Our Team
The Center for Teaching and Learning faculty support services are available through both online and in-person modalities. To quickly get in touch with questions about your course and find assistance by booking an appointment during Open Lab times and one-to-on consultations, on Zoom. You can also connect with faculty and instructional designers by joining the Faculty Hub on Slack.
Kendell Newman Sadiik
Associate Director of Transformative Teaching
Instructional Designer
LION Liaison
Buck comes from Washington State on the border with Canada. He has a great love for animation which is his main focus in film. Buck has a diverse background in many arts and sciences including foreign languages, biology, film, art and music. He is excited to work together with designers and professors to help create awesome tools in tune with students’ and teachers’ goals for success.
Expertise & Specialties
Film, Video and Radio Production
2D & 3D Animation & Animation Production
Adobe Creative Cloud Products
Autodesk Maya
Graphic & 3D Design
Education and Certification
Candidate for a BA in Film Studies, UAF
Casie Cameron is an experienced educator, writer, and designer based in Fairbanks, Alaska with over 15 years of education experience. As an Instructional Designer at the University of Alaska Fairbanks CTL, Casie creates courses with a focus on equity and inclusion, using digital spaces to foster engaging learning communities.
With a passion for storytelling, Casie designs courses influenced by pedagogies of equity and inclusion and always keeps digital innovations in mind. As a skilled designer, she excels in web design, publication design, photography, graphic design, and marketing campaigns.
In her free time, Casie enjoys outdoor activities such as skiing, camping, fishing, hiking with her dogs, and berry picking.
Expertise & Specialties
edX Course Design
Critical Pedagogy
Open Education
Communications
Blender 3D
Website design & management
Adobe Creative Cloud
Education and Certification
MA English (2019) University of Alaska Fairbanks
BA English, Concentration in British and American Literature (2011) California State University East Bay
Certified edX Course Creator
Chris Beks is an instructional designer and has been working with technology in higher education for more than fifteen years. He is interested in how technology can enhance instruction and assist the teaching and learning experience for faculty and students. He has been at UAF since 1996, as student, adjunct, and full-time faculty. Prior to joining CTL, he worked for seven years as a staff member in the OIT Training & Development group.
Expertise & Specialties
Canvas & Blackboard
Google Apps for Education
Educational Technology
Learning Management Systems
Education and Certification
B.S. in Business (Retail Management concentration)
Certificate in Information Technology Specialist
Blackboard Certified Trainer
ITIL Foundations Certification
Christen in an instructional designer, Google Certified Apps for Education Trainer, and has worked at CTL for 19 years. She values inquiry and ingenuity as tools for remaining an effective lifelong learner, and is most engaged thinking about how we become better problem solvers. She finds the most interesting spaces are platforms that intersect with social media and support user contribution, collaboration, and place-based learning.
Christen has also taught the Web Graphics & Multimedia class (CITS F221) for CTC, both face-to-face and online.
Expertise & Specialties
Instructional design
Google Apps for Education
Website development & management
Multimedia authoring
Graphic design
Social media integration
Podcasting
Metalsmith
Sculptor
Runner
Education and Certification
19 years, UAF CTL
7 years, Adjunct for CTC
7 years, Google for Education Certified Trainer
Clara has been an instructional designer at UAF since 2018 and has worked in education since 2009. Her experiences as an educator in elementary schools and science museums has sparked her interest in online instructional tools that maximize student engagement through active participation and lively discussion.
With her diverse education and work experience in everything from research science to social work, Clara is always eager to learn more about how the world works from the amazing instructors at UAF, and find innovative ways to bring those learning opportunities to students.
Clara grew up in Alaska, but has lived in Chile, Massachusetts, and Oregon. She feels very much at home here in the land of resourceful cooking and outdoor adventure.
Expertise & Specialties
STEM and Online Labs
Digital Accessibility
Captioning
PDF Remediation for Accessibility
Course- and Program-level Curriculum Design
Google Apps for Education
Graphic Design
Education and Certification
edX Certified Course Creator (2020)
Quality Matters Peer Reviewer (2018)
Master of Arts in Educational Studies, Lewis & Clark College (2016)
Bachelor of Arts in Environmental Sciences and Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality Studies, Williams College (2013)
Dan LaSota, M.Ed. in Online Instructional Design, has dabbled in science education, technology, and public policy for 35 years. He’s been an Instructional Designer at UAF Center for Teaching and Learning for the last 12.
Expertise & Specialties
Pedagogy
Remotely Controlled Labs
Strategic Design
Database and Web Development
Repartee
Media Literacy
Education and Certification
M.Ed. Online Instructional Design (2015)
University of Alaska Fairbanks
Alaska Teaching Certificate (1989)
University of Alaska Fairbanks
B.S. Physics and Astronomy (1987)
University of Rochester
Elle is a writer, designer, scholar, and teacher. She loves the challenge of designing engaging and equitable courses and is particularly interested in pedagogies that are rooted in land, community, and place. Her work often applies a critical lens to inclusivity in online and institutional spaces. As an instructor, she has taught lower and upper division courses in theories of language, culture, and digital technologies. Elle is from the Pacific Northwest and grew up in the shrub-steppe of Washington state. She spends her free time exploring the outdoors, baking, and attempting to keep her house plants alive.
