Her teaching and research focuses on at-risk, first generation, and immigrant students, especially as those populations access the K12-higher education pipeline. She is a PSU alum who earned a master's degree in Teachers of English to Speakers of Other Languages (TESOL) and has a doctoral degree with a Postsecondary Adult and Continuing Education specialization. She worked at PSU for five years in the Applied Linguistics Department as an ESL instructor for international and immigrant students, and for the last 15 years, in University Studies where she helped develop a new innovative general education program through teaching freshman and sophomore inquiry and senior capstone. Her bachelor's degree is in English in secondary education from Oral Roberts University in Tulsa, Oklahoma.