Dr. Kimberly McLeod
Interim Director Teaching and Learning Excellence Center (TLEC)
Associate Professor

Dr. Kimberly McLeod has spent her entire career in public education. She has held various positions in the public school setting including that of a teacher, counselor, and administrator for ten years. She is currently working as the Interim Director for the Teaching and Learning Excellence Center (TLEC) and is an Associate Professor for Texas Southern University in the College of Education and has worked for TSU for nine years. She has earned a Bachelor of Science in Interdisciplinary Studies from the University of Houston, a Masters degree in Counseling and Guidance, a Master's degree in Educational Administration and a Doctoral degree in Counselor Education from Texas Southern University.

Dr. McLeod is the immediate past president of the Houston Area Alliance of Black School Educator and currently serves on the board of the National Alliance of Black School Educators as the president of the southwest region working with 6 southwestern states. She also serves on the board of Dean's Professional Services and has helped pioneer the establishment of a learning and development center on a national level for their corporation. She is the founding editor for a nationally peer reviewed journal housed in the College of Education called the National Journal of Urban Education and Practice that has been in circulation since the founding year of 2007. Dr. McLeod has presented workshops at well over a hundred venues over the past five years and has written six books, three children's books, over 12 articles in various peer reviewed journals. She has been awarded Teacher of the Year by the college of Education at Texas Southern University and was selected as an award recipient of the YMCA minority achiever's award.

Desa Dow
TLEC Program Coordinator

Desa Dow is a Graduate Student pursuing her Masters in Counseling, at Texas Southern University. Her passion is to help and guide others, and her life thus far has been dedicated to doing so. She is the Vice President of the Texas Southern University Student Counseling Association, and a certified Peer Educator. Her undergraduate degree is in Early Childhood Education with a Concentration in Children Studies, from Brooklyn College, in Brooklyn New York. Desa has worked with children for over nine years and is currently in the process of developing her own enrichment program that will foster social, emotional, cognitive and physical growth of children birth to adolescence. Her expected graduation date is May of 2013.

Cherry Gooden
College of Education

Dr. Cherry Ross Gooden currently serves as an Associate Professor and Chairperson of the Department of Curriculum & Instruction in the College of Education at Texas Southern University in Houston, Texas. This 1964 graduate of Texas Southern University earned a B.S. in Elementary Education, and a Master's Degree in Elementary Education with a concentration in Reading, at Texas Southern University and a Doctorate of Education Degree in Educational Leadership and Cultural Studies with a program emphasis in Multicultural Education at the University of Houston.

Dr. Gooden is a dedicated, committed teacher with more than 42 years teaching experience— at both the elementary and university levels. She has been a consultant for various school districts in the state of Texas as well as in the nation.
Dr. Gooden is a member of many professional organizations including
National Association for Multicultural Education (where she is also a founding member), Texas Association of Black Personnel in Higher Education, International Reading Association, Concerned Educators of Black Children, and the National Alliance of Black School Educators where she serves as Secretary of the Higher Education Commission. She has also been active in community organizations such as Jack and Jill of America, National Women of Achievement, Top Ladies of Distinction, and Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority, Inc. 

Dr. Gooden, a member of Abundant Life Cathedral, is listed in Who's Who Among Black Americans and Who's Who in American Education.

Vera Walker Hawkins, Ph.D.
School of Communication

Vera Walker Hawkins, Ph.D., is an Associate Professor of Journalism at Texas Southern University (TSU) in Houston. Appointed Interim chair of the Journalism Department in 2006, Dr. Hawkins served in this capacity until September 2010. Dr. Hawkins served as Chair/Interim Director of TSU's Quality Enhancement Plan Committee and was intricately involved in the University's preparation for its SACS Accreditation Reaffirmation from 2007 - 2011.

Dr. Hawkins received her doctorate degree in journalism from The University of Texas-Austin. Before her most recent assignment at TSU, Dr. Hawkins was an American Educational Research Association Postdoctoral Fellow at The Massachusetts Institute of Technology. While in Boston, she collaborated on culturally relevant multimedia projects with the Harvard Graduate School of Education, The Sesame Workshop, WGBH Television, and the Cambridge Public Schools. Dr. Hawkins' areas of interests include comparative media studies, children's programming, journalism education, science reporting and multimedia technology.

