Professional Service

I am committed to participating in the larger discourse in my field as part of my creative research and this involves service in the field and to the community at large. During my time at Kent State, I have been able represent KSU at various local, national and international events, conferences, symposiums and exhibitions. One of the most exciting achievements during this time has been my participation in cultural exchange as Fulbright Fellow in Vienna, Austria. As a former Fulbrighter, I have also had the opportunity to serve as an expert panelist for both the Austrian-American Education Commission and the Romanian-American Fulbright Education Commission.

This year, I am the International Symposium on Wearable Computing Design Exhibition Co-Chair for the 2015 symposium in Osaka, Japan. My commitment to creative research and pedagogy has led me to be on the advisory board of the art and technology repository ARRAY[ ]. I also am active in the Maker, Crowdfunding and Open Source Communities. I believe in supporting local manufacturing and have supported the efforts of the TinyDuino development, an Arduino clone 1/4 of the size of the original Arduino board. I am actively involved in the development of OSLOOM – an open source loom project.

I was asked to contribute chapter to the upcoming Bloomsbury Press book Textile Technology and Design and am in the process of writing another chapter for the Cambridge Press book Redefining Creativity: Multi-Layered Collaboration in Art & Art Historical Practice. I also have had the opportunity to be a paper reviewer for the 2012 ITAA Annual Conference and for the Shapeshifting Conference Publication. Additionally, I reviewed manuscripts for Clothing and Textiles Research Journal (CTRJ) and for a book on fashion technology for Bloomsbury Press.

Departmental and University Service

I have been actively involved in departmental service as of my arrival at The Fashion School in Fall 2010. I dove head first into departmental committee responsibilities my first semester as I was assigned to 6 committees (including the FAC and 2 search committees). I had arrived amidst an environment of curricular redevelopment and graduate program creation. I was involved in creating a variety of technology-centric courses for both the undergraduate and graduate levels. One of these courses was the undergraduate bootstrapping Fashion Technology course. This course is required for the incoming freshman in both fashion design and merchandising and focuses on the development of digital skills within fashion design and merchandising. The committee meetings, the teaching load, and getting acclimated to a new environment took up most of my time. During Summer 2011, I was on the TechStyleLAB Search Committee for the TSLAB Manager.

In my second year (2011-2012), my committee load was lightened to 4 and included the FAC (as a whole), the TechStyleLAB and the Director’s Review Committee. The Director’s review only occurs every 3 years and it was a learning experience to see the review process. At the beginning of the 2011 academic year, I created the guidelines for and trained the staff of the TechStyleLAB on the laser cutter. Additionally, I acted as the Fashion Design Internship Coordinator, which let me gain a thorough understanding of what the Fashion Design department requires of student internships and what companies our students have internships with.

During 2012-2013, I continued to help shape the TechStyleLAB and the research occurring in the lab in my continued participation on the TechStyleLAB committee. I was able to contribute feedback to the third floor renovation project in regards to the setup of the new TechStyleLAB space. I participated in the representative FAC committee as an elected member for the third consecutive year. Additionally, I began service in the University’s Diversity Climate Survey Implementation Team in the University DEI Climate Study Committee. This was my first University level committee and it connected me with other diversity focused faculty at KSU.

In 2013 – 2014, I was involved in the following departmental committees: TechStyleLAB, Research/Culture Fund, and Sophomore Review. I enjoyed the Research Culture Fund the most because I was able to learn about the wonderful research my peers are doing. I was in charge of putting together the technology-oriented portion of the Sophomore Review. As the Fashion Technologist, I was involved in the Fashion Tech Hackathon as a mentor (in conjunction with the wonderful folks at Blackstone Launchpad) and was asked to be a judge for the Kent Hacks Hackathon. I taught an Arduino workshop leading up to that event.

In 2014 – 2015, I served on multiple University level committees and departmental committees.  I continued my service in the Diversity Climate Survey Implementation Team in the University DEI Climate Study Committee and started on the University Council on Technology. The most memorable University Committee I was on this academic year was the Vice President of Research Search Committee. It was truly an honor to serve on this committee to be able to have input as to the future of research at Kent State. I was able to continue my service in my departmental committees and added the role of Library Liaison. As our department is growing, I was fortunate to serve on the search committee for two Tenure-Track Assistant Professors in Design. In Spring 2015, I was honored to be invited by Dr. Alfreda Brown to share my story of success at Kent State University at the Diversity Scorecard Annual Review. I am committed to helping more of our design students engage formally with design research. During the Spring semester, I mentored a student for the 2015 Undergraduate Research Symposium.

• ISWC 2015 Design Exhibition Co-Chair


• Fulbright Fellow


• Peer Paper Reviewer