In some ways, Michelle Durham can trace her career as a television executive back to a flight to Paris she took as a college student. 

“I got off of the plane and I thought ‘Yep, this is where I’m supposed to be.’ Studying abroad was an untouchable dream that I got to make happen. I could see that my world was going to open up beyond Arizona,” she said. “I had such an amazing time that it started to build that a muscle memory of you can do things that are scary and ridiculous. It’s going to make you better. It’s going to make you stronger. So have those feelings of fear, but don’t let them stop you from doing anything because you never know what’s going to change your life.” 

Until she was there, studying abroad felt out of touch. She was leaving the country for the first time, and at the time, it was the scariest thing she’d ever done. But these days, she remains dedicated to Paris, visiting once or twice a year. 

“I had fun, I learned the culture. My family I lived with, we had dinner together every night and I came back just energized and with a new community,” she said. “All of the women that I studied with, we stayed together through the rest of the major. We had somebody who now is a game theorist, somebody who is in veterinary sciences. I’m in television. We were just a weird group of people who all came together in the French classes.” 

Durham, who graduated in 2002 with a double major in French and Communication, is currently the Senior Vice President of Programming for Warner Bros. Discovery. In recognition of her distinguished career as a media executive, specializing in television programming, planning and research and bringing innovation in reshaping the industry into the multiplatform format of today, Durham is awarded the College of Humanities’ 2025-26 Alumna of the Year. 

Durham started her television career in Los Angeles, working in research with the marketing team for the international side of CBS. She studied how audiences interacted with television shows and then got into qualitative research, listening to audiences. 

“I was reading TV guides to find out what people were watching, internationally. And it was very easy for me to read what was happening in France, which is one of the biggest television markets for U.S. product,” she said. “So all of a sudden, all of these passions, all of these things that I wanted to do – television, language, international business – were coming together for the first time.” 

Durham didn’t stay in her international role for long, moving on to the programing side of the company after moving to New York, and steadily rising through the ranks. Today, she is in charge of strategy for 15 cable networks, including budget and operational oversight, managing a team of 26 and a multi-platform portfolio of live sports, original series and acquisitions. 

“Those lessons about what people want to watch, how they’re watching it, how they’re consuming stories, what moves them from one place to the other, that all stayed. Those foundations are in learning about language and culture,” she said. “So while I don’t speak French every day, those foundational lessons still apply.” 

When she arrived at the University of Arizona, Florence Luna tested out of her language requirement. But she didn’t want to take a shortcut and miss taking advantage of everything the university had to offer. 

Luna, a first generation American whose first language was Spanish, started exploring what she was interested in and decided she wanted to study something both practical and challenging. 

“I wanted to expand the communities with which I could connect and have a more well-rounded experience. For me, that meant picking up a language,” she said. “I knew I wanted to leverage my education as far as I could, so I looked into a lot of different, more challenging languages, like Russian, Mandarin and Arabic.” 

Luna considered parts of the world where knowing the language could help her leverage her economics major, as well as what exposure she had to languages through pop culture, and landed on Mandarin. 

“I decided that I would just do one semester of Mandarin Chinese 101. After that, I went on to 202, and then I kept going and picked up Buddhist meditation and Japanese and Chinese nationalism and other courses until my advisor surprised me to say that I was only a few classes away from a degree in East Asian Studies,” she said. “At first, pursuing this out of a passion, I didn’t realize how it was a crucial component of preparing for my career.” 

Luna, who graduated in 2015 with a B.A. in East Asian Studies and a B.S. in Business Economics, is the recipient of the College of Humanities 2025-26 Young Professional Achievement Award. 

As an undergraduate, Luna studied abroad for one summer in Shanghai, an experience that helped develop her language skills and her appreciation for the culture, but also helped secure her first internship, with BMW in China. She also interned with Goldman Sachs and continued with the company after graduating. She went on to earn an MBA from Cornell University and today, she is co-founder and CEO of Fig Medical, which spun out of the university and secured investment capital. 

Reflecting on her career path, Luna said her East Asian Studies degree has helped in both expected and unexpected ways. 

