Role Model 2011

Category: Faculty

Dr. Darci L. Strother, Modern Language Studies

Dr. Darci Strother is a Professor at California State University San Marcos, where she has taught courses in literature, linguistics, and the Spanish language since 1993. She has served as the Chair of the Modern Language Studies Department several times, three times as the Interim Faculty Center Director or Co-Director, and twice as the Director or Interim Director of the North County Higher Education Alliance.  She currently serves as the Director of the Office of Community Service Learning, which helps provide students with real-world learning experiences outside the classroom, while offering valuable service that strengthens communities. Dr. Strother has published and lectured nationally and internationally at conferences representing a wide range of professional organzations, such as the Association for Theater in Higher Education, the International Association for Learning Laboratories, the American Association for Teachers of Spanish and Portuguese, and Continuums of Service.  Her special area of academic expertise is classical Spanish theatre. In 2009, she co-directed a study abroad program that took students to a classical theatre festival in Almagro (Spain), and she regularly takes students to Mexico through an ongoing community service initiative, "Hands Across Our Border."  She serves on the Board of Directors for the Association for Hispanic Classical Theatre, and is the Theatre Review Editor for the academic journal Comedia Performance. As a Fulbright scholar, she spent six months in Chile teaching, lecturing, and conducting research at the Universidad de Playa Ancha and the Pontificia Universidad Catolica de Valparaiso, as well as offering numerous workshops for Chile's current and future teachers. Her Ph.D. and M.A. degrees in Spanish are from the University of California Irvine, and she holds a B.A. degree from the University of Pennsylvania with majors in Psychology and Spanish (with honors).  While she loves to travel and has had the opportunity to visit countries on 5 continents, as a native Californian and graduate of San Clemente High School, she is delighted to have been able to build a career so close to home, at CSUSM.