Fifteen Named Outstanding Faculty

One faculty member in each category will be honored with a Distinguished Faculty award. 

Idaho State University’s 2023 Outstanding Teachers are Jeff Brockett, associate professor in the Doctor of Audiology program in the Department of Communication Sciences and Disorders, Tyler Burch, associate professor of Management in the College of Business, Michael Roche, assistant professor in the Department of English and Philosophy, Marie Stango, assistant professor of history, and Xiaomeng (Mona) Xu, associate professor of psychology and the Director of the Experimental Psychology Ph.D. program. 

Idaho State University’s 2023 Outstanding Service honorees are Hyeri Choi, associate professor of violin, Zackery Heern, chair of the Department of History, Ryan Lindsay, associate professor and chair of the Department of Community and Public Health, Dani Moffit, program director of the Master of Science in Athletic Training program in the College of Health, and Devaleena Pradhan, assistant professor of biological sciences. 

Idaho State University’s 2023 Outstanding Researchers are Cory Bennett, professor of mathematics education and chair of the Department of Teaching and Educational Studies, Zachary Gershberg, associate professor of journalism and media studies, Ryan Lindsay, associate professor and chair of the Department of Community and Public Health, Shannon Kobs Nawotniak, physical volcanologist in the Department of Geosciences, and Joshua K. Swift, associate professor in the Department of Psychology. 

More information about each of the winners is available below: 

Jeff Brockett

Jeff Brockett is an associate professor in the Doctor of Audiology program in the Department of Communication Sciences and Disorders. Classroom and clinical instruction has always been a big part of Brockett’s nearly 30 years at Idaho State University. He was hired in 1994 to establish a Hearing Services Program for the veterans of Southeast Idaho. Clinical instruction to graduate students was his first exposure to teaching but as the audiology program grew, he began teaching lab-based courses and this is where his curiosity in, and passion for teaching began. Since that time, he has taught a wide variety of clinic, lab-based, and classroom courses. Brockett’s interest in teaching lead him to further his education at ISU where he earned an education specialist degree (Ed.S) in 1996, and later a Doctor of Education in Instructional Technology (Ed.D) in 2003.

Brockett has a side interest in the learning style and attitude differences that exist across generations. He has had the opportunity to share this interest through presentations with his department faculty as a means of helping to develop effective teaching strategies in the online environment.

Brockett’s research interests include specialized testing of the middle ear, and also in the area of assessment of the patient with dizziness and balance problems.

Brockett has taught over 22 different graduate and undergraduate courses during his time at ISU in a wide variety of instructional formats including face-to-face, lab, clinic-practicum, multiple campus video-conference, completely online, online supplemented, and pseudo-flipped course modalities. His teaching philosophy is student-centered and focuses on the why as well as the how. 

Tyler Burch

Burch is an associate professor of management. He is absolutely passionate about teaching courses related to organizational behavior, loves the outdoors, and is enamored with his wife Erin and their three children. 

He finds immense purpose and joy in teaching the wonderful students at Idaho State University about leadership, team functioning and organizational behavior-related topics. Burch’s primary research interests include individual psychological withdrawal and embeddedness in organizations, management pedagogy, the work-family interface, and employee voice. His
research has been published in such outlets as the Journal of Business and Psychology, Journal of Organizational Behavior, Journal of Business Ethics, Management Teaching Review, Human Resource Management Review, Journal of Small Business Strategy, Journal of Developmental Entrepreneurship, Annual Review of Organizational Psychology and Organizational Behavior, and Journal of Leadership Studies.

Burch earned his PhD at University of Washington. 

Michael Roche

Michael Roche is an assistant professor in the Department of English and Philosophy. He is from Salt Lake City, and frequently visited Pocatello as a child. In fact, his father (and other relatives) graduated from ISU. That he was thrilled to join ISU in 2019 is thus a serious understatement.

Roche earned his Ph.D. in philosophy from the University of Wisconsin, Madison. Before that, he earned bachelor’s degrees in philosophy and psychology from the University of Utah. 

At ISU, Roche routinely teaches Introduction to Philosophy, Introduction to Logic, and various upper-level courses, including Philosophy of Mind, Philosophy of Language, and Metaphysics. His research focuses on the philosophy of mind and self-knowledge. Roche has taught philosophy at the college level for nearly 18 years (across four universities in four states) and continually strives to improve in the classroom. 