“At first, I was pursuing this out of a passion. I didn’t realize how it wasn’t tangential to my career preparation, but actually a crucial component,” she said. “Mandarin was a difficult language, and it was incredibly enriching and fulfilling to be able to learn this incredibly difficult language. It gave me a lot of courage to continue to face other challenges, I was able to kind of use that same courage and kind of tap into all of those characteristics that I developed.” 

Luna also applies humanities skills at her healthcare startup, Fig Medical, a prior authorization software that streamlines the administrative burden for doctors by using AI to improve the likelihood that the prior authorization will be approved, getting patients care sooner and doctors reimbursed faster.

“The patients who are impacted, the doctors that we’re communicating with, the executives who are running hospitals, they are often coming from all sorts of places in the United States, and outside the United States, with all sorts of cultural backgrounds,” she said. “Understanding how to communicate across cultures, and also understanding how important a perspective is that is very culturally different than your own, is increasingly important to building solutions.” 

The growing Department of Public and Applied Humanities is adding Entrepreneurship as its latest emphasis, partnering with the McGuire Center for Entrepreneurship to offer students a degree that integrates professional skills and a foundation in the humanities. 

The Entrepreneurship emphasis for the B.A. in Applied Humanities will launch in Fall 2026. 

Both the Department of Public and Applied Humanities and the McGuire Center for Entrepreneurship are national leaders in their respective fields and the Entrepreneurship emphasis will integrate the technical and practical knowledge inherent to entrepreneurship with a foundation in the applied humanities that stresses collaboration, creativity, critical thinking, strategic storytelling and other high-demand career skills. 

“The Applied Humanities program is a premiere destination for the entrepreneurial humanities and a national model for 21st-century, career-oriented liberal arts education within public research universities,” said Matthew Mars, Professor and Interim Head of the Department of Public and Applied Humanities. “We’re pleased that students will have new opportunities as a result of this partnership with McGuire Center for Entrepreneurship, a longstanding, well-respected pioneer in the entrepreneurship education field that has cultivated an environment where innovation thrives, responsible leadership flourishes, and entrepreneurship becomes a powerful force for positive change across society-at-large.” 

The Eller College of Management was one of the College of Humanities’ first partners when the Applied Humanities major began in 2018, with the Business Administration emphasis one of four original options for students. 

“One of the goals of this emphasis is to help students develop an entrepreneurial mindset, the ability to identify opportunities, take informed risks, and act decisively in ambiguous, real-world situations. This mindset is increasingly essential regardless of career path, as industries, technologies, and jobs evolve at an accelerating pace. Rather than relying solely on predefined roles or stable career ladders, entrepreneurial thinkers are better equipped to adapt, create value, and lead change,” said Bob Griffin, Executive Director of the McGuire Center.

Entrepreneurship will be the 12^th emphasis students can choose in pursuing a B.A. in Applied Humanities, joining: Business Administration; Consumer, Market & Retail Studies; Engineering Approaches; Environmental Systems; Fashion Studies; Game Studies; Medicine; Plant Studies; Public Health; Rural Leadership & Renewal; and Spatial Organization & Design Thinking.

The Applied Humanities program has grown significantly since it began in 2017, with approximately 400 current majors and nearly 300 alumni. For Applied Humanities majors, an internship and pre-internship career readiness course are requirements for graduation, and many students have already designed their own entrepreneurial internships. 

For more information, contact Mars at mmars@arizona.edu. 

Albrecht Classen, University Distinguished Professor in the Department of German Studies, has received several recent accolades.

A prolific scholar and teacher of the Middle Ages and the early modern age, Classen has published 138 books and 887 articles. 

In November, Classen’s article for the journal Dialogo was cited in the issue’s introduction:  “Prof. Albrecht Classen clearly emerges as the most renowned voice – his wide-ranging expertise and scholarly authority infuse the section with both gravitas and an expansive understanding of how literature continues to illuminate spiritual truth.” 

As of December 2025, his Academia.edu profile is in the top 1 percent, with almost 28,000 public views, and readers coming from 150 countries. 

Also in late 2025, for the second straight year, Classen was named a Highly Ranked Scholar - Lifetime by ScholarGPS. In the specialty of modern history, Classen is ranked second in the world, up from fifth last year, and the top in the United States. 

