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Faculty

Full-Time Faculty


David Ryan

Academic Director
(415) 422-5524

David Ryan serves as the Academic Director and Faculty Chair for the Professional Communication and Certificate in Professional Communication programs. He teaches undergraduate courses in rhetoric, focusing on orality and literacy studies, and graduate courses in strategic and technical communication, specializing in strategic planning and usability/UX studies. His research interests relate the intellectual history of technical communication with classicism, human enhancement technologies, and...

Porter Shreve

Administrative Director
(415) 422-6708

Porter Shreve teaches part-time in the MFA in Writing Program and is full-time Director of Administration for the MA in Professional Communication Program. Before coming to USF, he spent eight years as Director of the MFA Program in Creative Writing at Purdue University, where he was also Professor of English. A fiction and nonfiction writer, he is the author of the novels The Obituary Writer, Drives Like a Dream, When the White House Was Ours, and The End of the Book. His books have been...

Education:

MFA, University of Michigan

Myojung Chung

Assistant Professor

Professor Myojung Chung teaches courses in Strategic Communication and is helping to develop the Health Communication concentration in the MAPC at USF. Prior to academia, she worked as a journalist and a strategic communication practitioner. In her research and teaching she focuses on how the emergence of new media influences social and psychological processing of messages. She is also interested in whether there are national or cultural variations in message processing. Prof. Chung also has...

Education:

PhD, Mass Communication, Syracuse University

Moira Gunn

Associate Professor
(415) 422-5427

Associate Professor Moira Gunn is a former NASA scientist, engineer and software programmer. Gunn is internationally recognized for her work with global biotechnology business and emerging global information systems. Her pioneering research continues to investigate and inform the next generation of conscientious developers and leaders in biotechnology and information systems. As one of the leading drivers behind the Business of Biotechnology Program, Gunn teaches classes on the legal, ethical...

Education:

PhD, Mechanical Engineering, Purdue University, Lafayette, IN, MS, Computer Science, Purdue University, Lafayette, IN, BS, Computer Science, USF, CA

Tika Lamsal

Associate Professor
(415) 422-2576

Tika Lamsal received his Master's in English literature from Tribhuvan University, Nepal in 1997 and taught at the Central Department of English, Tribhuvan University for eight years before he came to the U.S. for his studies. He received his PhD in Rhetoric and Composition from the University of Louisville, Kentucky. His dissertation, entitled "Globalizing Literacies and Identities: Translingual and Transcultural Literacy Practices of Bhutanese Refugees in the U.S.," is an ethnographic study...

Education:

PhD in Rhetoric and Composition, University of Louisville, Kentucky, MA in English Literature, Tribhuvan University, Nepal, 1997

Michelle LaVigne

Associate Professor, Public Speaking Director
(415) 422-4366

Michelle LaVigne received her BA in English from the University of Texas, Austin and a PhD in Communication Studies - Rhetoric from the University of Wisconsin, Madison. At USF she teaches written and oral communication classes across disciplines and programs. Her classes focus on multimodality and publicity in academic, civic, and professional contexts. Her research focuses on the intersections between dance, rhetoric, and performance. In particular, Prof. LaVigne writes about the persuasive...

Theodore Matula

Associate Professor
(415) 422-5809

Ted Matula earned his PhD in Communication from The Ohio State University, specializing in rhetorical theory and its usefulness in studying popular culture. In addition to public speaking and written and oral communication, he teaches courses on popular culture, free speech, and communication ethics. His research has been published in Communication Studies and Popular Music and Society.

Education:

PhD, Communication, Ohio State University

Expertise:

Rhetorical theory and its usefulness in studying popular culture

Allison Thorson

Associate Professor
(415) 422-5703

Allison Thorson joined the faculty at USF in 2009. She is a committee member on the Interdisciplinary Minor in Aging and Gerontology and Chair of the Communication Studies Assessment Committee. Professor Thorson's research focuses on interpersonal and family communication with an emphasis on how individuals and families communicatively manage and maintain individual and relational well-being following unexpected, hurtful, or non-normative events — often deemed taboo. Her current research...

Education:

PhD, Communication Studies, University of Nebraska-Lincoln, MA, Missouri State University, BA, University of Northern Iowa

Part-Time Faculty


Mitchell Friedman

Adjunct Professor

Mitchell Friedman, EdD, APR, is a Visiting Associate Professor in the Graduate School of Business and Public Policy at the Naval Postgraduate School (NPS) in Monterey, Calif. Since 2012, he also has served as Northern California Director of the Institute of Advanced Advertising Studies. This industry-sponsored program puts early career advertising agency professionals into real-life marketing environments. Friedman also helps a range of organizations to develop the communications and leadership...

Education:

EdD, Organization and Leadership, University of San Francisco, MA, Modern European History, Stanford University, BA, History, Brandeis University

Expertise:

Public Relations, Management Communication, Crisis Communication

Larry Kamer

Lecturer
(415) 422-5662

Larry began his career as a political campaign manager and consultant, working for former U.S. Senator Paul Simon and Reps. Abner Mikva and Lane Evans of Illinois, and former California Lt. Governor Leo T. McCarthy. Today, he is a veteran public affairs strategist and an expert in the management of difficult, public-facing challenges that determine the future of reputations, brands, and careers. His skills come from more than 30 years' work as a communications consultant, an executive in...

Michael Edward Lenert

Adjunct Professor
(415) 422-5152

Adjunct professor Michael Edward Lenert has 25 years’ experience teaching law, communications, and journalism at the University level, including to MA and PhD-level students. He is a licensed attorney in California with 30 years’ experience and has taught communications law and other classes at the University of San Francisco since 2009. He is a graduate of UC Berkeley and earned his Ph.D. from The University of Texas and his law degree from Georgetown Law School. From 2005-2009, he held the...

Education:

BA, University of California, Berkeley, PhD, University of Texas at Austin

Cynthia Schultes

Adjunct Professor
(415) 422-6862

Cynthia Schultes has taught at Trinity College in Washington, D.C., and Notre Dame Seishin University in Okayama, Japan. At USF, she teaches courses in rhetoric and language as well as historiography.

Education:

PhD, History, The George Washington University

Contact Info

Professional Communication MA

David Ryan, Academic Director

USF Downtown Campus, 101 Howard Street, San Francisco, CA 94105 (415) 422-5524