Dr. Hawkins' recently published her first book in January 2010, New Media Storytelling as Pedagogy for African American Children with Lambert Publishing Company. The book is available online at Amazon.com and other online vendors. For more on Hawkins research interests visit her website at www.schoolhousestories.org .

Maurice Mangum
Barbara Jordan-Mickey Leland School of Public Affairs

Michael Zeitler
College of Liberal Arts and Behavioral Sciences

Dr. Michael Zeitler is an Associate Professor of English and Director of Student Academic Enhancement Services's Freshman Seminar Program. He is the author of Representations of Culture: Thomas Hardy's Wessex and Victorian Anthropology (Peter Lang, 2007) and co-editor, with Charlene T. Evans, of Race and Identity in Barack Obama's 'Dreams from My Father': A Collection of Critical Essays (Mellen Press, 2012). Dr. Zeitler is a graduate of the University of California, Santa Cruz (BA), and The Johns Hopkins University (Ph.D.). He teaches a wide variety of subjects at Texas Southern University, including World Literature, British Literature, American Literature, and, African American Literature, both at the undergraduate and graduate level.

Jane Perkyns
College of Liberal Arts and Behavioral Sciences

Dr. Perkyns is an Associate Professor of Music has been a member of the faculty of Texas Southern University in Houston, TX since 1991 teaching applied piano, music history, theory, piano pedagogy and assisting in opera workshop and performance seminar classes, and served for three years as the Music Coordinator in the Dept. of Fine Arts. She was the 2011 recipient of the TSU McCleary Teaching Excellence Award.

Dr. Perkyns has performed extensively throughout Canada and the USA, appearing both as soloist, and collaborative artist. She has also been heard on several adio regional and national radio programs and has had the honor of premiering several works both in the solo and chamber music field. Along with her accomplishments in the classical field, Dr. Perkyns has also been active in the area of musical theatre and composition. She was the co-founder of Curtyn Calls Co., and assists at Theatre Under the Stars as a co-director of Musicals for Me, To. Both programs are devoted to the writing and producing of children's musical theatre and to teaching musical theatre classes to children with disabilities. Her musical theatre works have been performed throughout Texas. Excerpts of the production "Love is a Disability" were performed at the 2000 George Bush Medal Awards Ceremony in the presence of the President Bush, Sr. Dr. Perkyns received her graduate degrees from The Juilliard School (M.Mus.) and the University of British Columbia (DMA).

Remi Ademola
Center for Online Education & Instructional Technology

Remi is an information technology professional with an emphasis on academic technologies for teaching and learning. He currently oversees the administration and support of the blackboard learning management system on campus through the Center for Online Education and Instructional Technology (COLEIT). As an academic technology department, COLEIT provides workshops to faculty on various technologies applicable to their learning goals and objectives. The Center also works with faculty to develop wholly online courses and degree/certificate programs through sound instructional design techniques. Remi's office is located in the Library Bldg RM 504 or via phone (713) 313-4343.

Cassandra Hill
Thurgood Marshall School of Law School

Cassandra L. Hill is the Director of Legal Writing and an Assistant Professor of Law at Texas Southern University Thurgood Marshall School of Law (TMSL), where she teaches legal analysis and writing.  Professor Hill began her teaching career at UCLA School of Law and practiced in the areas of tax and employee benefits law at Baker Botts L.L.P.  She also served as a federal law clerk for the Honorable Vanessa D. Gilmore, United States District Court Judge. 

Professor Hill’s research interests include legal education and assessment, legal writing pedagogy, learning theory, and employment law matters.  She recently coauthored (with Professor Katherine Vukadin) an innovative book on legal analysis, Legal Analysis: 100 Exercises for Mastery, which will be published by LexisNexis Mathew Bender in spring 2012. She also has written several articles and essays and presented research on law school pedagogy and assessment.  Her recent article, Collaboration Training with an Eye toward Outcomes and Assessment, appeared in the Legal Writing Institute’s Second Draft.  She then was invited to give the keynote speech at the 2011 North and South Carolina Legal Research and Writing Colloquium, where she spoke on law school assessment and collaboration training.

