Colorado College welcomes 11 new tenure-track faculty members and four Riley Scholars to the CC community. The new faculty members embody a wide range of fields and disciplines, and many of them will be in the classroom on the first day of Block 1, which begins Monday, Aug. 29.

“CC is fortunate to have a national reputation that allows us to attract exceptional scholar-teachers,” says Colorado College President Jill Tiefenthaler. “Our incoming tenure-track faculty members, Riley Scholars, and visiting professors are outstanding, and they will have an enormous impact on our intellectual community.”

“I am delighted that these talented individuals have joined our faculty,” Dean of the College Sandra Wong says.  “Each brings interests, perspectives, and areas of expertise that will further enhance the breadth, depth, and vigor of our academic programs, our curriculum, and our campus conversations.”

The 11 new tenure-track faculty members are:

Janet Burge, Associate Professor of Mathematics and Computer Science
Burge began her teaching career at Miami University and received tenure in 2011 before becoming an associate professor at Wesleyan University in 2014. She earned her Ph.D. (2005) and M.S. (1999) in computer science from Worcester Polytechnic Institute, and received a B.S. (1984) in computer science from Michigan Technological University. Burge teaches Software Engineering and Object-Oriented Programming; Human Computer Interaction; and Machine Learning; and supervises student research projects on building web-based design rationale management systems. Her most recent journal article, “Untangling Wicked Problems,” will be featured in Artificial Intelligence in Engineering Design, Analysis, and Manufacturing. She is the lead investigator on an $800,000 NSF grant, and speaks regularly on new directions in software technology.

William D. Craighead, Assistant Professor of Economics and Business
Craighead earned his Ph.D. (2006) and M.A. (2001) in economics from the University of Virginia, and his B.A. with honors (1996) in economics and social thought from Carleton College. Previously an assistant professor of economics at Wesleyan University, Craighead teaches International Trade; Equilibrium Macroeconomics; International Economics; and Introduction to Economic Theory. His recent scholarship includes two co-authored articles, “Nominal Shocks and Real Exchange Rates: Evidence from Two Centuries” in Journal of International Money and Finance (2015) and “Current Account Reversals and Structural Change in Developing and Industrial Countries” in the Journal of International Trade and Economic Development (2015), as well as an article, “Monetary Rules and Sectoral Unemployment in Open Economies,” in Journal of Macroeconomics (2014). He also has published in The World Economy and Open Economies Review.

Prentiss A. Dantzler, Assistant Professor of Sociology
Dantzler came to Colorado College as a Riley pre-doctoral fellow and completed requirements for his Ph.D. (2015) in public affairs from Rutgers University. He received his M.P.A. (2011) from the West Chester University of Pennsylvania and his B.S. (2009) in energy and business finance from Pennsylvania State University. Dantzler teaches Community Development; Inequality: Intersections of Race, Class, Gender and Sexuality; Race, Class, and Gender in World Societies; Methods of Urban Planning; and Housing Policy and Its Impact on Urban Areas. His most recent journal article, “Exclusionary Zoning: State & Local Reactions to the Mount Laurel Doctrine,” will be published in The Urban Lawyer.

Jennifer Flores Garcia, Assistant Professor of Molecular Biology
Garcia recently held a postdoctoral fellowship in the chemistry and biochemistry department at the University of Colorado, Boulder. She earned her Ph.D. (2012) in genetics from the University of California, San Francisco and her B.S. (2006) in chemistry and biochemistry from the University of California, San Diego. Garcia teaches Molecular, Cellular and Developmental Biology; Microbiology; and Human Genetics; and is especially adept at employing hands-on active learning techniques to teach the principles of human genetics to non-majors. Her research focuses on yeast genetics. Her scholarly publications have appeared in RNA, Nature, Proceeding of the National Academy of Sciences, Molecular and Cellular Biology, Cell, and Genes and Development, and she received an NIH Ruth L. Kirschstein National Research Service Award in 2014.

