Born in the post-industrialized frozen outskirts of Buffalo, NY, I’ve had a fascination with how people think and adapt from a young age. I like to think that my voracious appetite for learning new things is the reason that I found a career that allows me to talk to and ask questions of subject matter experts from every background. I have travelled around the world with a head full of questions and a passion for improving the designed world we live in and connecting to the human beings (and cats and dogs) living in it. I currently reside in Atlanta, Georgia, with my yellow lab and orange tabby.

Design Philosophy:

Learning, far too often, is treated as an after-effect of expertise in a specific subject instead of as its own domain requiring its own expertise. The drive of any good learning designer should be to develop others, and so a learner-focused approach must be utilized. I believe that while not every subject is going to interest every learner, the prospect of learning something new should always be, on some level, exciting from the perspective of the learner. I believe we do this through following the latest instructional design methodologies and best practices. Learning Objectives that are not measurable and do not connect to the learner on a personal level, answering the question “how does this benefit me?” are objectives in need of redesign.

My passion for learning design comes from my own experience as a learner and a fascination with design thinking. In design, it’s often said that the best design products are 99% invisible (highly recommend the podcast by Roman Mars) and I believe that should be an aspirational statement for a designer.

Education:

Bachelors-Emory University 2014, Anthropology/Religion
Masters of Science-Georgia State University, 2018, Instructional Design and Technology