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Staff

Like our students and faculty, CMS staff members come with an eclectic set of tastes, backgrounds and experiences -- from an internet entrepreneur to a game designer to a radio DJ. Together with faculty and students, they contribute to the creative vision of CMS and ensure that the academics, projects, and initiatives run smoothly.

Jason Beene
Jason Beene
Art Director, Singapore-MIT GAMBIT Game Lab
Jason Beene is GAMBIT's Art Director, helping our team breathe life into the zeros and ones. Previously, Jason served as Studio Art Director of an internal THQ development group. During those 7 years, Jason was instrumental in the production of numerous Nintendo handheld titles and had the opportunity to work with the likes of Pixar and Nickelodeon. His time at THQ was proudly spent doing everything from pixel pushing to managing/mentoring a talented art staff. Additionally, as an alumni of the Rhode Island School of Design illustration department, Jason aims to offer both industry insight and his own creative talents to help further the efforts of GAMBIT.
Rik Eberhardt
Rik Eberhardt
Systems Administrator

As Systems Administrator for Comparative Media Studies, GAMBIT, and Project nml, Rik Eberhardt's current duties include maintaining the ever growing array of servers, lab computers, websites, and databases generated by our research projects, procuring and distributing equipment, and providing hands-on support for CMS faculty, students, researchers, and staff. A 2002 graduate from the College of William & Mary in Williamsburg, VA, he received his Bachelor of Arts with a Literary & Cultural Studies concentration in Postmodern Literature, 'Cyberpunk' Science Fiction, and Contemporary Japanese Literature in Translation. His previous professional experience was as a Desktop and Lab Systems Technician for Lesley University in Cambridge, MA. The ending to Shadow of the Collossus made him cry.

Kurt Fendt
Kurt Fendt
Principal Research Associate and Research Director, HyperStudio

Dr. Kurt Fendt is Research Director in Foreign Languages and Literatures and the Comparative Media Studies Graduate Program (CMS). He is Director of the HyperStudio, a development laboratory for educational media projects in the humanities and co-Principal Investigator and Manager of the d'Arbeloff-funded Metamedia project. He has held Visiting Professorships at the University of Cologne, the Technical University of Aachen (both Germany), and the University of Klagenfurt, Austria; he was also Visiting Scientist at the Fraunhofer Institut in Sankt Augustin, Germany. His work includes the conceptualization and implementation of multimedia applications for the humanities, with a special focus on foreign-language and culture education, interaction design, and research on hypertext and narrative theory. Since 2005, he has been organizing the MIT Short Film Festival.

Fendt teaches several courses in the CMS Graduate Program, in Foreign Languages and Literatures, and the Literature Section. He is co- Director of "Berliner sehen", a collaborative hypermedia learning environment for German Studies, the on-line collaboration space for educators "Berliner sehen Exchange", and co-author of the French interactive narrative A la rencontre de Philippe (CD-ROM version). Before coming to MIT in 1993, Fendt was Assistant Professor in the Department of Applied Linguistics at the University of Bern in Switzerland, where he established the Media Learning Center for the Humanities and earned his Ph.D. in modern German literature with a thesis on hypertext and text theory in 1993 after having completed his MA at the University of Munich, Germany.

Clara
Clara Fernandez-Vara
Research Associate, Singapore-MIT GAMBIT Game Lab
Clara Fernández-Vara is a Research Associate at the Singapore-MIT GAMBIT Game Lab. Her research concentrates on the study of games from the standpoint of textual analysis and performance. Other related areas of interest are videogame history and curriculum development for teaching videogame theory and practice. Clara holds a B.A. in English Studies from the Universidad Autónoma de Madrid (2000) and was awarded a fellowship from La Caixa Foundation to pursue a Masters in Comparative Media Studies from MIT (2004). She is a Ph.D. candidate in Digital Media from the Georgia Institute of Technology and is writing her dissertation on the design of players' experience with the aid of storytelling.
Generoso Fierro
Generoso Fierro
Events Planning Associate, CMS/GAMBIT

Generoso Fierro (Gene) is the events coordinator for CMS and the Singapore-MIT GAMBIT Game Lab, and works closely with our visiting scholars and research affiliates. Currently, Generoso is the membership director of the MIT radio station WMBR, where he is the longtime DJ of the program Generoso's Bovine Ska and Rocksteady. The show concentrates on the music of Jamaica prior to reggae (mento, ska and rocksteady) and has been on the air since 1997. A filmmaker and avid film fan, Gene recently finished a documentary on the legendary Jamaican guitarist Nearlin "Lynn" Taitt.

Amanda Ford
Amanda Ford
Administrative Assistant to Henry Jenkins

Amanda Ford is the Administrative Assistant to Henry Jenkins. She graduated from Western Kentucky University in 2005 with a Bachelor's degree in Literature and a minor in Film Studies. Since graduation, she has presented at the National Popular Culture Association conference on interdisciplinary studies in higher education and has taken further classes in history. She lives in Brooklyn, NY, with her husband and two dogs.