Sara J. Hanson, Assistant Professor of Molecular Biology
Hanson has held a postdoctoral fellowship at the Conway Institute, University College Dublin. She earned her Ph.D. (2013) in the interdisciplinary program in genetics at the University of Iowa, and received both her B.S. (2007) in biology and B.A. (2007) in chemistry from Buena Vista University. She has worked with introductory and advanced students in the fields of genetics and molecular biology. In 2013 Hanson received the Stephen J. O’Brien Award from the American Genetics Association for best student-authored publication in the 2013 volume of Journal of Heredity. Her teaching and research interests include comparative genomics, bioinformatics, and molecular evolution. Hanson’s most recent publications appeared in Proceedings of the National academy of Sciences and BMC Genomics.

Scott E. Ingram, Assistant Professor of Archaeological Anthropology
Ingram comes to CC from the Department of Sociology and Anthropology at the University of Texas at Arlington where he received an award from the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences for outstanding teaching in 2014. He earned his Ph.D. (2010) and M.A.(2004) in anthropology at Arizona State University, and his M.A. (1984) and B.A. with honors (1982) at Oklahoma State University. Ingram teaches Archaeology of the American Southwest; Archaeology of Sustainability; North American Archaeology; and Rise of Civilization. In 2015 he published a co-edited volume, Traditional Arid Lands Agriculture: Understanding the Past for the Future with University of Arizona Press. Ingram also has published numerous articles that focus on environmental changes and climate challenges in central Arizona.

Amy Lee Kohout, Assistant Professor of History
In 2015-16 Kohout was a visiting assistant professor of environmental humanities in the Environmental Studies Department at Davidson College. She received her Ph.D. (2015) and M.A. (2011) from Cornell University, and a B.A. (2004) with distinction in history from Yale University. Kohout teaches courses on the settlement of the U.S. West in the 19th century, environmental history and ethics, the Civil War and reconstruction, and 20th-century American history. She is the co-founder and editor of Backlist, an online publication that links readers to book lists and short essays by historians, and the editor of The Appendix, a journal of narrative and experimental history. Kohout’s article, “There is a Witchery in kodakery…,” was published in Rethinking History: The Journal of Theory and Practice (2012). Her piece on “Museums” is forthcoming in A Companion to the History of American Science.

Katrina L. Miller-Stevens, Assistant Professor of Economics and Business
As an assistant professor at the School of Public Service in the Strome College of Business, Miller- Stevens has taught at Old Dominion University since 2010. Katrina received her Ph.D. (2010) in public affairs from the University of Colorado in Denver. She earned her master of nonprofit management (2004) at Regis University in Denver and her B.A. in history at Colorado State University. Miller-Stevens teaches Introduction to the Nonprofit Sector; Management of Nonprofit Organizations; Leadership and Ethics; and Theories of Public Policy. Her scholarship includes “Collaboration processes and institutional structure: Reexamining the black box” in International Journal of Public Administration (2014) and “Rethinking a typology of watershed partnerships: a governance perspective” in Public Works Management & Policy (2015).

Natanya Ann Pulley, Assistant Professor of English
As an assistant professor of English, Pulley has taught at the University of South Dakota since 2013. She earned her Ph.D. (2013) in English—fiction writing and her B.A. (2007) in English from the University of Utah. She has taught courses on contemporary fiction, narrative theory and method, Native American literature, and creative writing. A poet and writer of fiction and creative non-fiction, her publications include “The Killer of Rabbits and Brothers” in States of Terror, “The Last Supper” in Last Night on Earth, and two poems, “Discourse” and “High-Water Mark” in Women Write Resistance: Poets Resist Gender Violence. Her fiction has appeared in numerous publications including Red Ink, Mud City Review, The Collagist and The Butter, As/Us: A Space for Women of the World, Bad Penny Review, The Los Angeles Review, Change Seven Magazine, Entropy Magazine, and Western Humanities Review.

