Fall 2011 Deans, Faculty, Staff

Judy Aulette (Sociology)

Judy Aulette is an Associate Professor in the Department of Sociology and the Women’s Studies Program at UNCCharlotte where she teaches courses in gender, families, and social inequality. She has received two research and teaching Fulbrights, one to Adam Mickiewicz University in Poznan, Poland and one to the University of the Western Cape in Cape Town, South Africa. She has also taught at Aberdeen University in Scotland, Kingston University in London, and the University of Wroclaw in Poland. Her most significant recent publications are Gendered Worlds (2008) Oxford University Press, Changing American Families (2009) Allyn & Bacon, and Cape Verdean Women and Globalization: The Politicis of Gender, Culture, and Resistance (2009) Palgrave MacMillan. She is currently working on a book on South African women and HIV and has an ongoing research project with colleagues from the University of Western Cape on developing online courses for students to learn qualitative research methods by conducting research with team mates from different countries. She will be traveling with her husband, Albert Aulette, a math and science teacher.
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Gregory Baker (Management)

Gregory Baker is Professor of Management and Director of the Food and Agribusiness Institute in the Leavey School of Business at Santa Clara University. He earned his Ph.D. and M.S. in Agricultural Economics from Purdue University. His research focuses on international development, food safety, strategic management, and childhood obesity and has resulted in the publication of more than 40 refereed journal articles. His textbook, Introduction to Food and Agribusiness Management (2002), is available in both English and Mandarin. He is the former editor of the International Food and Agribusiness Management Review. He lived for two years in Northeastern Brazil where he worked on an agricultural development project to improve the livelihoods of peasant farmers. Since then, he has worked and traveled extensively in the developing world, including the Dominican Republic, El Salvador, Uruguay, Brazil, and Ghana, where he has consulted and led student immersion programs. In 2009, he was named a Fellow of the International Food and Agribusiness Management Association. At New Mexico State University he was awarded the Patricia Christmore Teaching Award and he has been recognized many times at Santa Clara University for his contributions to teaching, scholarship, and service, including the President’s Faculty Recognition Award in 2004. He expects students to be engaged in the learning process and provides them with opportunities to be active learners both inside and outside of the classroom.
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Michel Boudrias (Oceanography)

Michel Boudrias, Oceanography, Environmental Science is an Associate Professor and Department Chair in Marine Science and Environmental Studies at the University of San Diego. He received his B.Sc in Marine Biology from McGill University in Montreal, Canada, his M.Sc. in Biological Oceanography from Oregon State University and his Ph.D. in Oceanography from the Scripps Institution of Oceanography at UCSD. His primary research area focuses on the effects of anthropogenic pollution on shallow-water coastal habitats where his team investigates the impacts of organic loading from a fish cannery on the benthic and planktonic communities in Bahia Magdalena, Baja California Sur, Mexico. He has supervised undergraduate and graduate research on topics ranging from fluid dynamics of locomotion in larval fish and pelagic crabs to heavy metals in seagrasses, clams and blue crabs to the effects of stingray feeding pits on benthic communities. He has extensive study abroad experience as chair of the Study Abroad committee, as a researcher on several oceanographic cruises, and as a teacher and researcher of interdisciplinary environmental projects in Mexico, Jamaica and Tahiti. Dr. Boudrias is also the Academic Director for Sustainability at the University of San Diego where he is responsible for strategic planning and implementation of inter- and multidisciplinary courses and research projects and he is the Principal Investigator on an NSF sponsored, innovative grant dedicated to climate change education for key influential leaders.
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Julie Bunck (Political Science)

A graduate of the University of Virginia, Indiana University, and Kansas State University, Julie Bunck is a Professor of Political Science at the University of Louisville. A three-time Fulbright Scholar (Mexico, Japan, and Central America), Professor Bunck has also taught in Australia and Vietnam and at Colgate, Tufts, Pennsylvania, and the University of Virginia. Her books have been assigned at various universities, including Stanford and Princeton, and her signature work, Fidel Castro and the Quest for a Revolutionary Culture in Cuba, leads the list of the twenty best books on the Cuban revolution compiled by Questia, the world’s largest on-line library. Julie Bunck has coauthored two volumes: Bribes, Bullets, and Intimidation: Drugs and the Law in Central America (Pennsylvania State University Press, forthcoming) and Law, Power, and the Sovereign State: The Evolution and Application of the Concept of Sovereignty. In 1996 she served as academic adviser to the Latin American and Caribbean Bureau of U.S. Agency for International Development. At the University of Louisville she won a Favorite Faculty Award and an Outstanding Faculty Mentor award. In 1999 she was the University’s Presidential Exemplary Multicultural Teaching Award, and she has served since 2002 as the University’s Distinguished Honors Professor.
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Pat Burke (Teaching Assistant)

Pat Burke currently teaches in the Philosophy Department at the University of Montana and for the Wild Rockies Field Institute in Missoula, Montana. He was President of BRI a firm specializing in comprehensive ecological restoration for twenty years. Pat received his B.A. in Philosophy from the University of California, San Diego (1972) and his B.S. in Forest Science from the University of Montana (1983). In addition he earned an M.S. in Forest Ecology (1985) and an M.A. in Environmental Philosophy (2010) from the University of Montana. His areas of teaching and research include Restoration Ecology, Environmental Ethics and Philosophy of Technology. His current focus is on the pressing ethical and philosophical issues associated with global climate change.
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Richard M. Castaldi (Business)

Richard M. Castaldi is a Professor in the Department of Management in the College of Business at San Francisco State University and has been on the faculty since 1988. He received his M.S.B.A. in Management from the University of Denver and a Ph.D. in Strategic Management from Virginia Tech. Professor Castaldi has published over 25 articles in scholarly publications including the International Marketing Review, the Journal of Global Marketing, the Journal of Transnational Management, the Journal of Business Strategies, the Journal of Applied Business Research, the International Wine Marketing Journal, the International Journal of Wine Business Research, Management Review, Entrepreneurship: Theory and Practice, among other peer reviewed journals. He has presented over 60 papers at national and international conferences. Professor Castaldi’s international teaching experience includes semesters in China, France, and Spain, along with the Semester at Sea summer 2009 voyage. Dr. Castaldi has been the Project Director of four successful “Business and International Education” grants awarded by the U.S. Department of Education that received over $750,000 of federal funds. These resources were used to enhance the internationalization of business administration curricula and to conduct research with the U.S. wine industry involving international trade enhancing projects. He is currently active in consulting and researching global challenges and opportunities facing the wine industry, along with designing successful corporate marketing strategies, building effective international strategic alliances, and creating global competitive advantage for US firms.
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John Casteen (Poetry)

John Casteen is a Visiting Assistant Professor in poetry at Sweet Briar College. He is a graduate of U.Va. (BA, 1993) and the Iowa Writers’ Workshop (MFA, 1996). He has contributed poems to The Southern Review, Ploughshares, The Paris Review, Shenandoah, and other magazines; he has written on gun policy, environmental policy, ethics and professionalism, and literary publishing for Slate, The Washington Post, The Chronicle of Higher Education, and The Virginia Quarterly Review, where he serves on the editorial staff. His first book of poems, Free Union, was released through the VQR Poetry Series in 2009 by The University of Georgia Press; his second, For the Mountain Laurel, will appear in spring 2010.
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Michael Fowler (Political Science)

