Our Faculty

Ellen Aiken: I have served as a core faculty member in the Sewall Residential Academic Program since 2003 and I teach The American West course in both Sewall and HRAP. The American West is the foundation course for CU’s Center of the American West Certificate Program. I work closely with the Center to introduce undergraduates to the program and to provide students with opportunities to meet and network with scholars, elected officials, and public policy makers who focus on Western issues. My academic work revolves around the transformative relationships that distinct cultural groups in the West have developed with the land and with each other. My current book project focuses on cross-cultural conflict and cooperation in the Union Pacific coal towns of southern Wyoming between 1880 - 1920. What I enjoy most about teaching at CU is the time I spend hiking with students on Boulder Open Space and Mountain Parks land. What inspires me most about teaching at CU is my work with a project called Dialogues on Immigrant Integration. This project facilitates conversations between CU students and immigrant service workers in the residence halls in order to promote cross-cultural communication and understanding. I began developing the Dialogues program in 2006 and it has since become a Model Project funded by a grant from CU’s Institute for Ethical and Civic Engagement. The Dialogues project has produced some amazing, eye-opening conversations between students and immigrant workers at CU!

Mark Bauerlein: Mark Bauerlein is a visiting professor in the Honors Program this year. Regularly, he teaches English at Emory University. His books include Literary Criticism: An Autopsy (1997) and Negrophobia: A Race Riot in Atlanta, 1906 (2001). His commentaries and reviews have appeared in Wall Street Journal, New York Times, Denver Post, and many other newspapers and magazines.

Daniel Boord: Professor Daniel Boord’s video works are in the collections of New York The Museum of Modern Art, The Getty Museum, and the Pacific Film Archives. His collaborations with CU Art Professor Luis Valdovino have been selected for screening by the La Biennale Di Venezia, the Venice Film festival as well as included in the Documentary Fortnight series at The Museum of Modern Art in New York City. 

Robert Buchwald: I have always been fascinated by the natural world and the way each part is simultaneously influenced and affected by every other piece. I grew up in West Texas where I spent my youth exploring the nearby desert. Many years later on a trip to Costa Rica, surrounded by the nightly chorus of jungle insects and frogs, I realized I wanted to spend the rest of my life learning about the natural world. After graduating from the University of Texas at Austin, I spent three years monitoring endangered species in North Cascades National Park and studying grey wolf behavior in Yellowstone. The amazing sights and unique experiences of those years cemented my passion for biology. I went on to UC Boulder for graduate school where I shifted my focus to honeybee social behavior, performing fieldwork in Colorado, Costa Rica and southwestern China. I have since completed a post-doctoral fellowship at Cal Berkeley, studying the biomechanics of bumblebee flight and how they respond to the challenges of life at high altitudes. In addition to biology, I also enjoy exploring wild places, riding my bike on trails & around town, growing backyard vegetables, and discovering new music from around the world. Lately, most of my free time is spent chasing around and playing with my young son.

Penelope Cole: Earned her doctorate in theatre from the University of Colorado Boulder with a focus in Scottish Women Playwrights. She has enjoyed a long career as a performer, as an actor, singer, and dancer. While primarily a director now, her early training in music, both instrumental and vocal, are a big part of all of her productions. Favorite directing experiences include: Mary Queen of Scot Got Her Head Chopped Off, Nine Parts of Desire, The Cradle Will Rock, Amadeus, and a 1950's Rock 'n' Roll adaptation of Shakespeare's Two Gentlemen of Verona. She has been fortunate to take two groups of students to perform at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe in Scotland and study in Scotland and London. Teaching specialties include: theatre history, Celtic theatre, acting, movement and period dance for actors, and dramatic literature.

Steve Dike: Steve is a recent PhD graduate from the University of Colorado.  His interests included intellectual history, cultural history, working class history, and the history of poverty in America. In his long and varied career, he has worked as a truck driver, pool guy, teacher, college instructor, and as the bouncer in a public library. Steve is also an alumnus of HRAP, or of the Kittredge Honors Program, as we called it, back in the day. In his free time, he practices yoga and plays chess and competitive contract bridge. 

