Praxis: A Writing Center Journal • Vol. 17, No. 3 (2020)

About the Authors

Aaron Colton, PhD is the Assistant Director of the TWP Writing Studio and a Lecturer in Writing Studies at Duke University. Previously, he was an Assistant Director of the Communication Center and a Marion L. Brittain Postdoctoral Fellow at the Georgia Institute of Technology. In addition to his research in writing center studies, he is currently developing a book project on the politics of writer’s block as it is represented in 20th- and 21st-century US fiction.

Annwesa Dasgupta, PhD is a postdoctoral researcher with the STEM Education Innovation and Research Institute. Her primary role at SEIRI is to facilitate the SEIRI seed grant program (SSG) that serves as a grant competition for innovative pedagogical implementations by STEM faculty at IUPUI. Her research interests include biology education as well as integrated STEM research.

Dana Lynn Driscoll, PhD is a professor of English at Indiana University of Pennsylvania, where she directs the Kathleen Jones White Writing Center and teaches in the Composition and Applied Linguistics doctoral program. She currently serves as Co-Editor for the open-source first-year writing textbook series Writing Spaces, which offers free readings and instructional materials for composition courses. She has published widely on writing transfer, learning theory, writing centers, and research methods and has offered plenary addresses and workshops around the globe. Her co-authored 2012 article with Sherry Wynn Perdue won the IWCA’s Outstanding Article Award.

Genie N. Giaimo, PhD is Assistant Professor and Director of the Writing Center at Middlebury College in Vermont. Along with Yanar Hashlamon, she is the special editor of a recent WLN issue on wellness in writing center work. She is the editor of the digital edited collection Wellness and Care in Writing Center Work (forthcoming late 2020, early 2021). Her research has been published in journals such as Praxis, Journal of Writing Research, The Journal of Writing Analytics, Teaching English in the Two-Year College, Kairos, and Research in Online Literacy Education, as well as in a number of edited collections (Utah State University Press, Parlor Press). She is currently writing a monograph on wellness, labor, and care work in writing centers.  Her research utilizes quantitative and qualitative models to answer a range of questions about behaviors and practices in and around writing centers, such as tutor attitudes towards wellness and self-care practices, tutor engagement with writing center documentation, and students’ perceptions of writing centers. 

Debbie Goss teaches first-year composition and also serves in the Writing Center at Soka University of America. She teaches ESL at Saddleback and Coastline Community Colleges and is a PhD candidate in Composition and Applied Linguistics at Indiana University of Pennsylvania. Her research interests include global citizenship education, WAC, social justice, first-year composition, and writing center studies. She is an editor for Inspiring Pedagogical Connections and has a piece forthcoming in Prompt: A Journal of Academic Writing Assignments. 

Laura Hazelton Jones, MS received a BA in English from Butler University in 2008 and an MS in Technical Communications from IUPUI in 2019. She was a peer writing tutor while earning her BA and MS degrees, and presented writing center research at the ECWCA 2019 conference during her time as a graduate student researcher at IUPUI. She is a medical editor in the Indianapolis area.

Justin B. Hopkins, PhD is a Teaching Professor and Assistant Director of the Writing Center at Franklin & Marshall College. Justin received his MA in International Performance Research from the Universities of Warwick, England, and Tampere, Finland, and he completed a PhD in Composition/TESOL at Indiana University of Pennsylvania. He has published in Praxis before, as well as in Qualitative Inquiry: “Coming Home: An Autoethnographic Exploration of Third Culture Kid Transition” (November 2015). His MA thesis, “Abstract and Brief Chronicles: Creative and Critical Curation of Performance,” appears in the online journal Liminalities (2012), and he has reviewed over 40 productions for Shakespeare Bulletin, Cahiers Elisabethains, Theatre Journal, and other periodicals. Justin's book Autoethnography in Undergraduate Writing Courses is scheduled to be published in 2020 by Peter Lang Press. 

Danielle Ice, MS has a B.S. in Technical Communication and an MS in Technology from the Purdue School of Engineering and Technology at IUPUI. She has been a technical communicator for various companies and continues to exercise her skills and keep up on technical communication topics. She has authored and co-authored various articles in the field and looks forward to being a part of the new generation of technical communicators.

Maureen McBride, PhD is the current Director of the University of Nevada, Reno Writing & Speaking Center. She has worked in writing centers for the past 10 years and with first-year writing programs for the past 16 years. Maureen has been a member of IWCA for several years and is currently the Nevada state representative to the Rocky Mountain Writing Centers Association. Maureen has served as an IWCA Mentor since 2017. Her writing center research focuses on agenda setting, affective dimensions of writing center work, peer-to-peer collaborative models, and writing assessment.

