Our faculty embrace the USF mission of educating the whole person — both heart and mind. Our professors pursue an ambitious agenda of research, teaching, and service. As scholars, they take on some of the world’s most challenging issues and problems.
In the classroom, they bring compassion and academic rigor. Outside the classroom, they are engaged professionals, making contributions to their communities and their respective fields.
EdD, International Educational Development, Teachers College, Columbia University , MA, Latin American Studies, Stanford University, BA, Sociology, Stanford University
Education and Development in the Global South, Peace and Human Rights Education, Education for Immigrant and Refugee Youth
Pamela Balls Organista, has a PhD in Clinical Psychology. Her areas of research include health issues in underserved populations, ethnic minority psychology, community-based research, and preventive interventions.
PhD in Clinical Psychology
Bernadette Barker-Plummer received her PhD from the Annenberg School for Communication at the University of Pennsylvania, her MA from the University of Texas at Austin, and her BA from Edinburgh University in Scotland. Her research interests are in media, social movements, and social change. Some of her work can be found in Critical Studies in Media Communication, Feminist Media Studies, Journalism Quarterly, Journalism Monographs, and Peace Review. She teaches Gender and Media, Introduction to...
BA, Edinburgh University in Scotland, MA, University of Texas at Austin, PhD, Annenberg School for Communication, University of Pennsylvania
Professor Benning received her PhD from the University of Colorado, Boulder in Environmental, Population and Organismic Biology. Her research interests include landscape ecology, urban ecology and resource conservation and management. Her most recent research focuses on remote sensing and GIS technologies in the study of tropical rainforest dynamics in Hawaii and riparian corridors in southern African savannas.
PhD, University of Colorado
Professor Benson's research areas include operating systems, parallel computing, and programming languages. He has designed and developed several run-time systems and tools for parallel programming languages and libraries. Specifically, he led the development of USFMPI, a multi-threaded implementation of MPI 1.2 for Linux using either Myrinet or Ethernet. In addition, Professor Benson co-created FlashMob Computing and he implemented much of the software that enabled the harnessing of 700...
PhD from the University of California, Davis
Operating Systems, Parallel Computing, Programming Languages
Liat Berdugo is an artist and writer whose work investigates embodiment, labor, and militarization in relation to capitalism, technological utopianism, and the Middle East. Her work has been exhibited and screened at Yerba Buena Center for the Arts (San Francisco), MoMA PS1 (New York), Transmediale (Berlin), V2_Lab for the Unstable Media (Rotterdam), and The Wrong Biennale (online), among others. Her writing appears in Rhizome, Temporary Art Review, Real Life, Places, and The Institute for...
MFA, Rhode Island School of Design, Digital + Media, 2013, BA, Brown University, Mathematics, Philosophy, 2008
Paula Birnbaum is the Academic Director of the Museum Studies Master of Arts Program and Professor of Art History and Museum Studies at USF. She is a specialist in modern and contemporary art and holds a doctorate in Art History from Bryn Mawr College. Professor Birnbaum is a former Fulbright Scholar and fellow at the Institute for Research on Women and Gender at Stanford University. Birnbaum’s research focuses on modern and contemporary art in relationship to gender and sexuality, as well as...
PhD, History of Art, Bryn Mawr College, MA, History of Art, Bryn Mawr College, BA, History of Art and French Literature, Bowdoin College
Hana Böttger’s interests lie at the intersection of structural materials engineering and architecture. She is the first chairperson of the Department of Engineering, launched in 2020. She also created and has been directing the Architectural Engineering minor program within the Department of Art + Architecture. She has taught international immersion courses and project courses in which students work with community partners, as well as architectural engineering topics. Hana has been a teacher...
MArch, MS, Structural Materials Engineering, UC Berkeley, BS, Civil Engineering, UC Berkeley
Tom Böttger is from Berlin, Germany and is first and foremost a teacher. He enjoys teaching the large introductory physics courses as well as hands-on courses like Electronics and Digital Electronics.In his research he studies optical, dynamical, and magnetic properties of solids, specifically optical materials doped with rare earth ions. This work is centered on understanding the fundamental material physics at the microscopic scale, but also geared towards the development of optical materials...
Montana State University, PhD in Physics, 2002, Montana State University, MS in Physics, 1999, Humboldt University, Germany, Diploma in Physics, 1996, University of Kent, England, University Diploma in Physics, 1993
Professor Karen Bouwer enjoys teaching all levels of French and Francophone language, culture and literature as well as classes on African literature and film. Her research interests include Francophone African literature, African cinema and gender. Her book Gender and Decolonization in the Congo: The Legacy of Patrice Lumumba was published by Palgrave Macmillan in 2010.
