began my professional career in publishing. Just before graduating from college, I won a trip to New York and one month working as a guest editor at Mademoiselle magazine. It was a great way to get a foot in the door and, after several months at an ad agency, I was invited to return to Mademoiselle to join the editorial creative staff full time.

I spent the next ten years at Condé Nast as an art director of Mademoiselle as well as Self and Vogue. My editorial work was recognized by the Art Director’s Club of New York. I frequently spoke as a guest at the School of Visual Arts and Pratt Institute.

At the same time, I freelanced for retailers Paraphernalia and LadyBug and designed fashion and beauty books for Condé Nast, Viking and Harmony Books, now a division of Random House. I was very fortunate to have worked with some of the most talented editors, writers, photographers and artists of the time. I considered Alexander Liberman, then the editorial director of Condé Nast, my mentor and advocate.

After ten years in publishing, I was interested in working in other media and began a master’s degree in Media Studies. While studying for the degree, I freelanced for Hearst Publishing and Family Circle magazine as well as fashion retailers.

After graduating, I moved from New York to New Jersey to become creative director at the company that owned J. Crew where I launched pilot catalogs for J. Crew Women and built the creative department of Clifford & Wills. Working at  J. Crew led to freelance at the NY agency Commercial Graphics on national accounts.

Unfortunately, directing location photography required a great deal of travel so once my son became school age I sought work closer to home. I art directed New Jersey Monthly magazine and then worked at Montclair State University in the Office of Public Information designing all kinds of educational and promotional materials.

Being on a college campus and having a child sparked my interest in education as well as the Internet. Long before the Web editors and sophisticated graphical browsers we have now, I designed the first two iterations of the Montclair State Web site. At the same time, I began my doctorate in creative arts education at Rutgers.

These interests converged and I soon switched my doctoral program to instructional technology and distance education. Eager to have an immersive experience in Web technologies, I left MSU to go first to Prudential, then to the New Jersey Devils NHL hockey club to create and manage professional Web-based media resources.

At the same time, I freelanced in multimedia development for educational publishers and began creating and teaching my first fully online courses. While completing my doctoral coursework, I taught as halftime faculty at Caldwell College in their arts program. I also taught in the Advanced Technology Institute Webmaster Certification programs of Bloomfield College and in the Web Design degree program at Berkeley College.

I returned to Montclair State while writing my dissertation to work in the College of Education’s Center of Pedagogy where I directed the Curriculum Resource Center. It was the perfect compliment to my interests in print and electronic educational media as well as supporting faculty in the use of technologies in teaching in both K-12 and higher education. I also taught in the literacy master’s program and created materials for the Yogi Berra Museum.

Upon completion of the doctoral degree, I accepted a position in the University IT department. Though I quickly found that I was more interested in education than in IT administration, I had some terrific accomplishments at the University including producing a nationally recognized teacher education program, Digital Backpacks, supported by Apple, Adobe, Inspiration and Handspring.

I participated in beta technology testing, brought profit to a campus technology conference, and performed in an historic international virtual educational conference. At the same time, I completed the Socrate Distance Learning Technologies Group faculty training program and began teaching creative media courses in the fully asynchronous program of the Art Institute, a system of private post-secondary degree-granting on-ground and virtual schools that are part of the Education Management Corporation.

In the fall of 2003, I joined the faculty of East Stroudsburg University in the department of Media Communications and Technology. In 2008, I was promoted to associate professor. I have continued my interest in communications, marketing, electronic media, educational technologies and distance learning.