Photo credit: John Michael Dickinson, Artist & Educator

As an Educator & Public Speaker

I have designed, led, and delivered educational experiences across a remarkable range of contexts — from university classrooms and community arts centers to accessibility-focused nonprofits, museum galleries, and professional development settings for more than a decade. My work spans curriculum development, instructional design, community engagement, digital content production, and educator training, serving learners from pre-K through adult across in-person, hybrid, and virtual platforms.

At the center of my practice is a sustained commitment to equitable access. I design educational experiences from the premise that high-quality learning opportunities should be available to everyone — regardless of ability, background, location, or circumstance. That conviction has shaped my work at every level, from developing grant-funded programming for students with autism spectrum disorder and sensory disabilities, to creating over 90 digital instructional resources to extend learning beyond the classroom, to advising organizations on inclusive program design and accessibility strategy.

I am also an experienced educator for educators. I have designed and facilitated professional development training for a wide range of institutions, including Braille Institute of America, the Muckenthaler Cultural Center, Orange Coast College, Laguna Art Museum, and Orange County Children's Therapeutic Arts Center, among others. These sessions have addressed inclusive teaching practices, accessible curriculum design, and community engagement strategies — reflecting both my depth of expertise and her ability to communicate complex ideas clearly and compellingly to professional audiences. My experience leading trainings, workshops, and presentations at the institutional level speaks to a fluency in public-facing communication that extends well beyond the classroom.

My multi-faceted career has taken me across a wide range of institutions and communities, including work with military-connected families overseas, Japanese-speaking students, professional artists, multigenerational learners, and individuals with neurodivergence or vision loss, building a breadth of perspective that informs everything I design and teache. A background in writing and visual arts further shapes my practice, influencing not only what I teach but how I communicate: through intentional design, visual storytelling, and educational materials crafted to be both functional and meaningful.

I approach education as a collaborative and relational practice. I believe in designing with communities rather than for them, in the power of arts-integrated learning to reach those whom more traditional approaches leave behind, and in the understanding that truly accessible education is iterative, ongoing work. Whether I am coordinating programming across multiple campuses, leading a community workshop, developing digital content, or training a room full of professional educators, I bring the same standard of care, rigor, and genuine investment in the people she serves.

If you are looking for an educator, program designer, consultant, or facilitator who brings both breadth of education experience and depth of conviction, I am available for workshops, speaking engagements, and collaborative educational projects. Reach out here.


Curricula & Professional Development

Writing & Language Arts

My teaching practice extends beyond the visual arts into writing instruction across multiple formats and levels — from early literacy and English language acquisition to academic essay writing, memoir, and creative writing for adult learners.

  • Academic Essay Writing | Poetry | Memoir | Fiction | Beginning and Intermediate English Reading, Writing, Speaking, and Listening Comprehension

Professional Development for Educators

I have designed and overseen professional development programming for educators and organizational staff, supporting instructors in building more inclusive, effective, and accessible learning environments.

  • Arts & Accessibility: Image Description | Strategies for Teaching Adults: Andragogy, Geragogy, and Peeragogy | Online Teaching Strategies | Accessibility and Online Learning with Canvas LMS | Professional Development Workshop: Prepping & Presenting CEU Workshops | Innovating Accessible Learning: Strategies and Change Management for Higher Education

Visual Arts

I have designed and taught studio art courses across a wide range of media, skill levels, and learning contexts, from foundational art education for K–12 students to advanced studio practice for adult learners. My visual arts curriculum consistently integrates accessibility, creative problem-solving, and individualized learning approaches.

  • Painting | Drawing | Ceramics: Wheel-Throwing | Ceramics: Hand-Building | Sculpture | Printmaking | Mixed Media | Tactile Mixed Media | 2-D Art Foundations | 2-D Art & Design | 3-D Art Foundations | 3-D Art & Design | Intermediate Independent Studio

Art History & Appreciation

I have taught art history and appreciation at the college level and in community settings for adult students, with an emphasis on critical thinking, cultural context, and accessible delivery for diverse learners.

  • Art History | Art Appreciation | Honors Art History

Accessibility-Focused Arts Education

Among the most distinctive threads of my teaching practice is her development of original courses at the intersection of visual arts and accessibility, designed specifically for learners with visual impairments, sensory disabilities, and diverse learning needs. These courses represent some of my most innovative curriculum work.

  • Visual Arts and Accessibility | Teaching Visual Art to the Visually Impaired | A Space to Thrive: Accessible Visual Art and Creative Writing | Mixed Media Tactile Arts


Programming & Professional Development Highlights

A Space to Thrive: Accessible Visual Art for Students with Visual Impairments and Sensory Disabilities

Muckenthaler Cultural Center

A Space to Thrive is a grant-funded accessible arts program developed and taught at the Muckenthaler Cultural Center, designed to create meaningful tactile and sensory art-making experiences for students with visual impairments and sensory disabilities. The program was built on the premise that studio art is not only accessible to these communities — it is a powerful vehicle for creative expression, confidence, and connection when designed with genuine intentionality.

The first iteration of the program was independently designed and taught, with subsequent sessions developed in collaboration with a fellow teaching artist — expanding the program's reach and incorporating multiple instructional perspectives into its design. Delivered across both in-person and virtual platforms, the program was structured to meet participants where they are, adapting materials, methods, and pacing to support a wide range of learning needs and abilities.

The institutional and grant support behind A Space to Thrive reflects both the rigor of its design and the recognized need for this kind of programming in the community — and represents the kind of thoughtfully funded, mission-driven educational work that sits at the center of this practice.

Accessibility & Online Learning with Canvas LMS

Orange Coast College

Invited by Orange Coast College to present as part of a college-wide professional development event, this workshop brought together faculty from across disciplines to examine how accessibility principles can be practically applied within the Canvas learning management system. The audience was not a specialized group — it was a cross-section of the college's instructional staff, representing a wide range of subjects, technical comfort levels, and prior experience with accessible course design.

The workshop was grounded in a straightforward conviction: that accessibility in online learning is not a compliance checkbox, but a design practice that improves the experience for every learner. Drawing on years of hands-on experience developing accessible curricula and digital content for communities with visual impairments and sensory disabilities, the session translated that expertise into concrete, immediately applicable strategies for improving existing Canvas courses — meeting faculty where they were and giving them tools they could use the same day.

Being brought in as an outside expert to lead institution-wide professional development reflects the kind of cross-sector, consultative work that defines this practice — bringing specialized accessibility knowledge into spaces where it can create broad, lasting impact.

Professional Development Series for Educators and Staff

Braille Institute (Virtual)

Designed and taught independently, this professional development series was delivered virtually to instructors, teaching artists, program coordinators, and staff across Braille Institute of America's statewide network of campuses, reaching a wide range of roles, experience levels, and instructional contexts within a single organization.

The series addressed the practical and theoretical dimensions of effective teaching in a modern nonprofit educational setting. Sessions on online teaching strategies gave participants concrete frameworks for designing and facilitating engaging virtual instruction. A workshop on adult learning theory — drawing on the principles of andragogy, geragogy, and peeragogy — challenged participants to examine their assumptions about how adults learn and what that means for how they design and deliver programming. A dedicated session on developing and presenting CEU workshops equipped staff with the skills to create continuing education offerings that meet professional standards and serve their communities well.

What distinguishes this series is both its scope and its origin: every session was independently conceived, designed, and taught, reflecting not only deep subject matter expertise across multiple domains, but the ability to identify what an organization needs, build programming to meet that need, and deliver it with clarity and confidence to a professional audience at scale.