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Entering
education from the private sector, my business experience integrated
management, accounting, forecasting and information system design within
the service sector. For almost 10 years, I worked for the largest law
firm in Orange County and also served many years on the directorate
boards of several privately held corporations. One day as I was staring
at Catalina Island from my office window, a vision of myself with white
hair doing the same job caused me to resign from a successful career.
Opining that there must be more to life, I enjoyed a lot of social
lunches and played many sets of tennis. Later for fun, I returned to
college taking a class in probability and statistics. I enjoyed the
course and enrolled for others. Realizing that it would be wise to
pursue a degree and finish my CPA, en route I discovered my passion for
economics and for helping students to learn the economic way of
thinking. With a life course charted, my goal was to become an
economics instructor with the South Orange County Community College
District. I am pleased to have achieved this vocational goal.
As a
re-entry student who attended both Saddleback and Irvine Valley
Colleges, I received a Bachelor of Arts and Master of Arts degrees in
economics from California State University, Fullerton.
Post graduate work
included two independent studies, Research Assistant for a USC Sea
Grant, and a certificate for the Online Teaching Program offered through
UCLA.
Since my
first adjunct teaching assignment at Irvine Valley College (IVC) in
January 1989, I have taught economics courses with the South Orange
County Community College District (SOCCCD), Chapman University and
California State University, Fullerton. Prior to that time, I worked
for 5 years as an Instructional Assistant at the Saddleback College
Learning Assistance program. During August 1997, I became full-time
faculty at IVC and for 7 years served as Academic Chair for the School
of Social and Behavioral Sciences.
I have been
fortunate to have received a Certificate of Achievement award for
co-creation of Irvine Valley College Business & Education Partnership;
Outstanding Adjunct Faculty Award,
Irvine Valley College;
Saddleback College Staff Achievement award from the Outstanding Women in
South Orange County; Outstanding Graduate Award, CSUF Department of Economics; and Outstanding
Senior Award, CSUF Department of Economics.
At IVC, I
have been involved in many rewarding projects such as being co-creator
of the Irvine Valley College Business and Education Partnership to
provide student internship opportunities; initiator of the John D. Lafky
Scholarship for the Outstanding Economics Student; textbook reviews for
Schiller, Colander, Hall and Lieberman, and Taylor; and organizer of the
Technology Fair for the CCEE (Community College Economics Educators).
My
professional associations include the American Economic Association
Committee
on the
Status of Women in the
Economics
Profession, the Atlantic Economic Society, Omicrom Delta Epsilon
Economics Honor Society, Phi Kappa Phi Honor Society, Community College
Economics Educators, the Institute of Management Science, and the
California Teachers Association.
Within
economics, my primary areas of interest are macroeconomic policies and
institutions that provide an environment conducive for economic
development and growth. During the 2003-2004 academic year, I completed
my sabbatical project, "Economies in Transition" when I traveled to 15
newly independent countries (NICs) of the former Soviet Union and the
Peoples’ Republic of China (PRC) to research and observe economies
undergoing structural change from central planning to market systems.
If you wish to view some of the pictures from my research, you may view
at:
http://faculty.ivc.edu/mstuffler/sabpicts.
While
teaching economics is my passion and personally very rewarding, it is of
equal importance to my professional vision to create and use innovative
teaching techniques to convey that economics is a way of thinking about
problems and choices that students will use throughout their lives.
This desire along with observation of student struggles to learn
economics principles led to the authorship of the Microeconomics
Resource Guide, Macroeconomics Resource Guide, and the Resource Guide
for Introductory Economics.
When I am
not teaching, I enjoy the beach, boating, biking, exploring, traveling
and wildlife photography with my husband. We have been married many
years—no specific number here. To date we have visited 110 countries
and of those, we have visited 30 countries two or more times. Since
his retirement eleven years ago, my husband still does some consulting
and web design, but more importantly he’s learned to cook—wahoo! We try
also to spend some time in Maui each year, we have a retirement condo
there and it is our paradise. While I am very tempted to learn to use
inline skates, I am certain that my lack of coordination would mean
massive injuries to me and other innocent victims.
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