His enthusiasm for philosophy no doubt helps him to be an effective teacher, and he feels privileged to be able to introduce college students to this fascinating and rewarding field. His main goal as a teacher is to strengthen his students’ critical thinking skills. Such skills are highly valued by would-be employers and collaborators. Moreover, because they can be exercised and refined throughout one’s life, students are likely to retain these skills beyond graduation day. Because philosophy is rooted in logic and argument, it is an ideal subject for this aim.

Marie Stango

Stango is a historian of the nineteenth century United States, and Assistant Professor of History at Idaho State University. She is a first-generation college graduate, earning her BA in History from New York University. She went on to earn her PhD in History from the University of Michigan. Stango joined the ISU community in Fall 2019 and teaches courses ranging from General Education undergraduate classes to graduate-level seminars. She offers courses on a variety of topics, including early American history, African American history, women’s and gender history, the U.S. Civil War, and a course on the history of witchcraft and magic. In all her courses, she aims to offer students research opportunities. Stango is committed to equity in the classroom, and she has twice been awarded an Open and Affordable Education Resources grant from ISU to find free or low-cost materials for her General Education courses.

Stango is a “teacher of teachers” who works closely with future K-12 educators pursuing History endorsements, and regularly teaches a course for teacher candidates on History pedagogy. She advises these students and is the College of Education’s content partner in History. Similarly, she supervises MA students in the History department, and has worked with numerous current high school teachers completing their MA in History. Stango regularly provides professional development training for current History teachers, and has served as a featured scholar for the Idaho Humanities Council’s Summer Teacher Institute, which connects Idaho teachers with scholars doing innovative work in humanities fields through a week-long intensive seminar.

Xiaomeng (Mona) Xu:

Xiaomeng (Mona) Xu earned a B.A. from NYU (on Lenape land), an M.A. and Ph.D. from Stony Brook University (on Setauket land), and completed an NIH postdoctoral fellowship at the Alpert Medical School of Brown University and The Miriam Hospital (on Wampanoag and Narragansett land). Dr. Xu joined ISU (on Shoshone-Bannock land) in 2013 and is an associate professor of psychology and the director of the Experimental Psychology Ph.D. Program. She teaches undergraduate and graduate courses, in-person and online, including Social Psychology, Human Sexuality, Professional Development & Writing, and the Teaching of Psychology.  Xu also advises psychology majors and minors and supervises undergraduates and doctoral students through her Teaching, Health, and Optimal Relationships (THOR) laboratory. She includes students in all aspects of her research and mentors student projects including honors, McNair, theses, and dissertations. Additionally, she works with students on manuscripts, grant applications, conference  presentations, and professional development including on teaching.

Xu’s teaching aims are for students to gain appreciation for the research process and psychology as a science, to hone fundamental skills such as critical thinking, and to increase their psychological knowledge so they are better able to understand themselves and others. She regularly attends and presents at at teaching conferences and workshops focused on empirically-based best practices. 

In recognition of her teaching and mentoring, Xu received the Jane S. Halonen Teaching Excellence Award from the Society for the Teaching of Psychology (STP; Division 2 of the American Psychological Association) in 2022. She has also received ISU Outstanding Master Teacher Awards in 2021 and 2018, and been recognized with the Outstanding Experimental Faculty Award from the ISU Psychology Graduate Student Association in 2015 and 2018.

Hyeri Choi

Hyeri Choi is associate professor of violin at Idaho State University where she coordinates the string program, teaches violin, viola, and related academic courses, and directs the string division of the ISU Summer Institute for Piano and Strings. She holds a Doctor of Musical Arts and Masters of Music in Violin Performance from the Eastman School of Music. Hyeri was on the faculty of Mansfield University of Pennsylvania, and Rutgers University’s Mason Gross School of the Arts Extension Division in New Jersey. During the summer, she serves as an assistant concertmaster at the MostArts Festival in Alfred, NY, and she is on the faculty at InterHarmony International Music Festival in Acqui Terme, Italy, and Montecito International Music Festival in Thousand Oaks, CA.

Choi has been the Concertmaster of the Idaho State-Civic Symphony since 2016, and is also a section violin of the Bozeman Symphony Orchestra and the Helena Symphony in Montana, and substitute violinist of the Boise Philharmonic and Spokane Symphony Orchestra in Washington.As a soloist, Hyeri made her New York debut at Weill Recital Hall, Carnegie Hall, as the First Prize Winner of 2014 American Protégé International Strings and Piano Competition. During her Eastman years, she gave a solo recital in the Musicales Concert Series at George Eastman House in 2012. 

