PHILIP L. FRANA

Philip L. Frana, Ph.D.

James Madison University

Departments and Programs: Interdisciplinary Liberal Studies; Independent Scholars; Honors College

Media contact: Eric Gorton, gortonej@jmu.edu

Looking for a speaker? I enjoy giving lectures on AI topics of general interest. Here are some recent talks.

Areas of expertise:

• software and information studies
• computing and culture
• creativity and innovation
• individualized and interdisciplinary education

Brief bio: Philip L. Frana is professor of Interdisciplinary Liberal Studies and Independent Scholars at James Madison University. His current scholarly interests focus on the social and cultural aspects of artificial intelligence and information technologies. He is editor and contributor to the Encyclopedia of Artificial Intelligence and past project director at the Charles Babbage Institute for Computing, Information & Culture. Areas of expertise include software and information studies, computing and culture, creativity, and individualized and interdisciplinary education.

Long bio: Frana’s scholarship and teaching at James Madison University focuses on interdisciplinary approaches to artificial intelligence, health informatics, and digital technologies. He is editor and contributor to the Encyclopedia of Artificial Intelligence: The Past, Present, and Future of AI and advisory board member and VR education team leader for the Museum of Science Fiction. He is also digital technology specialist to the GeoTech Center of the Atlantic Council, an international affairs think tank in Washington, DC. He received a doctorate in the history of technology, science & medicine from Iowa State University, and a bachelor’s degree in history and economics from Wartburg College. He served for several years as software history project director for the Charles Babbage Institute for Computing, Information & Culture at the University of Minnesota. He is past associate dean of the JMU Honors College and past director of undergraduate research in the Norbert O. Schedler Honors College at the University of Central Arkansas.

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Research & Scholarship

“What Policy Makers Need to Know About Quantum Information Science,” Atlantic Council Issue Brief, forthcoming.

Quantum information science (QIS) is a budding interdisciplinary field located at the convergence of computer science, mathematics, engineering, quantum physics, and philosophy. Experimental devices and techniques have already arisen from QIS—for example, quantum computers, quantum cryptography, and quantum teleportation—and other advances such as quantum artificial intelligence are on the horizon. But QIS is also valuable as a sandbox for learning more about the fundamental nature of quantum mechanics.

“The Political Economy of Quantum AI,” in Convergence: Artificial Intelligence and Quantum Computing—Applications and Use Cases, vol. 2, edited by Greg Viggiano, forthcoming from Wiley.

The race to make and use quantum artificial intelligence (QAI) technologies will dramatically reshape the complex political and economic landscapes of the contemporary world. This chapter explores the political economy of QAI, including an examination of the opportunities and challenges facing government leaders, policymakers, and corporate executives who will need to navigate this rapidly evolving terrain. The post-Newtonian turn in the social sciences—utilizing quantum concepts such as entanglement, non-locality, superposition, and complementarity—has fostered new ideas and hypotheses about all sorts of phenomena that might be amenable to study using QAI: voter behavior, economic analyses, virtual currencies, and geopolitical decision-making.

“Quantum AI in Healthcare,” in Convergence: Artificial Intelligence and Quantum Computing—Applications and Use Cases, vol. 2, edited by Greg Viggiano, forthcoming from Wiley.

Quantum AI holds significant promise as a ground-breaking approach to complex healthcare problems. Healthcare can benefit from leveraging the enormous power of quantum computing and algorithms to process massive and exponentially increasing quantities of medical data. Over the past decade, scientists have begun proposing quantum computing applications for precision medicine, personal health monitoring, medical imaging, drug discovery, disease diagnosis, clinical trials, epidemiology, medical data privacy and security, and healthcare system optimization. In this chapter, we give an overview of current thinking about quantum AI in healthcare, projections for its future use, and describe some of the ways in which it could transform the general landscape of the healthcare industry.

“The Digital Devil,” in The Routledge History of the Devil in the Western Tradition, forthcoming from Routledge University Press.

