My current job and title

My primary focus is my work at the Center for Writing and Rhetoric here at the University of Mississippi. I received my Ph.D. in English with a concentration in Rhetoric and Composition from Georgia State University in Atlanta (January 2011).

Personal Statements

I was born in Florida and raised in Georgia; I am the oldest of eight children. My parents love country living, so anytime civilization seemed about to encroach upon our home, we moved somewhere just a little more out of reach. We had to travel almost half an hour just to reach the "filling station" that was the grocery store, gas station, and community gossip center! My father has "itchy feet", so even though we had to travel on a budget, we visited many places across the midwest, northeast, and south.

After I married my husband Robert, I discovered he shared the same love of rural living as my parents did! We have lived in south Georgia, southeastern Pennsylvania, and places in-between. We lived about ten years in Pennsylvania but decided to return to our roots in 2001. My husband and I have called Georgia “home” for the last thirty-plus years, even when we lived elsewhere. We still have a home in the foothills of North Georgia, near Cleveland.

I became interested in education when we decided to home-school our children. The Internet was in its early stages, so we didn't use online technologies in our curriculum, but by the time I decided to attend college, I'd had experience with that technology in corporate training programs.

After spending more than a decade within the corporate world, working in retail management and computer software training, I decided to begin college with my daughter. I wanted to spend the rest of my working life doing something I enjoyed, and I enjoyed teaching. Because I’m also interested in writing and how technology integrates into that (or vice versa), my current work and my teaching here at Ole Miss are taking me in a direction I’ve long wanted to explore: the intersections of composition, pedagogy, and digital learning environments.

In addition to reading and writing, I enjoy many outdoor activities - the challenge is making enough time for them. I like to hike, camp, walk along country trails looking for wildflowers, and spend time with my fourth best friend, Buddy (he comes after my husband and two children). Buddy is my special friend, but he has lots of company. In 2005, Robert and I gave shelter to a pregnant rat terrier/fiest, Suzie. We were inexperienced in this area, and she's a little dog; after all, we thought, how many puppies can a little dog have? Well, we know the answer now (she had six)! In addition to Buddy and Suzie, we now have Hershey, Honey, Nora, and Ivory. We pamper them all, and they keep us active and alert.

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