Argentina, Brazil, and Uruguay
Claudio González Chiaramonte
Associate Professor and Director of the School in Latin America (Argentina, Brazil, and Mexico)
M.A., Ph.D., History, SUNY-Stony Brook
After studying in the United States as a Fulbright Fellow and Scholar from 1992-1994, Claudio returned to his native Argentina and designed the International Studies Program at the Centro Universitario de Idiomas--Facultad de Agronomia, Universidad de Buenos Aires. He directed the Dickinson College summer program in Málaga, Spain and most recently worked with the Pepperdine University program at the Universidad de Belgrano. He has also worked at the Universidad de Buenos Aires and the Universidad del Salvador and he has taught at Middlebury College and Dickinson College as a Visiting Instructor. Currently, Claudio teaches a semester-long seminar, "U.S. Diplomacy in the Cold War: Foreign Policy, Society, and Culture," at the Facultad de Filosofía y Letras (Universidad de Buenos Aires). The Director is stationed in Buenos Aires, but remains in regular contact with all C.V. Starr-Middlebury students studying abroad in Latin America in Argentina, Brazil, and Uruguay.
Liria C. Evangelista
Professor of the Course Cuaderno Latinoamericano – Argentina, Brazil, and Uruguay
Liria Earned her M.A. and Ph.D. from the State University of New York at Stony Brook, and taught at Middlebury College and Dickinson College before returning to Argentina to work for the Centro Universitario de Idiomas, Facultad de Agronomía, Universidad de Buenos Aires. There she developed the Spanish Program for Foreigners, and coordinated the English Program, also working as General Academic Director until 2004. A specialist in cultural studies and Argentine Literature, she has published a book on the issues of cultural memory during post-dictatorship Argentina, as well as several articles on Latin American and Spanish Literature. She teaches Latin American History and Culture to American students at the Universidad de Belgrano. She is presently teaching two courses at the National Museum of Fine Arts in Buenos Aires: Art and Horror during the XIXth Century and Popular Literature in the XIXth Century.
Maria Marta Gabriela Lamoretti
Program Coordinator
Maria Marta studied Anthropology and Graphic Design at the University of Buenos Aires, where she also taught Art History and History of Visual Communication at its Faculty of Architecture. Currently, she is pursuing a Master's degree in Cultural Organizations Management at the same university. She has a strong background in the performing arts (dance and lyrical voice training), and worked for 15 years in the publishing sector as a designer, journalist and technical editor. As coordinator for the program, she researches and supervises housing and internship placements, organizes extracurricular and program-sponsored activities, and manages general office administration in Buenos Aires.
Sylvia Murninkas
Resident Coordinator in Montevideo
Sylvia Murninkas studied Communications at the Labor University of Uruguay and Performance Theater at Montevideo's City School for Dramatic Arts and has production exerience in both journalism and advertising. As our resident coordinator, Sylvia is primarily responsible for the welfare of our students in Montevideo and for maintaining relationships with our housing and internship providers.
Chile and Mexico
Jeffrey Lee Stevenson
Associate Professor and Director of the C.V. Starr-Middlebury School in Latin America (Chile & Mexico)
M.A., Ph.D., Linguistics, University of Washington
Jeff started his career in international education interning with Food for the Hungry in La Paz, Bolivia in 1989 where he collaborated in health education/prevention programs among the Aymara of the Bolivian Altiplano. In 1990 he moved to Santiago, Chile where he lived for five years. In Chile, he first worked with Youth with a Mission and then taught English at the Instituto Chileno-Norteamericano de Cultura. After finishing an M.A. in TESOL from Central Washington University in 1996, he taught English for three years in Tokyo, Japan at Asia University. In 1999, he returned to his native state of Washington where he completed an M.A. in Romance Language Linguistics and a PhD in Linguistics at the University of Washington. Before accepting his current position of Director of the Middlebury School in Latin America (Chile and Mexico), Jeff was a member of the faculty of Seattle Pacific University where he coordinated a study abroad/service learning trip to Santiago, Chile and taught Spanish and graduate-level courses in Second Language Acquisition and Sociolinguistics. Of his love for Latin American cultures he states, “I went to Chile in 1990 with a 10-month plane ticket and stayed for five years.” He is passionate about helping students gain the second language and cross-cultural competence that will allow them to make significant contributions as global citizens.
Juan Pastene
Professor of the Course Cuaderno Latinoamericano – Chile and Mexico
After studying Spanish at the University of Playa Ancha (Valparaíso, Chile), Juan studied Journalism at the same institution, where he also obtained Bachelors degrees in Literature and Mass Media. He later enrolled for two semesters at SUNY Plattsburgh where he took courses in Mass Media and Journalism, before receiving an M.A. in Communication Studies from McGill University. Juan is the professor of the Cuaderno Latinoamericano course and he also works as a teacher at the Pontificia Universidad Católica de Valparaíso and as a journalist for the newspaper El Mercurio de Valparaíso. He has academic experience in courses related to Mass Media and Communication Theory, and he also has experience in research in immigration and transnationalism. The professor is stationed in Valparaíso, but he remains in regular contact with the students who study in all the sites in Chile and Mexico.
Paula Belén González Carrasco
Part time secretary
Paula studied Special Education and specialized in learning disabilities and school inclusion at the Universidad Raúl Silva Henríquez in Santiago, Chile. She is currently student-teaching at Santiago de Chile elementary school and she is a part-time secretary in the Santiago office. She has academic experience in courses related to school mediation and inclusion.
She researches and supervises housing and internship placements, organizes extracurricular and program-sponsored activities, and manages general office administration in Santiago.
Staff in Chile
Romilio Diaz, Aki Stevenson, Jeff Stevenson, Paula Gonzalez, Juan Pastene
Della Burke
Resident Coordinator in Mexico
Since studying abroad in Quito, Ecuador, Della has been very enthusiastic about the field of study abroad and the ability of the study abroad experience to change the lives of students in positive ways. She has worked in various capacities in the international offices of the University of Missouri, the University of Maryland, the University of Arizona and the University of California-Berkeley. In July 2007, she moved to Guadalajara. Before joining the Middlebury staff, she worked in the Coordinación General de Cooperación e Internacionalización in the Universidad de Guadalajara. Della has a BA in Spanish from the University of Missouri and an MA in Latin American Studies from the University of Arizona.