A graduate of Harvard Law School, the University of Virginia, and Dartmouth College, Michael Fowler is a Professor of Political Science at the University of Louisville. A Fulbright Scholar to Japan on two occasions, he also served as the first American to teach international law to Vietnamese officials and the first American to lecture Lao officials, teaching international negotiation to diplomats. He has also taught in Australia, China, Costa Rica, Italy, Mexico, Panama, and Venezuela, as well as in visiting posts at Tufts University, the University of Virginia, Georgetown University, and George Washington University. Professor Fowler has published six books, including the forthcoming Bribes, Bullets, and Intimidation: Drugs and the Law in Central America (Pennsylvania State University Press, coauthored with Julie Bunck). His most well-known work is Law, Power, and the Sovereign State: The Evolution and Application of the Concept of Sovereignty, also co-authored with Professor Bunck. He has also published Envisioning Reform: Enhancing UN Accountability in the 21st Century (UN University Press, 2009), with former United Nations Assistant Secretary-General Sumihiro Kuyama. Professor Fowler was awarded the University of Louisville College of Arts and Sciences Distinguished International Service award in 2003-4 and the Presidential Exemplary Multicultural Teaching Award in 2008-9.
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Wendy Goldberg (English Writing)

Wendy Goldberg is a Lecturer in the Program in Writing and Rhetoric at Stanford University, where she has taught since 1984. After earning her A.B. in English from Harvard, she received her M.A. and Ph.D. from Yale (English), completing her doctoral dissertation on the works of William Faulkner. At Stanford she has taught a wide range of courses in the writing program, including classes that feature a prominent oral presentation component. In 2002, she helped launch Stanford’s Hume Writing Center, as Coordinator (2002-2004), and then Assistant Director (2004-2007). Deeply committed to the Center’s campus-wide and community outreach, she developed workshops and writing events that celebrate multiple literacies and bring students from diverse ethnic and cultural backgrounds to Hume. Her account of these activities and the early years of the Center appears in the essay “Center Stage: Performing the Culture of Writing at Stanford,” part of the 2008 collection Creative Approaches to Writing Center Work. Wendy has succeeded in combining her enthusiasm for musical theater with the teaching of writing in a popular course entitled “All That Jazz: The Rhetoric of American Musical Theater.” She will be taking to sea with her husband Jerry White.
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Alan Goldin (Environmental Science)

Alan Goldin is an Associate Professor of Environmental Science at Westminster College in Missouri. He received his Ph.D. in Soil Science from the University of British Columbia and both a Master’s in Forest Soils and a Bachelor’s degree in Forestry from the University of Montana. He also holds an M.A.T. degree in secondary mathematics from Harvard University and a Bachelor’s degree in Mathematics from Antioch College. His employment experience includes two years teaching high school mathematics, working ten years as a soil scientist for the US Department of Agriculture, and teaching soils, geology, geography, environmental science, and chemistry for 20 years at the undergraduate level at five colleges. He is a firm believer in hands-on learning and has organized and led a number of off-campus geology trips to the national parks in the USA and Canada as well as geology/culture trips to Costa Rica, Iceland, Argentina, and Nepal. This activity has led to his receiving five teaching awards. He is an avid cyclist, having taken more than 50 self-sufficient tours in the USA, Canada, Iceland, Norway, New Zealand, and several others while cycling 20,000 km per year. He has written 20 peer-reviewed articles published in a variety of journals.
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Patrick Green (Religious Studies)

After graduating from Southern Methodist University (BA, M.Div) and Drew University (PhD) and studying for a year in Germany on a Dempster Fellowship, Patrick spent four years at the University of Texas as Bible Chair Instructor and Director of Lay Studies at the Wesley Foundation. In 1969 he came to the University of Alabama in the Department of Religious Studies as an Assistant Professor. He became an Associate Professor and Chair of the Department some three years later and served in that capacity for a number of years. Trained in the Philosophy of Religion, he also developed courses in American Culture and Religion, Christian Origins (New Testament), Religion and Southern Culture, and Comparative Religions. His present interests include Religious Thought and Deconstruction, Philosophical Buddhism (especially the work of Keiji Nishitani), the Radical Hermeneutics of John Caputo, and modern religious thought generally. Over the course of his career Patrick was nominated some eight times for The Outstanding Commitment to Teaching Award. In 1988 he was one of two professors named an Arts and Science Distinguished Teaching Fellow. A elected member of ODK, he was President of Phi Kappa Phi, a member of the American Academy of Religion and a Fellow of the Society for Values and Higher Education. Patrick was twice elected President of the Alabama Faculty Senate. After retiring in 2000 as Professor and Chair Emeritus he taught for two summers in the Alabama-Oxford program and continues to teach in University Honors and the Blount Undergraduate Initiative (an Honors Program in the College of Arts and Sciences).
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Layne Hanson (Assistant to the Academic Dean/Registrar)

Layne Hanson is currently the Assistant Director of Academic Affairs and Registrar for the Institute for Shipboard Education and lives in Charlottesville, Virginia. A native of Athens, Ohio, she received her undergraduate degree in International Studies from Ohio University. During her undergraduate career, she studied abroad twice in Merida, Mexico, once focusing on language acquisition and the other working for the Secretary of Tourism for the State of the Yucatan. Upon graduating she was awarded a Fulbright teaching assistantship and taught English in Indonesia for a year. She has also dabbled in environmental education while living in Northern California as well as counseling at-risk youth in Denver. She recently completed her MA in Higher Education from the University of Virginia. The Fall 2011 voyage will be her first Semester at Sea voyage and she can't wait to explore the new and exciting ports with her boyfriend, Brian Williams, and the rest of the faculty, staff, and students.
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Briavel Holcomb (Geography)

Briavel Holcomb is Professor at the Bloustein School of Planning and Policy at Rutgers University. Her B.Sc. is from the University of Nottingham, UK. She has a Dip.Ed. from Oxford University and a Ph.D. in geography from the University of Colorado. She has published three books and numerous articles on topics ranging from urban redevelopment to women’s rights to cyberspace and on tourism. She has taught at the University of Colorado, The New School and Columbia University in New York. She was on the faculty for the SAS Fall 1990 and Summer 2002 voyages, and spent a year at the University of Malta on a Fulbright scholarship. She received the Warren Susman award for Excellence in Teaching from Rutgers and the National Council for Geographic Education’s Distinguished Teaching Award. During the 2010-11 academic year she will be a Fellow at the Institute for Research on Women at Rutgers with a project on “The art and science of happiness.”
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Jim Huffman (East Asian History)

A one-time reporter at the Minneapolis Tribune, Jim Huffman taught East Asian history at Wittenberg University in Ohio for thirty years, after short teaching stints at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln and Indiana Wesleyan University. He also has taught at Dartmouth College. While teaching has been his passion, he also has written numerous articles on the history of Japanese journalism and has published seven books, including Japan in World History (Oxford, 2010), Japan and Imperialism (Association for Asian Studies, 2011), Yankee in Meiji Japan: The Crusading Journalist Edward H. House (Rowman and Littlefield, 2003), and Creating a Public: People and Press in Meiji Japan (University of Hawaii, 1997). With his wife Judith, he also has published English-language translations of two Japanese children’s books, The Cat that Lived a Million Times and Buying Mittens. He lives now in Chicago, where he is working on a study of the daily lives of Japan’s late-nineteenth-century commoners: rickshaw pullers, farmers, entertainers, miners, and emigrants, among others.
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Alfred Hunt (History)

Alfred Hunt is Full Professor Emeritus of History at the State University of New York, College at Purchase, where he was also Dean of the College of Letters and Science. The creator and on-camera host of “Critical Issues,” an award-winning SUNY-sponsored cable talk show, Hunt is also the recipient of the Chancellor’s Award for Excellence in Teaching. He is the author of Haiti’s Influence on Antebellum America, numerous scholarly articles, and has given over 100 public lectures. Demonstrating his commitment to international academic experience, Hunt has been a Fulbright Scholar in Venice, Italy and Barbados, West Indies, as well as founder, director, and instructor in study abroad programs in Spain and Italy. This is his third semester voyage with SAS.
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Jean M. Ippolito (Art History)

