Provost Leadership Fellows: 2022-2023
In the inaugural PLF cohort for academic year 2022-2023, and in an effort to more rapidly meet the goals of the program, we selected eight fellows—two for each vice provost area of work:
- Vice Provost for Academic Operations Fellows
- Vice Provost for Curriculum, Assessment, and Accreditation Fellows
- Vice Provost for Faculty Affairs Fellows
- Vice Provost for Global Affairs Fellows
- Vice Provost for Online and Innovative Educational Initiatives Fellows
Vice Provost for Academic Operations Fellows
Scot Raab
Scot Raab, PhD, AT, LAT, CCD is an Associate Professor in the Department of Physical Therapy and Athletic Training and Associate Dean of Academic Affairs in the College of the Environment, Forestry, and Natural Sciences (CEFNS). Dr. Raab was hired in 2011 to ensure high quality instruction and was involved in transitioning the Athletic Training curriculum from a BS to MS degree and establishing numerous internship opportunities. He also served as Interim Program Director and addressed enrollment concerns to grow the program. Dr. Raab continues to serve the Athletic Training profession as a member of the Arizona Athletic Trainers Association Board of Directors. As the Associate Dean he oversees and works to ensure all students in CEFNS have the resources needed to be successful. This involves enrollment driven decisions, scholarship and internship opportunities, student engagement, etc. Dr. Raab also assists the Dean to coordinate all college functions.
Oaklee Rogers
Oaklee Rogers, Ph.D., OTR/L is the Assistant Dean for the College of Health and Human Services at Northern Arizona University (NAU), located at the Phoenix Bioscience Core (PBC). Previously, she served as the Department Chair for the Occupational Therapy (OT) Program. Dr. Rogers has designed and taught numerous courses related to education, leadership, and mental health. Throughout her time at NAU, she has served in various leadership roles and was awarded the Outstanding Occupational Therapist of the Year from the Arizona Occupational Therapy Association in 2017. Dr. Rogers has obtained grant funding, published in peer-reviewed journals, and presented at state, national and international conferences.
Vice Provost for Curriculum, Assessment, and Accreditation Fellows
Kerry Thompson
Dr. Kerry Frances Thompson is a citizen and resident of the Navajo Nation. She is an Indigenous archaeologist whose research interests focus on the inclusion of Indigenous perspectives and paradigms in archaeology, tribal cultural resource management, Navajo identity, and Native American representation. The foundation of Dr. Thompson’s career in archaeology is the southwestern United States, primarily the Colorado Plateau where she worked in tribal archaeology for approximately 18 years. She is currently an Associate Professor and Department Chair in Anthropology.
Emily Hoppe
Currently in her seventeenth year of appointment at NAU, Dr. Emily Hoppe serves as Associate Professor of Flute and Associate Director of the Kitt School of Music. As a flutist and pedagogue, Dr. Hoppe has performed as an orchestral flutist, chamber musician, concerto soloist, and recitalist on international and national stages, and has presented masterclasses at universities and secondary schools across the United States. As Associate Director, Dr. Hoppe oversees curriculum and assessment for the Kitt School of Music, assists undergraduate and graduate students with advising, manages course scheduling, conducts transfer articulation for transfer students, serves as ACETS evaluator, and welcomes prospective students and their families at Discover NAU and Kitt School of Music Audition Day events. With a deep passion for leadership education, Dr. Hoppe has been a member of the NAU University Leadership Program and NAU Supervisor’s Academy, in addition to course study within the Master of Organization Leadership program at NAU. She currently serves as Chair of the Curriculum and Assessment Coordinating Committee and as a member of the College and Arts and Letters Curriculum Committee. Past committee leadership includes Chair of the University Graduate Committee, as well as chairing numerous committees for the Kitt School of Music. In addition, Dr. Hoppe serves as the NAU music representative for AZ Transfer, and is serving as chair for AY 2022-2023.
Vice Provost for Faculty Affairs Fellows
Angelina Castagno
Angelina E. Castagno, PhD, is a Professor of Educational Leadership and Foundations in the College of Education, and the Director of the Institute for Native-serving Educators in the Office of Native American Initiatives. Her teaching, research, and consulting focus on equity and diversity in U.S. schools and universities, and especially center around Indigenous education and Whiteness. Trained as an educational anthropologist, she studies institutions, policies, and the ways educators and communities engage systems of race and power. She works closely educational leaders, school districts, and postsecondary programs across the U.S. to provide equity consulting and engage in culturally responsive, anti-racist collaborative leadership. She is an Associate Editor for the Journal of American Indian Education and has authored or edited four books and numerous articles in peer reviewed national and international journals. Her most recent book was published in 2019 and is called The Price of Nice: How Good Intentions Maintain Educational Inequity.
Ron Gray
Ron Gray is an Associate Professor of Science Education in the Department of STEM Education and a President’s Distinguished Teaching Fellow. His scholarship centers on secondary and post-secondary science teaching and learning and he is currently funded by the National Science Foundation on two ongoing projects. He teaches courses on science pedagogy, the history of science, and learning theories, among other topics. Over the past two years, he has provided leadership in the College of Education’s highly collaborative efforts to revise the tenure-track promotion and tenure guidelines, non-tenure track promotion guidelines, and annual evaluation procedures. He has also served as his department’s Graduate Programs Coordinator since 2014 and as a representative on multiple curriculum and assessment committees. He is excited to join the team in the Office of the Provost to contribute to important university-wide initiatives.
