Program Faculty
Christine Jensen Sundstrom, Director and Instructor
Phone: (785) 864-1322
E-mail: cjensen@ku.edu
Christine Jensen Sundstrom, Director of the Graduate Writing Program (GWP) and an Associate Language Specialist at the University of Kansas, holds a PhD in the Cross-Cultural Rhetoric of Science. In the spring of 2001, she started the GWP to help graduate students study and practice the writing of their disciplines. Using her earlier experience teaching technical writing, ESL, and graduate writing as well as performing technical or professional editing, she designed Professional Writing (GS 750), Thesis and Dissertation Writing (GS 700), and Thesis and Dissertation Writing Tutorials (GS 710). In these classes, students learn to analyze the rhetorical structure of the graduate/professional genres of their field, get practical tips on how to write these genres or specific chapters effectively, and receive frequent feedback on their writing. She continues to teach these classes and now co-teaches a new Grant Proposal Writing course.
In the arena of graduate education, her scholarly interests include mentor-mentee relationships, effective mentoring, studying and teaching disciplinary writing, designing university support systems for graduate students, and using argument structure and genre analysis as lynch pins for teaching disciplinary writing and presenting. Her dissertation, Claim Strength and Argument Structure in International Research Articles: A Case Study Using Chinese, Ukranian, and U.S. Texts, provides a detailed analysis of how cultural contexts affect research articles at both the sentence and text level. She has made presentations on effective mentoring and the design of university graduate support programs. She has published expert briefs on various aspects of graduate writing for the GradShare site for ProQuest. She is currently working on a textbook for Professional Writing.
Her teaching is based on the philosophy that anyone can learn anything if information is presented in the right way. As a result, she will try many different methods of solving writing issues that come up to see what works for a particular student. She sees that work as collaborative, since the graduate students she works with are experts in research in their fields while her expertise is in writing about that research. She finds work with graduate students to be very rewarding.
Sarah Kern, Program AssistantPhone: (785) 864-8163
E-mail: gwsp@ku.edu
Sarah graduated from KU in 2003 with a MA in English. She worked as a lecturer with the English department until moving on to the private sector. Returning to KU in an adminstrative capacity has been a welcome pleasure.
At the GWP, Sarah serves as a catch-all administrative assistant. She manages student enrollment, recordkeeping and databases, hiring processes, program promotions, and the GWP website.
Phone: (785) 864-6043
E-mail: eadamson@ku.edu
As an instructor of Professional Writing, Thesis and Dissertation Writing Tutorials and Grammar and Editing tutorials, I’m excited to help students develop their innate gifts and their academic passions into writing that shines in their disciplines and speaks to the student’s life experience. I myself have followed both academic and non-academic paths in my life, and I value the life experiences and the “baggage” that all of us bring to the process of writing. After finishing my bachelor’s degrees in Latin American studies and journalism at KU in 2002, I went to work as a reporter for the Topeka Capitol-Journal. In my three years there, I wrote and edited the Spanish-language section, covered crime and even served a stint as the Online reporter. I loved networking in Topeka’s burgeoning Mexican community and becoming acquainted with a wide variety of community groups there. I returned to KU to pursue my master’s degree in Latin American Studies in 2005. I also realized that I am generally more interested in participating in my community than just writing about others’ participation.
I completed a master’s thesis titled “MUDHA: History of Haitian and Dominican-Haitian Women’s Organizing in the Dominican Republic” in 2007. As a graduate student I was a member of Lawrence Fair Food, an organization that supports the ground-breaking labor and human rights activism of the Coalition of Immokalee Workers, immigrant migrant farm workers in Florida. I have advised undergraduate students in the Latin American Studies major, translated materials into Spanish for United Students for Fair Trade, interpreted for Spanish-speaking parents in the Lawrence school district, organized lecture series’ and assisted with grant writing for the Center of Latin American Studies, and way back, worked as a conversation leader for the Applied English Center.