ScholarGPS analyzes scholarly activity, producing rankings based on a “continually updated, fully indexed compilation of metadata corresponding to over 200 million archival publications.” Highly Ranked Scholars are recognized for being in the top 0.05% of scholars in their specialties worldwide.

In January, Classen was elected to the Arizona Senior Academy Board of Directors, which serves the lifelong learning community of Academy Village. 

Classen, who began his career at the University of Arizona in 1987, specializes in German and European medieval and early modern literature and culture. He has won several prestigious teaching awards, including the Five Star Faculty Award (2009) and the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching 2012 Arizona Professor of the Year Award. He was knighted as Grand Knight Commander of the Most Noble Order of the Three Lions in 2017.

Sarah McCallum, Associate Professor of Classics, has been named a recipient of the Society for Classical Studies’ 2025 Award for Excellence in Teaching at the College Level. 

The Society for Classical Studies (SCS), founded as the American Philological Association in 1869 by "professors, friends, and patrons of linguistic science," was renamed in 2014 as the result of a strategic planning process and membership vote following a successful capital campaign. It is currently the principal membership organization in North America for the study of ancient Greek and Roman languages, literatures, history, material culture and the relationship of Greek and Roman culture to the broader ancient Mediterranean and beyond. 

The award description reads: 

“Dr. McCallum is a pedagogical wizard.” So her students testify, and the magic is evident across Dr. McCallum’s teaching. Whether she is teaching courses in introductory Greek, advanced Latin, or courses in translation, Dr. McCallum’s courses can be counted on to expand students’ skills and give them help in applying them, with a “consistency of excellence” that is recognized by students and colleagues alike.

Innovation and consistency may strike some as strange bedfellows, but both are hallmarks of McCallum’s approach. Students praised the clear rhythm to her courses, allowing for focus on the work itself, rather than keeping track of what was due next. McCallum herself prioritizes this weekly rhythm to help support student’s time management and attention, a practice which neurodivergent students appreciate. Assignments themselves, however, are far from routine, and students regularly testify to joyful engagement with unique twists on traditional assignments, from “Word Journals” and close reading exercises in her course on Homer in Translation to Latin projects working with the apparatus criticus.

McCallum’s ethos as a teacher centers around an “equity-driven” pedagogy adapted to individual student growth, with recognition of the diverse needs and wants of her students. Both revision of errors and reflection are regular parts of McCallum’s assessments, incentivizing and motivating students to learn from mistakes and to adjust their approach to the course material when necessary. McCallum meets 1-on-1 with every student in every course for mid-semester “progress and strategy” meetings, in which she is able to provide personalized (if time-intensive) support, and this personal approach in turn inspires heavy use of office hours from students seeking even more coaching and feedback. While this is no doubt a massive investment of time and energy, the results are striking. Her students testify to dramatic improvements in their language skills. And those who have gone on to success at Ph.D. language exams, specifically spotlight her courses as key to that achievement.

The care and nurture which Dr. McCallum invests into her courses is apparent everywhere. Syllabi, assignments, and course sites alike are beautifully designed and carefully organized. Students love “the amount of passion Professor McCallum had for the texts we examined, and the respect she paid to each student and their individual ideas,” as an anonymous student says in one course evaluation, “I always felt comfortable expressing my thoughts and reactions to what we read thanks to the environment she created and fostered in the classroom.” It takes a very special kind of teacher to generate students that not only find inspiration in her kindness and support, but also express appreciation that “she maintained high standards and never allowed me to take shortcuts in my work.”

Professor McCallum’s teaching has already been recognized with multiple awards and nominations at the University of Arizona, but the SCS is delighted to join the chorus by presenting Sarah McCallum with the 2025 Award for Excellence in Teaching of the Classics at the College and University Level. 

Previously, McCallum received the College of Humanities 2024 Distinguished Teaching Award. That same year, she was one of three university-wide recipients of the Provost Award for Innovative Teaching. 

She is the second recent Classics faculty member to receive the SCS Award for Excellence in Teaching at the College Level, following Robert Groves in 2020. 

As a speech language pathologist, often working with children with autism, Patricia Prelock had a unique vantage point for observing the power of language and communication. 