As a chamber player, Choi is a violinist in the Monarch Piano Trio at ISU, a member of Duo “Raon,” and a member of the Piano Trio “Dante Deo” which was created by Eastman alumni. She was invited to perform at the 2017 Grand Teton Music Festival (GTMF) Summer Season Preview Concert, and also was invited as a full scholarship fellow of the 1st and 2nd New Mexico Chamber Music Festival in Albuquerque. Hyeri has participated internationally with renowned artists in various summer festivals with full scholarships, including the Kirishima International Music Festival (Japan), the Music Alp Festival (France), and the Music Academy of the West (USA).

Zackery Heern

Heern is a faculty member in history, and he currently serves as chair of the Department of History at ISU. Heern earned his BA in History from UCLA, and he received his MA and PhD in Middle East Studies and World History at the University of Utah. 

Heern has published widely on Shi‘i Islam, Iran, and Iraq, and his book, The Emergence of Modern Shi‘ism: Islamic Reform in Iraq and Iran, was published by Oneworld Publications. His research has been featured in The Economist magazine. Additionally, he has published public-facing articles and his work has appeared in local, regional, and international media. He has served as a peer-reviewer for Harvard’s Islamic law journal, the National Endowment for the Humanities, and Oxford University Press. 

Heern has worked to serve ISU by helping students and faculty, supporting diversity, and developing distance learning initiatives. He helped create online programs for the BA and MA in History, and he has served as a faculty advisor for five student clubs. He also served on ISU’s Faculty Senate, the College of Arts and Letters Executive Committee, and ISU’s EAB leadership team. He has been a liaison between ISU and the Idaho State Board of Education. Heern regularly gives public talks to local organizations about the Middle East and Islam, and he has been a featured speaker at the Illinois Holocaust Museum, Harvard University, and Manchester University.

Ryan Lindsay

Ryan Lindsay, PhD, MPH, is an associate professor and chair of the Department of Community and Public Health. His national professional service highlights include representing Idaho as a voting member of the American Public Health Association’s Governing Council since 2018 and serving as an associate editor of BMC Public Health from 2017-2021. 

State community and professional service includes serving as president of the Idaho Public Health Association (2017), Tobacco Free Idaho Alliance (2021), and secretary and a founding board member of the Idaho Community Health Worker Association since 2020. He enjoys being an active participant on the boards of each of these organizations in order to improve public health for all Idahoans. Since April 2020, he served on the ISU COVID Health Committee that recommends COVID prevention guidelines and oversees screening, contact tracing and vaccination initiatives across the university and secured funding for these services to continue through the 2022-2023 academic year. He also serves on the Garrett Lee Smith grant advisory committee, federally funded youth suicide prevention grant through the Idaho Department of Education.

Dani Moffit

Moffit is the program director of the Master of Science in Athletic Training program in the College of Health. Prior to her time at Idaho State University, Moffit taught and was an athletic trainer for the Meridian School District in Meridian for 10 years, as well as was the undergraduate athletic training program director at Temple University in Philadelphia. 

She is the national chair of the National Athletic Trainers’ Association Connection and Engagement Committee, a CAATE Site Visitor, and has been involved with the BOC Exam Committee for
13 years. She received the NWATA Service Award in 2016, the NATA Service Award in 2017, the NATA Most Distinguished Athletic Trainer Award in 2018, the District Director’s Award in 2019, the ElevATe Award, and the CAATE President’s Award in 2021. She was inducted into the Northwest Athletic Trainers’ Association Hall of Fame in April 2022. 

Moffit volunteers at the Pocatello Free Clinic and is joined by her students to provide medical care at the Pocatello Marathon, the Simplot Games, and the Scout Mountain Ultra.

Devaleena S. Pradhan

Pradhan has been an assistant professor of biological sciences since Fall 2018. 

For four years, she has served as an assistant editor of the journal, Integrative and Comparative Biology, Division of Comparative Physiology and Biochemistry. She is also currently serving on the Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Committee for the Society for Behavioral Neuroendocrinology. 

In 2014, she earned her PhD in Neurobiology and Behavior from Georgia State University, after which she pursued her postdoctoral training at University of California, Los Angeles (2014-2018) and was a lecturer at California State University, Dominguez Hills (2017-2018). She completed her K-12 schooling in India, after which she received her BS and MSc from University of British Columbia. 

Pradhan has published more than 20 papers in both songbird and fish species to uncover how contextual signals from the environment regulate neurophysiology, morphology, and social behavior, and these papers have received more than 600 citations. During her training, Pradhan received major research grants and fellowships from both Canada and the United States. In 2015, she also received the Dorothy Skinner Award by the Society for Integrative and Comparative Biology, which recognizes women scientists in the early stages of their career for high scholarship. 