Professor Hill is a member of the Legal Writing Institute (LWI) and the Association of Legal Writing Directors.  She also is the Managing Editor for the LWI Monograph Series and the Secretary for the Diversity Committee of the AALS Section on Legal Writing, Reasoning, and Research.  She has served on the Program Committee for the AALS Section on Legal Writing, Reasoning, and Research and the AALS Section on Teaching Methods. 

Professor Hill is a member of the State Bar of Texas, the District of Columbia Bar, and the New York State Bar.  Professor Hill received her J.D. (first in her class) from Howard University School of Law and her B.A. from the University of Virginia, where she was initiated into Phi Beta Kappa.

Oscar Criner
College Science of Technology

Oscar H. Criner is Professor of Computer Science and Interim Associate Dean of the College of Science and Technology at Texas Southern University. He received his early education in the public schools of Texas and graduated from Phillis Wheatley Senior High School in Houston in 1956. He attended Howard University in Washington graduating with at B.S. in mathematics and a minor in physics. He received the Ph.D. degree in applied mathematics from the University of California at Berkeley.

In his early career, he was a data analyst for Lockheed Missiles and Space Company, a mathematician for United Research Services (URS Corp.) in Burlingame California, where he became an expert on the effects of nuclear weapons, finite amplitude stress waves, surface water waves, and computer models of mass fires. Going on to work for the U.S. Naval Radiological Defense Laboratory in San Francisco, he devised measures for the control of mass fires and constructed computational models in neutron cross-section spectroscopy. He also worked for Sandia Corporation in Livermore California, where he worked on the first true supercomputer, the Control Data 6600, solving problems in the vibration of thin shells.

Social issues had begun to dominate his thinking and activity and he was invited to join the Westside Community Mental Health Center, Inc. in San Francisco as Assistant Director for Operations. The Westside position and his activity in the community led to his being invited to join the faculty of the Department of Black Studies at San Francisco State University. There, his research in economics and the scientific workforce led to his understanding of the barriers that prevent African Americans from entering scientific professions and motivated his decision become active in science education and to teach at a historically black college.

After a search of computer science programs in colleges around the country, Dr. Criner found a perfect match. Texas Southern University, in his hometown, needed a person to head the computer science program. He became the first head of the Department of Computer Science at Texas Southern University in September 1976. He built a student body from 50 in 1976 to over 700 in 1984 when he left the position to become the Founding Dean of College of Science and Technology. He left the Deanship in 1986 to work in industry. From 1987 to 1993 he was on leave from the University and served as a consultant on software quality and productivity for large software manufacturers. Dr. Criner teaches computer science, computational modeling and environmental science. His current research interests are web based computing, complex environmental and ecological systems modeling, computational finance, and the homeland security issues of the petro-chemical transportation infrastructure.

Ladelle Hyman
Jesse H. Jones School of Business

Ladelle M. Hyman, CPA, Ph.D., Professor of Accounting, Department of Accounting and Finance, Jesse H. Jones School of Business, has taught the following courses during her thirty-one year sojourn at Texas Southern University:  UNDERGRADUATE:  Accounting 231 – Principles of Accounting I, Accounting 232 – Principles of Accounting II, Accounting 331 – Intermediate Accounting I, Accounting 332 – Intermediate Accounting II, Accounting 334 – Federal Taxation I, Accounting 336 – Cost Accounting, Accounting 431 – Advanced Accounting I; Accounting 436 – Federal Taxation II, BADM 101 – Introduction to Business; and GRADUATE:  Accounting 631 – Seminar in Managerial Accounting, Accounting 636 – Financial Accounting, Accounting 647 – Cost accounting and Analysis, Accounting 651 – Contemporary topics in Accounting, Accounting 655 – Seminar in Taxation, Accounting 657 – Seminar in Auditing, Accounting 670 – Financial Accounting in Health Care Organizations, Accounting 671 – Managerial and Cost Accounting in Health Care Organizations, EMBA:  Accounting 631—Seminar in Managerial accounting.

Ladelle has served on the following Committees:  Texas State Board of Public Accountancy,  National Association of State boards of Accountancy,  University Faculty Development Committee, Miss TSU Pageant Committee, Graduate Studies Committee,  Rank, Tenure, Salary, and Promotion Committee,  Academic Planning Committee, Faculty Research Committee,  Graduate Studies Committee, Undergraduate Curriculum Committee, and as an advisor to Beta Alpha Psi, The National Financial Information Fraternity.