Jean M. Ippolito is Associate Professor at the University of Hawaii at Hilo. She received her Ph. D. from The Ohio State University where she studied in the interdisciplinary program at the Advanced Computing Center for the Arts and Design. She received her Master’s degree from the University of Washington and Bachelor’s from Arizona State University. Dr. Ippolito speaks, reads, and writes Japanese fluently and has a fair command of Mandarin Chinese. She spent fall semester 1983 in a fourth-year intensive Mandarin Chinese language program at Beijing University in 1983, and did her dissertation research at the University of Tsukuba in Ibaraki prefecture, Japan, on a Fulbright Fellowship in 1992-93. Dr. Ippolito has taught art history and digital media at the Savannah College of Art and Design in Savannah, Georgia, and Chaired the Art Department at Georgetown College in Kentucky before taking her current position at the University of Hawaii at Hilo. Her book manuscript, entitled The Search for New Media: Late 20th Century Art and Technology in Japan is under contract for publication by Common Ground Publishers. Recently, Dr. Ippolito spent two months on a University of Hawaii at Hilo Research-Relations grant conducting research on contemporary Chinese New Media artists. She has been twice nominated for the Board of Regents Excellence in Teaching Award.
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Sarah Finocchario Kessler (Public Health)

Dr. Sarah Finocchario Kessler is currently a postdoctoral research fellow of the HIV Research Group at University of Missouri-Kansas City, and also an Assistant Adjunct Professor at Kansas University Medical Center’s Preventive Medicine and Public Health Department. Sarah has an undergraduate psychology degree from Loyola University of New Orleans, a master’s degree in public health from UCLA, and a PhD in international public health from the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. Prior to earning her doctoral degree, Sarah’s work with Family Health International provided practical, programmatic experience working in HIV clinics in Ghana and Kenya. Sarah’s research combines her interests in reproductive health and HIV by exploring childbearing intentions among people living with HIV and highlighting the need for comprehensive reproductive counseling in HIV clinical care. Sarah has explored these issues among women living with HIV receiving care in Baltimore, Maryland and Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. She is pursuing related research assessing low-resource options for safer conception and childbearing among people living with HIV in South Africa. Sarah has published her findings in the journals AIDS and Behavior and AIDS Patient Care and STDs.
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Phillip Kolbe (Business/Commerce)

Professor in the Institute for Policy and Economic Development at the University of Texas at El Paso and Professor Emeritus of Finance and Real Estate at the University of Memphis. Dr. Kolbe received his BS from the U.S. Air Force Academy and served as a Southeast Asia area specialist and special operations officer. His MA and PhD are from the University of Arizona. He has taught for more than 30 years, starting while he was the president of a real estate research corporation and CEO of a market research firm. Dr. Kolbe has twice received the Distinguished Teaching Award and was the first recipient of the Briggs Foundation Excellence in Teaching Award and the Palmer Professorship in Teaching Award. In total, he has received ten teaching awards during his academic career. Dr. Kolbe has traveled to over 100 countries and taught executives in France and Switzerland. He has done missionary work in the Congo, Zambia, and India. He serves as a consultant to a wide variety of companies including as an expert witness and has published numerous articles and several books on real estate and investing. Dr. Kolbe was a faculty member on the Spring 2010 Voyage.
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Stephen (Steve) Molloy (Management)

Stephen (Steve) Molloy is an Associate Professor of Management at Canisius College, a private, Jesuit University in Buffalo NY. His areas of expertise include Business Strategy, Entrepreneurship, Sustainable Development, and International Business. He received his BA in Marketing from Wilfrid Laurier University in Waterloo, Canada, his MBA in Marketing from York University, Toronto, Canada, and his Ph.D. in Strategy from Indiana University. In 2002 he won the Calvert MBA Teaching Award at Canisius, which was chosen by the MBA students. In January 2000, he led a group of 18 Canisius undergraduate students on a one-week seminar in London as part of the Canisius Study Abroad program. For many years he taught an intensive one-week seminar at the IESEG School of Management in Lille, France as part of their International Management Program. Dr. Molloy has been a guest lecturer at the University of Strasbourg Business School, Strasbourg, France and recently taught a MBA course at The German-Jordanian University, Talal Abu-Ghazaleh College of Business, in Amman, Jordan. He was also actively involved in the Entrepreneurial Assistance Program that helped Buffalo adult entrepreneurs write a business plan. Dr. Molloy has a number of publications and presentations in Strategy and Entrepreneurship. Dr. Molloy and his wife Brenda have traveled extensively in North America, Europe, Asia and the Middle East. His interests include photography, cars, scuba diving, and, having already designed and built two houses, he would like to build a zero-energy home in the near future..
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John Andrew Morrow (Spanish)

John Andrew Morrow is Associate Professor of Spanish and French at Ivy Tech. He completed an Honors B.A. in French and Spanish, as well as an M.A. and Ph.D. in Spanish American Literature from the University of Toronto, along with post-doctoral studies in Arabic at the University of Utah’s Middle East Center, the American Language Institute in Fez, and Qalam wa Lawh in Rabat. A specialist in Hispanic, Native, and Arabic-Islamic Studies, Dr. Morrow has authored numerous books, including the Encyclopedia of Islamic Herbal Medicine (2010), Amerindian Elements in the Poetry of Ernesto Cardenal: Mythic Foundations of the Colloquial Narrative (2010), and Arabic, Islam, and the Allah Lexicon: How Language Shapes our Conception of God (2006). He has also published a long list of academic articles and poetry. Born in Canada, Dr. Morrow has traveled throughout North, Central, and South America, as well as the Caribbean, Europe, and North Africa. He will be teaching Conversational Spanish III, Introduction to Islamic Culture, and Exploring the Other: The Theory and Practice of Travel Literature and Writing.
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Louis Nelson (Architecture)

Louis Nelson teaches courses in American architecture specializing in colonial and early national architecture, vernacular architecture, and theories and methods of sacred space. The majority of his work focuses on the early American South and the Greater Caribbean. Nelson is interested in the close examination of evidence, both material and textual, as a means of examining the ways architecture shapes the human experience. Nelson's prominence in the field is reflected in his recent selection as a senior co-editor of Buildings and Landscapes, a leading scholarly venue for research in the field since 1982. The Beauty of Holiness, his most recent book, examines the ways Anglican churches in colonial South Carolina, His interest in the colonial South has led him past the "sacred 13" where his fieldwork in Jamaica and the Leeward Islands has resulted in some of the first systematic recording of eighteenth and nineteenth-century English architecture in the Caribbean. He also directs the UVA Falmouth Field School in HIstoric Preservation, a month-long program held each summer in the coastal town of Falmouth, Jamaica. While his interest in the Caribbean began in colonial Anglican churches, his most recent work has focused on post-Emancipation domestic architecture. Working together with archaeologists, Nelson is interested using buildings to explore Afro-Caribbean culture through the transition from slavery to freedom.
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Christina Pitsch (Fine Arts)

Christina Pitsch is an Associate Professor of Fine Arts and chair of the Department of Interdisciplinary and Fine Arts at Chester College of New England (Chester, NH). She received her MFA from The New York State College of Ceramics, Alfred University and a B.A from Sarah Lawrence College. Her work is a hybrid of materials and techniques driven by larger conceptual questions of cultural icons and gender identification. She has shown extensively throughout the United States including exhibitions at: Purdue University, Florida State University Museum of Fine Arts, The Print Center (Philadelphia), and Palm Springs Art Museum. Internationally she has participated in residencies and exhibitions in the Netherlands, Switzerland and China. In addition she has traveled extensively in Europe, Morocco and China.
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Monica Frölander-Ulf (Anthropology)