Damian Doyle: I grew in the Republic of Ireland and at twenty-two went to Central Connecticut State University as an international student, earning a B.A. in English. I returned to Ireland for my M.A. in Anglo-Irish Literature and then went to University of Colorado, Boulder where I graduated in 2000 with a PhD in English Literature. For the past decade I have taught multiple writing courses in CU’s Program for Writing and Rhetoric. I’m presently faculty-in-resident in the Communication and Society RAP. Outside of work I enjoy biking, hiking, swimming and in the winter, snowboarding. I am fortunate to travel frequently and when at home I like to read, listen to music and cook.

Robert Ferry: This year Robert Ferry begins his thirtieth year on the faculty of the History Department at CU Boulder, which is also his alma mater (class of ’69). He received his graduate degrees in Latin American history from the University of Minnesota.  During the better part of the 1970's he lived in Caracas, Venezuela, where he played semi-professional baseball, traveled extensively throughout the country looking for old newspapers for the National Library of Venezuela, and met his wife (while doing research for his doctorate). His research interest is colonial Latin American, but he teaches on a broad range of topics in Latin America and Spanish history. During the academic year 2002-2003 he was a Fulbright fellow at the Universidad Veracruzana in Xalapa, Veracruz, Mexico, where he taught courses in United States history to Mexican students.

Daniel Jones: My Ph.D. is in musicology (music history), and my Masters degree has a dual focus in musicology and music theory. My specialty as a musicologist is American music, particularly folk and popular musics.  While my degrees are in traditional western musicology, I have naturally evolved toward a more ethnomusicological viewpoint, one which looks at music not only as sound patterns, but as a cultural activity through which people create and express identity and values, on both individual and group levels. As a performing musician, my instruments are in the steel guitar family (primarily pedal steel; secondarily lap steel, dobro). I play out regularly with my own instrumental quartet, Standard Deviations and am active as a freelance steel guitarist doing gigs and studio work in the greater Boulder-Denver area. Outside of music, I am a mountain dweller (a Nedhead!) and love outdoor recreational activities such as hiking, camping, cross country skiing, and trail running.  I also enjoy woodworking, home creation, and being a family guy.  At heart, I am a folky and a humanist.

Alan Lester: With no degree in Rock Climbing, Alan Lester had to settle for a Bachelor’s in Geology from University of Oregon (1985). Testing the waters of grad school at CU-Boulder (really, just looking for a drier climate and sun-warmed rocks), Alan was surprised to find that science is far more than stuffy textbooks filled with obscure terms and equations. In fact, science turns out to be an adventure itself, with a rich history and tradition of intellectual explorers discovering new aspects of the world at every turn. Alan received his Ph.D. in 1993, and continued a varied research program, often with the help of undergraduate assistants, including studies of atomic mineral structures, rock magnetism, geochemistry, and isotopic dating; all directed at deciphering the origin and subsequent evolution of the Rocky Mountains.A recipient of multiple university-wide teaching awards, Alan has focused on sharing his enthusiasm for science with undergraduate courses and public outreach (including K-12 education and television programming on Science, Discovery, National Geographic, and History channels). In 2007, Alan reduced his university appointment to part-time in order to follow another long-time passion and adventure; Alan is an airline pilot flying 50-80 seat aircraft for SkyWest and United Airlines. If you’re ever on a Canadair Regional Jet, listen up for those pilot names!

Mary Beth Lynch: I received my Ph.D. degree in exercise physiology from Arizona State University and have always loved working with athletes. My dissertation topic was related to nutrition, exercise, metabolism and obesity and was performed at the NIH Obesity Research Center in Phoenix, Arizona. I came to CU-Boulder in 1997 to do a post-doctoral fellowship in the IPHY department. I stayed on as an instructor and have been teaching the Nutrition course in various RAP programs ever since. Nutrition is an important topic of discussion these days. To me, good nutrition is about finding balance and moderation in food selection, learning to cook, choosing "whole" foods and eating foods that you enjoy.  I think it is important that children and young adults learn about important issues in our food system today - organics vs. conventional agriculture, food production and safety, and most basically where food comes from. I look forward to sharing with students the many exciting opportunities on campus to become involved with food issues and important food and sustainability projects in the community.