Though her career trajectory as a health professional was very clear, Prelock’s studies included a liberal arts foundation, including French and Latin. 

“I would always say language and communication is everything,” she said. “The ability to have an understanding of cultures, literature and languages, knowing that the people I interface with come from a variety of different regions, and understanding and appreciating their language and cultural traditions, I think, makes me a better clinician and a better researcher.”

In May, Prelock joined the University of Arizona as Provost and Chief Academic Officer, following five years as Provost and one year as Interim President at the University of Vermont. Her third day on campus, Prelock spoke at a ceremony in which Alain-Philippe Durand, Dorrance Dean of the College of Humanities, was bestowed with the l’Ordre des Palmes Académiques rank of Officer, France’s highest academic honor. 

“I think A-P, as our dean, has really identified how we can make the humanities relevant and current and still maintain the rigor that is so powerful in the humanities,” she said. “What we’re doing is really providing a career trajectory for students, that they still can have this deep knowledge of the humanities, but also be prepared for almost any career.” 

As provost, Prelock is focused on achieving “Success for Every Student,” and whether a student is a major, minor, or taking general education or language courses, the humanities are at the core of that education, giving students the ability to think critically, solve problems, and understand different perspectives and cultures. 

“When we think about fulfilling our land grant mission, it’s really about educating our community in Arizona and well beyond. I think what the humanities does is it provides that cultural context, that is so important for students to become an engaged citizen in their community, local, regionally and statewide,” she said.

As far as the other two components of the university’s mission, the College of Humanities adds the human element to research that shapes the future, and makes strong contributions to the university’s community engagement, through the Poetry Center’s one-of-a-kind archive and reading series, and public presentations through the Tucson Humanities Festival. 

In her first year on campus, Prelock said she’s been impressed by the way in which the College of Humanities incorporates study abroad and internships into career pathways for students. She has also observed widespread collaborations across campus, citing specifically the Applied Humanities degree and the Health Humanities Hub at the Andrew Weil Center for Integrative Medicine. 

“We have a dean in A-P Durand who really believes in the value of the humanities and is innovative in his approach to make the humanities truly relevant. He is not afraid to say ‘We study the humanities because it’s valuable and builds you from an intellectual perspective. But it also prepares you for any career that you want,’’’ she said. “I think that’s a differentiator for us.” 

Congratulations to the College of Humanities’ Outstanding Senior for Spring Winter 2025, Loyda Vance! 

Vance is a first-generation college student graduating with dual degrees, a B.A. in Spanish and Portuguese and a B.S. in Urban and Regional Development. In the spring, she will continue at the University of Arizona, pursuing her master’s degree in Urban Planning. 

In her convocation address, Vance told fellow graduates that she chose the Spanish Generalist concentration as her major in the Department of Spanish and Portuguese because she loves the language and wanted to learn all sides of it.  

“Through the wide range of classes, I learned how impressive consecutive interpreting is. I gained a deeper understanding of culture and lived experiences through literature. My Hispanic linguistics classes helped me notice and correct my own grammatical errors. These were my building blocks, skills I will use every day moving forward,” she said. “The lessons you have learned and the skills you have perfected will also stay with you. Your dedication to learning something new, something meaningful, something that helps you build bridges with communities will guide you far beyond the classroom. Humanities is you. It is us.” 

Vance originally started at the University of Arizona right after high school, but indecision and financial reasons caused her to leave school. After three years, she returned to college through the Second Start program at Pima Community College, where she founded Art Sparks, a student-led organization that promoted artistic growth and community engagement. 

As president, she led weekly workshops, organized gallery showcases, and partnered with local organizations—including the Japanese Garden, El Jefe Cat Lounge, and Survivor Shield Foundation—to bring art into public and healing spaces. Those experiences helped spark her passion and she returned to the U of A, knowing how she wanted to combine her two majors into a career. 

“I want to help strengthen connections between public services and Spanish-speaking communities while keeping an open door to all the diverse communities that make up Tucson,” Vance told her fellow graduates. 

