College of Charleston Welcomes New Faculty

The College of Charleston is proud to welcome its new faculty members. With a diversity of expertise in a variety of disciplines, they come excited and ready to teach, mentor and inspire students across campus.

Over the fall semester, The College Today has been introducing these Cougars to campus a few at a time – in no particular order – giving the CofC community the opportunity to get to know them all a little better.

Please give a warm welcome to the faculty members in the third of this introductory series, and check out the Faculty & Staff News page to learn about other new faculty members!

Rochelle Altman ’99
Visiting Instructor, Department of Health and Human Performance

Background: Proud CofC graduate! A first-generation graduate from Dillon, South Carolina. Trained as a psychologist with work history in San Diego, California, and locally.

Expertise: My research interests center on understanding and addressing mental health and health disparities affecting children, young adults and other vulnerable populations. I focus on how inequities in education and access to health-promoting resources, including green spaces, shape mental well-being and overall health outcomes. By exploring these critical issues, I aim to advance public health efforts that promote equity and resilience in underserved communities.

Outside Interests: I enjoy high altitude thru-hiking, which involves long-distance hiking on trails at higher elevation

Looking Forward: I look forward to engaging with the diverse student body and interacting with colleagues.

Gaëlle Blanvillain ’05 (M.S.)
Visiting Assistant Professor, Department of Biology

Background: I grew up in the south of France and attended universities there for both undergraduate and graduate education. I then had the opportunity to work on sea turtle conservation in Costa Rica before deciding to pursue a master’s degree in marine biology at the College of Charleston. From there, I moved to Chapel Hill, North Carolina, and then I worked as a research assistant for the National Center for Scientific Research at an ecology station in the Pyrenees mountains of southern France. My family then relocated to Colorado, before I decided to get my Ph.D. in biological sciences at Virginia Tech, which I completed this summer.

Expertise: My area of expertise is in infectious diseases in wildlife with an emphasis in conservation biology and ecophysiology. 

Outside Interests: I love hiking and camping, and traveling the world with my husband and daughter. Every summer we spend a month in Europe to reconnect with my family and discover new places. I also love food and enjoy cooking almost every night at my house! 

Looking Forward: I am excited about teaching courses in areas that I have worked in for so long. I am also excited to connect with students and implement active learning strategies.

Madison Crow ’20
Adjunct Faculty, Department of Hispanic Studies

Background: I am from Nashville, Tennessee, but I am proud to say I am a graduate of CofC. Before returning to my alma mater, I taught English in Spain, completed my master’s in Latin American studies at Vanderbilt University and worked in Metro Nashville Public Schools with newly arrived, Spanish-speaking students. I am thrilled that life has brought me back to beautiful Charleston and to the College!

Expertise: While a student at CofC, I worked closely with the Migrant Education Program and the local school district to conduct research regarding the experiences of Indigenous language–speaking adults from Latin America in the Charleston area. While in graduate school, I furthered my interests in this area by learning Maya K’iche’ both in Nashville and in Xela, Guatemala, and with my master’s thesis, which centered on the experiences of Indigenous language–speaking students from Latin America in public schools. While teaching Spanish at the College of Charleston, I am looking forward to engaging my interests in the Spanish language and my love of teaching, and reconnecting with the diverse linguistic communities in Charleston.

Outside Interests: When I am not teaching, I love reading, talking my dog to the beach, rollerblading, trying new restaurants and traveling!

Looking Forward: The most exciting element about teaching Spanish is the opportunity to see students really use their language skills in their lives – whether that be abroad or right here in Charleston.

Michael Ferguson
Adjunct Faculty, Department of History

Background: I am originally from Danbury, Connecticut, and just moved to the greater Charleston area this summer! I received both my M.A. and my B.A. degrees from Western Connecticut State University and taught at multiple higher education institutions in the state. Additionally, I served as a state representative in the Connecticut General Assembly from 2017–19 and was previously a member on my local school board in Danbury.  

Expertise: I focus on American politics and history. My areas of focus include 20th-century history, elections, campaigns, political strategies, voting patterns, political parties, local political dynamics, the presidency and analysis of elections.

Outside Interests: I am always interested in learning and seeking to improve my skillsets. Additionally, I enjoy cooking and trying new recipes. I like to travel with my wife and explore places both near and far. I am also a sports fan and enjoy watching sports, especially baseball as I am a big New York Yankees fan!

Looking Forward: The chance to interact with students from all over the country will be exciting as we will all have the chance to gain different insights and perspectives. I will be teaching survey sources, which will provide the chance to help students see the value that can come from understanding our history and how we can actively participate in the political process!

