Past Featured Faculty

Dr Lanette Jimerson | Visiting Assistant Professor, English Department

“My research focuses on teacher development, writing assessment, and technology” – Dr. Lanette Jimerson

Lanette Jimerson is a visiting professor in English Education within the College of Education. Prior to coming to Purdue University, Jimerson completed an MA and PhD in Language, Literacy, Society, and Culture at the University of California, Berkeley.

Jimerson has served as the director of the Secondary English Credential and Masters Pathway at UC Berkeley and also as the program manager at the Stanford Center for Assessment, Learning and Equity at Stanford University. Her research encompasses 14 years of teaching secondary English in the San Francisco Bay area.

Jimerson has numerous research publications which explore the intersection of writing instruction, technology, and human rights. One of her publications, “Localizing Human Rights Education Through Technology” was published by Springer Publications.

Breanya Hogue | Assistant Professor in Literacy and Language Education

Dr. Breanya Hogue is an assistant professor of Literacy and Language in the College’s Department of Curriculum and Instruction and joined us in August 2022 while finishing her PhD in Literacy, Culture, & Language Education at Indiana University-Bloomington.

“My research agenda includes implementing and studying culturally responsive and proactive pedagogies, practices, and strategies with pre-service teachers that can shape their teacher dispositions and impact students, families, and communities,” Hogue says. “My overall research interests include pre-service teacher urban education preparation, diverse children’s literature, and supporting the development of quality literacy programs and initiatives.”

She is currently working on starting a Children’s Defense Fund (CDF) Freedom Schools program site in the summer of 2023 at Purdue. “This program will provide an enriching summer literacy opportunity at no cost to children and families in our West Lafayette community that otherwise may not be able to afford it,” she said. “This site will also provide some of our preservice teachers with an opportunity to work within this national intergenerational model, learn about the CDF integrated curriculum, and gain culturally relevant teaching practices to add to their teaching toolboxes.”

She is also assisting with interactive read-alouds with the Literacy & Language Development Clinics project with Dr. Christy Wessel-Powell.

Two recent publications she’s excited about:

Appleget. C., Shimek, C., Myers, J., & Hogue, B. (2022). Self-Study communities of practice: A traveler’s guide for the journey. In B. Butler & S. Bullock (Eds.), Learning through Collaboration in Self-Study: Critical Friendship, Communities of Practice, and Collaborative Self-Study. Springer Publishing.

Shimek, C., Appleget, C. Meyers, J., Hogue, B. (2022) Wobbling our Way to Culturally Proactive Pedagogies: Achieving Flow in U.S. Teacher Education. Journal of Education for Teaching. 

“When I’m not conducting research, I enjoy traveling and exploring new places. and trying out new restaurants,” Hogue said.

Read more about the Purdue CDF Freedom School Program

Dr. Janine Duncan | Clinical Associate Professor in Family and Consumer Sciences Education

Dr. Janine Duncan is a Clinical Associate Professor in Family and Consumer Sciences Education within the Department of Curriculum and Instruction. Prior to her position at Purdue University, Duncan earned a bachelor’s in Home Economics Education from the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, followed by an MSEd in Education Administration and a PhD in Education Policy Studies from the University of Missouri-St. Louis. She has served as a teacher educator for 17 years, coming to Purdue University from Kansas State University.

Duncan’s research interests include family and consumer sciences, professional literacy development, critical science framework, and the recruitment and retention of family and consumer sciences. Aside from her research, some of her other current projects include co-developing the American Association of Family & Consumer Sciences Virtual Critical Science Academy, and serving as the International Federation for Home Economics Vice President for the Americas.

One of Duncan’s recent publications is titled “Truth or consequences: Advancing equity in family & consumer sciences in the United States”, published in the International Journal for Home Economics.

Outside of her studies and professional work, Duncan enjoys gardening, cooking, and spending time with her family.

Dr. Chea Parton | Visiting Assistant Professor of Curriculum and Instruction

“It’s hard to be equitable and understanding if you don’t know about yourself first. If you don’t understand yourself as an individual, you won’t understand where you fit inside a community, and you won’t be able to know how you can use your talents and gifts to benefit the rest of that community.” – Dr. Chea Parton.

Dr. Chea Parton is a Visiting Assistant Professor of Curriculum and Instruction in the Transition to Teaching Program in the College of Education. She earned a BA in English at Purdue before beginning her teaching experience at Southern Wells High School in Poneto, Indiana, where she also coached middle school volleyball and basketball. She returned to Purdue to earn a MSED in English Education, then received a Dean’s Fellowship to pursue a PhD in Language & Literacy from The University of Texas at Austin.

Parton became interested in rural education due to many experiences in her own life – including being a rural student from Gaston, Indiana, a rural undergraduate and graduate student at Purdue University, a rural teacher, and then a rural doctoral student at the University of Texas at Austin. Her dissertation Country-fied city or city-fied country?: The Impact of Place on Rural Out-Migrated Literacy Teachers’ Identities and Practices details the experiences of out-migrated teachers who grew up in rural areas but taught at non-rural schools, and how they learned to blend their rural and non-rural language and cultural experiences into their teaching practices.

Parton’s research interests focus on the inclusion of rural representation in young adult literature and how rural English teachers can implement these stories into classroom curricula.