“We support refugees, non-English speakers, and anyone who needs guidance accessing essential resources. We recognize and embrace cultural differences, seeing them not as barriers but as opportunities to connect and understand. We listen to people’s stories, learn from their experiences, and allow ourselves to step into their world, even if only for a moment. Through empathy, knowledge, and the skills we’ve gained in the College of Humanities, we are prepared to be bridges, helping others navigate challenges, and making a meaningful difference in our communities.” 

In nominating her as Outstanding Senior, Eliud Chuffe, Associate Professor and Director of Undergraduate Studies, and Yadira Berigan, Associate Professor of Practice and former Director of Undergraduate Studies, wrote that Vance is guided by her “belief in the power of language as a bridge—not a barrier.” 

“We have observed Loyda’s remarkable journey—characterized by resilience, dedication, intellectual curiosity, and a deep sense of purpose in everything she does,” they wrote. “She demonstrated that she is academically gifted and that, despite many obstacles, she is a stronger individual who is deeply rooted in our community and our culture and has a purpose to help everyone.” 

At the U of A, Vance’s career goal of building more inclusive cities has guided her research and community involvement, including work to create an interactive website to make Green Stormwater Infrastructure information more accessible to the public. 

“Her ability to translate complex planning ideas into community-friendly tools highlights her as a bright student and a future fully bilingual urban planner with vision and empathy,” Chuffe and Berigan wrote. “As someone raised in a Spanish-speaking household, Loyda understands the real-world impact of language gaps in public services. Her goal is to improve city infrastructure and ensure that Spanish-speaking residents have equal access to resources and representation. Loyda embodies this mission in everything she does.” 

Jennitza Barreras, graduating in May 2026 with a double major in Spanish and Elementary Education: Bilingual Emphasis from the University of Arizona, is one of the 2025 Undergraduate Centennial Achievement Award Recipients. 

Angus Leydic, a fourth-year doctoral candidate in the Graduate Interdisciplinary Program in Second Language Acquisition and Teaching (SLAT) who has been a graduate assistant in the Department of Spanish and Portuguese and the Department of Public and Applied Humanities, is one of this year’s Doctoral Centennial Achievement Award Recipients. 

A first-generation Mexican American student, Barreras is proud to set an example for her four younger siblings and grateful to her parents, whose sacrifices made her education possible. Originally from Gridley, California, she moved to Sahuarita at age 14, where she built a strong sense of home and community.

Her college journey began in the College of Architecture, Planning and Landscape Architecture in 2020, but the COVID-19 pandemic, financial struggles and long overnight shifts forced her to step away. Returning in 2022 with renewed focus, she discovered her passion for education as a career and a calling. 

These challenges strengthened her commitment to equity and access in education. Her journey has been one of persistence, not only on her own behalf, but on behalf of her family, her community and the support system she has built at the U of A.

Barreras has taken on leadership and service roles as student council treasurer and social media chair, College of Education ambassador and AmeriCorps tutor. Through the TRIO Teacher Prep Program, she has worked as a peer mentor, math and Spanish tutor, and student assistant, supporting college students and engaging families through outreach. She has also sought professional development in STEM, preparing to bring engaging and culturally responsive math and science experiences into her future classroom.

Her academic achievements include the AASRA Scholarship, Alumni Council’s Dean Taylor Scholarship, Marilyn J. Ludwig Scholarship and the ADELANTE Internship Award. She has also earned dean’s list recognition in both the College of Humanities and the College of Education.

Barreras plans to begin her teaching career in local Title I schools while pursuing graduate studies and, ultimately, a doctoral degree in education. She hopes to continue serving as an advocate for underrepresented students both in and out of the classroom, building pathways to equitable education. 

Leydic is a fourth-year doctoral candidate in the Graduate Interdisciplinary Program in Second Language Acquisition and Teaching (SLAT). They earned their Master of Arts in languages, literatures and cultures, with a focus on theoretical and applied Spanish linguistics, from Illinois State University, and their Bachelor of Arts in Spanish literature and art history from Duquesne University. Raised in Pittsburgh, they are a first-generation American and a first-generation college graduate.

