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Academic Management
I joined KIMEP University as Full Professor of English and Cultural Studies and Research Director in August 2019. In my capacity as Research Director for the College of Humanities and Education, I was responsible for a number of initiatives to promote KIMEP internationally. I launched five new Research Associations in five sub-disciplinary areas to encourage international research collaborations. As part of the suite of progressive measures a new journal, Language, Culture, Environment, was launched and an annual conference initiated.
Between 2019 and 2023 I served on many committees and groups at university and college level. I served on Senate: Academic Council, was Chair of the University Promotions and Retentions Committee, Strategic Research and Research Directors’ Committee, New Library, Systems Centralisation, Journal, Web-Design Committee, through which we established a variety of new websites, and the Environmental Research Association. I was also a member of the Language Research Association, Culture Research Association and Education Research Association. In 2020, I contributed substantially to the strategic plan of the university, setting bold new challenges university-wide.
At National Taiwan University, I focused my attention specifically on research and teaching strategies. I revolutionized teaching in the Department of Foreign Languages and Literatures by designing six to eight new courses every year, both compulsory and elective, initially for graduates but subsequently for undergraduates as well, and by introducing new metacognitive and student-centred methods of teaching and learning.
I directed numerous dissertation students, both undergraduate and graduate, and although I encouraged my own Renaissance Studies students to pursue Ph.D. study in locations with strong archival resources, typically Cambridge, UCL, Yale and Oxford, I guided many other registered students through their Ph.D. years.
I organized faculty lectures and hosted international guest speakers, international conference sessions and workshops. I inaugurated the DFLL’s first graduate conference with Brad Gregory as the guest speaker. Aside from teaching and developing the curriculum, I formulated new international projects, secured funding and managed research budgets. As the screenwriter of ‘Teaching Business English’, a popular television series in China and Taiwan, I was able to provide an invaluable consultancy service for the National Taiwan Language Testing Centre’s courses that were considered second only to the resident Stanford course.
I served as a Project Assessor for the Ministry of Science and Technology in Taiwan and participated in a range of recruitment processes, from setting and grading graduate entrance exams through to assessing prospective undergraduate and Ph.D. students and faculty. I was instrumental in setting up collaborative faculty research and teaching groups and directed two in Metacognition and Renaissance Paratext. Just prior to my departure I directed the International Taiwanese Shakespeare Forum, which organizes conferences, supports workshops and funds faculty research on Shakespeare, and in this capacity I was also a conference organizer for TACMRS.
For over a decade I have been very involved with work at both Cambridge University and the University of Western Australia. In my capacity as Senior Research Fellow and Adjunct Professor at UWA and as St. John’s College’s Lady Margaret Beaufort Fellow, I initiate and develop high quality international research networks, projects and publications. During my most recent Cambridge fellowship, during COVID lockdown, I collaborated with the Cambridge Central Asian Forum to organise a seminar for my Environmental Research Association at KIMEP University. I also collaborated with St. John’s College graduate students to develop a suite of funded mental health and wellbeing projects, from art classes through to gardening. Through my lockdown gallery exhibition, which was subsequently published by Cambridge, I aimed to encourage creative solutions to COVID-19 misery.
In 2021 I received an Adjunct Senior Research Fellowship in Life Sciences at La Trobe University, Australia, that enabled me to pursue important collaborative research and in 2022 I became a Research Associate at Sussex University to facilitate my research on the cultural histories of oceans, seas and shorelines.
Business Management
Technical Illustrations Associates, Manchester: Business Systems Manager, (1984-1991).
I joined as a recent graduate from a Business Studies course, aged 20, and revolutionized the working systems of a newly established company (ex ICI). I reduced working hours and increased profits by introducing computers to the company and designing databases to run the business more efficiently.
I managed the working systems of eight employees, trained assistants and eventually introduced Apple Mac Computer Graphics using prototype technologies and software that had to be self-taught. I could have started a new software company at that point but decided to pursue academic studies instead. By the time I left the company in 1991 it was virtually fully automated.
Dillons (Waterstones) Book Store: Academic Bookseller, (1991-1993).
I dramatically increased sales in the Education and Psychology sections of a new, five-floor, bookstore in Manchester by paying attention to trends and acting on them. I responded to the development of Counselling as a newly professionalised area of Psychology by purchasing all of the key text books to assert Dillons as the brand leader. I also noted the emergence of the Key Stage textbooks to prepare infants for the government’s new testing policies and created a supportive, resourceful purchase area for parents and teachers. I noticed Open University students’ eagerness to ‘block-purchase’ as soon as the reading list was issued each year and guaranteed those sales as well. I liaised with publishers, purchased books, organized public events and offered a range of book services to the public. Although poorly paid, the job fitted in with my decision to return to university and pursue an academic career.
Cheadle Hulme School, Cheadle, Cheshire: School Librarian, (1995).
I took up the role of the School Librarian (maternity cover) to supplement my M.Phil. tuition scholarship at the University of Manchester. I enjoyed the opportunity of working with enquiring young students. Here, I redesigned the library according to the school’s curriculum to facilitate student access to pertinent resources. I was responsible for every aspect of developing and maintaining online and manual library processes and providing library guidance to teachers and students during library lessons.