Modern Languages - Emeritus Faculty

120-Hour TESOL/TEFL Certificate, United Kingdom, 2023

Qualified Administrator, Intercultural Development Inventory, Olney, Maryland, 2020

Ph.D. in German literature, University of Washington, Seattle, WA, 1996

M.A. in German language and literature, Ohio State University, Columbus, OH, 1991

• Administrator effectiveness in higher education

• Curriculum design for 21st century skills, high-impact practices, proficiency development

• Data inquiry and application for recruitment, retention, and continuous improvement

• Cinema of Andreas Dresen / Last Generation Directors of the former GDR

Beginning German I, II / Intermediate German I, II / Composition and Conversation / Advanced Stylistics / Business German / Germanic Civilization and Culture - Beginnings to WWII / Contemporary Culture of the German-speaking Countries / Introduction to German Literature / German-language Literature by Women / German Literature of the 19th and 20th Centuries / German Literature and Film / Introduction to German Cinema / Berlin in Film – Film in Berlin / The Cinema of Andreas Dresen / German Popular Culture / Advanced German Translation

Dr. McGee taught at WKU from 1997 to 2021. She coordinated the German curriculum at WKU and taught all levels of German, with an emphasis on 20th and 21st century Germany literature and culture. She is a Fulbright Scholar (Potsdam-Babelsberg 2002-2003) who has published in journals such as Film History: An International Journal, German Studies Review, Colloquia Germanica, and Foreign Language Annals as well as in film anthologies appearing in Britain and Germany.

She revised the German curriculum at WKU to foreground contemporary topics and applied uses of the language, in order to better prepare graduates to use German in their future careers. Dr. McGee is a passionate proponent of study abroad, having studied three languages in four countries and led seven study abroad programs since coming to WKU. She contributed to the development of a robust WKU International Student Teaching Program in Werne, Germany, for future K-12 teachers in all disciplines and levels. She and Heike Armbrust created the Armbrust/McGee Scholarship that makes awards each year to support WKU students studying abroad in Germany.

Dr. McGee served as Head of Modern Languages from 2009 to 2020. In that time, she initiated creation of the Arabic and Chinese major/minor programs, added Russian and expanded Japanese offerings. She arranged professional development to support faculty in having a better understanding of proficiency and assessment. She used data-based approaches to improve recruitment and retention. Under her guidance, the department brought in more Fulbright Language Teaching Assistants, ALLEX TAs and Taiwan Interns, and supported several graduate assistantships. These efforts helped the department expand offerings in critical languages in particular.

From 2018 to 2020, she served as Co-Principal Investigator of the Chinese Flagship at WKU. Additionally, she wrote grant proposals to expand Japanese at WKU (awarded, declined) and to provide professional development for teachers in Kentucky (awarded, directed). In addition, she has co-authored or contributed to STARTALK and Department of Education grant proposals that emanated from the department while she was at the helm.

Dr. McGee is a leader in the field of world language teaching. Her path to leadership in the field began when she was selected to join the TraiNDaF 2004 cohort (a project of AATG and the German government), intended to develop future leaders in the field. She was President of the Kentucky Chapter of the American Association of Teachers of German from 2004-2006 and Testing Chair from 2009 to 2014. She convened Heads and Chairs of Modern Languages at the annual Kentucky World Languages Association Meeting from 2010 to 2016. She contributed to two rounds of revision to Program Review for World Languages in Kentucky. In 2020, she was recognized by the Kentucky World Languages Association with its Lifetime Achievement Award.

A committed advocate of professional development and of faculty engagement in the discipline, she attended and presented regularly at annual conferences of the American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Languages (ACTFL) and the Kentucky World Languages Association (KWLA). She engaged in extensive professional development for her administrative role at WKU, most substantially through her participation in the Management Development Program at Harvard University in 2012.

She conducts program reviews in world languages departments and continues to share her expertise through writing for Academic Leader and consulting for LifeStories Matter LLC. In 2023, she was named to the Fulbright Specialist Roster. She expects to serve abroad in the areas of world languages pedagogy and higher education administration.

Rev. April 2023