Anansa is a second-year student in the MA Applied Linguistics program. Hailing from Troy, NY, she graduated from the University of Rochester with a B.A. in Linguistics in 2015. As an undergraduate, she was most interested in the linguistic connection between West African languages and liturgical languages used in African based religions in Latin America. Anansa is fueled by the power of language to include and empower, particularly when it comes to English Language Learners and speakers of non-standard dialects of English. She believes that nuances of language use are vital in humanizing, affirming, and validating our lives. Anansa also enjoys sudoku puzzles, card writing, reading memoirs, and playing pick-up basketball.
Laurel Dispenza (Research Operations co-chair)
Laurel is in her second year of pursuing a masters in applied linguistics. Her love for languages surfaced as a little girl, but her experience studying and working abroad deepened that love and revealed a curiosity about linguistics. It's the fascinating interaction of identity and language that's found in sociolinguistics, as well as the desire to help students find their voices that keeps Laurel motivated to learn more. When she's not running, baking, or writing, Laurel can be found analyzing the accents of her friends.
Kelly Frantz (Research Operations co-chair)
Kelly is a second-year Master's student in Applied Linguistics at Teachers College, Columbia University. She discovered her passion for language during her undergraduate studies at Allegheny College, where she studied Spanish and Portuguese. After spending a year as a Fulbright English Teaching Assistant in Ecuador, she decided to pursue language research in order to better understand effective learning and teaching practices. She is specifically interested in using conversation analysis to examine the development of interactional competence in learners over time. In her free time, you can find her running through Central Park or cozying up with a cup of coffee and her Russian homework.
Deepika Vasudevan (Social Operations co-chair)
Deepika is a second year student in the MA TESOL (General) program at Teachers College. Originally from India, she got her bachelor's degree in Computer Science and left that professional field for the glamorous world of teaching English, after earning her CELTA certificate. She taught ESL for two years where she realized her need to further strengthen her pedagogical fundamentals. A year into the master's program, she is deeply interested in sociolinguistics and how discourse in general is used to do certain things in certain ways. When she's not geeking out about Phonetics or Discourse Analysis, she enjoys cooking and baking, and dreaming about learning new languages