Sarah Franco
Visiting Assistant Professor, Department of English

Background: I hold a Ph.D. in composition and rhetoric from the University of New Hampshire and I have taught writing and literature courses throughout New England since 2007. I recently became certified in the teaching of mindfulness, a science-based practice, and I regularly integrate mindfulness practices with the teaching of writing.

Expertise: My research interests include first-year writing, veteran studies, psychotherapy and narrative therapy, the psychology of mindfulness, and feminist research methodologies. 

Outside Interests: I love learning about local histories, hearing people’s stories and building connections to the past and the people who’ve come before us. 

Looking Forward: I am most excited about getting to know CofC students and exploring with them how different modes of communication can shape the stories they tell!

Caroline Guthrie ’10
Visiting Assistant Professor, Department of Communication

Background: I earned my master’s in media, culture and communication at New York University and my Ph.D. in cultural studies at George Mason University in Fairfax, Virginia. My book, The American Historical Imaginary: Contested Narratives of the Past, was published by Rutgers University Press in 2022. Before all that, I was an undergraduate student here at the College of Charleston, so it’s great to have come full circle! 

Expertise: My main areas of research are popular culture (particularly film and television) and intersectional feminism. My recent work has focused on how the past is portrayed in popular media influences contemporary understandings of national identity. 

Outside Interests: Lately, I’ve been enjoying gardening a lot; I planted a lot of new flowers in my yard over the summer. Given my research interests, it’s probably no surprise that I’m a big fan of movies, and I really love finding offbeat or surprising films from the classic era. 

Looking Forward: My classes provide a thorough examination of the role of media in shaping our lives and culture. We live in an incredibly media-saturated world, but society hasn’t had the opportunity to catch up in terms of media literacy. I give students the tools they need to be savvy consumers and creators of a variety of media forms, and I think that’s pretty exciting!

Tom Hicks
Assistant Professor/Artistic Director of the International Piano Series, Department of Music

Background: As a recitalist and chamber musician, I perform internationally and have appeared as a concerto soloist on more than 60 occasions. I am a Yamaha Artist. My recordings for the Metier, Nimbus and Divine Arts labels include works by Tchaikovsky, Liszt, John Ireland, Rebecca Clarke, Samuel Coleridge-Taylor, Camden Reeves and Augusta Read Thomas. My recording of Liszt and Ireland was selected as American Records Guide’s Critics Choice of 2022, and my recording of Augusta Read Thomas was selected as BBC Music Magazine’s Recording of the Month. I most recently recorded the complete nocturnes by Chopin for release in 2025. I am a gold medallist in numerous competitions and hold degrees and awards from the University of Manchester, the Royal Northern College of Music, Yale University and Northwestern University. My teachers have included Mervyn Grand, Murray McLachlan, Christopher Elton, Boris Berman and James Giles.

Looking Forward: Working with music students is incredibly rewarding because you get to witness them gain skills and confidence first at the piano (in my case) and then in their wider lives.

Hannah Hoover
Adjunct Faculty, Department of Sociology and Anthropology

Background: I grew up in Nashville, Tennessee, and received a B.A. from Tulane University with majors in anthropology and classical studies. I am currently a Ph.D. candidate at the University of Michigan. I’ve lived in the Lowcountry for the past three years while working on my dissertation research, and have mentored several College of Charleston students through archaeological fieldwork. I’m excited to extend my interactions with CofC in the classroom!

Expertise: I apply a wide range of material analyses to understand the daily decisions people make in contexts of political transformation. I am especially interested in the entanglements of Indigenous sovereignty and settler colonialism in the past and present, and work with a multi-vocal praxis that centers Indigenous voices and scholarship. My current research focuses on the Yamasee, a Native American community who built a powerful nation in South Carolina at the turn of the 18th century. 

Outside Interests: I love being outdoors and am an avid walker/explorer of the historic towns and landscapes of South Carolina. I also enjoy reading, listening to podcasts and spending time with my cats, Phatty and Phridge.

Looking Forward: I’ll be teaching Introduction to Anthropology and am eager to explore with students both the diversity of the human experience and the things that bind us all together. 

Alexis Johnson
Community Oral Historian and Project Coordinator, College of Charleston Libraries

Background: I am from Cheraw, South Carolina. I earned my bachelor’s degree in English from Francis Marion University in 2013 and my master’s degree in Pan-African studies (African American studies concentration) from the University of Louisville in 2015. After completing my master’s degree, I served as a writing center coordinator at Northeastern Technical College and then as an academic advising director at Francis Marion University. After nearly three years in higher education administration, I began my Ph.D. in social foundations of education (history of education concentration) at the University of Virginia. There, I served as an associate director of the teachers in the Movement Oral History Project and a co-principal investigator for the National Park Service’s Carter G. Woodson Home National Historic Site Ethnographic Resource Study. After earning my Ph.D. in 2023, I started at the College of Charleston Libraries in my current role.

