (my dissertation adviser at Rensselaer), I wrote Writing in a Visual Age, a textbook for first-year composition. In March of 2007, Lee and I were asked to produce a second edition of the book, which is due out in August 2009. The publisher decided that it was sufficiently different from the first edition to warrant a new title, so the new book is called Writing Now.
In the summer of 2006, I was invited to participate in research funded by an NSF grant that is investigating the flow of information from federally-funded nanoscience research centers into industry. This new area of research resulted in a series of workshops designed to reduce the amount of time it takes for innovations in research to move into beneficial products. With Professor Lynda Aiman-Smith of the College of Management at NCSU, I produced several conference presentations based on this work.
Teaching
Over the past nine years, I have focused much of my attention on my teaching, which is the source of much satisfaction. I have taught a variety of courses for both graduate and undergraduate students, and each course brings its own rewards (and challenges). With the added incentive of a LITRE (Learning in a Technology Rich Environment) grant, I created materials for online learning in ENG332 Communication for Business and Management. Two of these online modules are available on this site for use by anyone who finds them worthwhile.
As of the fall of 2005, I am once again becoming involved with the Department of English Internship Program. In my early years at NCSU, I assisted Dr. Judi Gaitens in the creation of this program, and I taught the related course for two years after Judi retired. In my role as the Internship Coordinator, I hope to continue the good work done by my colleagues, Jason Swarts and Cat Warren, in providing a program that reaches more students and inspires more community involvement. For the past several years, we have averaged about 20 students per semester, which is up from the previous average of 10 students per semester.
With the cooperation of the NCSU Career Center, we have held a series of events to promote the program, and are seeing significant growth in student participation--approximately 20 students per semester now participate. In fall 2008, we created a scholarship for interns, and hope to get sufficient funding to support one student each semester. Contributions welcome!
Service
My service to the department and the university consists of the normal gamut of committee assignments and minor administrative tasks. Like most of my colleagues I enjoy some of these activities (e.g., advising) and dread others (e.g., committees that meet frequently). The one bright spot in most service assignments is the opportunity to work with and learn about my colleagues. In such a large department, its hard to know everyone well, and committee assignments are an excellent instrument of socialization.
Last updated 2/12/09