Consultant Bios

Jill Belli received a B.A. in English & Classical Studies from the University of Pennsylvania and is currently a Ph.D. candidate in the English Program at the CUNY Graduate Center. Her dissertation explores the intersections among Happiness Studies (cultural representations, scientific research, policy development), pedagogies & educational curriculum, and Utopian Studies (theory, literature, & the "utopian impulse" broadly conceived). In additional to completing doctoral certificates in American Studies and Interactive Technology & Pedagogy, Jill also researches and writes about Composition & Rhetoric and the Digital Humanities. Along with much enthusiasm, she brings to the Baruch Writing Center her experiences teaching composition and literature courses at Baruch College, Queens College, & Stern College for Women, working with faculty and students as an Instructional Technology Fellow at Macaulay Honors College & Baruch College, and creating (as the Society's web developer) a new interactive digital space for the Society for Utopian Studies.

Keri Bertino (on leave through mid-April 2012), Director of the Writing Center, holds a BA from Vassar College and an MFA in Writing from Columbia University. She has taught in Columbia's Undergraduate Writing Program, and worked at both Columbia's Writing Center and The Cooper Union's Center for Writing and Language Arts. Before graduate studies, Keri taught high school English through Teach For America in Baltimore; she has also done freelance curriculum writing for Teach For America and KIPP Schools. Her interests include the use of narrative in scholarship, bridging secondary and post-secondary education, and urban education.  She co-teaches the Honors Thesis Writing Workshop and is the co-coordinator of the Writing Across the Curriculum program at Baruch.

Keridiana Chez is a PhD candidate in English at CUNY's Graduate Center. She has taught English at Queens College and the NYC College of Technology, Women's Studies at Brooklyn College, and writing at the Cooper Union Center for Writing. Her areas of expertise include critical and close reading, brainstorming and outlining, crafting flow between ideas, and organizing essays.

John Deming holds a BA in Journalism from the University of New Hampshire and an MFA in Poetry from The New School. His main areas of interest include argumentative essays, critical reviews, and literary analysis with a special emphasis on 20th and 21st Century American poetry. He has taught and tutored native and multilingual writers at Baruch College, The New School and Borough of Manhattan Community College. He is a published poet and journalist and edits the poetry book review journal Coldfront Magazine.

DJ Dolack (Acting Co-Director, Spring 2012) is also the Writing and Communications Coordinator at the Student Academic Consulting Center (SACC). He holds a BFA from Emerson College and an MFA from Vermont College. He has been at Baruch since 2007 and teaches ENG 2100/2150. His poetry and reviews have been widely published, and he is also a contributing writer and the video editor at Coldfront Magazine.

Luke Fiske holds a BA in English Literature and Philosophy from the
University of Cape Town, South Africa, and received a Master1s Degree in
Fine Arts from New York University. He has taught writing at the University
of Cape Town, and is currently a Lecturer in Expository Writing at New York
University, where he also works with the Honors students in Psychology. His
particular expertise is on essay structure, the use of evidence, and
sentence patterns. Other interests include economics, cognitive science,
and fiction.

Garth Risk Hallberg holds a B.A. from Washington University in St. Louis and an MFA from NYU. His areas of interest include English and world literature, history rhetoric, philosophy, and literary style. The author of A Field Guide to the North American Family, he is a 2008 Fellow in Fiction from the New York Foundation for the Arts, and teaches at Fordham University.

Dawn Jordan received her MA in TESOL from Hunter College and her MA in Media Studies from The New School. Besides her experience as a Consultant at Baruch's Writing Center since 2005, Dawn brings an extensive background of teaching and tutoring multilingual students, in particular, from her work in academic programs at LaGuardia and Hunter Colleges. She has focused on teaching writing, ranging from ACT exam preparation to writing skills for an MCAT review course. Currently, she teaches writing to English as a Second Language (ESL) students at LaGuardia. 

Matt Lombardi holds a BFA from Emerson College and an MFA in Fiction from The New School, where he was a teaching fellow in The Riggio Honors Program: Writing and Democracy. Before graduate studies, he tutored and taught English abroad to students in Chile, Thailand and Hungary. His areas of interest include American literature and travel writing.

Kalpana Narayanan holds a BA from Georgetown University and an MFA from Columbia University, where she taught writing. She is a 2010 Fellow in Fiction from the New York Foundation for the Arts, and currently teaches at Parsons The New School for Design. Her areas of interest include the intersection between academic and creative writing, film theory, and fiction.

Jono Mischkot received his MA in English from San Francisco State University and his MFA from the New York University Writing Program.  He is currently a fulltime Lecturer in the Expository Writing Program at NYU, but has taught a variety of subjects: Literature, Creative Writing, Grammar, and Basic Composition.  His areas of expertise are literary interpretation, essay organization, brainstorming ideas, and creative writing.

Rachel Riederer holds a BA in Environmental Science from Harvard and an MFA in Nonfiction Writing from Columbia. She has taught in Columbia's undergraduate writing program and writing center, and worked as an admissions essay consultant for pre-med students at Columbia's School of General Studies. Before going back to school for her MFA, Rachel was a grant writer at a New York City homelessness organization. Her journalism and essays have appeared in the 2011 Best American Essays collection, The Nation, The Rumpus, The Missouri Review, and others. She is especially interested in helping students achieve clarity in their writing and finding revision processes that suit their writing styles

Heather Samples (Acting Co-Director, Spring 2012) holds a BA from Johns Hopkins University and an MFA from Columbia University. Her areas of interest include the relationships between writing and other scholarly disciplines; the interplay between memory, narrative and rhetoric; and Appalachian folklore. Heather has taught writing in both traditional classrooms and writing centers at Columbia University and the Cooper Union for the Advancement of Art and Science, and is currently at work on a novel.

Kathleen Savino holds a BA in English from Montclair State University and an MFA in fiction writing from Columbia University. She also works for Columbia's Writing Center and as a writing instructor for LEDA (Leadership Enterprise for a Diverse America), a non-profit program that helps underprivileged high school students apply for college. Her specialties include: brainstorming, literary analysis, application writing, creative writing, gender studies, and ESL. She has published work in the Columbia Poetry Review and Venus Magazine.

Joshua Weber holds a BA in English Literature from Southern Methodist University, and received a MFA from New York University. He has taught creative writing and is currently a Lecturer in Expository Writing at NYU. His areas of expertise are in literary interpretation, essay structure, brainstorming ideas, and critical reading. Other interests are history, film, and fiction.

Alex Welcome is a PhD candidate in Sociology at CUNY's Graduate Center. He has taught Social Theory and Research Methods at Queens College. He has also taught Race and Ethnicity at City College. He specializes in critical reading, APA formatting, and argumentative essays.

Franklin Winslow received his MFA in writing from Columbia University. His areas of interest include the poetics of dislocation, the aesthetics of narrative prose, and the interplay of linear and lyric thought. Charles Portis' True Grit, Michio Kaku's Hyperspace, and Ludwig Wittgenstein's Philosophical Investigations are three of his favorite books. He has taught composition at CUNY Baruch and John Jay College of Criminal Justice. He has also led writing workshops and seminars throughout the city. His fiction and reviews have appeared Publishers Weekly, The New Criterion, The L Magazine, and Art Asia Pacific.