Developing from this multicultural perspective, their work and research seeks to improve the lives of minoritized people, with their current focus on LGBTQ+ people within larger social institutions. Angus has received multiple awards, including the Linda Waugh/SLAT Research Grant to fund their current dissertation project, the American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Languages Stipend Award to support travel and research presentations for K-16 educators and administrators, and the prestigious Bilinski Fellowship for 2025-2026.

Their most recent projects are titled “Ontologically and Epistemologically Trans: Trans Being and Sense-Making in a Digital Gay Space” and “Queer and/or Trans Student Perspectives on Queering Classroom Materials.” They previously served as co-chair for the 2023 SLAT Roundtable Conference and successfully secured the Professional Opportunities Development Grant to fund the event and host the international plenary speaker.

Leydic has served for two years as the graduate student liaison to the SLAT Executive Council. They have held graduate assistant positions in the English Writing Program, the Department of Spanish and Portuguese and the Department of Public and Applied Humanities. They have also worked in private K-12 schools teaching Spanish, U.S. history from an antiracist lens, and art classes. In addition, they have held positions as a case manager for foster care in Pittsburgh for Spanish-speaking youth and as a case manager for unaccompanied refugee minors in facilities associated with the Department of Human Services.

As a peer mentor for first-year SLAT graduate students, Leydic helps foster community within an interdisciplinary program. They have also served as a teacher advisor for an LGBTQ+ student association during their time as a K-8 teacher and as a curriculum designer, developing sexual orientation, gender identity and expression (SOGIE) training for previous workplaces.

After graduating, Leydic hopes to promote ethical research design and develop equitable teaching practices with students and educators alike. 

In a November symposium organized by Arum Park, a new generation of Classics scholars from across the country gathered at the University of Arizona to discuss how the field is expanding by examining connections with Asia. 

The two-day symposium, supported by a Faculty Seed Grant from the Office of Research & Partnerships and a Capacity Building Grant from the Research Leadership Institute, included both scholarly presentations and a roundtable discussion about the future of the field and what can be gained from exploring Classics and Asia together. 

Park, Associate Professor of Classics, is a former co-chair and current board member of the Asian and Asian American Classical Caucus and co-editor of the new University of Michigan Book Series “Classics and Asia at the Intersections.” Park said she conceived the symposium out of admiration for the innovative research she’s seen in the AAACC community and the importance of sharing it with her home institution’s faculty, graduate students and undergraduates. 

Speakers included UCLA’s Kelly Nguyen, who explored how Vietnamese writers from the French colonization era to contemporary times have engaged with the Greco-Roman classical tradition for different liberatory purposes; College of the Holy Cross’s Dominic Machado, presenting comparative readings of civil war poetry from ancient Rome and modern Sri Lanka; and the University of Washington’s Christopher Waldo, whose work on Asian American writers’ engagement with classical antiquity brought critical attention to a whole body of modern literature that had largely been ignored by previous Classicists. 

“This kind of work responds to and pushes against a more traditional way of thinking about Classics, that modernity and antiquity are totally separate, and it has inspired my current book project on Asian identity and Greek tragedy,” Park said. 

The roundtable showcased the AAACC’s revolutionary dual mission of both promoting groundbreaking research and supporting and elevating Classicists who inhabit marginalized identities. The roundtable included Nguyen, Machado and Waldo, along with Katherine Lu Hsu, Tori Lee, Young Richard Kim and Ellen Bauerle, moderated by Park. 

“I saw the roundtable and symposium as an opportunity for us to speak explicitly about the spirit of support and community at the heart of our work as Classicists,” Park said. “It’s vital that we counter the model of isolated, competitive, and even combative knowledge production that can be pervasive in academia, to expand knowledge through human connection, and to forge human connection through the expansion of knowledge.” 

Waldo, the author of the forthcoming first book in the University of Michigan series, said the focus on mentorship has played a significant role in developing this community of scholars.

“The vision that we have is important for sustaining the future of Classics. One of the classes I teach is about race and identity in antiquity, and my students get so excited about these topics and about talking about the future of the field of Classics and where this study of antiquity can go,” he said. “A lot of students see themselves represented just because I’m the professor of the class, but when they can read articles by Asian American scholars, they get excited about that. They like this much more contemporary vision of the field and it makes them more interested in taking more Classics classes. It gives me hope about the future.”