Claudia Forero-Sloan
Claudia Forero-Sloan
Finance, Singapore-MIT GAMBIT Game Lab
Claudia Forero-Sloan comes to GAMBIT from the MIT Sloan School of Management, where she worked as a Financial Assistant for the past two years and supported three Faculty in the Sloan Management Science department as an Administrative Assistant for five years before that.  She will continue working with finance and administration for GAMBIT. In her free time, Claudia enjoys reading and playing with her 5-year-old daughter Annabella.  
Andrew Grant
Andrew Grant
Technical Director, Singapore-MIT GAMBIT Game Lab
Thanks to two wonderfully dedicated game-playing grandmothers, Andrew Grant started playing games before he could hold the cards. From there, he went on to explore board games, strategy games, role-playing games, and computer games. This exploration shows no signs of slowing down. Andrew graduated from MIT in 1993 with Bachelor's degrees in both Computer Science and Mathematics (6 and 18, darnit) and a minor in Creative Writing. After 6 months in the real world, he discovered that someone would actually pay him to design and program computer games, so he returned to his gamer roots by joining Looking Glass Technologies, and then DreamWorks Interactive. Since then, Andrew has survived 10 years as a programmer-for-hire and independent developer in projects ranging from underwater robotics to yet more games. Now, Andrew is the Technical Director for GAMBIT, applying his rather eclectic skillset to the wide array of technologies used in the lab.
Jesper Juul
Jesper Juul
Lecturer for Writing and Humanistic Studies

Jesper Juul has worked with video game theory since the field's early days in the late 1990s. Though originally trained in literature, he tries to consider video games in a broader perspective, also spanning psychology, computer science, and player studies. He is currently examining the emergence of casual games: video games that reach outside the traditional video game audience.

Prior to his appointment at GAMBIT, Jesper was an assistant professor at the Centre for Computer Game Research Copenhagen where he also earned his Ph.D. While Jesper works with and thoroughly appreciates pure theory, he is also interested in the intersection of video game theory and development practice. He has worked as a designer and programmer of multiplayer web-based games and, more recently, casual games.

Jesper's book on video game theory Half-Real was published by MIT Press in 2005. His blog on video game theory, The Ludologist, can be found at www.jesperjuul.net/ludologist and a collection of his writings can be found at www.jesperjuul.net/text.

Geoffrey Long
Geoffrey Long
Communications Director and Researcher, Singapore-MIT GAMBIT Game Lab
Geoffrey Long is Communications Director and Researcher for the Singapore-MIT GAMBIT Game Lab. He is also a 2007 graduate of the CMS master’s program, an avid transmedia scholar, a writer, an artist and a filmmaker. He has been the editor-in-chief of the literary, culture and technology zine Inkblots, a co-founder of both the software collective Untyped and the award-winning film troupe Tohubohu Productions, and the founder of the creative consulting company Dreamsbay. His writing has appeared in Polaris, Gothik, Hika and {fray}, and he is a frequent speaker at conferences including SIGGRAPH, SCMS and FuturePlay. His personal website and portfolio can be found at http://www.geoffreylong.com.
Marleigh Norton
Marleigh Norton
Prototyping Manager, Singapore-MIT GAMBIT Game Lab
Marleigh Norton is the Prototyping Manager for the Singapore-MIT GAMBIT Game Lab and a research manager for the Teacher Education Program’s Outdoor Augmented Reality project at the Columbus Zoo. A recent addition to TEP, Marleigh brings years of design experience from both the commercial and academic sectors. Her recent work as an interaction designer for the Waterford Research Institute aimed to teach reading, math, and science to young children through the use of educational games. She holds a master’s degree in human-computer interaction from Georgia Tech, where she created an augmented reality 3-D puzzle game. New interaction paradigms are a major interest of hers, and past projects have included collaborative touch-screens for the NASA Ames Research Center and voice user interfaces for major telephone companies.
Scot Osterweil
Scot Osterweil
Research Director, Education Arcade

Scot Osterweil leads several Education Arcade projects promoting learning in math, literacy, history, science and foreign language. Formerly the Senior Designer at TERC, a research & development center devoted to math and science education, he designed Zoombinis Island Odyssey, winner of the 2003 Bologna New Media Prize, and the most recent game in the Zoombinis line of products (Riverdeep/TLC). He is the creator of the Zoombinis, and with Chris Hancock he co-designed the multi-award winning Logical Journey of the Zoombinis, and its first sequel, Zoombinis Mountain Rescue. He is the also the designer of the games Switchback and Yoiks!.

Scot's other software designs included work on InspireData (Inspiration Software). He has participated in research on the role of computer games in learning, and on the use of video in data collection and representation. He previously worked in television, on the production of Public Television's Frontline, Evening at Pops, and American Playhouse, and as an animator on a wide range of programs. He is a graduate of Yale College with a degree in Theater Studies.