Phone: (785) 864-1305
E-mail: ebyleen@ku.edu
Elizabeth Byleen, Associate Language Specialist at the Applied English Center, has over 25 years experience teaching writing, designing writing courses, and training and supervising writing teachers. She was recently presented with her department’s Excellence in Teaching Award and is the author of the university-level textbook, Looking Ahead: Developing Skills for Academic Writing. In the Graduate Writing Program, Liz has guided more than 60 native and non-native speakers in writing their theses or dissertations, as well as related journal articles, grants, and application materials. In these one-on-one tutorials, she has worked with students from more than 25 KU academic departments.
Phone: (785) 864-6042
E-mail: cjandura@ku.edu
Phone: (785) 864-6111
E-mail: lagotte@ku.edu
After years of moving between the job market for funding, and university for study, I finally received a BA in Anthropology in 1997. Directly after graduating, I moved to Kanazawa, Japan to teach English at a private conversation company. This time was a catalyst for an interest in comparative education studies as I had several high school and university students who attended my classes. After Japan, I returned to the States and entered the University of Kansas for a master’s program. Here, I wrote on the education reform conducted by the US occupation forces in Japan after WWII for my Anthropology degree. I then chose the University of Wisconsin-Madison for PhD work because it offered a unique opportunity to double major at the highest level. Thus, for the past four years I have studied Anthropology and Educational Policy Studies in Madison. My current interest has turned to domestic issues, as I feel the time is crucial to interrogate the growing relationship between the US military and public school policy.
Phone: (785) 864-6044
E-mail: pshaver@ku.edu
I am delighted to work with students through the Graduate Writing Program as a lecturer for GS 710 Thesis and Dissertation Writing Tutorials. I have over 8 years of teaching experience, with many age groups and linguistic backgrounds. I have taught writing courses at Ottawa University and Baker University, as well as for the Applied English Center. My Master's degree is in TESOL (teaching English to speakers of other languages) and I am currently ABD (all but the dissertation) in Curriculum & Instruction through KU's School of Education. Working on writing a dissertation myself, I bring real-time experience to the challenge and excitement of being in this part of the process for receiving a PhD.
My philosophy of teaching reflects a commitment to critical pedagogy- engaging in mutual inquiry with respect equally for all members of the classroom and larger community. To be educated by inquiry is to become more practiced at speaking one's mind, hearing another do the same, and respectfully sharing, listening, and reflecting. As a teacher, it is my purpose, a continuing journey, and my bliss to make an invitation to these relationships, in as compelling and engaging ways as possible. This pedagogy is empowering and liberating because it is the student's voice which is valued with the same regard as that of the educator. It is liberating because of the tools we each take away to better represent our communities and ideas and values we each hold dear to the outside world. Liberating because through it, we each get to learn and be reminded how to love and accept ourselves!
Phone (785) 864-6045
E-Mail: rwwilson@ku.edu
Ron received his PhD from the University of Kansas and has been serving as a lecturer in the Department of Film and Media Studies. He has also designed an online independent study course for the Department of Continuing Education. While at the Film and Media Studies department he taught an introductory course on graduate studies to new graduate students. This piqued both his interest and passion for working with graduate students on developing their research, organizational, and writing skills. In addition to teaching graduate research proficiency, Ron is also a writer who has published books, essays, and reviews in film and media studies. His special research interest is in film genres, particularly crime films, film and cultural history, and television studies.
Elizabeth Yeager Reece, Instructor
Phone: (785) 864-6044
E-mail: eyeager@ku.edu
Elizabeth received her PhD in American Studies from the University of Kansas in 2011 and currently works with graduate students in the program's Thesis and Dissertation Tutorials. She is also an Adjunct Assistant Professor of Anthropology at Washburn University. She has taught courses in American Studies, Anthropology, Sociology, and Women, Gender, and Sexuality Studies. Her current research builds on her interest in anthropological spatial theory, cultural memory studies, the issues and methods of ethnography, popular culture/music scholarship, performance studies, and U.S. social and cultural history since 1945. Elizabeth's research explores the intersections of music, community, and identity. She earned a B.A. in History and Philsophy from Gettysburg College and an M.A. in American Studies from the University of Alabama.
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