SOU Undergraduate Studies
Lee Ayers-Preboski
Associate Professor and Co-Director of the Division of Library and Undergraduate Studies
PhD – Criminal Justice, Southwest University, 2001; EdD – Instructional Technology and Distance Education, Nova Southeastern University, 2001; MEd, Education (English emphasis), Southwestern Adventist University, 1997; BA – Public Administration/Criminal Justice, National University, 1985; AS – Law Enforcement, Miramar College, 1983
Lee’s career at SOU began in 1998. Her teaching responsibilities have included a wide array of courses in Criminal Justice and research and writing courses, practicums and internships, capstones, and the Purposeful Learning Seminar. Since 2013, as an appointed member of the State of Oregon’s Higher Education Coordinating Commission (HECC), Lee has been part of the state entity responsible for ensuring pathways for Oregonians’ educational success and works with partners across the public and private higher education arena. Lee’s board memberships include the Oregon Criminal Justice Commission and Jackson County Community Works. She is a current member and the former chair of the Jackson County Public Safety Coordinating Council. She has served on the Research Board for the Oregon Department of Corrections, as the President of the Inter-Institutional Faculty Senate for the former Oregon University System, and as Chair of the SOU Faculty Senate.
Office: Computing Services 211
Phone: 541.552.6505
E-Mail: ayersl@sou.edu
Carrie Forbes
University Librarian and Co-Director of the Division of Library and Undergraduate Studies
PhD – Curriculum and Instruction, University of Denver, 2020; MA – Higher Education, University of Denver, 2011; MLS – Indiana University-Bloomington, 1999; BA – History, Western Michigan University, 1998
Office: LIB 328
Phone: 541.552.6823
E-Mail: forbesc@sou.edu
Jaelle Dragomir
Instructor
Office: Computing Services 216
Phone: 541.552.8406
E-Mail: dragomirj@sou.edu
Danielle Hammer
Instructor and Bridge Program Coordinator
PhD – Literature in English, The University of California, San Diego, 2018; BA – English and Anthropology, Southern Oregon University, 2011
Danielle is living her dream of teaching at her Alma Mater, SOU. The wonderful professors that guided her time in school here also inspired her to pursue a career teaching in higher education, so she is happy to be able to give back to the Southern Oregon community. As a student, Danielle was also a Ronald E. McNair Post-Baccalaureate Achievement Program scholar, and her time in this wonderful program taught her the importance of encouraging diversity in higher education. To this end, Danielle works as the Coordinator for the SOU Bridge program. She is happy to dedicate her time and energy to helping the underrepresented Oregon students in this program to thrive in their first year of college. In her research, Danielle is fascinated by the literary representations of madness and haunting in Irish literature. She is specifically interested in how authors from marginalized groups use literature as a revolutionary tool to express their cultural oppression. She continues this theme in her Purposeful Learning Seminar course: Unsolved Mysteries. Her seminar course examines how many pop-culture monsters can symbolize much deeper cultural issues. She also loves a good scary story!
Office: CS 215
Phone: 541.552.6014
E-Mail: hammerd@sou.edu
Warren Hedges
Instructor
PhD, English, Duke University, 1993; MA, English, Graduate Certificate in Women’s Studies, Duke University, 1988; BA, Creative Writing, College of Wooster, 1986
Warren Hedges has served as a tenured professor in SOU’s English department and later helped create the Emerging Media and Digital Arts (EMDA) major. He has wide-ranging interests and has taught courses for the English, Art, EMDA, and Communication departments as well as Purposeful Learning Seminar and the Honors College. Before coming to SOU in 1996, he was a Visiting Assistant Professor at Duke University. His current research focuses on video games, and on how speculative genres such as science fiction and fantasy help us to imagine more inclusive cultures, societies, and worlds.
Office: Susie Homes 105
Phone: 541.552.6926
E-Mail: hedges@sou.edu
Laura Jessup
Senior Instructor I; Chair, Purposeful Learning Seminar Program
MA – English (Rhetoric & Composition), Portland State University, 1993; BA – English, University of California at Santa Barbara, 1991
Laura is an experienced and dedicated teacher who has worked with university students since 1992. Her strong, gentle leadership guides students to pursue their passions with confidence and perseverance. Her interests have led her to publish works of nature writing, travel journalism, and educational medical writing. In graduate school, she specialized in Literature of the English Romantic poets, Early 20th Century American novelists, and Rhetoric and Composition. As a lifelong learner, Laura has been able to connect her talents as a writer, grant writer, organizer, and compassionate teacher to help those differently abled and those seeking medical and/or caregiving information. Laura’s current research interests and skills have led her to volunteer in the community as an Internationally Board-Certified Lactation Consultant (IBCLC) and La Leche League Leader, collaborating with healthcare professionals in Southern Oregon Lactation Association (SOLA). She is active in piloting course designs for non-traditional learners and contributes her expertise to peer mentoring, and many support programs and initiatives at SOU.
