Faculty and Staff Directory

Introduction

I love teaching at UW Tacoma! I appreciate the relatively small class size because it fits my preferred Socratic method of teaching that fosters critical thinking through asking appropriate and probing questions that encourages thoughtful, not rote, answers from students. In this way, I encourage students to think actively about the media system that surrounds them, as well as the society in which they live.
Since receiving my PhD in Communication from the Institute for Communication Research in 2010, I have taught a variety of classes in the Communication major at the University of Washington Tacoma.

Current Research: My research closely parallels the courses I have created and taught at UW Tacoma. My latest book - Journalism, Politics, and the Dakota Access Pipeline: Standing Rock and the Framing of Injustice (Routledge, 2019) explores the #NODAPL movement through the lens of environmental justice. Focused on framing research and interviews with the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe, the book is a natural progression from my environmental communication course TCOM 310. My first book – Landscape and the Environment in Hollywood Film: the Green Machine (Palgrave, 2017) – makes a clear case for considering ecological issues as a key part of intersectionality in cultural studies. It was from the ideas in this book that my new course (TCOM 312) was created.

Affiliations

• Chair and Steering Committee Member of the Environmental Education Community of Interest in partnership
with the Puyallup Watershed Initiative (2017-2020)
• Commissioner with the Sustainable Tacoma Commission, a part of the City of Tacoma (2014-2016).
• Faculty Fellow, University of Washington (2018, 2019)

Honors and Awards

• University of Washington Husky Green Award (2021)
•McKinstry Champion of Sustainability Scholarship (2019)
• Distinguished Teaching Award (2015)
• Distinguished Research Award (nominated) (2014)
• Distinguished Leadership Award (nominated) (2014)
• Outstanding Woman Award, University of Washington Tacoma (2014)
• Outstanding Teacher award, from the Outstanding Student Ceremony and Recognition (OS3S), University of Washington Tacoma (2014)
• Tacoma’s Biggest Carbon Loser, from the City of Tacoma’s Sustainable Tacoma Commission (2014)
• International Provost Grants (awarded), 2013-14 UW Faculty-led Study Abroad
• Voted Extrameritorious by Interdisciplinary Arts and Science faculty (2012)
• List of Teachers Ranked as Excellent by Their Students, University of Illinois (2006, 2007 and 2009)
• Pollsters and Parishioners: Survey Workshop on American Religion and Politics, Grant, Henry Institute, Calvin College (2009)
• Oak Ridge Institute for Science and Education, Three-year Fellowship (2000-2003)

Teaching

Classes include:
• Ecology, Inequality, and Popular Culture (TCOM 312)
• Critical Media Literacy (TCOM 101)
• Contemporary Issues in Environmental Communication (TCOM 310)
• Media Ethics (TCOM 257)
• Gender Ethnicity Class and the Media (TCOM 444)
• Political Economy of the Media (TCOM 380)
• Field Methods in Communication (TCOM 464)
• incoming freshman CORE courses
• graduate courses in the MAIS program (TIAS 502 and TIAS 503)

Academic Service

• Article Reviewer, Environmental Communication: a Journal of Nature and Culture (2020, 2017)
• Article Reviewer, Journal of Communication Inquiry (2018)
• Chair, Steering Committee for the Russell Family Foundation Environmental Education Communities of Interest as part of the Puyallup Watershed Initiative (2019).
• Steering Committee for the Russell Family Foundation Environmental Education Communities of Interest as part of the Puyallup Watershed Initiative (2018-2020)
• South Sound Green Tour Steering Committee (Spring 2018)
• Co-organizer, “A Plastic Ocean” event, partnering with
Point Defiance Zoo and Aquarium. William Phillip Hall (2017)
• Funding Development Committee Member, Environmental Education Community of Interest, Russell Family Foundation (2016)
• Commissioner, Sustainable Tacoma Commission: collaboration with Tacoma city officials, local businesses, and local environmental organizations (2012-2016)