Throughout her higher education, Pradhan has been committed to teaching in environments diverse as classrooms, laboratories, field stations, and outreach educational programs. Mentoring has been a big part of her career since she started graduate school and has trained over 60 high school students, undergraduates, and graduate students combined. Many of her trainees have presented their research at both institutional and international conferences, have published papers as her co-authors, and have gone on to successful paths, including graduate, veterinary, and medical fields. She regularly provides science engagement activities to the community through topics and activities that intersect with her passions and expertise in research and teaching. In 2022, she received a National Science Foundation CAREER Award, a part of which supports her science engagement outreach activities at ISU and the community at large.

Cory Bennett

Bennett is a professor of mathematics education and chair of the Department of Teaching and Educational Studies within the College of Education. His research centers on mathematical discourse, creating classroom cultures of reasoning, and developing instructional leaders' praxis. He works with educators and educational leaders, both locally and globally, to advance understandings in the teaching and learning of mathematics and to support instructional leaders' capacity to create effective systems and high quality, student-centered learning structures within STEM content areas.

Zachary Gershberg

Gershberg is an associate professor of journalism and media studies at Idaho State University. He was the lead author for The Paradox of Democracy: Free Speech, Open Media, and Perilous Persuasion (2022), co-written with Sean Illing, of Vox, for the University of Chicago Press. Since its release, the book has been the subject of discussion in the New York Times, NPR, Lawfare, Radio New Zealand, and the International Journal of Communication, among other publications and venues. Gershberg, who earned a Ph.D. at Louisiana State University, explores media ecology, journalism history, and political communication in his research. Other works of his can be found in collected volumes such as Global Journalism: Understanding World Media Systems (2021) and The Rhetoric of Fascism (2022). At ISU, Gershberg teaches a range of courses including Media Literacy, Feature Writing, and Mass Media History, Law, and Ethics.

Shannon Kobs Nawotniak

Kobs Nawotniak is a physical volcanologist in the Department of Geosciences at ISU, where she has been since 2011. She earned her BS Geology from Michigan Technological University and her PhD Geology from the University at Buffalo. She is particularly interested in the connections between volcanic processes and the resulting geologic products, allowing us to interpret the past on Earth and other planets. She has been involved with analog research in support of space exploration for nearly a decade, becoming a specialist in operationalizing scientific exploration for robotic and human missions. She has served as an astronaut for simulated missions to Mars, worked in the Mission Control science backroom team for NASA's rehearsals for the Artemis 3 return to the Moon, and discovered a new hydrothermal vent system in the Pacific Ocean. 

Ryan Lindsay

Lindsay, PhD, MPH, is an associate professor and chair of the Department of Community and Public Health. As a trainee and faculty member, he has more than 15 years of experience conducting public health research and evaluation through epidemiologic observational and experimental study designs. He has been involved in Community Health Worker workforce development and evaluation in Idaho since 2016 and was recently awarded a $3 million federal Community Health Worker Training Program award through the Human Resources and Services Administration (HRSA). 

At ISU, Lindsay has been awarded over $5 million as primary or co-primary investigator. He has led research in how substance use, including smoking, influences communicable disease infection and progression. His research has highlighted the plight of people living with HIV/AIDS and/or addiction, people experiencing homelessness or disability, immigrants, and sex worker populations.

Joshua K. Swift

Swift is an associate professor in the Department of Psychology and a core faculty member in the Clinical Psychology Doctoral Program. He has been a faculty member at Idaho State University for the past seven years. Prior to that he was a faculty member at the University of Alaska Anchorage. He completed his doctoral degree in clinical psychology at Oklahoma State University, a doctoral internship at SUNY Upstate Medical University, and his undergraduate degree in psychology at Brigham Young University. In the Department of Psychology at ISU he teaches graduate courses on ethics and clinical supervision and undergraduate courses on psychopathology and clinical psychology.

Swift is a psychotherapy process and outcome researcher. In conducting this research he focuses on identifying processes and developing methods for encouraging treatment-seeking in individuals with a mental health need, retaining clients in psychotherapy once they have begun it, and maximizing the gains that clients can experience while in treatment. He has published nearly 100 peer-reviewed journal articles and a book on premature termination in psychotherapy, and has over 100 professional conference presentations. In conducting this research he collaborates with colleagues across the globe, including the recent completion of a Fulbright Award in Taipei, Taiwan.