The ‘digital devil’ is a compelling metaphor for the hidden computer systems that have become integral to our daily lives. Computing has transformed the way we work, play, communicate, and carry out business. It reduces uncertainties and accelerates modern life. This chapter delves into the omnipresent influence of demons that inhabit the computers, information flows, and software we have come to depend on over the last half century. It explores the intricate ways in which these ethereal entities have intertwined with, influenced, and been transformed by computer professionals and the very fabric of our technological age.

“Creating a Diverse Honors Faculty Through Collaborative Relationships within the Community and the University,” Honors in Practice 20 (2024): 263–277.

A well-structured and diverse faculty is crucial for the success of an honors college, as it fosters academic excellence, a lively and experiential learning environment, and broad-based and inclusive university conversations. Honors colleges and programs have difficulty making proactive roadmaps and sustainable strategies where there is limited faculty continuity, an insufficient range and representation of viewpoints, and too many distractions from the core mission of delivering exceptional educational experiences. In this article, we argue for more fulsome support of affiliate and adjunct faculty, recognizing their pivotal role in addressing the diversity, inclusivity, and integrative needs of honors programs and colleges.

“Assessing Smart Nation Singapore as an International Model for AI Responsibility,” International Journal on Responsibility 7, no. 1 (2024): 1-30.

While AI and other smart technologies greatly contribute to material aspects of well-being, there are concerns that they threaten quality of life in Singapore, where self-reports suggest the workforce is among the unhappiest in the world. In Singapore, smart technology and digital governance have freed up labor for activities where human empathy and understanding are unique and indispensable, but also threaten to undermine human dignity and accountability. This paper undertakes a comprehensive assessment of Singapore as an international model for AI responsibility from the perspective of the history and philosophy of technological governance.

“How Honors Advising is Different,” introductory chapter in Advising for Today’s Honors Students (Lincoln, NE: National Collegiate Honors Council, 2023), 3-30.

The introduction to a book on honors advising. The introduction provides an overview to a number of advising philosophies and techniques commonly used in the honors context. Crucially, the essay considers how each of these approaches must be adapted to the unique needs of honors students. A concise and practical resource for anyone beginning their honors advising journey and a reaffirming manifesto to experienced practitioners, the essay previews many of the theoretical and philosophical approaches to advising that feature in the rest of the book.

“Honors Mindsets and Motivations,” in Advising for Today’s Honors Students (Lincoln, NE: National Collegiate Honors Council, 2023), 55-71.

A chapter of a new honors advising monograph which presents the expectancy-value-cost model together with sample advising scenarios derived from real experience with students in the James Madison University Honors College.

“Harnessing the Potential of AI,” Madison: The Magazine of James Madison University 46, no. 3 (Fall 2023): 32–39.

It’s a common refrain in media portrayals — the idea that artificial intelligence will take our jobs. As the field of AI makes significant progress and achieves landmarks of historic importance, its potential to spark fear and confusion can easily overshadow its potential for improving lives. Despite the rapid uptake of AI by a broad swath of industries and subfields, there remains considerable media fearmongering about AI. It has become a scapegoat for nearly every cultural anxiety, from inequality to apathy. To prepare students for a changing world, we must foster truth and dispel unfounded fears.

“What Policy Makers Need to Know About Artificial Intelligence,” Atlantic Council Issue Brief (June 29, 2023).

Behind the hype and fear lies a crucial truth—AI is designed to augment human intelligence, not replace it. This primer explains how AI developers strive to create systems that mimic human capabilities by finding patterns, making predictions, and generating meaningful and actionable insights using data generated by our information-rich world.

“Demographics, Inc., Computerized Direct Mail, and the Rise of the Digital Attention Economy,” IEEE Annals of the History of Computing 45, no. 2 (April-June 2023): 15–28.

