What is your advising philosophy?

My approach is student-centered and developmental. The liberal arts offer incredible opportunity for discovery and personal growth, and I am extraordinarily lucky to play a part in helping others explore relationships between different ideas and how those ideas might empower them to think about their own paths and about what they're looking for from the university. If I'm doing it right, I'm not only helping to frame questions about how to best navigate the options and demands a person faces, but also making space to think about how experiences encountered in that process allow for reflection on one's own ideas and goals.

What was your path to Newnan?

I started out pretty confident that I wanted to be a college professor because that was the most appealing path I had encountered up to that point in my life. I had always enjoyed reading, learning, and discussing ideas--and I came to enjoy teaching very early into graduate school--but as I produced more and more scholarship, I came to realize that it was not exactly what I had enjoyed most about college or graduate school. Instead, I preferred thinking broadly about the university and what people get out of it, and I especially liked making time to speak with students about their wider interests. I had been fortunate in my time in graduate school to get to know some academic advisors there, and they convinced me that someone with my background could plausibly make the transition into advising. After some background reading and dedicated study, I set out to find a full-time advising job and eventually entered the profession. The first place I found was lovely but far from my family, so I sought a lovely place closer to my original homeland of southeastern Michigan: Newnan Academic Advising Center.

Why did you join Newnan?

I am very excited about a place like Newnan where I can make learning and knowledge part of my daily work while also helping others in concrete, particular ways. I'm also very lucky to join a staff of thoughtful, compassionate people who bring a great diversity of perspectives and experiences to the mission of helping others move toward their goals.

Class you loved and why?

Relatively early in college I took a course on the development of the eighteenth-century British novel. It really opened my perspective as far as how much room for particularly and depth of thought there could be in college courses, even at a small institution like the one I attended.

Interests and hobbies:     

Reading, brewing and roasting coffee, finding new parks and other pleasant places in which to read and drink coffee.