I grew up as a bi-cultural (British & American) Air Force brat, living across the U.S., Spain, and England during my formative years. After high school, I served in the 101st Airborne Division before, as a first generation student, earning a BA in English Literature at the University of Buffalo, where I studied under poets Robert Creeley and Mac Hammond. I then went on to Yale University, earning a Master’s in Renaissance Studies and a PhD in European History under Professor Geoffrey Parker, with a focus on Golden Age Spain.

My teaching career has taken me from Yale University, to the University of Utah, Weber State University, and 17 years at Salt Lake Community College, where I led one of the college’s largest General Education courses and taught Great Books. I’ve authored two books: Philip III and the Pax Hispanica (Yale University Press) and It Begins with Our Questions: The Humanities as a Call to Action (Hayden-McNeil).

For the last sixteen years, I’ve held a variety of leadership roles, including department chair of Humanities and then Division Chair of Humanities, Language, and Culture, then Dean of Humanities and Social Science all at Salt Lake Community College, then Dean of Liberal Arts at Truckee Meadows Community College, and most recently Dean of Instruction the University of New Mexico - Los Alamos campus, overseeing a wide range of academic disciplines and services, including tutoring centers and libraries. Cabrillo College, with its outstanding faculty, staff, and students, is proving a great place to work and grow.

Outside of Cabrillo, I’m a vegetarian who enjoys good lattes, literature, music, movies, and dark beers. My daughters—a pediatric nurse and an art instructor—live in Salt Lake City. I spent 30 years in the deserts of the Intermountain West and am thrilled to be back to the moisture and greenery of the waterside!