This article chronicles the origins of mechanized and computerized direct mail, mass personalized marketing, and the role of these technologies in the development of the digital attention economy. It includes an account of the first several decades of Demographics, Inc. that became one of the largest and most profitable database marketing companies in the world. Headquartered in Conway, Arkansas, Demographics developed LOFS, a market-leading proprietary data processing application for maintaining and renting lists, and personalizing direct mail for political, consumer, and business marketing campaigns.

“Quantum Planet Hacking: Quantum AI and Climate Change,” in Convergence: Artificial Intelligence and Quantum Computing—Social, Economic, and Political Impacts, vol. 1, edited by Greg Viggiano (Hoboken, NJ: Wiley, 2023), 93–109.

Scientists are using data, algorithms, and artificial intelligence to pinpoint and develop solutions to human-caused environmental challenges. Quantum AI platforms are a key component of the burgeoning green economy, which will move us from a take-make-waster linear model of growth to one that is circular, regenerative, and focused on society-wide benefits.

“What is Quantum Computing?” in Convergence: Artificial Intelligence and Quantum Computing—Social, Economic, and Political Impacts, vol. 1, edited by Greg Viggiano (Hoboken, NJ: Wiley, 2023), 221–238.

Quantum computing is a fundamentally unique way of processing information and calculating solutions to problems. Quantum computers are capable of operating in an extremely large number of states simultaneously, while classical computers can operate in only one state at any given moment. Because they work in a different way, many scientists believe that these quantum computers can deliver exponential speedups and solve problems that elude classical computers.

“What is Artificial Intelligence?” in Convergence: Artificial Intelligence and Quantum Computing—Social, Economic, and Political Impacts, vol. 1, edited by Greg Viggiano (Hoboken, NJ: Wiley, 2023), 239–246.

Artificial intelligence is a rapidly evolving field rooted in computing and the cognitive sciences. As an academic field, AI involves research on intelligent agents that perceive and respond to environments like cyberspace or the physical world to achieve specific goals. Siri and Alexa chatbots are examples of intelligent agents, as are the sensor and actuator-based systems implanted in Roomba vacuum cleaners and Tesla cars. More generally, AI encompasses both real and fictional efforts to imitate human (and animal) intelligence and creativity with machines and code.

“Using Algorithmic Imaginaries and Uncanny Pedagogy to Facilitate Interdisciplinary Research and Digital Scholarship,” Honors in Practice 18 (2022): 81–95.

An interdisciplinary honors course titled “Minds, Machines, and Meaning” incorporates the notion of the algorithmic imaginary, which explains how people make use of algorithms to create new information infrastructures and communities and how these algorithms shape us in turn. Describing a culminating writing assignment in speculative research, I explain how this course facilitates interdisciplinary research while fostering student and faculty growth, and reflect on the possibility of its future variation, the uncanny valley of algorithmic anti-humanism.

“Battling Smallpox,” Iowa Public Broadcasting Service, 2022.

Part of an Iowa Public Broadcasting Service series on the history of healthcare. One of the most contagious diseases of this period in history, smallpox was a killer. Smallpox affected Iowans of all ages. Those who survived could be left blind or disfigured by ugly scars called pockmarks. Few diseases were so destructive to humans. It was a disease with no cure. The word “smallpox” brought fear to Iowans as the disease could easily spread through whole communities.

Encyclopedia of AI: Past, Present, and Future of Artificial Intelligence, Robotics, and Automation (Santa Barbara, CA: ABC-CLIO, 2021).

This authoritative reference work provides readers with a complete overview of artificial intelligence, including its historic development and current status, existing and projected AI applications, and present and potential future impact on the United States and the world. The CHOICE review says: “[The book] can be read from cover to cover. These thought-provoking articles draw engagement. Frana and Klein successfully demonstrate the remarkable accomplishments of AI; its future appears bright. Summing Up: Highly recommended. All readers.”

“Telematics and the Early History of International Digital Information Flows,” IEEE Annals of the History of Computing 40, no. 2 (April–June 2018): 32–47.