Dr. Monica Frölander-Ulf, Associate Professor Emerita, received her Ph.D. degree in Anthropology from the University of Pittsburgh and taught Anthropology courses for over 30 years at University of Pittsburgh, Johnstown. She co-authored (with Frank Lindenfeld) the book, A New Earth: The Jamaican Sugar Worker Cooperatives 1975-1981 and has published or presented papers on women in Finland, cooperative development, teaching in prison, and service-learning. Her major professional interests include global political economy, economic inequality and development, comparative studies of women and the acquisition of knowledge through service and intercultural exchanges. She has developed and directed service-learning programs in Jamaica and the Navajo Nation in cooperation with Amizade Global Service-Learning and Volunteer Programs and has worked and traveled in Africa, the Caribbean, Europe, and China.
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Julia Rux (Psychology)

Julia Rux, PhD is Professor of Psychology at Georgia Perimeter College. Her PhD is in Developmental Psychology from The Pennsylvania State University, College Park. Her MA is in Cultural Anthropology from The University of Wisconsin, Madison. She earned her BA in Psychology from Hanover College. Having been inspired by a sophomore Study Abroad semester in Mexico, she spent a post baccalaureate year as an OAS Fellow at the National School of Anthropology and History of the Universidad de Mexico. Another of her interests, gerontology, motivated the choice of her dissertation topic: “Widows and Widowers” using a dissertation grant from the Administration on Aging. Her research interests include the culture and personality of gypsies (Roma) and the changing roles for women in contemporary cultures. As if a gypsy by cultural heritage, her travels combine living and working, place to place. Hired by the University of Maryland, University College Overseas Division, she lived and worked in Japan, Australia, Belgium, Italy and Germany. For nine summers, as a teacher/administrator, she took students from Georgia to France, England, Italy, and Spain. Dr. Rux is honored to have taught on the Spring ’04 SAS voyage. She has been awarded several teaching excellence awards. Her professional memberships include American Psychological Society, Society for the Teaching of Psychology, and American Anthropological Association. Dr. Rux enjoys yoga, walking, movies, and is a voracious reader.
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Andrew Sallans (Librarian)

Andrew Sallans is the Librarian for Digital Services and Computer Science at the University of Virginia. After building strong research experience in the field and on digital projects during his undergraduate days (B.A. History, Archaeology, and Art History, University of Virginia), Andrew put his skills to work in managing collections, projects, and services within the library world (M.L.I.S, Florida State University). In 2008, Andrew returned to school to continue refining his skills in leadership and management at the intersection of business and technology (M.S. Management of Information Technology, University of Virginia). From 2006 to 2010, Andrew served as the Head of the Research Computing Lab in the University of Virginia Library, a group which provided technical and software support for undergraduate, graduate, and faculty research. Today, he is leading a University of Virginia Library initiative to support scientific research data management in response to emerging requirements and trends around data preservation, sharing, and access. Andrew and his wife Michelle love to travel, and look forward to visiting many new places, revisiting some familiar ones, and sharing the entire experience with the faculty, students, and staff along the way.
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Scott Sernau (Global Studies)

Scott Sernau is Director of International Programs and Professor of Sociology at Indiana University South Bend. He received his Ph.D. in sociology with an emphasis in international development from Cornell University. He regularly teaches courses on social inequality, urban society, and global issues. In addition to working with international programs for the campus and the university, he regularly leads a course on sustainable communities in Costa Rica, has taught in Mexico and France, and served on the faculty of the Fall 05 Semester at Sea voyage. He has won ten university teaching awards, including the Sylvia Bowman Award for distinguished teaching and the PA Mack Award for distinguished service to teaching, and serves on the IU Faculty Colloquium on Excellence in Teaching and the Center for a Sustainable Future. He is the author of several books including Bound: Living in the Globalized World (Stylus), Social Inequality in a Global Age (Sage), and Global Problems: The Search for Equity, Peace and Sustainability (Pearson).
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Rashna Singh (Literature)

Rashna Batliwala Singh received her B.A. Honours degree from the University of Calcutta, her M.A. from Mount Holyoke College and her Ph.D. from the University of Massachusetts at Amherst. Singh is the author of The Imperishable Empire: British Fiction on India (Three Continents Press) and Goodly is Our Heritage: Children's Literature, Empire, and the Certitude of Character (Rowman and Littlefield). She has contributed to Asian American Playwrights and to the Encyclopedia of the Jewish Diaspora. An essay on Chinua Achebe and Joseph Conrad is forthcoming in Things Fall Apart 1958-2008 (Rodopi), and an essay on Rudyard Kipling will appear in October 2010 in Patriotism, Globalisation and Postcolonialism (Palgrave Macmillan). Singh is also the author of scholarly articles and conference papers on the literature of Empire and postcolonial literatures as well as on multicultural and pedagogical issues. Singh was one of two professors in the state awarded the Massachusetts Council for International Education Lectureship in 1998. In 2003 Singh received a National Endowment for the Humanities Summer Institute Grant to participate in an institute at Oxford University. Currently she teaches at Colorado College as a Visiting Professor and at the University of Colorado at Colorado Springs as an Instructor.
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Dan Spencer (Environmental Studies)

Dan Spencer is Associate Professor of Environmental Studies and has taught at The University of Montana since 2002. Dan was born and raised in California, and received his B.A. in Geology from Carleton College, Minnesota in 1979, and his Masters of Divinity (1983) and Ph.D. (1994) in Environmental Ethics from Union Theological Seminary, New York. From 1993-2002 Dan taught in the Philosophy and Religion Department at Drake University, Des Moines, Iowa, where he also directed the Environmental Science and Policy Program. In addition to environmental studies, Dan’s areas of teaching and research include ecological ethics, ethical issues in ecological restoration, religion and ecology, and globalization, justice, and environmental issues in Latin America. He has live and worked in Latin America off and on since 1978, and has led over fifty travel seminars to Latin America and the Caribbean where he and his students examine issues of human rights, environmental justice, and sustainable development within the context of the global economy. Dan is the author of Gay and Gaia: Ethics, Ecology and the Erotic, published by The Pilgrim Press (1996). Currently he is researching the intersection of globalization, development, and climate change issues in the developing world.
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George Thomas (Linguistics)

Professor Thomas received his B.A. and Ph.D. in Russian from the University of London in the United Kingdom. Since 1969 he has been teaching at McMaster University in Hamilton, Ontario, specializing at first in Russian language and linguistics and later branching out into Slavic and general linguistics. He has taught introductory courses in linguistics as well as upper level and graduate courses in sociolinguistics, language planning, applied linguistics, languages in contact and historical linguistics. His main field of research has been in the area of language contact, language planning and lexical enrichment. Most of this research, published in 34 articles and three book-length monographs, has concentrated on Russian, Czech, Slovak, Slovene and Serbo-Croatian. However, in 1991 he published Linguistic Purism, a much cited book dealing with the efforts around the world to combat unwelcome mostly foreign influences on the local language. Among his recent academic interests are areas of linguistic convergence and pidgins and creoles. Since his formal retirement in 1999 as Full Professor of Linguistics he has continued to teach and maintain an active research profile. His major work in progress at the moment is a book on the linguistic history of Europe. He has studied, taught and lectured throughout eastern and western Europe, North America and South Africa and has traveled widely in Europe, eastern and southern Africa and the Americas. This will be his third voyage with Semester at Sea, having previously circumnavigating the globe in Spring 2009 and 2010. He looks forward to resuming his observations of the key role language plays as well as the difficult challenges it presents to the twin issues of globalization and development.
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Amy Unruh (Ethnomusicology)

