I graduated from the University of California with a PhD in Linguistics, specifically Psycholinguistics. So I am either a cognitive psychologist who loves language, or a linguist who loves cognitive psychology. (My dissertation was on the role of memory in language processing.) My most important work, though, has always been as an educator. If you think of the three most important people in your life, I wager all of them are teachers, in some sense. I see teaching as an opportunity to make a positive impact on someone's life; an opportunity that not everyone has. I have taught a broad range of subjects, in a variety of scenarios, but throughout the most powerful part of teaching is that I learn at least as much from my students as they do from me. I have taught humanities (history, writing, philosophy), science (Linguistics, Psychology), and math, but the most rewarding aspect is the chance to change the trajectory of students' life through understanding. In my spare time, I enjoy reading Sci-Fi/Fantasy, working on old cars/machines, and backpacking.

- Languages, Linguistics, Cognitive Science - Statistics and the visual display of quantitative information - Reading (fiction) - Classic cars - Backpacking/bushcraft - Sailing and nautical navigation