The origins of telematics and the early history of international information flows is recounted. As a result of post-World War II efforts to encourage the free flow of data in the service of peacemaking and economic growth, the computer utility, distributed data processing services, and the post-industrial information society were born. Hand in hand with these developments emerged political and technical difficulties of data protection, network and national sovereignty, and identity. Interconnection and high-velocity information sharing encouraged culturally ingrained expectations of flow at work and in life. It also destabilized the national security, international relationships, and global commerce.

“Best Practices in Two-Year to Four-Year Honors Transfers,” Honors in Practice 13 (2017): 9–20.

James Madison University and Northern Virginia Community College teamed up in April 2014 to build a memorandum of understanding (MOU) between their respective four-year and two-year honors programs. This MOU is the basis for the continued work between these two institutions to collaborate and find research to assist other interested honors deans, directors, and coordinators in creating similar MOUs and demonstrating the importance of such agreements in higher education.

“An Interview with Stephen A. Cook,” Communications of the ACM 55, no. 1 (January 2012): 41–46.

A condensed version of an oral history interview with A.M. Turing Award recipient and ACM Fellow Stephen A. Cook, considered one of the originators of computational complexity theory.

“An Interview with Edsger W. Dijkstra,” Communications of the ACM 53, no. 8 (August 2010): 41–47.

A condensed version of an oral history interview with A.M. Turing Award recipient Edsger W. Dijkstra, the first formally educated computer programmer in Europe, inventor of Dijkstra’s algorithm, and originator of structured programming.

“Implementing Wikis in Honors Courses,” Journal of the National Collegiate Honors Council 10, no. 2 (Fall/Winter 2009): 53–56.

My preference is to teach  -oriented honors classes grounded in constructivist epistemology, where knowledge is assembled and transformed by students working with resource persons. In such courses, innovations emerge from collaboratively organized projects, and students accept primary leadership roles. Until the introduction of new digital technologies, this kind of collaborative process was limited in time and space to one semester, the confines of a classroom, and the class members themselves. The process was restricted and incomplete. Wikis provide a means to break away from these restrictions.

“Medicine and the Family in the 1930s,” in Great Depression: Peoples and Perspectives, edited by Hamilton Cravens (Santa Barbara, CA: ABC–CLIO, 2009), 65–84.

The Great Depression challenged both the physical and mental health of Americans. Family practice in the Depression was above all a down-to-earth cottage trade. The doctor expected to serve his injured patients in a manner paralleling the local garageman. The auto made available for urgent care. He mastered all branches of the medical arts, including infectious disease, obstetrics, pediatrics, surgery, and radiology. He was a healer of mental as well as physical ailments. In complicated cases, he became a general contractor supervising the other health-building trades: nurses, social workers, and specialists. In his focus on personality and deportment, he saw the individual as a whole person, as a part of a family, and in turn, the greater community. And finally, safety and security formed his chief objectives–in a time and place characterized by neither one.

“Charles V. Chapin (1856–1941),” “Joshua Lederberg (1925– ),” “Mark I,” “Norbert Weiner (1894–1964),” and “SAGE (Semi–Automatic Ground Environment),” in Research and Discovery: Landmarks and Pioneers in American Science, ed. Russell Lawson (Armonk, NY: M. E. Sharpe, 2008).

This encyclopedia is an overview of the history of science in America from colonial times to the present. Organized alphabetically within scientific discipline, the set is divided into fourteen sections that include overview essays tracing the historical development of the specific discipline in a cultural and social context.

“Honors 2025: The Future of the Honors College,” Honors in Practice 4 (2008): 29–33.

As we attempt to foresee the future, we recognize that the increase in the number of honors colleges over the past decade appears to be an accelerating trend. We base our predictions on the continuation of this trend and on our need as honors administrators to anticipate and welcome the multiple impacts it will have on current and future honors colleges. We have selected four connected areas as the focus of our consideration: mission; curriculum; assessment and accreditation; and recruiting.