Amy Unruh is an ethnomusicologist and Adjunct Instructor at Kent State University’s main and Stark campuses. She has also taught at Bowling Green State University and the Ohio State University’s ATI branch. She holds a B.A. in Music, a B.F.A. in Drawing and Painting, and a M.M. in Music History from Bowling Green State University. She received her Ph.D. in Musicology-Ethnomusicology from Kent State University in December of 2009. Her dissertation, Louis Moreau Gottschalk (1829-1869): The Role of Early Exposure to African-Derived Musics in Shaping an American Musical Pioneer from New Orleans, has been published on-line. Dr. Unruh’s research interests include West-African music and dance, Balinese music and dance, the influences of African musics on the musics of the Americas, and music and spirituality. She has studied and performed a wide variety of percussion music and dance from Ghana and Senegal, as well as Balinese gamelan, Thai piphat, Chinese sizhu, and African-derived musics from Cuba and Haiti. During her undergraduate and graduate studies, she participated in four study abroad summer workshops in Ghana, West Africa, and three in Bali, Indonesia which included intensive study in music, dance, and culture. She has also studied Ghanaian dance at the University of Legon in Accra, Ghana. Currently she is a member of the Society for Ethnomusicology and the College Music Society.
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Melissa White (Teaching Assistant)

Melissa White is a doctoral candidate in English at the University of Virginia. Her research interests include nineteenth-century American literature and culture, lyric poetry in English, and textual studies. She has worked extensively in UVa’s Writing Program: tutoring in the Writing Center, contributing to redschoolhouse.org, mentoring junior instructors, and teaching themed composition courses about food, celebrity, social media, and cultural literacy, as well as electives in public communication with a service component. After earning her bachelor’s degree from the University of Oregon, she taught English as a Second Language in the Czech Republic, and later worked as a technical writer for the engineering, finance, and high tech industries. She speaks French and a bit of German. Since 2009, she has volunteered with Girl Scouts in a low-income community in Charlottesville, and is excited to visit fellow member countries of the World Association of Girl Guides and Girl Scouts. She is traveling with her partner, Aaron Shrewsbury.
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Michael Williams (Drama)

Michael Williams, one of the leading experts in contemporary South African musical theatre, is currently the Managing Director of Cape Town Opera, South Africa. He has worked as a theatre/opera/musical director and educator in Nepal, England, Sweden and USA. Extensive career as director of numerous operas, musicals and plays in South Africa. Prize winning author of ten novels (USA, European, and SA editions), Crocodile Burning, American Library Association Award. Other publications include Anthology of 4 African Operas for Young People. Librettist of seven South African operas; Poet & Prophetess premier at NorrlandsOperan, Sweden. SA Young Artist Award; Nederburg Opera Award for directing & writing SA operas; Percy Fitzpatrick Award for SA fiction. Previous appointments include lecturer at Stellenbosch University, SAS Theatre Arts professor on Fall 91, Spring 96 and Fall 04 voyages. B.A. English & Drama; Performance Diploma, University of Cape Town, South Africa.
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Rhonda Williams (Psychology)

Dr. Rhonda Williams received her Docorate of Education in Counseling and Human Services from Kansas State Unversity. Her Bachelors was also from KSU and her Masters from University of Colorado Colorado Springs, the university for whom she is now an associate professor. As a former school counselor of 25 years she was honored with the Colorado School Counselor of the Year and the American Middle School Counselor of the Year. From UCCS she received the Community Service Award. While she enjoys teaching her counseling classes, she is also very involved in adolescent mentorship program which is one of her areas of research. She has co-authored a book called Making smart choices: Social and emotional skills for adolescent girls,and a training curriculum; A handbook for leading positive youth development programs: Smart-Girl. She has authored several articles on this topic such as Developmental issues as a component of intersectionality: Defining the Smart-Girl program. She is currently working on research regarding collaboration with administrators and school counselors, ethical issue of a school counselor. One of her favorite courses to teach is social and cultural issues of educators. She is very involved in the training teachers and administrator on becoming socially responsive educators.
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Sharon Winters (Assistant Librarian)

Sharon Winters serves as the Library Director at Tacoma Community College where she works to turn students on to the power of information literacy. She spent 20 years in public libraries working in the areas of information technology, technical services, facilities, circulation services, and business, serving as deputy director of support services for public library systems in Washington state and Virginia. Sharon holds a MPA degree from George Washington University and a MLS from the University of NC at Greensboro. She co-founded and serves as board president of Historic Tacoma, a non-profit focused on historic preservation, education and advocacy. Her other interests include public policy, art & architecture, most anything vintage, and independent travel. Sharon will be joined on the fall 2011 voyage by her husband, Kendall Reid, senior librarian in the household.
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Thais Bouchereau (Living Learning Coordinator: Academic Success)

Thais joins the Fall 2011 Semester at Sea voyage with over 15 years of Student Affairs Housing related experience. In her collective managerial positions, Thais has served as the Coordinator for Residential Education at the University of California, Santa Cruz as well as the Director of Housing and Residence Life at Spelman College, where she has served as a key member to President Tatum’s Task Force on Student Development, determined best practices within Student Affairs via site visits at Universities throughout the United States, and presented pertinent housing updates to the College’s Board of Trustees. Thais currently serves as one of the Associate Directors of Residential Life at the University of California, Irvine where she has collective responsibilities for an Undergraduate Housing Community of over 5,200 students. Thais received her Bachelor of Fine Arts degree from William Paterson University in Wayne, NJ and it is at the University of Hartford in Hartford CT where she did her graduate work in Guidance and Counseling. Thais has traveled abroad to London, Canada and Mexico. As the Living and Learning Coordinator for Academic Success on the Fall 2011 Semester at Sea voyage, she is ecstatic about the opportunity to immerse herself in new cultures as she travels to cities around the world. Her 13 year old son Donovan will be joining her as they embark on, what they consider an experience of a lifetime.
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Valerie Brown (Communications Coordinator)

Valerie received her B.A. in International Relations from Stanford University. Her semester spent studying abroad in Paris, rather than satisfying her desire to see the world, only encouraged it. She is currently an Administrative and Research Assistant at a small company in the San Francisco Bay Area. Her work researching and presenting on educational groups and initiatives has been rewarding and will transition nicely to reporting from the voyage. Valerie looks forward to being a part of the Semester at Sea community and helping share the voyage with participants’ family and friends through the ship blog and press materials. She speaks French and is working on her Mandarin skills. She hopes to be able to learn a phrase or two in every country along the journey. Valerie’s interests include languages, sunshine, architecture, new friends and football (American and European.) She looks forward to indulging in all of these on this voyage.
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Christy Burke (Living Learning Coordinator: Community Service & Learning)

Christy is a Doctoral student at Kent State University in the Cultural Foundations of Education program. Her research interests involve the development of a civic identity, "local-global" service-learning experiences and the civic mission of Higher Education. She works with community-based learning programs at Kent State in the Office of Community Service, Learning and Volunteerism. Prior to returning to school, Christy coordinated civic engagement and student leadership initiatives at the University of South Florida. She has worked with students to develop international service-learning immersions with communities in El Salvador, Costa Rica and the Dominican Republic. Christy has a M.Ed. in Higher Education Administration from Loyola University Chicago and BA in English from Baldwin-Wallace College. Christy volunteers her time as a speaker with the Cleveland Collaborative Initiative to End Human Trafficking. She enjoys new food adventures, collects children's books and loves working in new communities and learning from other's stories. Christy had the opportunity to sail as an LLC with the summer 2009 voyage and is thrilled about the opportunity to be a part of the SAS community again in 2011!
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Andrew Centofante (Videographer)

Andrew graduated from James Madison University in 2005 with a degree from the School of Media Arts and Design in Digital Video and minors in Graphic Design and Film Studies. In 2008, Andrew started an advertising and branding agency in Charlottesville, Virginia where he did work for various companies producing branding materials, print collateral, websites and television commercials. In his spare time he likes riding his motorcycle, painting, solving puzzles and eating spicy food.
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Joshua Crouthamel (Field Office Coordinator)