Expertise: Oral history, history of African American education, history of higher education, Black intellectual history, 20th-century Black freedom movements and student activism

Outside Interests: I love to bake and enjoy spending time with family. I am a bunny mom to Dash, and collect teacups and Black Santa Clauses!

Looking Forward: I have been out of the classroom for a few years, so I very much look forward to teaching again. I will be teaching in the Department of History and am grateful for the opportunity to contribute to the department’s public history concentration by providing courses in oral history. Oral history challenges the historically oppressive and extractive practices of outsiders telling the stories and histories of historically marginalized communities and empowers these communities to have ownership of their histories. My hope is that teaching this liberatory method will inspire students to become oral historians.

Latoya Joseph
Adjunct Faculty, Department of Teacher Education

Background: I was born in Jamaica, West Indies, and raised in New York. I have a B.A. in English from the University of Maryland, College Park, and a master of arts in teaching from Johns Hopkins University. My background includes work as an elementary and middle grades teacher, work in curriculum design and instruction and work in high school leadership and administration.

Outside Interests: My hobbies include traveling, reading and spending time with my children at their various soccer, basketball and football games.

Looking Forward: At the College of Charleston, I am most looking forward to working with students who are preparing to enter the field of teaching and education. I am thrilled to support and help usher a new batch of educators into this rewarding field.

Martin Kociolek
Visiting Assistant Professor, Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry

Background: I am originally from Bethlehem, Pennsylvania. I received my bachelor’s degree in chemistry from Syracuse University and my Ph.D. from the University of New Hampshire. I recently “retired” from Penn State after 25 years at Penn State Behrend in Erie, Pennsylvania, where I was a faculty member in chemistry and served 10 years as director (dean) of the School of Science. 

Expertise: My broad area of expertise is organic chemistry with interests in the chemical and biological properties of organic heterocycles. Additionally, I have done consulting and research in the area of biodiesel production.

Outside Interests: Outside of work, I love to cook, hike and do DIY projects around the house.

Looking Forward: I still continue to be fascinated by the creativity and complexity of organic molecules, forming the basis of life and the foundation for so many things in the world around us. After a significant number of years in administration, I eagerly look forward to getting back into the classroom and passing on this fascination to my students.

Roy Martin
Assistant Professor, Department of Accounting and Business Law

Background: I started my accounting career on the Bearing Sea of Alaska before moving on to the University of Washington for my undergraduate and master’s degrees in accounting. I operated my own public accounting firm focused on tax consulting, planning and compliance. In 2019 I sold my practice and began the Ph.D. program at Oklahoma State, and I graduated in May 2024.

Expertise: My research interests are in corporate tax behavior and tax policy, with some expertise in partnership taxation.

Outside Interests: I’m an avid motorcycle rider.

Looking Forward: Students learning practical and actionable knowledge to help them create successful careers in business.

Taryn Zlatin McKenzie
Adjunct Faculty, Department of Management and Marketing

Background: Bachelor of science in marketing from the University of Maryland Honors Department, graduated summa cum laude. Executive graduate degree in business management from Harvard University. Currently pursuing Ph.D. at Anderson University for organizational leadership. From Baltimore and currently live in Mount Pleasant. Lead people services at Booz Allen.

Expertise: Emotional intelligence organizational culture: employee engagement, human-centric leadership, marketing org and development leadership

Outside Interests: Yoga, pickleball, reading, boating, swimming, anything near the water

Looking Forward: I will be able to add real-world examples and experiences to the lessons! Can’t wait!

David Merkel
Adjunct Faculty, Department of International Studies

Background: I previously served as deputy assistant secretary of state for European and Eurasian affairs, a director on the National Security Council, as well as deputy assistant secretary of the U.S. Treasury Department, senior professional staff on the U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Committee and senior foreign and defense policy advisor for the U.S. House leadership. I have lived and worked in Africa, Asia and Europe. I was an associate fellow with IISS, as well as a nonresident senior fellow with the Atlantic Council and Johns Hopkins SAIS. 

Expertise: Great power competition; U.S. foreign policy; Russia, Europe, Asia; and the geopolitics of energy

Outside Interests: Travel and reading

Looking Forward: My class explores the arena, players and challenges of today, providing the student with an opportunity to understand the competition between great powers, their interests and the interests of the countries of the Global South Plus, and the challenge of cooperation and preventing large-scale war.

Kelly Owen ’99 (M.A.)
Adjunct Faculty, Department of Hospitality and Tourism Management

Background: For 22 years, I taught thousands of students from middle school to the military, high school to higher education – most of them at my master’s alma mater, the College of Charleston. During this time, I developed the English curriculum for the First-Year Experience Hospitality and Tourism course. In 2018, I returned to hospitality to open Salamander Hospitality’s Hotel Bennett as the executive assistant and special projects coordinator. As the executive assistant to the president and office manager of Beemok Hospitality Collection, I look forward to returning to the classroom where the BHC team and I will explore defining and delivering luxury in the inaugural course, Luxury Hospitality Experience Management.

