Fellows Directory

Lucy Atkinson

Current Fellow

Natalie Czimskey

Current Fellow

Natalie Czimskey, Ph.D., is a lecturer in the Department of Speech, Language, and Hearing Sciences at The University of Texas where she earned all three of her degrees. She began teaching as a doctoral student in 2012 and continued teaching part time until completing her Ph.D. in 2019 when she joined the faculty full-time.  Her primary research area is adult neurogenic disorders with a special interest in traumatic brain injury, though her passion is teaching; she has taught 9 different courses in the past 2 years.

Michael Findley

Current Fellow

Layla Guyot

Current Fellow

Layla Guyot is a data scientist, educator, and researcher, who joined UT Austin during Fall 2020. After pursuing mathematics and physics in undergrad, Layla completed a M.S. in Applied Probability and Statistics, just by chance. She gained some experience as a statistician before combining her aspiration to teach and conduct research through her Ph.D. in Mathematics Education at Texas State University. Her research focuses on designing courses and developing curriculum materials to promote authentic practices and ease the transition to the workplace.

Fernanda Leite

Current Fellow

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.

Ruth Shear

Current Fellow

Ruth Shear is a Professor of Practice in the Chemistry Department, and a Research Educator of the Urban Ecosystems research stream in the Freshman Research Initiative (FRI). After a PhD in Chemical Physics from Griffith University (Australia) and postdoctoral work at Stanford and Cornell, she started as a lecturer at UT Austin in 1996. After running the physical and analytical chemistry teaching labs for 10 years, she helped create FRI in 2006. She has been teaching Research Methods in various forms ever since.

Stacy Sparks

Current Fellow

Stacy Sparks is a Professor of Instruction in the Chemistry Department and focuses much of her teaching on General Chemistry courses. She directs the Chemistry Learning Assistant Program, which provides an experiential learning experience for 80 undergraduate students each semester, building their teaching and leadership skills and preparing them to assist general chemistry and organic chemistry students in the classroom.

 

Gwendolyn Stovall

Current Fellow

For the last 10+ years, Gwen Stovall has worked as a biochemist and aptamer researcher in the CNS Freshman Research Initiative, where she leads a Course-based Undergraduate Research Experience (CURE) to identify aptamers, understand the underlying mechanisms and parameters of aptamer selections, and investigate aptamer specificity. As an educator, Gwen is committed to student empowerment and success, and seeks to improve student outcomes by mentoring, teaching, challenging, and engaging students.

Kristina Zvinakis

Current Fellow