Expertise & Specialties
Inclusive Design
Critical Pedagogy
Digital Scholarship
Place- and Community-Based Learning
Canvas
Google Apps for Education
Adobe Creative Cloud
Writing and Composition Pedagogy
Education and Certification
PhD in English, Rhetoric & Composition (2023)
Graduate Certificate in Digital Humanities and Culture
Washington State University
MA in English (2017)
University of Alaska Fairbanks
BA in Convergent Media Journalism and French (2011)
Central Washington University
Eric is a video producer with over a decade of experience in news, marketing, and VFX and is fascinated by the intersection of technology and education. In his free time he loves to cook, make video games, and spend time with his family.
Expertise & Specialties
Video Editing
Compositing
3D Animation
Unity
Education and Certification
Video Editing
Compositing
3D Animation
Unity
Ian is a media designer with 5 plus years experience creating multimedia across many different platforms.
Expertise & Specialties
Media Creation
Education and Certification
BA Film & Performing Arts, University of Alaska Fairbanks, 2021
Part 107, UAS Pilot
Jennifer is an instructional designer at UAF CTL with over 25 years experience working with faculty. She is interested in the confluence of innovation and higher education in the facilitation of successful educational experiences. She is also interested in ways to foster transdisciplinary efforts within the university system. Jennifer teaches online digital graphics and imaging courses for UAF, works as a professional fine artist, and gets outside and off grid as much as possible. jmossdesign.com, jmossart.com
Expertise & Specialties
edX Course Creation
Open Education & OER
WordPress
HTML, CSS
Augmented Reality
Adobe CC Apps
Digital Storytelling
Graphic Design & Illustration
Fine Art
Education and Certification
Digital Graphics Instructor, UAF
edX Certified Course Creator
Creative Commons Certified Educator
QM Peer Reviewer
QM APPQMR and IYOC Facilitator
BA English Literature, UAF
Pacific Northwest College of Art
Jenn is an Educational Psychologist who is committed to redesigning learning experiences to give all students the opportunity to achieve their dreams. She came to UAF with experience teaching at the graduate and undergraduate level, mentoring thesis and doctoral students, consulting, and serving in administrative roles at a wide spectrum of institutions. That experience informs her approach to designing and developing courses that engage, challenge, and appeal to diverse learners. Jenn has created a wide range of faculty (and administrator) development opportunities on accessibility, program curriculum development, instructional and learning design and delivery, experiential learning, differentiated instruction, and effective online teaching practices. She loves tackling new course design challenges and helping faculty find ways to make their subjects compelling and accessible to Alaskan students.
Expertise & Specialties
Curriculum Design
Faculty Development
Online Innovation
Online Teaching Effectiveness
Pedagogy
Quality Matters
Accessibility
Learning Design
Experiential Learning
Differentiated Instruction
Education and Certification
Ph.D. in Educational Psychology
Walden University
M.S. in Educational Psychology
Walden University
B. S. in Psychology
Troy University
Blackboard Certified Trainer
Blackboard Exemplary Course Peer Reviewer
Certified QM Peer Reviewer
Certified Online and Face to Face Applying the QM Rubric Trainer
Certified Online and Face to Face QM Improving Your Online Course Trainer
MBTI Practitioner
Online Pedagogy Peer-Reviewer
Karina has worked in higher education for over 12 years. Her passion for learning began at an early age when she (mostly) taught herself English after moving from the Philippines to Alaska. Since then Karina has moved from one classroom to another—on campus, online, overseas, or in a kitchen. After graduating from UAF, Karina had plans to go to medical school but was intrigued and challenged by the social determinants of health. She completed a master’s degree in public health doing research on nutrition education, food security, and rural policy. Karina hopes to someday build evidence for a regional food security index to strengthen public policy and community-based programs in the state and beyond. Karina currently teaches for the Allied Health program in the UAF College of Rural and Community Development.
When not juggling learning, teaching and working in higher education, Karina loves spending time with her family and corgi. She enjoys eating, reading, befriending animals, exploring the outdoors, making her family laugh, and traveling to places she’s read about.
Expertise & Specialties
Policies and operations
Classroom management
Faculty resources
University administration and organization
Education and Certification
MPH in Public Health Practice (2020),
University of Alaska Anchorage
I-Corps alumni (2019), National Science Foundation
Graduate fellow in Collaborative Arctic Summer School in Epidemiology (2018), University of Tromsø
Graduate fellow in International Comparative Rural Policy Studies (2017), Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona
BA in Biological Sciences and Psychology (2009), University of Alaska Fairbanks
Kendell Newman Sadiik
Associate Director of Transformative Teaching
INSTRUCTIONAL DESIGNER
LION LIAISON
907.455.2093
Kendell is a writer, teacher, and instructional designer who has been working in higher education for the last ten years. Her writing and teaching explore the edges of their fields, including digital storytelling, e-literature, experiential learning, and hybrid education environments. Her teaching philosophy is student-centered and engaged with the many communities that students navigate daily. With her B.A. in Political Economy, she worked in social science research in Cambridge, MA before moving to Fairbanks to pursue an M.F.A. in Creative Writing, which she completed in 2015. She’s excited to work with teachers and students to develop learning environments made better by the creative and intentional incorporation of technology.
