Writing in just about all of its aspects—the act of writing, the dissemination of writing, the teaching and researching of writing, and the administration of writing programs—is only growing more complex and more challenging as the twenty-first century wears on.

This site provides an overview of my own work as a teacher, researcher, and administrator to understand and teach writing in all of its complexity.  This site, and my career, focus on three different aspects of this complexity.

Building a Lifespan Perspective on Writing

We know a lot about writing and how it works.  What we don’t quite know enough about is how people write throughout the entirety of their lives: how writers (and their writing) grow and change in response to changing circumstances, goals, social connections, etc.  Understanding writing development through the lifespan can help us link together our knowledge about writing and how it works and, in turn, inform how we support writing in all parts of writers’ lives.

Developing Principled Teaching Practices

I am very interested in both what we teach about writing and how we teach it.  I’m also fascinated by the values inherent in our curricular and pedagogical decisions.  I aim toward developing principled teaching practices that embrace current insights into successful teaching practices and are informed by the values that we hold.

Constructing and Sustaining Structurally Kind Writing Programs

Teaching does not exist in a vacuum: we are always teaching as part of larger programs, departments, and colleges.  These larger organizations shape our teaching in unexpected (and sometimes problematic) ways.  As a writing program administrator, I’m responsible not just for my own teaching practices and circumstances, but those in the program that I run.  How can I take advantage of available resources to create a writing program that is sustainable, transparent, and equitable for students, teachers, and administrators?

Each of these aspects is explored on separate pages on this site, where you can find an overview of my current thinking, my ongoing projects, and some recent publications and presentations.  You can also check out the blog, which has shorter pieces that explore my thoughts on various current events, books and articles I’ve read, and discussions I’ve heard about.  Finally, the about page provides an overview of me and my career, as well as contact information for anyone interested.