Tufts Travel-Learn Faculty Hosts

Constance Toth Berindei, Lecturer, Romance Languages
Constance Toth-Berindei received a B.A. degree in English and a M.A. degree in Italian literature with a thesis on Cesare Pavese from the University of Minnesota. She studied in Italy at the Universita per Stranieri in Perugia and in Siena. She lived and worked in Rome as a translator for Italian film, a teacher of English as a second language, and on various projects for the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations. She has been teaching Italian at Tufts for twenty years and is on the editorial staff of the arts, sciences, and engineering bulletin of Tufts. Professor Berindei has lived and studied in both Tuscany (Siena) and Umbria (Perugia) and has traveled extensively throughout the region exploring the sites of the Tuscany itinerary.
Professor Berindei is an avid reader with an interest in literature, art history, history, mythology, folklore, and foreign cultures. She enjoys classical music, the theatre, museums, film, the outdoors, and travel. She has lived and traveled extensively in Europe (especially Italy, France, Hungary, Romania); speaks English, Italian, French, passive Romanian.

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Kerri Lee Conditto, Lecturer of French, Romance Languages
Kerri Conditto has been a lecturer at Tufts since 1999. Before moving to Boston, she lived in Paris where she taught English at the Ecole Nationale de Commerce. Her avid interest in contemporary French culture has led to her co-creation/ direction of the Department’s French Film Series as well as the creation of French Film Study Series published by Focus Publishing.
"I am fluent in French with a rudimentary knowledge of Spanish. My areas of specialty are French film and technology and I love dance, art and music. I especially enjoy learning about other cultures and sharing my experiences with others. I enjoy traveling and spend a considerable amount of time visiting France yearly. Having lived and spent a great deal of time in Paris, I know (and love) the city!"

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Patricia Foley Di Silvio, Senior Lecturer/Coordinator, Romance Languages
Patricia Di Silvio received an MA in Italian from Middlebury College, the Laurea in lingue e letterature straniere moderne from the Università di Firenze, an MA in Linguistics from the University of Colorado and her Ph.D. in Linguistics from the University of North Carolina. She is the coordinator of the Italian Language Program at Tufts and regularly teaches all levels of Italian language. She is a frequent contributor at the annual meetings of the American Association of Teachers of Italian and the American Association of Italian Studies with papers on language methodology and the Italian Curriculum. Patricia's areas of specialization and interests are Italian, Linguistics, Foreign Language Methodology, and Italian Cinema.

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Kevin Dunn, Dean of Academic Affairs for Arts and Sciences/Associate Professor of English
I hold a BA from the University of Louisville, and MA from Oxford University and a Ph.D. from Yale University. I taught at Yale before coming to Tufts in 1995. I joined the administration in 2002, but I continue to teach courses in the English Department. In the summers, I teach at the Bread Loaf School of English, Juneau Campus, where I am also On-site Director. I have published on a variety of topics in Renaissance poetry, prose and drama. My areas of specialization and interests are Renaissance literature and history, Shakespeare and drama, the Bible as literature.

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George S. Ellmore, Biology Professor, Department of Biology
George Ellmore was born in Germany, raised in France, and educated in California where he earned his Ph.D. in Botany at the University of California at Berkeley. His Tufts research combines basic and applied work in plant biology. In addition to teaching biology courses, Prof. Ellmore runs annual student research trips to Hummingbird Tropical Field Station near Great Exuma, Bahamas, directs the Environmental Studies Program, teaches Alpine Botany in Talloires France, and advises the Tufts Wilderness Orientation program.

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John Morgan Fyler, English Professor, English Department
Born in Chicago, Professor Fyler completed his studies in Dartmouth College and received his Ph.D. from University of California, Berkeley. He has taught medieval and Renaissance literature at Tufts since 1971. He has published a book on Chaucer and Ovid (Yale University Press, 1979) and edited one of Chaucer’s poems, The House of Fame, for the Riverside Chaucer (Houghton Miffin, 1987). He has held fellowships from the American Council of Learned Societies and the Guggenheim Foundation, and recently finished a book on medieval ideas about the origin of language.
"I’ve traveled in western Europe and in the former Soviet Union. I read French fluently; my comprehension is good, and speaking fair. I also read German with good comprehension, and Italian with fair comprehension. I’ve done a lot of work with Latin and Old English, which are of course very useful in everyday travel."

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Anne Frances Gardulski, Associate Professor and Chair, Department of Geology
Anne Gardulski is an Associate Professor in the Department of Geology at Tufts and is the department chair. She earned a B.S. at Michigan State University, M.S. at the University of Arizona, and Ph.D. at Syracuse University. Between her graduate degrees, she worked as a mineral exploration geologist in Idaho and Montana. She has been on the Tufts faculty since 1987, where her teaching includes oceanography, sedimentology, and stratigraphy. Her research interests are focused on Triassic strata and environments in the southwestern U.S. Anne has traveled to Australia, New Zealand, and England for geologic field trips and to the Four Corners area of the U.S., including Navajo Nation land.