Christine Macdonald: My Ph.D. is in English, with a focus on American Literature.  I have taught college courses in writing and literature at CU Boulder since 1992. I wrote my dissertation on the law and literature of slavery, connecting these two disciplines through the legal concept of jurisdiction.  In addition to teaching for the Honors Program, I teach upper and lower division courses for the Program for Writing and Rhetoric. Before I decided to go to graduate school and become an academic, I worked in Development (fundraising) at Children’s Hospital, Boston.  Using my experience at Children’s, I now teach a service-learning course in Grant Writing, in which students write grants for local nonprofits.  I serve on the steering committee for the Institute for Ethical and Civic Engagement, and am interested in developing courses and programming here at CU that help students connect their academic, civic and personal lives.

Vincent McGuire: I was born in Brooklyn, New York in 1951. I attended Holy Cross H.S. from 1965-1969.  I came to the University of Colorado in 1976 and received my B.A. in politics in 1979. I went back to New York and took the Masters Degree in Political Science from New York University in 1984. My thesis was an analysis of the politics and policy of acid rain. I also taught High School Social Studies from 1980-1987. Returning to CU in 1989, I took the Ph.D. in Political Science in 1995. My dissertation was on liberalism and republicanism at the American Founding. I am now a Senior Instructor in the Farrand Residence Academic Program and the Kittredge Honors Program.  I teach a variety of courses from American Government to Western Political Thought. I am the Faculty Liaison to the Honor Code as well as the advisor to two Honor societies. I am happily married, have three children of varying ages, and two dogs. My interests are classic films, travel and debunking accepted conventions.

George Moore: I am a poet and teacher, and travel a good deal these days in Europe and Asia. My primary areas are Modern and Contemporary Literature, Shakespeare, and Creative Writing. I have been attending artist residencies the last few years with various artist communities, in Spain, Portugal, Iceland, Canada and Greece. Much of my own work now is in collaboration with visual artists in some of these places, and I have lived for periods of time India, Tibet, Thailand and Europe. I’m also a motorcycle enthusiast, and do some touring during the summers in the western states, about which I’m writing a book at present called The Lone Rider's Guide to the American West. My poetry can be found online and in a number of national journals.

Bob Nauman: Received dual Masters degrees in music and fine arts before completing his PhD in Art and Architectural History at the University of New Mexico. He currently teaches in the Department of Art and Art History at the University of Colorado in Boulder, where his research focuses on art and architectural history of the 19th and 20th centuries. He is the author of several books and articles dealing with issues of contemporary art and architecture. His book On the Wings of Modernism dealt with issues of American modernism and architecture during the Cold War, a topic he has pursued in other publications. Bob has also served on the Publications Committee for the Society for Photographic Education’s Exposure magazine, and coordinates the writing and reading of the Advanced Placement Art History exam, which is administered to high school students throughout the United States. His background in arts administration led to the establishment of an internship program that he continues to administer, between the University of Colorado, the Denver Art Museum, the Denver Museum of Contemporary Art, and the CU Art Museum. Summers find Dr. Nauman traveling. He has taught study abroad programs in Italy, and is traveling to England, Belgium, and the Netherlands this summer.

Rolf Norgaard: A faculty member at CU since 1987, I currently serve as Associate Director of the Program for Writing and Rhetoric. I recently led the effort to design and implement a new first-year writing curriculum for the campus; I also coordinated upper-division writing courses in Business and Engineering. My true home is the classroom, where my teaching has been honored with the Boulder Faculty Assembly Teaching Award, the highest such award on campus. I have taught in the Honors Residential Academic Program for about a decade. As an active writer and scholar, I can speak first hand to the challenges - and joys - of writing.  Come November and December, I won’t be able to contain my enthusiasm for nordic skiing. My wife is a linguist and also a faculty member at CU-Boulder.