Vice Provost for Global Affairs Fellows
Okim Kang
Okim Kang is Professor of Applied Linguistics and Director of the Applied Linguistics Speech Lab at Northern Arizona University (NAU), Flagstaff, AZ. Her research interests are speech production and perception, L2 pronunciation and intelligibility, L2 oral assessment and testing, automated scoring and speech recognition, World Englishes, and language attitudes. She has published 6 books, 1 edited volume for conference proceedings, over 70 journal articles, 17 book chapters, over 50 invited and keynote speech presentations, and more than 130 conference presentations. She is currently an associate editor for Applied Linguistics (the most prestigious journal with the highest impact factor in the field of applied linguistics), and has chaired several international conferences. She also obtained over 42 intramural and extramural grants (over $ 1.4 millions), including federal (NSF), non-profit, and testing agency grants. She received the President’s Award for 2021-2022 for instructional, scholarly, and service contributions to NAU, and the Graduate Research Mentorship Award for Research and Creative Activity NAU 2020. She is also a recipient of the Most Promising Young Scholar Award recognized by NAU (2012) and by Educational Testing Service (2014). Her research work has been featured in NAU Reviews (formally NAU News) a few times, National Public Radio (NPR), and Flagstaff Daily Sun Newspaper. In addition, she is a founder of an NAU online 50-Hour TESOL certificate program for Chungnam National University students in South Korea in 2016. In 2020-2021, she had modified its existing online TESOL Foundations course (i.e., Essentials of Foreign Language Teaching -ENG 599) for Languages and Education Consulting (LEC) in Sonora, Mexico. Currently, she is a coordinator/academic director of the NAU-LEC program.
Yeon-Su Kim
(in memoriam)
Yeon-Su Kim (she/her) is the Executive Director of the School of Forestry at Northern Arizona University (NAU) since 2021. Yeon-Su (or Yeonsu) is a social scientist who studied how we can value ecosystem services that forests provide in economic terms. Yeon-Su was born and raised in one of the largest metropolises in the world, Seoul, South Korea. While growing up during the period of rapid economic growth in South Korea, she was motivated to communicate values of forest conservation to people with different vantage points. She has a PhD in Forest Resources from Oregon State University and started her academic career at NAU in 1998, where she developed a passion for promoting inclusive excellence in forestry education. She has taught a range of both undergraduate and graduate classes over twenty years while focusing her research on economics and policies for promoting ecological restoration and forest conservation in the American Southwest and tropical developing countries. As the Executive Director, she is motivated to empower faculty and students from all backgrounds, identities, and lived experiences to reach their full potential, which is part of the NAU’s core commitments. (Dr. Yeon-Su Kim was tragically lost to our community in November 2022.)
Vice Provost for Online and Innovative Educational Initiatives Fellows
Kyle Winfree
Dr. Winfree first joined the Lumberjack family as a student in Physics. After this, he worked at the USGS Astrogeology Branch, taught at Coconino Community College, and was the Outreach Coordinator of the NAU American Indian Mobile Educational Resource program. In 2007, he started the MS in Robotics program at the University of Pennsylvania, after which he joined the Biomechanics and Movement Science PhD program at the University of Delaware where he studied robotic gait rehabilitation. He was then a post-doctoral researcher in Nursing at the University of Delaware. While his experience on the east coast was positive, ultimately he and his family missed the Lumberjack life. In 2015, he returned to NAU as an Assistant Professor in the Informatics and Computing Program, now part of the School of Informatics, Computing, and Cyber Systems. Here, he has served as the Associate Director of Undergraduate Programs for the past three years, runs the Wearable Computing Lab, and teaches in Computer Science, Informatics, and Electrical Engineering.
T. Mark Montoya
T. Mark Montoya, Ph.D. is Associate Dean for Curriculum and Student Affairs and Associate Professor of Ethnic Studies in the College of Social and Behavioral Sciences. A first-generation college student, Montoya’s scholarship centers broadly on the US-Mexico borderlands, borderlands pedagogy, Ethnic Studies, and first-generation student experiences. At NAU, he is most involved with the First-generation Learning Community, the Teaching Academy, and the Commission on Ethnic Diversity. Montoya also serves as President of the Association for Borderlands Studies and Chair of the Northern Arizona Dream Fund. He is on the editorial board of the Journal of First-generation Student Success and is a CatalystFIRST speaker for the NASPA Center for First-generation Student Success. Montoya’s recent awards include the NAU President’s Distinguished Teaching Fellow (2022-2026 term), the “Government Department Star” of the College of Arts and Sciences at NMSU (2020), and the Victoria Foundation’s Outstanding Latinx Faculty Service/Teaching in Arizona Higher Education Award (2019). He is most grateful for his partner Katy and their dog Maya.