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Specializing in cultural and institutional learning and program design, collaborative problem-solving in education, teaching critical thinking as a civic skill, and advancing American higher education to fit 21st Century needs and expectations.

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Assistant Director for Accreditation Services
Higher Learning Commission of the North Central Association
Chicago, IL
June 2005 - present

Liaison for 180 colleges and universities in 19 states. Provide assistance to institutions throughout the process of self-study, institutional change, and accreditation review. Consult with institutional executive leadership, faculty, and staff; facilitate workshops and learning. Areas of focus include academic and institutional operations, strategic planning, finances, public engagement, program development and assessment, multiple learning contexts, and state, national, and international education.
Focus: working with assisting institutions to envision and implement positive change.


Marketing Director
JDM & Associates
Chicago, IL
March 2005 - June 2005

Developed new accounts and a branding strategy for the firm. Focused on national brand-awareness with current accounts through print but particularly the web. Designed website content, functionality, and search-engine accessibility.
Focus: developing firm’s understanding of cultural trends.


Associate Professor of English
Transylvania University, Lexington, KY
September 1992 — May 2004 — Tenured and Promoted, 1998

As senior faculty, roles included administration: directing the English Department and committee leadership and membership on all major committees involved in university operations (Tenure/Promotion, Board of Trustees, Curriculum, Grants Allocations, Faculty Searches in multiple disciplines, and designing university assessment programs). Co-administered an annual visiting writer / speaker program. Service outside the university: organization of colloquia with other universities in the humanities and social theory and membership on diverse community and organizational boards in the arts.

Curriculum: specialized in curricular design in American Literature, American Studies, writing (fiction and non-fiction), and popular culture (music, film, television, web, comics, toys, fashion). Courses developed included studies in artificial intelligence, conspiracy theory, human consciousness, ethnicity, the Vietnam war, literary studies in 19th and 20th Century American literature, and performance art. (see website) Focus: designing and facilitating opportunities for learning and growth.


Teaching Fellow
University of California, Santa Cruz
September 1986 - June 1992

Lecturer in creative writing, expository writing, and interdisciplinary arts.
Focus: designing and facilitating opportunities for learning and growth.

Doctorate, American Literature (Special emphasis: American Studies / Popular Culture)
University of California, Santa Cruz
August 1992

Bachelor of Arts, English Literature (Highest Honors)
Saint Mary's College, Moraga CA
May 1986

Research grants: National Endowment for the Humanities Summer Grant (1995), David and Betty Jones Foundation Research and Development Grants (1994, 1996, 1998, 2003), Keenan Foundation Grant (2000).

Teaching awards: Bingham Fellowship for Excellence in Teaching ($50,000 award, 1997) Transylvania University Teaching Award (1992), University of California, Santa Cruz: Teaching Fellowship Competition (1991), Outstanding Teaching Assistant (1989).

Asking Alice: Essays on Illegal Drugs and Contemporary Culture , co-edited with Ian Jones. Manuscript in progress.

"Family Values and Feudal Codes: The Social Politics of America's Twenty-first Century Gangster," Journal of Popular Culture , Vol. 37, No. 4, May 2004.
---. reprinted in The Gangster Film Reader, Alain Silver and James Ursini, eds. Amadeus / Limelight, 2006. (Ingrid Walker)

"William Pierce," essay for The Encyclopedia of American Conspiracy Theories , Peter Knight, Editor. ABC-CLIO Publishers. August 2002.

"White Hope: Conspiracy, Nationalism, and Revolution in The Turner Diaries and Hunter, " Conspiracy Nation , Peter Knight and Alasdair Spark, eds. (New York: NYU Press, 2001).

"Entertaining Knowledge: (Popular) Cultural Literacy in the United States," Oregon Humanities , vol. 1, 1999.

"Libra, JFK , and the Paranoid Politics of History," in Thresholds: Viewing Culture , University of California, Santa Barbara, vol. 11, 1998.

Other, general readership: essays, book reviews, editorials.

Dissertation
Paranoia, Politics and the Popular Imagination: Conspiracy Narratives in Contemporary American Literature
Study examining conspiracy as a narrative form that shaped the way twentieth-century America articulated and understood its history and, more specifically, the way conspiracy narratives inform a cultural conception of sociopolitical authority.

"This is your Family on Drugs: Three Films About the Drug War," Cultural Studies Association, Boston, May 2004.

"Users: The New Terrorism in United States Popular Culture," Popular Culture Association / American Culture Association, New Orleans, April 2003.

"Family Values and the Mob: The Sopranos as Middle Class America," Film and Literature Conference, Florida State University, Tallahassee, January 2002.

"Unforgettable: The Epistemology of Memory in X Files and Conspiracy Theory," Southern American Studies Association, Wilmington, N.C. February 1999.

"An American Tale: Conspiracy all Around Us," Conspiracy Conference, King Albert's College, Winchester, England, July 1998.

"Mobilizing the White Masses: Writing Social Revolution in William Pierce's Fiction," Social Moves Conference, New Orleans, LA, November 1997.

"Risks of Ethnic Identity: Dangerous Liaisons in David Mamet's Homicide, " Popular Culture and American Culture Associations of the South Conference, Savannah, GA, October 1996.

Using: Narcotica and Desire , a book-length representation of the subculture of drug users, using as a social reality, the politics of desire, who uses, and why.

Steven Crow
Executive Director
Higher Learning Commission
Chicago, IL 60602
800.621.7440x102
scrow@hlcommission.org

Anthony Vital
Professor of English
Transylvania University
Lexington, KY 40508
(859) 233-8260
avital@transy.edu

John Gardner
Executive Director
Policy Center on the First Year of College
Brevard, NC
828.966.5309
gardner@fyfoundations.org

Martha Billips
Assistant Professor of English
Director, Foundations of Liberal Arts
Transylvania University
(859) 233-8390
mbillips@transy.edu