Fellows Directory

Niveen AbiGhannam

Dr. Niveen AbiGhannam is a science communication researcher and educator whose work centers around the strategic and inclusive communication of technical knowledge. More specifically, her research seeks to understand individual, organizational, and social factors that can drive or hinder public engagement with STEM behaviors. She also examines the identities of publicly engaged scientists and engineers and the meanings that they associate with their engagement experiences. On the teaching front, Dr. AbiGhannam has taught Engineering Communication at UT since 2015.

Amelia Acker

Amelia Acker is an associate professor in the School of Information where she directs the Critical Data Studies Lab. Amelia researches people who build and maintain archives, data technologies, and information infrastructure. Amelia's PTF project is SCiSCHOOL, a science fiction book club that brings graduate students together to discuss the ethics and social impacts of near and future information technologies in our daily lives.

Diane Bailey

Open any book on university teaching and you are sure to find thorough discussion of in-class techniques to engage and motivate students, to place learning squarely in their hands, and to get them collaborating with one another. Now look for the section on how to negotiate your courseload, market your under-enrolled elective, build up a largely stable repertoire of courses, or network in a new community to find industry folks and others who can help you with materials for and guest talks in your course.

Matthew Balhoff

Matthew is a professor in the Hildebrand Petroleum and Geosystems Engineering (PGE) Department. Matt’s work as a PTF includes a curriculum-wide design project that is presented to the students in their first petroleum engineering class, taught in the spring of their first year. In every PGE class they are assigned at least one homework assignment or project taken directly from the design project. The objective of this initiative is to use unique methods and tools to develop an integrated and synergistic program.

Maura Borrego

Andrew Carlson

Tanya Clement

Tanya E Clement is an Associate Professor in the Department of English at the University of Texas at Austin. Her primary areas of research are textual studies, sound studies, and infrastructure studies as these concerns impact academic research, research libraries, and the creation of research tools and resources in Digital Humanities (DH).

Katie Dawson

Project Title: Drama-Based Pedagogy: Refinement and Alignment for the University Context 

Andrew Dell'Antonio

Andrew Dell’Antonio (he/him/his) specializes in musical repertories of early modern Europe, with a focus on seventeenth-century Italy. His research interests include musical historiography, reception history, and disability studies.

Michael Findley

Erica "EG" Gionfriddo

Erica Gionfriddo is a dance artist, educator and somatic researcher who believes in the intelligent body each of us occupies. They are co-founder of ARCOS Dance (arcosdance.com), whose ongoing inquiry probes the intersection of technology and humanity through rigorous interdisciplinary experimentation. ARCOS’ recent work has focused on “hacking” consumer technologies, or repurposing them outside of their intended uses, into performance and developing an embodied cyborgian movement language.

Michelle Habeck

Martha Hilley

Martha Hilley is a PTF Emeritus Fellow after 36 years on the faculty of The University of Texas Butler School of Music! During that time, she has served as Professor of Group Piano and Pedagogy, head of the keyboard division, Associate Director of BSOM and Director of Undergraduate Studies.

Peniel Joseph

Peniel Joseph is the First-Year Representative on the 2020 PTF Steering Committee.

Krishna Kumar

Krishna Kumar is an Assistant Professor in the Civil, Architecture, and Environmental Engineering at the University of Texas at Austin. Krishna’s work involves developing exascale micro and macro-scale numerical methods for modeling natural hazards. Krishna also develops Scientific Machine Learning algorithms: Graph Network Simulators and Differentiable programming to accelerate numerical methods and solve optimization, design, and inverse problems.

Fernanda Leite

Fernanda Leite is a Professor in the Cockrell School of Engineering at the University of Texas at Austin. She holds the John A. Focht Centennial Teaching Fellowship in Civil Engineering. She is the past Chair of a University-wide Bridging Barriers research initiative called Planet Texas 2050. Her built environment research program sits at the interface of engineering and computing. She teaches courses on Building Information Modeling, Project Management and Economics, Construction Safety, and Sustainable Systems Engineering.

Filippo Mangolini

Filippo is an Assistant Professor in the Walker Department of Mechanical Engineering. His interdisciplinary research activities aim to develop a fundamental understanding of the chemical and physical processes occurring on material surfaces as well as at interfaces under extreme environments and far-from-equilibrium conditions. Filippo teaches courses on Materials Engineering, Enhancing Sustainability through Tribology, Phase Transformations, and Advanced Methods in Surface Analysis.

Rick Neptune

Project Title: Integrating Computational Techniques in the Engineering Curriculum 

Eric Nordquist

Paola Passalacqua

D'Arcy Randall

Navid Saleh

Navid Saleh is a Professor at the Civil, Architectural and Environmental Engineering department. He is an environmental engineering faculty member with a passion for teaching. His mission as an educator and researcher has been to engage with the community and co-create knowledge. He has developed modules utilizing problem-based learning (PBL) pedagogy, conducted detailed and systematic evaluation, and devoted himself to student learning at UT.

Pedro Santacruz

Julie Schell

Julie Schell is the Assistant Dean of Instructional Continuity and Innovation in the College of Fine Arts. She is also an assistant professor of practice in the Department of Design and Program in Program in Higher Education Leadership. Julie is an expert in teaching and learning and has taught courses on higher education pedagogy, design pedagogy, design thinking, and technology and innovation in higher education for more than a decade. 

Carolyn Seepersad

Project Title: Freshman Introduction to Research in Engineering (FIRE)