“Automobiles,” “Automotive Technology,” “Canal Boats,” “Locks,” “Minneapolis–St. Paul   International Airport,” “Orville Wright,” and “Wilbur Wright,” in The American Midwest: An Interpretive Encyclopedia (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2006).

This first-ever encyclopedia of the Midwest seeks to embrace this large and diverse area, to give it voice, and help define its distinctive character. Organized by topic, it encourages readers to reflect upon the region as a whole. There are portraits of each of the region’s twelve states, followed by entries on society and culture, community and social life, economy and technology, and public life.

“Encryption and Code Breaking” and “Computer-Aided Control Technology,” in Encyclopedia of 20th-Century Technology, ed. Colin A. Hempstead (New York: Routledge, 2005).

Comprised of essays arranged alphabetically, most on individual objects, artifacts, techniques, and products, this is an up-to-date reference work for all those involved in teaching or researching the history of twentieth-century technology, as well as the serious general reader.

“Battling Smallpox: State and Local Boards of Health,” Iowa Heritage Illustrated 86 (Summer 2005): 61–66.

The Iowa State Board of Health added a new voice to the debate over the relationship between epidemic disease, immigrants, and the marketplace. However, the board could do little to prevent the spread of smallpox but share its expertise and lend its authority to encouraging the use of the cowpox vaccine and the quarantine of exposed persons.

“A Risk Perceived is a Risk Indeed: Assessing Risk in Biomedical Research and Health Policy,” in The Social Sciences Go to Washington: The Politics of Knowledge in the Postmodern Age (New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 2004), 78–109.

Contemporary risk-assessment literature often separates national health promotion policies from national biomedical research policies. Where popular health promotion showcases the enigma of “good health” versus “personal freedom,” biomedical research is interpreted as a zero-sum game where ambitious research agendas are constrained by limited public funding. The epistemological bifurcation of biomedical research and health policy, however, neglects an underlying conjunction between the two areas in the contemporary risk assessment-abatement debate. In both cases, individuation and “democratic” decision-making altered our most basic assumptions about the nature of risk in and out of the laboratory. Risk, moreover, now represented negative outcomes to avoid rather than as–on balance, at least–neutral events in the game of life.

“Marion Dorset and Hog Cholera Research in the Biochemic Laboratory of the USDA Bureau of Animal Industry,” Veterinary History 12 (Fall 2004): 228–245.

Marion Dorset began his career as an Expert Assistant Chemist in the Biochemic Laboratory of the United States Department of Agriculture in 1894. He became one of the foremost agricultural chemists of his day. His long labors in the laboratory and field brought success purifying and standardizing skin-reacting tuberculin, detecting chicken pullorum disease, and improving farm sanitation. His greatest achievement, though, was the discovery of an effective method for preventing hog cholera.

“Before the Web There Was Gopher,” IEEE Annals of the History of Computing 26, no. 1 (January–March 2004): 20–41.

The World Wide Web, universally well known today, was preceded by an efficient software tool that was fondly named Gopher. The Internet Gopher, much like the Web, enabled users to obtain information quickly and easily. Why, then, did it disappear but the Web did not? Gopher faded into obscurity for two main reasons: hypertext and commerce.

“Researching the History of Software: Mining Internet Resources in the ‘Old World,’ ‘New World,’ and the ‘Wild West,’” Iterations: An Interdisciplinary Journal of Software History 1 (September 2002): 1–35.

The Web is becoming more than a tool for finding book and article citations and tracking down archival collections—it is also becoming a source for digitized versions of a wide array of materials valuable to historians. In this review we explore the New World of sources in the history of software available on the Web, and attempt to provide a map, or at least a series of guideposts, for this digital landscape. In the first part we will look at sources that parallel or bear a strong resemblance to the kinds of sources traditionally available in the “Old World” of archives and libraries. In the second part we will discuss sources from the more obscure corners of the Web, with little resemblance to traditional sources, and no traditional mechanisms for use by historians.

“A Well-Intentioned Query and the Halloween Problem,” IEEE Annals of the History of Computing 24, no. 2 (April–June 2002): 86–88.