David Sherwood: David Sherwood, PhD, is an associate professor and the associate chair in the Integrative Physiology department. He has been at CU-Boulder over 25 years and has taught courses both in Honors and in the IPHY department focusing on the acquisition and control of motor skills. His research focuses on the factors that influence the accuracy and consistency of motor skills including practice organization, the focus of attention, and the type and amount of verbal feedback. He enjoys tennis, golf, and cycling.

Michele Simpson: I had no idea when my plane landed in Colorado, in 1980, that I was here to stay. A transplanted New Yorker, I toggle between teaching courses in the Farrand Residential Academic program and Women and Gender Studies. You can also find me working in the community on peace, justice and education-related issues. Educated as a lawyer, at Indiana University-Bloomington and Jamaica, West Indies, I thoroughly enjoy the exhilaration of a good debate and actively seek to complicate what is often presented as “natural” or “normal.” Love discussing food, contemporary films, and fiction. Being a dedicated yoga practitioner/teacher, I can be seen on campus carrying around a mat, and walking my little white dog, Stuart Little.

Judith Streit: Judith Streit holds a Ph.D. in Biblical Interpretation, with an emphasis on Hebrew Bible/Old Testament. Her dissertation was a literary study of the Bible’s protagonist, God. Academic interests include the history of interpretation and literary appropriation. An educator by vocation, she enjoys time in the mountains, has eclectic tastes in music, loves the arts, and reads widely.

Paul Strom: Paul Strom graduated from CU-Boulder where he majored in Mathematics and Physics. He holds a Ph.D. in “Religion and Social Change,” and his research interests are in the history and strategies of non-violent social transformation. He enjoys teaching ethics, directing the Residential Honors Program, and he is listed on the faculties of the Peace and Conflict Studies and INVST Community Studies programs. Dr. Strom also enjoys music (Mozart and Black Keys), movies (Raising Arizona and Blade Runner), chocolate, lemon meringue pie, and living in the mountains. Watch for him around campus on his bike or on the hiking trails in Rocky Mountain National Park.

David Valeta: David Valeta has taught at CU since 2002 in the area of Western Religious Traditions. His academic preparation includes: B.A. in Biblical Studies and Biblical Languages from Geneva College (PA); M.Div. from Bethany Theological Seminary (IL/IN); Ph.D. in Religion from the University of Denver/Iliff School of Theology (CO). In addition to research and teaching interests listed above, he is particularly interested in issues concerning Civil Religion and the interface of Religion, Politics, and Culture in the modern world. He has been part of study seminars to Israel, the West Bank and Jordan and has participated in service projects in Guatemala with Habitat for Humanity and Disaster Relief in New Orleans.

William Wei: Dr. William Wei earned his doctorate in modern Chinese history from the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor. He is the senior Asian history specialist in the History Department. His primary research centers on modern China, especially the themes of revolution and counterrevolution. His secondary one is on Asian American history, focusing on Chinese Americans within the context of the overseas Chinese Diaspora. Reflecting these intellectual pursuits are his major works: Counterrevolution in China: The Nationalists in Jiangxi during the Soviet Period (University of Michigan Press, 1985) and The Asian American Movement (Temple University Press, 1993). He is frequently invited to lecture on Asian history and culture, and the Asian American experience. He has held a Rockefeller Fellowship, Mellon Fellowship, and Fulbright-Hays Fellowship. He enjoys traveling abroad. In the summer 1997, he worked as a journalist covering the historic handover of Hong Kong to China. In the summer 2006, he served as the Academic Dean of the Semester at Sea faculty aboard the MS Explorer, visiting various countries around the Pacific Rim. In the summer of 2010, he participated in an international faculty development seminar on Tibet.