Bob Ford
Faculty Senate & The College of Science and Technology

Dr. Robert L Ford is President/CEO of DRF Industries, LLC.  He is Professor of Chemistry, Director of the Center for STEM Education and Outreach (C-SEO), a Principal Organizer of the Houston AllKidsAlliance Third Ward Regional Council, and member of the Advisory Committee for the International Conference on ICT for Africa 2011.  Ford is Chair of the Faculty Senate Mentoring Committee at Texas Southern University, the TSU GLOBE Partnership Coordinator and represents the College on the University Research Council. He represents his College on the TSU Faculty Senate, and chairs the College of Science and Technology Fundraising, Events, and Public Relations Committee.  Dr. Ford is a board member of Bridging the Digital Divide, Inc.; the Earl Carl Institute for Legal and Social Policy, Inc., the Houston-Luanda Sister City Association, and a member of the Thompson Elementary School Site Based Decision-Making Committee..  He has served as Associate Provost for Research at TSU, Vice President for Advancement and Research at Fort Valley State University, Vice Chancellor for Research at Southern University in Baton Rouge and Interim Chair of the TSU Chemistry Department. He represents TSU on the Greater Houston Energy Collaborative and led the University’s Texas Emerging Technology Fund Initiative.  He is a member of the Advisory Board of the Greater Houston Area American Red Cross Southeast Branch, a member of the Institute of Green Professionals and founding Chairman of the Minority Serving Institution Research Partnership (MSIRP). Ford has expertise in STEM education, project development and management, environmental and sustainable development, group facilitation, and small business and entrepreneurship development. He has international business and technology experience in South Africa, The Republic of the Gambia, Senegal, Nigeria, Taiwan, Germany, China, and The Netherlands. He earned a Bachelor of Science degree in chemistry from Southern University and A&M College in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, and a Ph.D. in Physical Chemistry from Purdue University at Lafayette, IN, where he was recently recognized as a Distinguished Alumnus at both institutions.  During his years at Xerox Corporation in Rochester, NY and Palo Alto, CA, Ford worked in the areas organic charge transfer complex materials development for improved photocopying applications (Webster Research Center) and flat panel display device technology development based on multicolor colloidal systems (Palo Alto Research Center). In the applied research arena, he conducted a feasibility study in the Republic of the Gambia relative to agricultural waste to energy for electricity production, and uranium enrichment processing in Germany and The Netherlands.  He is affiliated with the TSU National Transportation Security Center of Excellence focusing on Petrochemical transport.  Current areas of research interest include petrochemical transport, STEM education, and environmental sustainability.

Dr. Lily Cheung
College of Pharmacy and Health Sciences

Dr.  Cheung is an Assistant Professor of Pharmacy Practice, College of Pharmacy and Health Sciences since the year of 2010.  Dr. Cheung enjoys her role at TSU in teaching, research, and service. Prior to coming to TSU, she has been working at Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania for 20 years in various positions, including Clinical Pharmacy Specialist in Pharmacokinetics, Pharmacy Supervisor for Professional Development and Pharmaceutical Care, and as Clinical Pharmacy Manager.

Dr. Cheung is a graduate of National Taiwan University (BS) and Texas Southern University (BS/PharmD).  She is currently teaching courses in the Doctor of Pharmacy curriculum, and precept students in the Internal Medicine rotations.

Arbolina L. Jennings
QEP & College Liberal Arts and Behavioral Sciences

Arbolina L. Jennings is Assistant Professor of English in the College of Liberal Arts and Behavioral Sciences, Associate Director of the Quality Enhancement Plan (QEP), Co-Chair of the Subcommittee on General Education at TSU, and a Thomas F. Freeman Honor’s College  Faculty Fellow.

Professor Jennings has participated in a variety of external grants in course re-design, including the Majors Course Liberal Arts Design Team, The Houston A+ Challenge Grant, and the NEH Film in the Humanities Grant.  Professor Jennings serves on several Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board (THECB) committees, including the College and Career Readiness Standards  (CCRS) as English Language Arts Vertical Team Member, and on the THECB Committee on Student Learning Objectives for the new Texas Core Curriculum.

Arbolina L. Jennings has edited several books and written extensively on the modern novel and on fiction-film interrelationships.