The Halloween Problem demonstrates the role of cautionary tales in the history of computing. The Halloween Problem emerged in the context of structured query language optimization in relational database research. Normally, a query optimizer works by measuring system calls and paging requests and applying heuristics to the entire access path tree. Query optimization was one of the most challenging tasks facing System R researchers at IBM. These experiments with query optimization form the milieu in which the Halloween Problem emerged.

“Testing Physicians’ Limits: Medical Informatics and Diagnostic Decision-Making,” CBI Newsletter 22 (Summer 2000): 4–7.

The idea that medical technologies have promoted physical, emotional, and intellectual “distancing” in the past, that is, a growing divide between caregiver and client, is well-known and popularly accepted. Yet this way of thinking about the introduction of technologies into medical spaces is of relatively recent origin and does not reflect the many other ways that powerful medical technologies, particularly medical-computer applications, have been evaluated by certain segments of society in the past. Medical informatics, defined today as “the application of computers, communications, information science, engineering, and technology to medical care, medical education, and medical research,” is one useful and illustrative case in point. In the late 1950s and throughout most of the 1960s physicians, medical educators, and researchers embraced the movement toward the exploitation of computers and computer software to collect and organize burgeoning stores of medical knowledge and provide significant decision- and therapeutic-support in their interactions with patients and students. Skepticism toward certain applications of medical informatics as agents of “distance” did not emerge until the late 1960s.

“Coordinating the Experts and the Masses: The Professions of Health and the Creation of American Community Health, 1915-1940,” Ph.D. diss. Iowa State University, 1999.

This dissertation explains how public health professionals and their successors perceived themselves between 1915 and 1940, how they conceived of their expertise, and what they proposed to do with it. By examining their own conclusions about the way things work or, alternately, do not work, the outline of an entirely new way of practicing public health appears, described at the time as “community health.”

“Smallpox: Local Epidemics and the Iowa State Board of Health, 1880–1900,” Annals of Iowa 54, no. 2 (Spring 1995): 87–118.

Iowa’s inauguration of a State Board of Health in 1880 introduced Iowa communities, railroads, and health care providers to a new source of potential support in the battle against smallpox. By promising to rid towns of scourges of diseases that had agitated citizens since territorial days, board physicians pledged to win a war against a whole host of “specific febrile diseases/’ including scarlet fever, diphtheria, and smallpox.

Recent Teaching

Interdisciplinary Scholarship | Honors First and Second Year Seminars | History of Technology and Engineering | Art, Technology & Ideas | The Attention Economy | Minds, Machines & Meaning | Demystifying Creativity | The Past, Present, and Future of eHealth Technologies | Oral History and the Study of Memory | Science, Pseudoscience & Logical Fallacies | Thesis Research | Senior Seminar

Recent and Upcoming Presentations

“Use of Interdisciplinary Teaching to Inspire Creative Thinking Among Students about the Climate Crisis,” American Geophysical Union (AGU) Fall Meeting, Washington, DC, December 10, 2024.

“Experiential Learning, Research, and Self-Determination: Crafting Self-Designed Learning Experiences with Students from Historically Underrepresented Groups,” National Society for Minorities in Honors, Harrisonburg, VA, October 19, 2024.

“Smart Nation Singapore as a Case Study of Ethical Reasoning in Action,” Society for Ethics Across the Curriculum 2024 Conference, Clemson, SC, October 3-5, 2024.

“AI4E: Artificial Intelligence in Education,” Presidential Engagement Fellows, Harrisonburg, VA, September 23, 2024.

“The Future of AI in the Classroom and the Workplace,” JMU Board of Visitors Meeting, Harrisonburg, VA, September 12, 2024.

“Spiritual Robots,” Penn Social, Washington, DC, September 9, 2024.

“Spiritual Robots,” Crooked Run Sterling, Sterling, VA, September 8, 2024.