Expertise & Specialties
Curriculum Design
Tools for Collaboration
Student-centered Learning
Digital Storytelling
WordPress
Canvas
Google Apps
Adobe Creative Cloud
Trauma-Informed Pedagogy
Critical Digital Pedagogy
Education and Certification
Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing (2015)
University of Alaska Fairbanks
Bachelor of Arts in Political Economy (2008)
Williams College
Magna Cum Laude
LJ Varghese joined UAF CTL as an instructional designer in summer 2022. Focusing on UAF’s AlaskaX initiative, they bring experience in library and archival sciences as well as DEI work within higher education institutions. LJ believes education should be equitable and accessible, and they are interested in defining and creating transformative teaching and learning experiences.
Expertise & Specialties
Course & program development
edX
Education and Certification
BA in Biopsychology, Cognition and Neuroscience – University of Michigan, Ann Arbor
MSI – University of Michigan, Ann Arbor
Mika is from a small interior town in Alaska. She loves film in all aspects, with a gravitation towards post-production and production design. As a graduate of the film program at UAF, Mika holds skills in graphic design, camera work, editing, directing, and finding ways to spend time productively waiting for exports.
Expertise & Specialties
Film & Video Production
Adobe Illustrator, After Effects, Premiere, Photoshop
Graphic Design
Art
Education and Certification
BA in Film Studies, UAF
Nathaniel is passionate about the intersection of technology and culture. His experience includes museum exhibit design, developing online learning for Alaskan Athabascan languages, and project management. He enjoys working with content experts to create student experiences that feel authentic in a digital realm, and is excited to explore these possibilities at UAF CTL.
Originally from Seward Alaska, Nathaniel is a UAF Linguistics Alumni and has lived in Fairbanks since 2012. He enjoys cabin trips with his dog, husband, and good food.
Expertise & Specialties
Canvas
Adobe Creative Cloud
Google Apps for Education
Project Management systems
Interaction Design
Education and Certification
BA Linguistics (2016)
University of Alaska Fairbanks
Magna cum laude
Modern Leadership (2018)
Doyon Leadership Training / Inspire Leadership Academy
Sarah is an instructional designer at UAF CTL and serves as the LMS Coordinator. Prior to joining the Design Team, Sarah worked for eCampus Student Services as a Student Services Specialist providing proctoring services for members of the UAF and Fairbanks community and assisted eCampus students and faculty with all things online learning.
Sarah is a life-long learner who understands the transformational power of education to change students’ lives. She actively searches for ways to help all students pursue their educational dreams. Sarah is currently pursuing advanced certifications in both Blackboard and Canvas in order to improve the teaching and learning environment for faculty and students. Her research interests include innovative educational technologies that inform instructional strategies in course developments and trauma informed pedagogies.
Expertise & Specialties
Canvas LMS
Blackboard LMS
A 2007 UAF graduate, Sean spent a majority of his adult life living and teaching in Hokkaido, Japan until he returned to Alaska in 2015. In his time at rural Japanese elementary and junior high schools, Sean actively used technology to enhance instruction and broaden students’ cultural horizons, played a lot of dodgeball and learned how to unicycle. Himself a graduate of an online graduate degree program in 2014, Sean hopes to help faculty and students get the most out of their online teaching and learning experiences.
Expertise & Specialties
MOOCs
edX Course Design
Video Production & Screencasting
Interactive Video
Virtual & Augmented Reality
Accessibility & Captioning
Language Education & Second Language Acquisition
Education and Certification
B.A. in Linguistics (2007)
University of Alaska Fairbanks
M.A. in Applied Linguistics (2014)
University of Massachusetts Boston
Google for Education Certified Trainer
Certified Professional in Accessibility Core Competencies
International Association of Accessibility Professionals
After working for us for multiple semesters as a student worker while she completed her BA degree, Shayla joined UAF CTL as a full-time employee in 2022. She expands our graphic design and original illustration capabilities.
Expertise & Specialties
Graphic design
Custom illustration
Media Production
Education and Certification
Bachelor of Arts in Art and Japanese Studies, University of Alaska Fairbanks
Zach Cureton-Hazard is a member of the design team at the University of Alaska Fairbanks Center for Teaching and Learning. Zach has a bachelors degree in chemistry and is a certified secondary science teacher in Alaska. After spend 6 years teaching science in Alaska (two years in Saint Marys and 4 years in Seward), he joined the team at CTL.
Expertise & Specialties
Badgining & Microcredentials
Canvas
The MILL Makerspace
Education and Certification
B.S. in Chemistry
Alaska Department of Education Professional Teaching License