{"id":210,"date":"2019-02-04T11:51:36","date_gmt":"2019-02-04T16:51:36","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.montclair.edu\/faculty-excellence\/?page_id=210"},"modified":"2026-03-20T14:38:27","modified_gmt":"2026-03-20T18:38:27","slug":"about-us","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/www.montclair.edu\/faculty-excellence\/about-us\/","title":{"rendered":"About Us"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Office for Faculty Excellence (OFE) empowers faculty at all career stages and ranks to achieve their highest potential in teaching, research, leadership, and service. Through inclusive, comprehensive, and strategic professional development, OFE supports faculty success in fulfilling Montclair State University\u2019s mission<\/a> as a public-serving institution, advancing the common good.<\/p>\n

The Office for Faculty Excellence is part of the Provost’s Office and is located in Cole 142.<\/p>\n

Senior Associate Provost for Faculty Affairs<\/h2>\n
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\"Emily_Isaacs\"\/<\/figure>\n<\/div>
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Dr. Emily Isaacs<\/strong><\/a>, Senior Associate<\/span>\u00a0Provost<\/span> for Faculty Affairs and Professor in the Department of Writing Studies, has a long record of teaching, scholarship, and service at Montclair State University. Dr. Isaacs published Writing at the State U: Instruction and Administration at 106 U.S. Comprehensive Universities<\/em> (2018) and Intersections: A Thematic Reader for Writers<\/em>\u00a0with Catherine Keohane (2017). She has published numerous articles on teaching writing, writing programming in public higher education, and challenges in higher education.<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n

Director of Faculty Development<\/h2>\n
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Dr. Catherine Keohane<\/a> has a Ph.D. in English from Rutgers University. She supports faculty of all ranks in their career development. Catherine has published in the field of writing studies and eighteenth-century British literature, and oversees OFE\u2019s support of faculty research and writing. She works with faculty to support both student and faculty belonging, and is the OFE lead on Strong Student Campaign communications. Catherine published <\/span>Intersections: A Thematic Readers for Writers<\/span><\/i> with Emily Isaacs (2017). <\/span>She previously served as Director for Writing Placement in the First-Year Writing Program. She is an executive board member of To Improve the Academy <\/em><\/a>and also serves as president of the <\/span>Burney Society (North America)<\/span><\/a>.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n

Program Coordinator<\/h2>\n
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Dalilah Smith-Santos<\/strong><\/a> joined the OFE in January of 2023 after seven years working for the MTA in the Real Estate Department where she served in several capacities, most recently as the Facilities Management Administrator.\u00a0 Prior to working at the MTA, Dalilah worked for the Children\u2019s Aid – Next Generation Center supporting this NYC organization in providing services to help children in poverty succeed and thrive.\u00a0 Ms. Smith-Santos received her B.S in Public Administration from John Jay College.<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n

Faculty Developers<\/h2>\n
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Dr. Vera Senina<\/a> is an interdisciplinary scholar and teacher whose disciplinary expertise spans from the study of the humanities to digital technology and artificial intelligence. Vera also has top-company industry experience in project management and employee development.\u00a0Vera’s current projects are:<\/p>\n

— Dialogue Across Difference (lead event organizer and working group coordinator)<\/p>\n

— AI Working Group (lead project manager)<\/p>\n

— Faculty hiring (lead on faculty search committee education)<\/p>\n

— International Faculty community.<\/p>\n

— AI for faculty development and research.<\/p>\n

— web-content management for the Office for Faculty Excellence.<\/p>\n

— Thank a Professor program.<\/p>\n

— Wednesday morning Research and Writing group.<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n

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Dr. Courtney Glore Crimmins<\/a> is a Faculty Developer in the Office for Faculty Excellence and serves as OFE’s Adjunct Liaison. She supports faculty of all ranks in teaching and development, including systems training. Courtney facilitates OFE’s “Just for Adjuncts” programming, a series of professional development workshops and drop-in sessions, as well as the newly-developed Adjunct Orientation. Courtney also teaches in the Department of World Languages and Cultures. She has a Ph.D. in Germanic Language and Literature from the University of Michigan.<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n

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Trina Chance O\u2019Gorman <\/a>is a faculty developer dedicated to supporting faculty and student success at the university. She has been a part of the Montclair State University community since 1998, in a number of roles, from being a graduate student in our Master of Arts in Teaching\u00a0<\/span>program, as well as a TA, to working as an adjunct writing instructor in our English and Writing\u00a0<\/span>Studies departments and mentoring student teachers during their clinical internship. Her\u00a0<\/span>experience as an adjunct instructor has been enhanced by leadership training and co-facilitating\u00a0<\/span>workshops based on the research and work of Bren\u00e9 Brown with the Tragedy Assistance\u00a0<\/span>Program for Survivors (TAPS), which supports surviving military families. She is dedicated to\u00a0<\/span>creating community and spaces in which\u00a0faculty can reach their full potential.<\/p>\n

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Faculty Writing Coach<\/h2>\n
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Michele McCormick<\/a> <\/div> <\/p><\/div>\n

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Graduate Assistants<\/h2>\n
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\"talia<\/figure>\n<\/p><\/div>
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Talia Cantor<\/strong> is a graduate assistant for the OFE.\u00a0 Talia received her Bachelor of Arts in English Literature from Dickinson College, and is now pursuing her Master of Arts in English. Her goal is to eventually earn a Ph.D. in English and subsequently become an English literature professor. <\/p><\/div> <\/p><\/div>\n

Student Assistants<\/h2>\n
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Samaiyah Bey<\/strong> is a student assistant for the OFE. She is currently a sophomore studying Film & Television with a minor in Business. Her goal through MSU is to get as many social and academic experiences as she can with her future goal being to work in film editing and marketing<\/p><\/div> <\/p><\/div>\n

Last Modified: Friday, March 20, 2026 2:38 pm<\/em><\/p>eji<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Meet the team at the Office for Faculty Advancement. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":8348,"parent":0,"menu_order":116,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-210","page","type-page","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.montclair.edu\/faculty-excellence\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/210","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.montclair.edu\/faculty-excellence\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.montclair.edu\/faculty-excellence\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.montclair.edu\/faculty-excellence\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.montclair.edu\/faculty-excellence\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=210"}],"version-history":[{"count":162,"href":"https:\/\/www.montclair.edu\/faculty-excellence\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/210\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":15091,"href":"https:\/\/www.montclair.edu\/faculty-excellence\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/210\/revisions\/15091"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.montclair.edu\/faculty-excellence\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/8348"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.montclair.edu\/faculty-excellence\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=210"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}