Ten years after sailing as a student on Semester at Sea in the Spring of 2001, Joshua Crouthamel is so excited to return to the program as the Field Office Coordinator for Fall 2011. Since his inaugural voyage Josh graduated from New York University with Honors (Drama, Journalism, African Studies), and worked his way around the world several times (he’s earned his keep as an actor in NYC, a barman in Beijing, a nanny in New Zealand, a tour guide in Thailand and many other professions – these are better communicated over cocktails). He is currently the senior travel editor for Australia’s largest web portal and lives in Sydney.
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Tracey Dowling (Living Learning Coordinator: Career Development)

Tracey joins the SAS staff with a background in providing comprehensive career coaching to driven college students at The University of Tennessee, The University of Georgia and Augusta State University. She has aided students in their quest to successfully secure competitive positions in a wide range of pursuits from federal service, Fortune 500 companies, international not-for-profits and even professional clown school. She has advised Career Development Interns, Students in Free Enterprise (SIFE) and Zeta Tau Alpha (ZTA) student organizations. Tracey received a BBA in Marketing from Valdosta State University and a MS in Higher Education from Florida State University. Outside of career serves, Tracey thoroughly enjoys volunteering with the Make-A-Wish Foundation as a Wish Granter. She enjoys avoiding chain restaurants, reading almost anything, and stopping to visit almost any museum or random interesting place she comes across on the side of the road. Tracey is thrilled to join the SAS community and share her passion for career development!
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Myla Edmond (Alumni & Development Coordinator)

Myla joins the Semester At Sea Fall 2011 voyage after nearly five years of being with the University of Indianapolis. Most recently, Myla was Interim Executive Director for Alumni Relations. Prior to serving as Interim Executive Director, Myla was Assistant Director for Alumni Relations where she managed the alumni online community, created marketing campaigns for the Alumni Association, wrote marketing communication pieces, initiated and led a successful international travel program targeted for young alumni engagement, served as the adviser for the Student Alumni Association, created and distributed electronic newsletters and announcements, led a website redesign, and created programming to educate students on their role as future alumni.
Myla earned her Bachelor of Business Administration in 2000 from Western Michigan University with majors in marketing and psychology, and her Master of Arts in English from the University of Indianapolis in 2011. Myla sailed as a student with Semester At Sea during the Spring 1999 voyage, served on the Alumni Association Board of Directors from 2008-2011, and is currently serving a two-year term as a member of the Voyager’s Council. Her experience with Semester At Sea in 1999 has continued to impact her life. She is extremely excited to sail as the Alumni & Development Coordinator, describing it as the perfect opportunity to blend her professional interests in university advancement and working with students, with her personal interests in international travel and her love for Semester At Sea. In addition to traveling, Myla loves to write short stories and novels, and has published a book of poetry entitled, Dawn: Diary of a Poet.
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Dave Eng (Living Learning Coordinator: Involvement & Recreational Sports)

Dave was most recently the Assistant Director of Student Activities at Hamilton College. He joins Semester At Sea with a background in student activities and co-curricular student development at Fordham University, NYU, and Montclair State University. Dave graduated from the University of Hartford in 2005 with a BA in Communications and Advertising and from NYU’s Steinthardt School of Education in 2009 with an MA in Higher Education & Student Personnel Administration. At Hamilton Dave served as a mentor for the International Friendship Program where he advised resident international students of the diverse array of student activities options. At NYU he served as a facilitator for the International Graduate Student Seminar where led discussions, planned learning objectives and arranged guest lectures and field trips for the international graduate student body. Dave also studied in San Juan, PR as part of an artistic theatre exchange where he acted with performing arts students of the Universidad de Puerto Rico. In addition to student affairs professional Dave is an actor, writer, and comedian and is extremely excited to be sailing with Semester at Sea.
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Michael Haas, M.A., MFT (Psychologist)

Michael received his B.A. from Harvard University in English History and Literature, and his M.A. in Clinical Psychology from the Professional School of Psychology in San Francisco.
Michael has a private practice in Berkeley, California. He sees a wide range of presenting issues and enjoys working with adults, children, parents, couples, adolescents, and families. In addition, he has developed a unique approach for working with students who are having academic difficulties due to learning differences and/or motivational problems. This includes both family Interventions combined with specialized academic tutoring. As a member of the Faculty at John F. Kennedy University, Michael has, for many years, supervised graduate student trainees in their Master's level field work in Clinical Psychology.
In his spare time Michael enjoys playing basketball, hiking in the mountains, reading historical novels and trying to understand the mysteries of current political and economic events.
Michael has lived in Europe for extended periods of time (Denmark and France) and traveled widely in Europe and Asia. He is looking forward to joining his third SAS voyage. From his previous experiences (Fall '98 and Fall '03--on which both he and his wife Rosalyn were the Mental Health Team) he remembers intense interaction with interesting faculty and staff, unfettered by routine chores of daily life…the power and beauty of being at sea and experiencing the world in such a slow-motion, stately fashion…and the rewarding opportunity of helping students increase their self-knowledge as they face the challenge of exploring the world.
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Kristin Hannah (Dependent Children Coordinator)

Kristin is a graduate of both the University of Arizona and American Institute of Interior Design. She is certified as a Sustainable Designer and qualified as an Eco-Consultant by the Harper Institute. Kristin owns her own interior design firm called Hannah Interiors which specializes in sustainable design and green building. She also operates Virtual Interior Designers, a web-based business offering online interior design to clients worldwide. Kristin loves Semester at Sea. She was a student on the spring '99 and summer '00 voyages. As a student she received the award for being "the most involved student in the community." Kristin also worked for SAS in the field office during the spring '02 Voyage as the Independent Travel Coordinator. She really enjoyed being in charge of the Vicarious Voyage Program. This was a program where packages from the SAS community were created after each port and sent to selected schools around the world. Kristin & Brian sailed on the Enrichment Voyage '10 to the Caribbean. They feel grateful for the opportunity to have gotten married at sea on the MV Explorer during the SAS 2011 Alumni Reunion Voyage. Kristin resides in Lake Geneva, WI with her husband Brian Waspi. The couple are sailing together on the fall '10 Voyage with Kristin as the Dependent Children's Coordinator and Brian as the IT Coordinator. Kristin's experience working with children includes working at a private school for two years in Antigua, Guatemala. Kristin has visited over 64 countries and 5 continents. She is fluent in Spanish and American Sign Language and loves life. She enjoys being positive, healthy eating, living consciously, interesting world discussions and feeling grateful for all the wonderful opportunities life has brought her way.
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Theresa Hunt (Assistant Lifelong Learners Coordinator)

After receiving a degree in Theatre Arts and Communication from the State University of New York at Geneseo, Terry began a career in arts administration. She served as company manager for the international arts festival ‘PepsiCo Summerfare’ for ten years. As Assistant Director of the Performing Arts Center at SUNY Purchase, Terry acted as liaison to the Prompters, the Center’s influential and active organization of patrons and volunteers. A subsequent freelance career in writing and editing has allowed Terry to accompany her husband, Alfred (a history faculty member) on numerous study abroad programs for college students. They also launched a small cultural tourism business which catered to Alfred’s adult education audience. Together with their two sons, they have traveled extensively, living for several years in Italy and Spain. This is Terry’s third voyage and first opportunity to serve the community as a member of the staff.
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Barbara Lang (Lifelong Learners Coordinator)

