David Jacques Farahi
David Farahi, MBA, is an affiliate professor in the School of Hospitality at Metropolitan State University of Denver.
Department: School of Education
Rashad Anderson
Rashad Anderson, Ph.D., serves as an associate professor in the School of Education, and Director of the Call Me MiSTER Program at Metropolitan State University of Denver.
Charlie Buckley
Charlie Buckley, Ph.D., is an associate professor in the School of Education at Metropolitan State University of Denver. Her areas of expertise include inclusive education, supporting students with disabilities including those with significant support needs and autism, and those using alternative and augmentative communication. Buckley focuses on advancing inclusive education practices in public schools and higher education.
Beyond teaching, Buckley co-created the Social Communication and Engagement Triad for the Colorado Department of Education. Additionally, she co-authored and submitted an article titled, “Using a Social Model to Guide Individualized Education Program Development and Change Educational Paradigms to Be Critically Inclusive,” published in the American Speech-Language-Hearing Association Journal and is available in the National Library of Medicine online database.
While at MSU Denver, Buckley led the establishment of the Autism Significant Support Needs Certificate Program at the School of Education. She played a significant role in creating the inclusion strand within the Master of Education in Curriculum and Instruction program. She holds a certificate of clinical competence in Speech-Language Pathology from Colorado State University.
Buckley earned her Ph.D. in Special Education from the University of Northern Colorado and her Master’s of Science in Communication Disorders from Colorado State University.
Kathryn Young
Kathryn Young, Ph.D., is a professor in Secondary Education at Metropolitan State University of Denver and served as a faculty fellow with the Office of Institutional Diversity at the University for a number of years. She earned a Bachelor of Arts in French Education from University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, a Masters of Arts in Teaching in Special Education with a concentration in Emotional and Behavioral Disorders from North Carolina Central University and a Ph.D. in Educational Policy from University of California, Berkeley.
Young has worked as an educator for 25 years and in higher education for the past 14 years. Before becoming a professor she taught French for a year, then English, Math and Science in the Peace Corps, then went on to be a special educator specializing in working with students with Emotional and Behavioral Disabilities. Her research interests include disability studies in education, inclusive education, cultural competence, diversity in higher education, and (Hierarchical) microaggressions in Education and in the workplace. She is an Intercultural Developmental Inventory (IDI) qualified administrator. Young has more than 20 published papers, numerous presentations across her research interests, and a new co-authored book titled Fix Your Climate: A Practical Guide to Reducing Microaggressions, Microbullying, and Bullying in the Academic Workplace.
Alfred Tatum
Alfred Tatum, Ph.D., is a professor in the School of Education at Metropolitan State University of Denver.
Dorothy Shapland
Dorothy Shapland, Ed.D., is an assistant professor at MSU Denver, with expertise in a multitude of areas concerning early childhood education. She has more than 30 years of experience as an early childhood educator. Her research includes relationship building with students and families, social-emotional skill development in the early grades, and creating inclusive learning communities in the early grades. She has presented on a number of topics, such as “Born Scientists: Encouraging and Developing Scientific Inquiry with Young Children,” and “Reducing Challenging Behavior & Supporting Young Children’s Social Emotional Development.” She is a founding member of the VOICES Diversity Council, Division for Early Childhood of the Council for Exceptional Children, and a member of the National Association for the Education of Young Children as well as the Association for Childhood Education International.
Todd Reimer
Todd C. Reimer, Ph.D., is a professor in the Department of Secondary Education at Metropolitan State University of Denver.
In his professional career, Reimer has worked supporting student engagement and learning for over twenty years. He has researched and presented on a wide range of issues during that time, including research on learning communities, performance assessments, online blended learning, and student motivation.
Reimer earned his doctorate in Learning Sciences and a bachelor’s in Secondary Education and Teaching from Northwestern University.
Nhu Nguyen-Siedem
Nguyen-Siedem, Ph.D. is a physical education professor in the School of Education at Metropolitan State University of Denver. She is an avid outdoors enthusiast, mother and teacher, and developed a progressive secondary methods course that became a part of required course curriculum for a K-12 physical education program. The program includes activities such as skateboarding, takraw, rugby, tchoukball and speedball.
When she isn’t teaching and advising her students, she can be seen coaching USA junior national volleyball, or playing the game herself.
Lupe Martinez
Lupe Martinez teaches courses in diversity, classroom management and curriculum, language arts and social studies. He has been teaching at Metropolitan State University of Denver for over 25 years.
The highlight of his MSU Denver career has been the development and implementation of an urban teaching preparation partnership program with Denver Public Schools’ Math and Science Leadership Academy, which has been going strong for more than 15 years. The program is based off of a model, which has been refined and improved over the years, that he presented at an international conference in Barcelona, Spain, in 2013 and at a conference in San Francisco in 2014.
Martinez earned his Associate of Arts from San Francisco City College and his Bachelor of Arts from San Francisco State University. After earning his bachelor’s degree, Martinez joined the Teacher’s Corp. During that time he was a kindergarten and fourth grade elementary school teacher in his hometown neighborhood of San Francisco, interacting with children who reminded him of his younger self. He earned his master’s degree as part of that program and ultimately attained his doctorate from the University of Colorado Boulder.
Besides his presentations on the partnerships for teacher preparation, he has presented papers throughout the United States, in Singapore and in Beijing on diversity and the characteristics of a 21st century educator.
Janelle Johnson
Janelle Johnson, Ph.D., is an associate professor with the School of Education at MSU Denver, where she teaches in STEM teaching and learning. Prior to her current role, she was the STEM equity specialist at MSU Denver and a coordinator for Project SEED-Scholarships for Education and Economic Development at the University of Arizona. Johnson was also the program coordinator for a State Department-funded leadership institute for indigenous university students from Latin America. During this time, she served as a guest researcher at the Center for Research and Higher Education in Social Anthropology. She has also taught math and science to elementary and middle school students.