Pearson author roundtable on digital learning
Authors share how technology has changed teaching and how digital learning allows for more active learning and content retention.
Learn more about the digital courseware mentioned in this video.
About the authors

Dr. Lourdes P. Norman-McKay, Florida State College at Jacksonville
Dr. Lourdes Norman-McKay earned her PhD in biochemistry and molecular biology from the Pennsylvania State University College of Medicine. Her postdoctoral fellowship in microbiology and immunology focused on the role of viruses in cancer. She has been training allied health students at the associate, baccalaureate, and post baccalaureate levels for the past 17 years. She is currently a professor at Florida State College Jacksonville where she mainly teaches microbiology and anatomy and physiology, and where in 2016, her peers and students recognized her with the Outstanding Faculty Award.
Dr. Norman-McKay has extensive STEM program development experience that ranges from developing and launching a biomedical sciences baccalaureate program to serving as a curriculum designer and subject matter expert for the Florida Space Research Institute and Workforce Florida. Most recently, she was invited to serve in the U.S. Department of State’s Bureau of International Information Programs to promote STEM education innovation and women in STEM. Dr. Norman-McKay is also an active participant in the American Society for Microbiology’s (ASM) Microbiology in Nursing and Allied Health Task Force Committee; an associate editor for ASM’s Journal of Microbiology and Biology Education; and the author of Microbiology: Basic and Clinical Principles, a textbook used across the globe to teach tomorrow’s healthcare team — many of whom are now front-line workers in the current COVID-19 crisis.

Eric Gaze, Bowdoin College
Eric Gaze directs the Quantitative Reasoning (QR) program at Bowdoin College, is Chair of the Center for Learning and Teaching, and is a Senior Lecturer in the Mathematics Department. He is the current President of the National Numeracy Network (NNN 2013 – 2017). Eric has a QR textbook published with Pearson, Thinking Quantitatively: Communicating with Numbers, with blog: https://thinkingquantitatively.wordpress.com/.
Eric has given talks and led faculty workshops on the topics of QR Across the Curriculum, QR Assessment, and has served on review teams of QR programs. Eric was the Principal Investigator for a NSF TUES Type I grant (2012-14), Quantitative Literacy and Reasoning Assessment (QLRA) DUE 1140562, and has published articles on teaching and learning related to citizen literacy. Prior to coming to Bowdoin, Eric led the development of a Masters in Numeracy program for K-12 teachers at Alfred University as an Associate Professor of Mathematics and Education.

Professor Tracie L. Miller-Nobles
Tracie L. Miller-Nobles, CPA, received her master’s degree in accounting from Texas A&M University and is working on her doctoral degree in adult education also from Texas A&M University. She is an associate professor at Austin Community College. Previously she was a senior lecturer at Texas State University and has taught as an adjunct at University of Texas-Austin. Professor Miller is an author of Horngren’s Accounting textbook.

Dr. Nivaldo J. Tro, Santa Barbara City College
Nivaldo Tro has been teaching college chemistry since 1990 and is currently teaching at Santa Barbara Community College. He received his PhD in chemistry from Stanford University for work on developing and using optical techniques to study the adsorption and desorption of molecules to and from surfaces in ultrahigh vacuums. He then went on to the University of California at Berkeley, where he did postdoctoral research on ultrafast reaction dynamics in solution.
Dr. Tro has been awarded grants from the American Chemical Society Petroleum Research Fund, the Research Corporation, and the National Science Foundation to study the dynamics of various processes occurring in thin adlayer films adsorbed on dielectric surfaces. He lives in Santa Barbara with his wife and their four children. In his free time, Dr. Tro enjoys mountain biking, surfing, and being outdoors with his family.