As part of her work in rural education, Parton writes a blog, (Non)Rural Voices, on her website, Literacy in Place, an online repository of rural literature resources to serve teachers. She also produces a podcast titled Reading Rural YAL (Young Adult Literature), which she describes as an opportunity to elevate voices of rural communities and to give students from these communities the opportunity to hear from people who truly represent it. She was recently featured in a Daily Yonder article, “The Power of Place.”

Signe E. Kastberg | Professor in Mathematics Education and Mary Endres Chair in Elementary Education

“I want my impact in mathematics teacher education to be lived in the words I have written about teaching and the experiences of my students and my students’ students,” Kastberg said.

Kastberg is a professor of Mathematics Education and the Mary Endres Chair in Elementary Education. She began her journey to becoming an instructor by earning a BA in Mathematics from Keene State College, followed by an MA in Mathematics and PhD in Mathematics from The University of Georgia.

Kastberg chose to go into education because she has always loved learning and sharing in the excitement of other people’s learning experiences. During her experiences as an educator, she has earned an Excellence in Mathematics Teacher Education Teacher Award from The Association of Mathematics Teacher Educators (AMTE) and the Charles P. Murphy Undergraduate Teaching Award from Purdue University. Her research interests include relational practice in mathematics teacher education, including exploring and illustrating listening, trust, care, and empathy, and the ways in which these sustain and motivate student-teacher collaborations.

She received a conference grant from the National Science Foundation that resulted in edited book focused on mathematics teacher educator work, titled Building support for scholarly practices in mathematics methods.

She describes her most rewarding experiences at Purdue as collaborations with colleagues that inform her learning.

Adrie Koehler | Associate Professor in Learning Design & Technology

Adrie Koehler enjoys research that is directly correlated to teaching and learning experiences. The bulk of her research interest relates to implementing emerging technologies such as social media to support instructional strategies, along with crafting new transitional techniques for pre-service teachers as they are just beginning their teaching careers and facilitating problem-centered learning.

She teaches a myriad of Master’s and PhD courses, including Foundations of Learning Design and Technology (EDCI 513), Instructional Design Project Management (EDCI 633), Advanced Practices in Learning Systems Design (EDCI 672), Issues And Methods In Learning Systems Design Research (EDCI 673), and Advanced Instructional Design Theory (EDCI 674).

During her career, Koehler has received multiple grants for her work, including two large, prestigious grants: 1) a $600K National Science Foundation grant titled “Expanding accessibility of learning through blended synchronous instruction of F2F and remote students” with Nathan Mentzer (PI), a faculty member with a joint appointment in the Purdue Polytechnic Institute and College of Education; and 2) a $1.5M Governor’s Emergency Education Relief fund grant with fellow College of Education faculty members Tim Newby, Jennifer Richardson, Kharon Grimmet, and Trish Morita-Mullaney titled “Becoming an Online Teacher Even When I Didn’t Sign Up for It”.

Koehler joined the College of Education faculty after graduating with a PhD in Curriculum & Instruction in 2015. She earned a BS in Business Education; Business Administration; and Information, Design, and End-User Computing from Indiana State University, followed by an MS in Technology from IUPUI. One of Koehler’s favorite memories during her time at Purdue was seeing her students complete a collaborative autoethnography analyzing their processes for understanding theory, and seeing the joy and excitement in her students’ eyes when they published their findings as “Instructional design learners make sense of theory: a collaborative autoethnography” in Educational Technology Research & Development.

Bill Watson | Professor of Learning Design and Technology

Bill Watson believes that outcomes should drive the learning process as opposed to the calendar, and that this process should be optimized for each learner.

Watson, recently promoted to professor of Learning Design and Technology in the College of Education and Director of the Purdue Center for Serious Games and Learning in Virtual Environments, teaches Integration and Management of Technology for Learning (EDCI 56400), Motivation and Instructional Design (EDCI 58800), and Educational Video Game Design (EDCI 55600).

He earned a BA in English, an MS in Information Science and a PhD in Education with a focus on Instructional Systems Technology, all from Indiana University.

The core of his research lies in personalizing education to meet the needs of learners as individuals through such technologies as video games and learning management software. One project is an online merit-based platform where learners earn digital badges based on completed projects. This platform is called “Passport” and has been discussed in the Chronicle of Higher Education, New York Times, Campus Technology, and U.S. News and World Report. He was also named one of the Top 30 Technologists, Transformers, & Trailblazers by the Center for Digital Education in 2015.

Watson’s favorite memory of Purdue University was having the opportunity to speak at a Purdue Ted-X and sharing his passion for how he hopes to transform Education. Watch “Square pegs for round holes – why education reforms fail”

Dr. Arianna Banack | Professor of English Education

Dr. Arianna Banack is a Visiting Assistant Professor of English Education in the Department of Curriculum and Instruction. Her research focuses on implementing critical literacy with diverse contemporary young adult literacy (YAL) in secondary English classrooms, with a current project focusing specifically on two content analyses of queer Young Adult graphic novels centering on Black, Indigenous, and People of Color characters.

Banack earned a BA in MA in Education and Secondary English from the University of Connecticut followed by a PhD in Literacy Studies from the University of Tennessee, Knoxville. Her recent publications include Voices from the Middle, discussing the power of verse novels in middle grade classrooms to assist students with discussing identity, as well as a publication for the Journal of Curriculum Studies titled “Overwhelming whiteness: A critical analysis of race in a scripted reading program.” She enjoys yoga, peloton, reading YA literature for fun, and going to the beach.