“Divine Integration: How Can Humanity Coexist with Spiritual Robots?” The Graduate Charlottesville, Charlottesville, VA, July 22, 2024.

“AI and Society,” BranchOut! 21st Century Multicultural STEM Education Project, Washington, DC, July 19, 2024.

“The Ethical Compass of Artificial Intelligence: Serving Society,” Elder Exchange Forum, Harrisonburg, VA, June 13, 2024.

“Deep Tech for Good,” National Active and Retired Federal Employees Association, Harrisonburg, VA, April 9, 2024.

“A Model for Levels of Autonomy in Technical Communication,” Artificial Intelligence and the Teaching of Technical Communication Conference, Utah Valley University, Orem, UT, March 20, 2024.

“Promoting Peace, Education, Education, Economy, and the Environment with Artificial Intelligence,” Harrisonburg Rotary Club, Harrisonburg, VA, March 11, 2024.

“New Horizons in Teaching Artificial Intelligence to Students from All Majors,” 13th Symposium on Communicating Complex Information
(SCCI), Old Dominion University, Norfolk, VA, March 4, 2024.

“AI and Complex Information Systems,” Fundamentals of Information Systems, James Madison University, Harrisonburg, VA, February 12, 2024.

“Cultivating Trustworthy Open Collections of Human Knowledge,” University of Central Arkansas, Conway, AR, October 17, 2023.

“Artificial Intelligence as an Interdisciplinary Human Endeavor,” Bridgewater College, UTC Symposium, Bridgewater, VA, October 9, 2023.

“Teaching AI and Ethics in the Interdisciplinary Humanities Classroom,” Society for Ethics Across the Curriculum Conference, James Madison University, Harrisonburg, VA, October 3, 2023.

“Smart Cities, One World: Singapore’s Response to AI Responsibility,” Gandhi Center/Terry D. Beitzel Symposium, James Madison University, Harrisonburg, VA, September 28, 2023.

“AI/ML: A Year in Review,” Washington, DC, Atlantic Council, Washington, DC, March 28, 2023.

“The Future of Honors Education,” Ball State University, Muncie, IN, February 20, 2023.

“A First Census of Individualized Postsecondary Programs in the United States,” 14th National Individualized Major Program Conference, CUNY, New York, NY, 2023.

“Uncanny Simulacra: Pedagogy and Student Artwork as Tools for Interrogating Post-Human Worlds,” Northeast Modern Language Association Convention, 2021.

“Six Ways to Teach Creativity in Honors,” Annual Meeting of the National Collegiate Honors Council, New Orleans, LA, 2019.

“Mindsets and Motivation in Honors Advising,” Annual Meeting of the National Collegiate Honors Council, New Orleans, LA, 2019.

“Helping Individualized Major Students Develop Facility with Complex Concepts,” Individualized Major Program Conference, Norman, OK, 2019.

“Confessional Narratives on New Honors Colleges,” Annual Meeting of the National Collegiate Honors Council, Boston, MA, 2018.

“Gender Diversity in Honors Recruitment and Retention,” Annual Meeting of the Southern Regional Honors Council, Orlando, FL, 2018.

“How Assessment Suggested a Change of Focus for James Madison University’s Independent Scholars Program,” 9th Individualized Major Program Conference, Durham, NC, 2018.

Recent Service

National Individualized Major Programs Network Steering Committee (2020–present)

President, Virginias Collegiate Honors Council (2019–2021)

JMU Honors College Academic Unit Head (2018–2020)

Provost’s Research & Scholarship Task Force (2018–2019)

JMU Entrepreneurship Fellow (2016–2020)

Chair, NCHC Two-Year to Four-Year Transfer Committee (2015–2021)

JMU Faculty Research Council (2014–2020)

Executive Secretary-Treasurer, Southern Regional Honors Council (2011–2017)

National Collegiate Honors Council Diversity Committee (2008–2009, 2018–present)

National Collegiate Honors Council Program Committee (2007, 2009, 2012–2020)

Published Faculty Stories