Dr. David Laibson, Harvard University
David Laibson is the Robert I. Goldman Professor of Economics and a Faculty Dean of Lowell House at Harvard University. He leads Harvard's Foundations of Human Behavior Initiative. Laibsonʼs research focuses on the topic of behavioral economics, with emphasis on intertemporal choice, self-regulation, behavior change, household finance, public finance, macroeconomics, asset pricing, aging, and biosocial science. He is a member of the National Bureau of Economic Research, where he directs the National Institute of Aging Roybal Center for Behavior Change in Health and Savings, and is a Research Associate in the Aging, Asset Pricing, and Economic Fluctuations Working Groups. Laibson serves on Harvardʼs Pension Investment Committee and on the Board of the Russell Sage Foundation, where he chairs the finance committee, as well as the advisory boards of the Social Science Genetics Association Consortium and the Consumer Finance Institute of the Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia. He has served as the Chair of the Department of Economics at Harvard University and as a member of the Academic Research Council of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau.
Laibson is a recipient of a Marshall Scholarship. He is a Fellow of the Econometric Society. He is an elected member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, the National Academy of Social Insurance, and the National Academy of Sciences. He is a two-time recipient of the TIAA-CREF Paul A. Samuelson Award for Outstanding Scholarly Writing on Lifelong Financial Security. Laibson holds degrees from Harvard University (AB Economics, summa cum laude), the London School of Economics (MSc in Econometrics and Mathematical Economics), and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (PhD in Economics). He received his PhD in 1994 and has taught at Harvard since then. In recognition of his teaching, he has been awarded Harvardʼs ΦΒΚ Prize and a Harvard College Professorship. Laibson is co-author of two Pearson titles: Macroeconomics, 3rd Edition and Microeconomics, 3rd Edition.

Professor Brooke L. Whisenhunt, Ph.D., Missouri State University
Brooke Whisenhunt is a professor of psychology at Missouri State University where she has been a faculty member since 2002. She received her bachelor’s degree from the University of Arkansas in 1997 and her PhD in clinical psychology from Louisiana State University in 2002. Her research has focused on body image, obesity, and eating disorders, in addition to the scholarship of teaching and learning. She teaches undergraduate courses, including Introductory Psychology, Abnormal Psychology, and Teaching of Psychology, in addition to graduate-level courses in psychological assessment.
In addition to her academic position, she is also a licensed clinical psychologist. She was a member of the introductory psychology redesign team at Missouri State University as part of a statewide mission in course redesign through the National Center for Academic Transformation (NCAT). The redesign team transformed introductory psychology at Missouri State University into a blended course and demonstrated significant improvements in learning outcomes. The results of this project have been published in Psychology Learning and Teaching and Scholarship of Teaching and Learning in Psychology. Since the completion of the redesign project, Dr. Whisenhunt has been serving as a Missouri Learning Commons Scholar to assist other institutions in the state implement redesign projects. She is also a National Center for Academic Transformation (NCAT) Redesign Scholar. She has presented across the country about pedagogical strategies to improve learning, decrease institutional costs, and improve retention in introductory psychology.

Dr. Jeff Manza, New York University
Jeff Manza is Professor of Sociology at New York University. An award-winning teacher, his research examines how different types of social identities and inequalities influence political processes such as voting, partisanship, and public opinion (at both the macro and micro level). He is the co-author (with Chris Uggen) of Locked Out: Felon Disenfranchisement and American Democracy (Oxford University Press 2006), and three books with Clem Brooks: Social Cleavages and Political Change (Oxford University Press, 1999), Why Welfare States Persist (University of Chicago Press, 2007); and Whose Rights? Counterterrorism and the Dark Side of American Public Opinion (Russell Sage Foundation Press, 2013). Manza and Brooks are currently completing a book on the trends and underlying mechanisms of public attitudes towards categorical versus economic inequality, entitled The Two Inequalities: Public Responses to Categorical and Economic Inequalities for Oxford University Press. He also coordinates The Sociology Project, a collaborative series of introductory textbooks in Sociology co-authored by Manza and other members of the Department. Two titles have been released so far, The Sociology Project: An Introduction to the Sociological Imagination and Social Problems.

Mary Anne Poatsy
Mary Anne Poatsy is a senior adjunct faculty member of Montgomery County Community College, teaching various business, management, and computer application and concepts courses in classroom and online environments.
Since 1995, Poatsy has taught at various elementary and secondary institutions, including Gwynedd Mercy College, Montgomery County Community College, Muhlenberg College, and Bucks County Community College. She has also trained in the professional environment and presented at several conferences. Before teaching, Poatsy was a vice president at Shearson Lehman Hutton in the Municipal Bond Investment Banking Department.
Poatsy holds a BA in psychology and education from Mount Holyoke College and an MBA in finance from the Northwestern University J. L. Kellogg Graduate School of Management.