Office: Computing Services 213
Phone: 541.552.8411
E-Mail: jessupla@sou.edu
Dave Kahn
Instructor
MA – Discipline, University of Southern California; BA – Discipline, University of California Los Angeles
Dave has taught for over 30 years and has been at SOU for 18 years.
Office: CE 029
Phone: 541.552.6619
E-Mail: kahnd@sou.edu
Matt Moreali
Senior Instructor I
Juris Doctor (JD) – Law and Government Certificate, Willamette University College of Law, 2013; BA – Politics, History and Legal Studies, University of San Francisco, 2005
Matt works to equip students with the skills needed to clearly articulate their own ideas and express them to various audiences and in any situation. Though once pursuing his own law practice, Matt is inspired by teaching and has taught at Rogue Community College and Southern Oregon University, focusing on leadership skills, expository writing, research writing, and interpersonal communication courses. Because of his background and training as a lawyer, Matt draws on the rhetorical and logical foundations of legal analysis and encourages his students to apply these concepts to their own disciplines. Matt continues his scholarship on topics and inquiries related to freedom of speech, mass hysteria, and family law. He is currently an inactive member of the Oregon State Bar.
Office: Computing Services 210
Phone: 541.552.6142
E-Mail: morealim@sou.edu
Craig Stillwell
Senior Instructor II
PhD – History, University of Notre Dame, 1992; BA – Biology, BS – Chemistry, University of Oregon, 1982
Craig began his academic career in the chemical and biological sciences, but his fascination with the humanistic side of scientific inquiry led him to pursue a master’s in the history and philosophy of science and a doctorate in European History with an emphasis in the history of science and medicine. His PhD dissertation examined the ideas and science of Ilya Metchnikoff, the eccentric Russian pathologist who became one of the first immunologists and who popularized yogurt as a health food in the early 1900s. After a postdoctoral position at Stanford University studying the history of recent immunology, Craig taught for ten years at the Lyman Briggs School of Science at Michigan State University, where he embraced “The Best of Both Worlds” by teaching the history and philosophy of science and medicine to pre-science and pre-med majors. Moving back to the Rogue Valley in 2001, he soon found himself teaching at SOU, where he developed a University Seminar course that focuses on the art, science, and ethics of medicine. His hobbies include bodybuilding and aquaria keeping.
Office: Computing Services 212
Phone: 541.552.8438
E-Mail: stillwec@sou.edu
Elizabeth Whitman
Senior Instructor II
MA – Transformative Studies, California Institute of Integral Studies, 2019; MA – English Literature, University of Oregon, 1985; BA – English and French, University of Oregon, 1983
Elizabeth’s research interests center on the nature of learning and the art and craft of teaching. How do we sustain, innovate, and energize our knowledge and wisdom for a changing world? Elizabeth loves to grapple with big-picture ideas and real-life experiences that promote dialogue, increase awareness of the shared, systemic interconnections that shape our lives, and lead us to appreciate and manage inevitable ambiguities. She embraces learning with diverse, inclusive, and transdisciplinary perspectives, knowing that big questions require wide-ranging scrutiny. Her teaching and life accomplishments are defined by curiosity, creativity, playfulness, empathy, and a deep and abiding love of the natural world. Elizabeth’s inquiry and commitment to lifelong learning have led her to explore arts-based research, storytelling and narrative, folklore and mythology, indigenous art, music and craft, food politics, social justice, ethology, positive psychology, and especially the transformative potential of education in its many forms.
Office: Computing Services 214
Phone: 541.552.8406
E-Mail: whitmane@sou.edu
Emeritus Faculty
Deborah Brown
Senior Instructor II
E-Mail: dbrown@sou.edu
General Education Staff
Kelley Smail
Administrative Assistant
Office: Computing Services West 213
Phone: 541.552.6260
E-Mail: smailk@sou.edu
Hazel Tincher
Student Success Coordinator
Office: SC 172
Phone: 541.552.6290
E-Mail: tincherh@sou.edu