Kate White

Kate White

  • Student Success Center

    Assistant Director for Language Learning Services

Office Location

Charles Library 230

Phone

215-204-0703

Contact:

  • With questions about our Conversation Partners program
  • If you are an instructor, and you want to talk about language learning resources
  • For verification that you (or your student) utilized the Conversation Partners program
  • If you have questions about supporting international students and/or language learners

Kate has always loved languages and linguistics. She holds a Bachelor's degree in Russian from the University of South Carolina and a PhD in Slavic Linguistics and Second Language Acquisition from the Ohio State University. Kate believes that learning cannot be divorced from context, cultural or otherwise, and is very interested in encouraging learners' intercultural and interactional competencies — in other words, improving how we teach and learn how to do things with language in context. Kate began her professional career as a postdoctoral fellow and Russian instructor at Rice University in Houston, TX, where she developed workshops for faculty related to topics in second language acquisition, evidence-based teaching approaches, and confronting assumptions about teaching and learning. She has also taught courses in intercultural competence and Russian language, literature, culture, and film. She then worked at Western Michigan University and with national stakeholders and collaborators as the Research Director and Program Manager of the Accelerating Systemic Change Network, a professional network focused on systemic improvement of STEM education programs. In this position Kate is excited for the opportunity to deepen and diversify our understanding of language use and language learning, and to work with the students, tutors, and conversation partners at the Student Success Center.

Kate is from the Atlanta, GA, area and has lived in seven different U.S. states. When possible, she enjoys knitting, sewing, reading (fiction and nonfiction), drinking tea, listening to podcasts, volunteering, and watching hockey. On the weekends you can often find her in a coffee shop or bookstore, knitting and getting lost in a new book.