Barbara recently retired from Cornell University after twenty years, first as a faculty member for 17 years in the School of Hotel Administration and then as an academic and career advisor. During her time at Cornell, Lang was a Faculty Fellow and Cornell Adult University lecturer presenting various seminars and classes to adult learners. Prior to Cornell University, Lang was a company spokesperson and culinary director for ten years at a Napa Valley winery, affectionately described as a mixture of Betty Crocker and Bette Midler. Lang has hosted several hundred special events nationwide for media, industry and consumers; she continues to speak at industry conferences and conventions. Other careers and interests include restaurateur, book author, schooner chef, culinary instructor, triathlete, and speaker on the QM2 and Crystal Cruise Line. Currently, Lang is a modest entrepreneur, managing two small businesses – The Etiquette Factor (providing dining/business etiquette tips to college students and professionals, logging in over 100 events in recent years) and RTR Ideas, a specialty food consulting business, assisting hospitality food professionals. Lang received her undergraduate and graduate degrees from Cornell University and looks forward to sharing her enthusiasm for international food and culture as the Lifelong Learners Coordinator.
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Cherjanét Lenzy (Living Learning Coordinator: Intercultural Competency & Diversity)

Cherjanét currently serves as the Director of Diversity Affairs at Allegheny College in Meadville, PA. As Director, she has infused her passion and commitment for social justice with her love of identity development. In her role she works with students through advising, program development, academic support and individual consultation.
Previously, Cherjanét served as the Scripps Communities of Resources and Empowerment Coordinator (SCORE) at Scripps College and a Residence Hall Director at Macalester College. She has worked in the field of diversity for the past six years and enjoys the strong relationships she builds with students. These connections are at the heart of her work. Cherjanét holds a B.A. in Mass Communications from Wright State University and a M.Ed. in College Student Affairs Leadership from Grand Valley State University.
Through her graduate education, Cherjanét studied at Universidad de las Américas in Puebla, Mexico during a short-term study abroad. Since then, she vowed to see other parts of the world, and is ecstatic that her wish will come true through her first Semester at Sea voyage. Back to Staff List

Paula Levitt (Assistant Field Office Coordinator)

Paula is very enthusiastic to join the fall 2011 SAS voyage as the Assistant Field Office Coordinator. Paula holds a B.A. in Communication from the University of California at San Diego and is currently working towards her M.A. in International Education at SIT Graduate Institute. Paula spent the last year teaching English in a small village in South Korea and explored Asia during her vacation time. Before that, she lived in Massachusetts managing a cultural exploration program that used cooking as a vehicle for Boston youth to share their diverse cultures and learn about the international community. Paula has coordinated experiential educational programs for preschoolers through adults. She is looking forward to working with college students again, leading and learning alongside them, on a Semester at Sea educational adventure of a lifetime. While traveling, Paula enjoys body surfing, taking cooking classes, volunteering, people watching, and talking to locals. She also loves volleyball, spicy food, hula-hooping, singing, laughing and dancing. After the fall voyage, Paula will have traveled to almost 20% of the world’s countries. She is really looking forward to visiting Africa for the first time. Back to Staff List

Kristin Luna (Assistant Field Office Coordinator)

Kristin received her B.S. in journalism and electronic media from the University of Tennessee, Knoxville; studied abroad at the University of Edinburgh; and completed a one-year post-graduate program in international journalism and world politics at universities in the Netherlands and Denmark. She has been all over the globe to six continents and more than 80 countries during her career as a travel writer—from tracking gorillas in Rwanda to sailing around the Arctic Circle to honeymooning in the jungles of Borneo. Kristin has written more than a dozen guidebooks for Frommer's and Globe Pequot Press, and is a former contributing writer for Newsweek, Forbes Traveler and the Travel Channel. After working at a number of magazines in New York City, she relocated to San Francisco where she has continued her career as a freelance writer for magazines and newspapers such as Robb Report, Islands, Sherman's Travel, the San Francisco Chronicle, Toronto Globe & Mail, Real Simple, Glamour, Self, Redbook and many more. She also owns and operates an award-winning travel blog, Camels & Chocolate, in her free time. Kristin is excited to bring her travel-planning panache and love of spreadsheets to the assistant field office coordinator role. Her husband, Scott—also a journalist who she, coincidentally, met studying abroad—will be tagging along for the ride. Back to Staff List

Katherine J. Murray, PhD (Assistant Dean of Students)

Katherine received her doctorate in Communication from Stanford University in June 2011. At Stanford, she conducted research with the Communication between Humans and Interactive Media Lab and the Center for Computer Research in Music and Acoustics and served as a teaching assistant in coursework ranging from technology use to democratic theory. Throughout her time in academia, Dr. Murray has worked in various student affairs positions in new student services, housing and residential services, and semester in Washington programs. Dr. Murray was an undergraduate student in the Plan II Honors Program at The University of Texas at Austin, graduating with a BA with special honors and highest honors. She holds an MA in Communication, Culture, and Technology from Georgetown University where her thesis was awarded distinction. Dr. Murray first traveled abroad as a 12-year-old, accompanying her mother on a tour of eastern Europe. Subsequently, she participated in summer interchange programs in Finland and the Philippines and was awarded the Congress-Bundestag Scholarship to study in Germany for a year. She has continued to travel extensively; her recent trips include visits to Thailand, Kenya, and Costa Rica.
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Remi Nagata (Living Learning Coordinator: Religion & Spirituality)

Remi is the Program Coordinator for Residence Life at the University of Oregon. She works on advising many student groups in the residence halls and collaborates with people throughout campus to put on academic, diversity, and social events for 3,600 students. She has received her M.Ed. in College Student Services from Oregon State University and B.A. in Art and Planning Public Policy & Management from the University of Oregon. Remi sailed as a member of the inaugural Student Affairs at Sea program, and the graduate program assistant for student leadership during the summer 2010 voyage to the Mediterranean. She enjoyed every aspect of her previous voyage on the MV Explorer and is very excited to be back on the ship as a member of the Student Life team.
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Joi Thailoan Ngo (Living Learning Coordinator: Student Leadership)

Born and raised in Dallas, Texas, Joi received her Bachelor of Arts in English from the University of Texas at Austin. Her passion for literature and writing guided her toward her teacher certification for English/Language Arts and Reading Grades 8-12. She then graduated with a Masters of Education in Student Affairs from the University of California Los Angeles. Throughout her career in student affairs both as a student and a professional, she has worked in multicultural student affairs, lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender student affairs, new student services, retention services, and recreation. She is currently the Residence Director of Jackson Hall at Texas State University-San Marcos. Her life-long love affair with travel and obsession with new foods makes this voyage an opportunity of a lifetime!
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Annie Rappeport (Outreach Coordinator)

Annie just graduated with her Masters in Higher Education from the University from Virginia and has worked as the Global Ambassadors Program Coordinator for just over a year. Extremely excited to go on her first semester voyage, Annie looks forward to being part of an amazing community. Prior to working and living in VA, Annie was a graduate assistant at the University of Arizona in the Dean of Students Office working in Judicial Affairs, she also helped as an intern, develop the transfer student service center at University of Arizona. Annie obtained her undergraduate degree in Drama with a minor in Music from Trinity University in San Antonio, TX. Annie’s international experience includes living in Prague, Czech Republic during a summer at the music conservatory there under the guidance of Ladislav Kubik. Annie loves fines arts, is a freelance graphic designer and sings/composes on the side. Other interests include yoga, jazz, travel, basketball, dancing, scrap booking, rock climbing and she would really like to learn the drums... and some more languages! Annie looks forward to exploring the world with a new shipboard family and making friends around the world.
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Rosalyn Rivkin, LCSW (Psychologist)