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Tatyana Gassel-Vozlinskaya, Lecturer in Russian, German, Russian, and Asian Languages and Literatures
Born in Moscow, Russia, Tatyana (Tanya) graduated from Moscow State University with MA in Journalism and worked on various Russian newspapers and a radio station, Youth. In 1980, she and her family emigrated to the United States. She joined the faculty of Tufts University in 1986 and has taught Russian language and special courses on politics, business, media, social and cultural issues in Russia and the former Soviet Union. In 1988, Tatyana graduated from Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy with MA in Soviet Studies. From 1988 to 1995, she was actively involved in the Nuclear Age History and Humanity Center at Tufts, and initiated and conducted 9 links of “Space-Bridge Programs” between Tufts and Moscow State University.

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Annie Poignant Geoghegan, Lecturer in French, Romance Languages
Annie Poignant Geoghegan, born and initially educated in France, developed Wanderlust at an early age and, since first coming to the U.S. as an American Field Service student, she has traveled extensively around the world and spent time in over twenty countries in South, Central, East, and Southeast Asia, Latin America, Africa and Europe. She holds a Master’s degree from the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy, and a French Licence and Maîtrise in English and American literature.

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Pamela Gayle Haltom, Spanish Lecturer, Romance Languages
Professor Haltom received her M.A Spanish from Middlebury College. She has completed residence and study in Mexico, Guatemala and Spain, traveling extensively throughout Latin America. Her associated work includes developing and presenting in-house pre Columbian food history exhibit for the Cambridge Peabody Museum’s Mesoamerican Maya Festival as well as complementary Spanish language and culture components for classroom use. Pam has taught Spanish at Tufts for the past nine years, and specializes in developing Spanish conversational skills and cultural awareness.

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Boris Hasselblatt, Professor of Mathematics, Department of Mathematics
I grew up in Germany, Ethiopia, and Berlin, have studied physics in Berlin and at the University of Maryland in College Park. I got an MA in mathematics at Maryland in 1984 and a Ph.D. in mathematics from the California Institute of Technology in 1989. Since then I have been on the faculty at Tufts for the past 7 years. I've also lived in Paris and in Zürich (Switzerland). My areas of specialization and interest are dynamical systems (of which one branch is chaos theory) and classical music.

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Vida T. Johnson, Professor of Russian, German, Russian, and Asian Languages and Literatures
Professor Vida T. Johnson has been teaching Russian language, literature, and film for many years at Tufts She was born in Belgrade, Yugoslavia and came to the U.S. with her family at age 11. She received her BA in Russian History and Literature from Radcliffe College and her M.A. and PhD degrees in Slavic Languages and Literatures from Harvard University. Professor Johnson is the author of many articles on Yugoslav literature and on Russian literature and film. She is the co-author of “The Films of Andrei Tarkovsky: A Visual Fugue” (Indiana UP, 1994). Currently the focus of her research is post-Soviet cinema and she travels frequently to film festivals in Russia and the former Soviet republics.

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Laura Baffoni Licata, Professor, Department of Romance Languages
Born and raised in Italy, educated at the Universita’ degli Studi di Bologna (Italy) where she graduated in 1970 with a Doctorate Degree in Foreign Languages and Literatures, Laura Baffoni Licata combines an extensive background in Italian literature, culture and history with a lifelong enthusiasm for travel. In 1985 she received her Ph.D. in Italian Literature from the University of Connecticut.
Professor Licata’s professional scholarship and research include several publications in the field of Italian Literature, with a concentration on Twentieth-Century Italian Poetry. Before joining the Tufts Faculty in 1985, she taught in the Italian School System, at Trinity College, in Hartford, Connecticut and at Wheaton College. At Tufts she teaches upper-level Italian literature courses and regularly performs advising duties as a Pre-major and Major Advisor.

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Andrew McClellan, Associate Professor of Art History, Art & Art History
Having joined the Tufts faculty in 1986, Andrew McClellan is now Associate Professor and current Director of the Graduate Program in Art History. Born and raised in Chicago, McClellan received his BA and PhD from the University of London in England. He is the author of two books on the history of museums, including the first comprehensive history of the origins of the Louvre Museum. While doing research for his PhD he lived for two years in Paris. As a member of the Tufts faculty he has been a frequent contributor to the Talloires program near Annecy and has traveled widely in France.

