My life and experience as an ethnographer and educator has brought me to five continents. As a writer, I seek to ponder more deeply questions about our humanity. My aim is to commercialize my research in Kenya and Uganda to help better understand the uniqueness and shared commonalities amongst all of us across the globe. In my writing, I challenge readers to question their own and the general West’s relationship and understanding of the African continent and its many peoples and force readers to reflect on our shared humanity.

Bringing my Research to the Mainstream
My research examines how one fits into the world and ponders how culture, community, and education affect and change who we are and how we interact in the world. My research is based in the unique cultural context of the agropastoralist Karamoja region in Northern Uganda. I explore how the unique education offered by an international congregation of women religious prepares young women to transition out of secondary school into unknown and impending futures. In my work, I investigate how the charism and theological praxis of the international congregation of women religious inspired them to serve in this distinct educational and cultural setting. My work helps understand how this particular type of religious education affects young women as they strive to achieve a sense of well-being in relation to their personal aspirations and maintain connection and participation in their families and cultural community.

My Educational Journey
I earned my PhD in Anthropology of Education at the Faculty of Education, University of Cambridge. I earned a second Master’s Degree in Education at the University of Oxford. My Master’s fieldwork and dissertation at Oxford introduced me to East African agropastoralists, contemporary debates in global education, international development, and religious education in post-colonial East Africa. In that initial project, I explored through ethnographic methods and writing, one American Catholic missionary orphanage in Kenya that provides safe community living and opportunity to attend school.

My master and doctoral research seeks to construct deeper knowledge and envision a new values debate in the under-researched world of contemporary Catholic education in East Africa. I hold an additional Master’s Degree in Education from Mercy University and a Bachelor’s Degree in Latin American/Interational Studies from the University of Missouri-Columbia.