Rosalyn has a B.A. in English Literature from Swarthmore College; MSW, University of Michigan. In a career spanning over three decades, Rosalyn has worked as: Psychotherapist with individuals, couples, families, young adults, adolescents, and children of various socio-economic/cultural/racial backgrounds; Director of 3 Family Therapy Training programs; Teacher at professional Psychology Graduate Schools; Consultant to psychology professionals, educators, writers, business executives. Since 2008, as member of a consulting group, Rosalyn has offered short-term mental health and psycho-educational services to military families, Child Care Center staffs, and Chains of Command. She has completed numerous Rotations for the Army and Air Force (Europe, Asia, USA).
Rosalyn has traveled widely, often with the whole family, sometimes (long ago) with her young children, solo, or as team leader for service projects (Asia, Africa, USA). Wherever her interests and curiosity take her, she reads novels and poetry, hikes, visits museums, Yoga classes, and off-the-beaten-track habitats as far north as the Pole, as far south as Antarctica. Rosalyn prefers travel by water, loving all boats and ships equally, from modest rafts and clunky ferries to grand ocean-going vessels. Having grown up in a river city, she seeks out streams and their relatives, the great rivers, lakes, and seas.
Circumnavigating the globe again with SAS is an honor and dream come true. Experiencing the stimulation and warmth of the shipboard community, assisting students at a major life crossroad, and absorbing the beauty and adventure of living on oceans will again thrill her each day of the journey.
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Phillip D. Sloane, MD, MPH (Physician)

Phillip is the Elizabeth and Oscar Goodwin Distinguished Professor of Family Medicine at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He received a B.A. in history from Pomona College, Claremont California, and M.D. from the Medical College of Ohio, Toledo, Ohio, and a Master in Public Health from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Certified in family medicine and geriatric medicine, he has previously worked in rural medical practice, as an emergency department physician, and as staff members at the University of North Carolina Hospitals. He is first author of numerous articles and of the popular textbook for medical students, Essentials of Family Medicine, now in its 6th edition. At age 18 (spring 1968) he sailed on Semester at Sea (then called World Campus Afloat). With his wife Sheryl (a gerontologist and professor of social work at UNC), he looks forward to sailing once again, this time as trip physician. Back to Staff List

Heidi Warner (Physician Assistant)

Heidi Warner is a graduate of the Yale University Physician Associate program and has been working at Northwest Family Medicine, a full-service primary care office near Boulder, Colorado, for the last 13 years. She enjoys working with patients of all ages and has a particular interest in preventive and women’s health. She believes that addressing individuals’ unique health issues is critical to providing excellent care. Prior to becoming a Physician Assistant, Heidi graduated Magna Cum Laude and University Honors with a Bachelor of Science degree from Colorado State University in Exercise and Sport Science. She worked in preventative health for 5 years at John Muir Medical Center in Walnut Creek, California. Heidi is a Fall, 1988, Semester at Sea alumni, and is thrilled for the opportunity to share such an amazing journey with her husband, Jeff, and sons, Reade and Tate. She is excited to sail with you and help with your health care needs. Back to Staff List

Brian Waspi (IT Coordinator)

Brian is an entrepreneur and business owner specializing in online commerce. He is CTO and partner at Clear Water Outdoor, a specialty outdoor retailer, and a member of the Outdoor Industry Association. Brian is also the Owner/Co-Founder of the online gift service My Dream Home Registry. He holds a Bachelor’s Degree in Environmental Science from Northern Arizona University. Brian is married to Kristin Hannah, the Children’s Coordinator for the Fall 11 Voyage and SAS alum. The two sailed together on the May 2010 Enrichment Voyage and were married aboard the ship during the January 2011 Alumni Voyage! Brian and Kristin reside in Lake Geneva, Wisconsin and enjoy escaping to exotic (and warmer) winter locations. Brian has visited multiple countries in Europe, Central America, and the Caribbean. He is an avid outdoorsman, amateur economist, and enjoys philosophical debate.
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Spencer Weiner (Photographer)

Spencer is an award-winning visual journalist based in Santa Barbara, California. His 25-year career has allowed him to witness history, and intimate moments in regular people’s lives; documenting everything from the impact of Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans, to Jazz clubs in Cairo. There's no economic or sociopolitical boundary Spencer is not interested in crossing, both as a peaceful witness and as a social advocate. His images have been featured in magazines and newspapers all over the world, first as a Photojournalist for the Associated Press in both Florida and Georgia, then 18 years as a Staff Multi Media Visual Journalist for the Los Angeles Times. In 2004 he was a member of the Los Angeles Times Pulitzer for Breaking News Reporting of the Southern California Wildfires. Currently, Spencer is principle of his own Visual Journalism Agency; SAWfoto.com, producing Film, Audio and Photography on contract with The New York Times, Getty Images and the Associated Press.
Academic Studies included Fine Art Photography and Photojournalism at the University of Florida and Political Science and Religious Studies at Jerusalem Institute, Israel. Spencer has served as a Volunteer guide for Junior League of the Blind Wilderness education programs, Waldorf Schools of North America Wilderness Expeditions and is a member of; National Press Photographers Association & National Eagle Scout Association.
Traveling with Spencer are his beloved wife, Sonja Lowell RN BSN and his two-year-old-joy-filled-rascal-daughter, Vajra Sky.
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Katherine Wheatle (Living Learning Coordinator: Health Promotion Specialist)

Katherine currently serves as a Community Health Educator at University Health Services of The Pennsylvania State University. She is also a guest instructor and consultant for the Department of BioBehavioral Health at Penn State, where she teaches courses on health promotion theory and strategies, health disparities and inequities, and health issues related to college students. Katherine has coordinated several campus wide health promotion programs focused on stress management, sexual health, body image, and alcohol education. She holds a Bachelor of Science degree in African American Studies with minors in Sociology and Health Policy & Administration from Penn State and a Master of Science in Public Health degree in Health Policy & Services Research with a concentration in Mental Health from Emory University. Katherine has worked for Stamps Health Services at the Georgia Institute of Technology, as well as the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta, GA. She attributes her love for travelling to her own study abroad experience at the University of Ghana in Accra, Ghana and has advocated for underrepresented students to engage in study abroad experiences, especially to non-traditional locations. Katherine has travelled to over 10 countries, including across Europe. This will be her first voyage with Semester at Sea. Though she will miss her peer educators at PSU, Katherine is elated about the opportunity to sail across the world with dynamic, engaged, and healthy faculty, staff, and students!
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Trina White (Administrative Assistant)

Trina is an enthusiastic optimist whose thirst to better understand various cultures and create connections between the people of the world has led her across the country, overseas and back again. She is lucky enough to have journeyed with Semester at Sea twice – once on the S02 voyage aboard the S.S. Universe Explorer and again on the F04 voyage aboard the M.V. Explorer. Trina has a B.A. from Pine Manor College in Boston, MA and currently serves as an Administrative Assistant at William Morris Endeavor Entertainment, NY. She is an ardent practitioner of yoga and loves, pretty much, any kind of music and dancing.
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Ben Williams (Community Resource Officer)

Although this will be the first Semester at Sea voyage for Ben Williams, he has had international experience as a former Air Force NCO. He is retired from the Colorado Springs Police Department after 25 years of service. For the past nine years, he has worked in the Colorado Springs School District as a campus supervisor for an alternative high school for at-risk youth. This voyage offers Ben and his wife an opportunity to continue work with young people, while at the same time being able to travel around the world and experience a variety of different cultures.
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Brian Williams (Textbook Coordinator)

Brian Williams was born in Denver, Colorado and lived there most of his life. He moved to Charlottesville with his girlfriend, Layne Hanson, a few years ago while she studied higher education at The University of Virginia. Brian will be accompanying Layne on this voyage as the textbook coordinator. Brian studied Psychology at the University of Northern Colorado while also working as a counselor at a treatment center for sexually abusive youth. Since then he has worked for a number of companies in the mental health field including the City of Charlottesville’s Department of Social Services, and currently Charlottesville League of Therapists. He is excited, to say the least, about the opportunity to travel with Semester at Sea on his first voyage. He recognizes the spectacular value and uniqueness of this program. He looks forward to getting to know people from all over the world and being a part of the great community that Semester at Sea is known for.
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