Jon Meckley, MS holds associate and bachelor's degrees in Mechanical Engineering Technology and a BS in Plastics Engineering Technology from Penn State Erie in 1990. Jon has a master's degree in Plastics Engineering from the University of Massachusetts at Lowell. Jon worked at Penn State Erie’s Plastic Technical Center doing solids modeling and running a Stereolithography machine. From 1992 to 1994, Jon was a design engineer and co-owner of Innovation Design Services, Inc., a computer-aided engineering consulting firm for the plastics industry. From 1994 to 1998 Jon has worked for Penn State Erie’s Plastic Technology Deployment Center as a project engineer. Since 1999 Jon has taught at Penn State Erie in the Plastics Engineering Technology as an Associate Professor and is Department Chair. He is a Past Chair of the Blow Molding Division of SPE and Past President of the Northwest Pennsylvania SPE Section.

Ruth C. Pflueger, MFA is the Director of the Learning Resource Center and an Affiliate Instructor of English at Penn State Erie, The Behrend College. She received the MFA. degree in Creative Writing from Goddard College, Plainfield, VT, USA, in 2001. She has worked in business and industry. Her research interests include improving the efficacy of tutoring services, particularly in writing. She has been an Investigator on two NSF-STEM grants.

Corinne Renguette, PhD is Program Director, Associate Professor of Technical Communication, and director of the Technical Communication Writing Center in the Purdue School of Engineering and Technology at IUPUI. She holds a Ph.D. in applied linguistics and certificates in technical communication and Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages. She has designed and taught a variety of face-to-face, online, and hybrid courses in English for specific purposes, applied linguistics, and technical and scientific communication. Her interdisciplinary research interests include intercultural technical communication, user-centered design, evaluation and assessment of educational technologies, and inclusion across the curriculum, especially in STEM education.

Molly Rentscher is the Graduate Writing Support Coordinator at University of the Pacific where she directs the Graduate Writing Center. She has worked in writing centers for the past 10 years as an undergraduate writing fellow, graduate student administrator, and writing center director. Molly has been a member of IWCA for several years and was a mentee in the IWCA Mentor Match Program from 2017 to 2019. Her writing center research focuses on tutor education, second language writing, and developing core principles for writing centers.

Matt Rothrock is Student Success Coordinator at Indiana University-Purdue University Columbus (IUPUC). This role includes oversight of campus writing assistance. Matt received his bachelor’s degree from IUPUI in English language and literature in 2008 and his master’s degree in Applied Communication Studies from IUPUI in 2019. Tutoring, supplemental instruction, and gateway course supports are his principal work foci. 

Brandon H. Sorge, PhD is an Assistant Professor of STEM Education Research in the Department of Technology Leadership and Communication at IUPUI. His research interests include all aspects of STEM education, especially the development of a diverse and civically minded STEM literate workforce. More specifically, his research has focused on K-12, discipline-based education research (DBER), and corporate social responsibility.

Robert Weissbach, PhD received his BS in Electrical Engineering from the University of Florida in 1987, his MSEE from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in 1990, and his Ph.D. from Arizona State University in 1998.  Prior to pursuing his doctoral degree, he worked on the design and construction of turbine generator sets for General Dynamics Electric Boat Division.  From 1998 – 2016 he was a faculty member in Electrical and Computer Engineering Technology at Penn State Behrend in Erie, PA.  Since 2016 he has been the Chair of the Department of Engineering Technology at IUPUI in Indianapolis, IN.  His research interests are in renewable energy, energy storage and engineering education.  Dr. Weissbach is a registered engineer in Pennsylvania.

Jennifer Wells, PhD is Director of Writing at New College of Florida, the State University System of Florida’s designated honors college. She is the co-author of Beyond Knowledge and Skills: Writing Transfer and the Role of Student Dispositions (2012) and the co-editor of The Successful High School Writing Center: Building the Best Program with Your Students (2011). Currently, she is working on a manuscript for WPAs about the Walt Disney Company’s approach to human resource management.

Cat Williams-Monardes is a doctoral candidate in Composition and Applied Linguistics at Indiana University of Pennsylvania, where she works as an Assistant Assessment Coordinator in the English Department. Prior to teaching college composition, she worked as a grant writer in the DC Metro area. Her research focuses on Disability in the writing center, mental illness in the composition classroom, and social justice in the context of classroom and programmatic assessment.