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Colin Orians, Associate Professor, Biology Department
Colin Orians received his Ph.D. at Penn State University and is currently an Associate Professor of Biology, his research is directed toward understanding environmental and genetic factors that generate variability in plant traits (i.e., growth rate and foliar chemistry), and determining the ecological and evolutionary consequences of this variability. His research is internationally recognized and supported by the National Science Foundation and the Andrew Mellon Foundation. Recent recipient of Bullard Fellowship from Harvard University, Colin is a frequent presenter at national meetings. He teaches Ecology, Field Biology, Tropical Biology and Introductory Biology, and travels to the tropics to conduct research and to lead alumni tours.

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Elena Lydia Paolini, Lecturer in Italian, Romance Languages
Elena Paolini, lecturer in Italian, has taught at Tufts since 1996. She received an M.A. in Romance Languages and Literatures from Harvard University in 1993 and a B.A. magna cum laude in Italian Studies from Brown University in 1991. During her time at Brown, she spent a year studying at the University of Bologna in Italy. She has won numerous awards for her excellent teaching and is fluent in Italian and Spanish, with a good knowledge of German and French. Elena is passionate about travel and has explored Europe extensively. Her research primarily focuses on literature, folklore and local traditions. She has a particular fondness for discovering culinary specialties.

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Mark Pokras, Associate Professor, Environmental & Population Health-Cummings School of Veterinary Medicine
Mark Pokras received his undergraduate degree from Cornell University and his Doctor of Veterinarian Medicine degree from Tufts University. Currently he is a faculty member and the Director at the Tufts Wildlife Clinic. His areas of specialization and interests are medicine and surgery of native wildlife, native wildlife as environmental indicators, allometric scaling and conservation biology. His hobbies include birding, kayaking, outdoor activities and folk music.

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Beatrice Lorge Rogers, Professor, Friedman School of Nutrition Science and Policy
Bea Rogers is Professor of Economics and Food Policy, and Dean for Academic Affairs at the Gerald J and Dorothy R Friedman School of Nutrition Science and Policy, where she has been on the faculty for 22 years. She holds a Ph.D. from Brandeis, where she studied economics and public health and her undergraduate degree is from Radcliffe College in Experimental Psychology. Her research on food aid programs, food price policy, household food security, and the means by which food and other resources are distributed within households has taken her to over a dozen countries on four continents, including the US. In connection with her research she has lived in Pakistan and worked and traveled extensively in Asia, Africa, and Central and South America.

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Emese Margit Soos, Senior Lecturer, Romance Languages
Born in Hungary, raised in Switzerland and the United States, Emese Soos combines an extensive background in literature, culture and history with a lifelong enthusiasm for travel. She received her B.A. from Mount Holyoke College and her Ph.D. from the University of Wisconsin-Madison, and before joining the Tufts faculty in 1982 she taught at Holy Cross College, Wellesley and Harvard Divinity School. Director of French language instruction at Tufts, she also teaches a course on literature and the arts in Paris during the Belle Époque, 1880-1914. Her father’s wartime activities led her to edit a book on Hungarian resistance during WWII written by one of his colleagues. Frequent trips to Budapest to visit family and friends help her maintain fluency in her native Hungarian, as well as provide insight into the post-Communist evolution of Hungarian society.

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Van Toi Vo, Ph.D., Associate Professor, Biomedical Engineering
Professor Van Toi Vo was born in Saigon, Vietnam. He earned his undergraduate and graduate degrees at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Lausanne (Switzerland) in the Micro Engineering field. He was a visiting scientist in the Laboratory of Medical Physics at the Amsterdam University (Holland) and a post-doc at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in the Harvard-MIT Health Science and Technology program. He has been a professor at Tufts University since 1984. Van founded and directs the Biomedical Engineering Program at Tufts University. He has developed different educational activities with several universities in Vietnam including Ha-Noi, Ho Chi Minh-City and Can Tho Universities. He was instrumental in initiating the Vietnamese North American University Professor Network: a mechanism designed to promote interaction among university professors of Vietnamese extraction in the U.S. and Canada.

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Donald Wertlieb, Professor, Child Development
Donald Wertlieb, Ph.D. is Professor and former Chairman of the Eliot-Pearson Dept. of Child Development, and former Director, Tufts University Center for Children. He serves on the Community Health Policy Board and the University College of Citizenship and Public Service Advisory Board at Tufts. He was the founding director of the Center for Applied Child Development (CACD) partnering with scores of schools and human service agencies in the New England region in school reform initiatives. Dr. Wertlieb's undergraduate education and first master’s degrees are from Tufts University. He is also a graduate of the Clinical and Community Psychology Program at Boston University. Prior to joining the faculty, he served on the faculty of the Judge Baker Guidance Center.

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