Dwanna Lynn Robertson, Assistant Professor of Race, Ethnicity and Migration Studies
Robertson earned her Ph.D. (2013) in sociology and a Graduate Certificate in Native American Indian Studies at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst. She received her M.S. (2010) in sociology from Oklahoma State University, an M.B.A. (2003) in business administration from East Tennessee State University, and a B.A. (2001) in political science from the University of Central Oklahoma. Robertson teaches courses on American ethnic studies, American Indian perspectives, and research methods. Her article, “Decolonizing the Academy and Subversive Acts of Indigenous Research: A Review of Yakama Rising and Bad Indians,” was published in Sociology of Race and Ethnicity (2016). Another recent work, “Invisibility in the Color-Blind Era: Examining Legitimized Racism Against Indigenous Peoples,” was published in American Indian Quarterly (2015). Robertson currently serves as the acting cabinet secretary to the Department of Education and Training of Muscogee (Creek) Nation.

Karen R. Roybal, Assistant Professor of Southwest Studies
Roybal earned her Ph.D. (2011) in American Studies at the University of New Mexico, and has taught in its Department of Chicana/o Studies. She received an M.A. (2002) in Communication Studies from the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, and a B.A. (2000) with honors in journalism and mass communication from the University of New Mexico. She has taught Introduction to Chicana/o Studies; Early American Literature; Chicana Literature and Film; and Chicana/o Latina/o Civil Rights. Her publications include “Rawhide Tough & Lonely: Eva Antonia Takes the Reins” in Southwestern American Literature (2014) and “Pushing the Boundaries of Border Subjectivity, Autobiography, and Camp-Rasquachismo” in Aztlan: A Journal of Chicano Studies (2013). Her monograph, Archives of Dispossession: Uncovering Mexicana Memory Through Testimonio, is under review by University of North Carolina Press.

In addition, the four Riley Scholars are:

Charrise Barron, pre-doctoral Riley Scholar-in-Residence and Visiting Instructor in Music
Barron is a Ph.D. candidate in African American Studies at Harvard University with primary and secondary fields of concentration in religion and ethnomusicology, respectively. She earned a Master of Divinity (2010) summa cum laude from Yale Divinity School and an A.B. (1998) cum laude in computer science from Harvard University. Her research and teaching interests include contemporary gospel music, black popular music since the 20th century, and African and African American history and religion.

Felicia Chavez, post-doctoral Riley Scholar-in-Residence and Visiting Assistant Professor in English and Film and Media Studies
Chavez holds an M.F.A. (2012) in Creative Nonfiction Writing from the University of Iowa and a B.A. (2005) summa cum laude in English from DePaul University. Chavez has taught courses including Thesis Research and Planning and The Audio Essay at Colorado College, and she has served as thesis writing specialist in CC’s Colket Center for Academic Excellence since 2014. In recent years she has been a contributing producer to “Critical Karaoke” and to audio essays with KRCC, Colorado College’s NPR-member station.

Yetunde Olaiya, pre-doctoral Riley Scholar-in-Residence and Visiting Instructor in Art
Olaiya is a Ph.D. candidate at the Princeton University School of Architecture, holds an M. Arch. from the Harvard Graduate School of Design, and an A.B., magna cum laude, in architecture from Barnard College. Her areas of specialization include history and theory of modern architecture and urbanism (with a focus on sub-Saharan Africa), history of Third World development and globalization, colonial and postcolonial African history, histories of science, technology and imperialism, and techno-politics.

Camisha Ann Russell, post-doctoral Riley Scholar-in-Residence and Visiting Assistant Professor in Philosophy
Russell earned her Ph.D. (2013) in philosophy from Penn State University, an M.A. (2008) in philosophy from the University of Memphis, and a B.A. (2000) summa cum laude in French and public communication from American University. Russell’s areas of specialization include critical philosophy of race, ethics and bioethics, African American philosophy ,and feminist theory. She teaches The Hunger Games and Social Philosophy; Critical Epistemology: Race, Gender, Knowledge and Ignorance; and Race, Gender, and Bioethics.