| Job: |
Heads of Ross Commons; Visiting Assistant Professor of Art History; Associate Professor of Mathematics |
| Hometown: |
Omaha, Nebraska, and Davidson, North Carolina |
| Favorites: |
Getting out in nature |
| One thing we are: |
Parents of young children |
Our job is deeply gratifying. Our role is to integrate the residential, social, and academic experiences of students and to create an intellectual community within the Commons itself. We work with students in Ross and with faculty across campus to develop interesting programming — if they want to bring in a speaker and have a dinner at our house, for example, or if they need help in getting a program off the ground, we work to make these things happen.
Many of our favorite memories have been forged through the connections students make over dinners in our home with visiting speakers, artists, and performers. On one evening, we had former poet laureate Billy Collins as a guest following a public reading, and students gathered around the piano for an impromptu sing-along in his honor. On another occasion, a gifted dancer-choreographer performed a solo on a stool in the middle of our kitchen, before we all settled into dinner and conversation. We consider ourselves lucky to count such surprising encounters — shared with students who might never wander through one of our classes — as part of the familiar fabric of our days.