Expertise: Hospitality experience development, effective hospitality and training programs, and culture building

Outside Interests: Running, writing, reading, cooking and gardening

Looking Forward: Hospitality is a fast-paced, ever-changing landscape, which continues to evolve in Charleston and of which BHC is intricately excited about. We look forward to sharing our hospitality hopes and insights with students and the community. 

Dylan Rollo
Visiting Assistant Professor, Department of Communication

Background: I’m from Olathe, Kansas, which is outside of Kansas City. Most of my life has been in the Midwest, with the exception of a few years in New York state, so I hope I can adjust to the South! I got my B.A. at Drake University in Iowa before heading to Syracuse University for my M.A. and returning to the Midwest to get my Ph.D. from Northwestern University. I just finished two years at Drake, my alma mater, as visiting assistant professor of rhetoric in the English department.

Expertise: I am a rhetorician and communication scholar by training, with particular emphasis on critical cultural approaches to visual and architectural imaginings. I use an interdisciplinary body of materialist, queer and rhetorical theory to study the imaginative resources offered by utopian media, aesthetics of difference and visionary architectural designs.

Outside Interests: In the past few years I have been taking figure drawing and other visual art courses, which has been an immensely rewarding pastime. I previously served as the GM for a several-years-long D&D campaign that I would love to start back up, time permitting! Otherwise, I enjoy watching too much YouTube and Dropout, occasional video gaming and cuddling with my dog, Vinci.

Looking Forward: I’ll be teaching a course sequence, COMM 280 & 281, which will give us the opportunity to develop larger-scale projects over the course of two semesters! I am really looking forward to what students come up with and how I can help them follow their curiosity into some fascinating areas of research and discovery.

Donna Sanderson
Adjunct Faculty, Department of Teacher Education

Background: I am originally from Malvern, Pennsylvania, located in the western suburbs of Philadelphia, and I just move to Charleston in August 2024. My educational background began at James Madison University, where I earned a B.S. in early childhood education, and Widener University, where I earned a M.Ed. in elementary education and a reading specialist certification. My doctoral program was completed at University of Pennsylvania for an Ed.D. in reading/writing/literacy and a principal certification. Professionally I taught in public schools in Pennsylvania, was a head of school and a district elementary education supervisor. For the last two decades-plus of my career, I was a professor at West Chester University in the early and middle grades program, and absolutely loved working with my advisees, teaching my students and interacting and collaborating with my colleagues. I’m excited and honored to start my next teaching chapter here at the College of Charleston. 

Expertise: My research interests over the past 25 years have focused on early literacy skills, the art of play in education, using hands-on manipulatives as teaching tools and the importance of service-learning experiences for teacher candidates. I have written numerous academic journal publications on the topics and have brought undergraduate students to many different countries to gain international teaching experience.  

Outside Interests: I enjoy being active and outside. As a former college swimmer I still like to “move” on a daily basis and find myself in the gym or going on long walks all over the peninsula. I enjoy spending time with family, cooking and eating out, and I’m always cheering on my hometown sports teams. 

Looking Forward: I am excited to teach a course on curriculum, instruction and literacy assessment to teacher candidates pursuing their South Carolina teaching credentials. I look forward to working with CofC students out in the nearby elementary classrooms as they practice teaching youngsters literacy skills and strategies. I am eager to watch their interactions with their young students while also watching their confidence and enthusiasm for the profession rise. 

Meg Skow ’82
Adjunct Faculty, Department of Teacher Education

Background: My educational background includes a B.A. in fine arts from the College of Charleston; Gifted Education Endorsement from Charleston Southern University; National Board Certified in art/early adolescence through young adulthood; and postgraduate coursework at The Citadel, University of South Carolina, Charleston Southern University and College of Charleston. I taught art in Dorchester District Two for 39 years (14 years at the elementary level and 25 years at Rollings Middle School of the Arts). I’m am an active member in SCAEA and NAEA (professional art ed organizations). I have taken students on tours to Europe since 2014. This trips are so impactful and meaningful for my travelers and me. 

Expertise: Arts, culture and learning styles

Outside Interests: Art and travel are passions of mine. I enjoy painting, drawing, sculpting and photography. I also enjoy traveling and exploring cultures of other countries – leading groups or alone. 

Looking Forward: Understanding and using the arts in integrated instruction is valuable. Learning by actually making art and performing is fun! Making connections among the arts and other disciplines makes the learning more engaging and lasting.