Daniel Pereira
Research Manager, Convergence Culture Consortium
Daniel T. Pereira attended the USC School of Cinema-Television, Division of Animation and Digital Arts as a member of the MFA Program in Film, Video and Computer Animation. From 1994 to 2001, he was the technical and creative manager of the IBM Digital Media Laboratory located at Universal Studios, Hollywood. In that position, Pereira provided strategic market research, hands-on training and digital media production capabilities to various digital media companies including Sony Pictures Imageworks, Walt Disney Interactive Group, Universal Music Group and iFilm.Daniel T. Pereira attended the USC School of Cinema-Television, Division of Animation and Digital Arts as a member of the MFA Program in Film, Video and Computer Animation. From 1994 to 2001, he was the technical and creative manager of the IBM Digital Media Laboratory located at Universal Studios, Hollywood. In that position, Pereira provided strategic market research, hands-on training and digital media production capabilities to various digital media companies including Sony Pictures Imageworks, Walt Disney Interactive Group, Universal Music Group and iFilm.
Douglas Purdy
Douglas Purdy
Manager, Film Office

Douglas Purdy is the Manager of the Humanities Film Office. He is also the teaching assistant for Kung Fu Cinema: Transnational Perspectives. Purdy has been a DJ at WZBC's Beyond the QE2: Future Funk Radio, one of Boston's longest-running dance shows. He has completed a horror novel and is currently plodding through the second. His most recent publication was in the small press anthology, Vivisections.

Mike Rapa
Mike Rapa
Technology Support Specialist
As Technology Support Specialist, Michael Rapa is the first point of contact for CMS tech support and the technology liaison for project NML. A graduate of The Art Institute of Boston, Rapa received his Bachelor of Fine Arts in 2007 with focus on Graphic Design and Digital Illustration. He is an avid member of the global video gaming community, regularly sacrificing several hours of his day to owning n00bs. His previous professional experience was as a Desktop, Lab Systems, and A/V Technician for Lesley University in Cambridge, MA.
Erin Reilly
Erin Reilly
Research Director, Project New Media Literacies
Project New Media Literacies Research Director Erin Reilly is co-creator of Platform Shoes Forum’s model program Zoey’s Room, a national online community for 10-14 year-old girls, encouraging their creativity through science, technology, engineering and math (STEM). Zoey’s Room has proven results in advancing STEM and Media Literacy skills. In 2007, Erin received a national educational Leaders in Learning Award from Cable in the Classroom for her innovative approach to learning through Zoey’s Room. A recognized expert in the design and development of thought-provoking and engaging educational content powered by virtual learning and new media applications, Erin has been a featured speaker, panelist and keynoter at several industry events. Erin serves on the Working Committee of Pop!Tech (http://www.poptech.org), an internationally acclaimed technology event that can be seen on PBS and the Technology Committee of the Maine Arts Commission.
Brad Seawell
Brad Seawell

Brad Seawell coordinates the MIT Communications Forum and helps to promote and organize some CMS public events including the media-in-transition conferences. He is associate editor of the media-in-transition anthologies Rethinking New Media: The Aesthetics of Transition and Democracy and New Media. Prior to working at MIT, he was an editor at Banker & Tradesman, a business weekly based in Boston.

Becky Shepardson
Becky Shepardson
Undergraduate Administrator

Prior to working for CMS, Undergraduate Administrator Becky Shepardson was an administrative assistant for the Computer Science and AI Lab at MIT. She continues to work part-time as an editorial assistant for the theoretical computer science journal Information and Computation, edited by Albert Meyer. Interesting coincidence:  Albert Meyer was the Chair of the CoC (Committee on Curricula) when the CMS Undergraduate Major was approved on an experimental basis in 2003.  Becky is finishing up a master’s degree in Applied Linguistics at Boston University.

Philip Tan
Philip Tan Boon Yew
Executive Director, Singapore-MIT GAMBIT Game Lab

Philip Tan is the executive director for the US operations of the Singapore-MIT GAMBIT Game Lab, a game research initiative hosted at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He is concurrently a project manager for the Media Development Authority (MDA) of Singapore.

He has served as a member of the steering committee of the Singapore chapter of the International Game Developers Association (IGDA) and worked closely with Singapore game developers to launch industry-wide initiatives and administer content development grants as an assistant manager in the Animation & Games Industry Development section of MDA. He has produced and designed PC online games at The Education Arcade, a research group at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology that studied and created educational games. He complements a Master's degree in Comparative Media Studies with work in Boston's School of Museum of Fine Arts, the MIT Media Lab, WMBR 88.1FM and the MIT Assassins' Guild, the latter awarding him the title of "Master Assassin" for his live-action roleplaying game designs. He also founded a DJ crew at MIT.

Jessica Tatlock
Jessica Tatlock
Project Associate, Project New Media Literacies

Jessica Tatlock joined Project New Media Literacies in February 2009, having spent the previous year coordinating the Internet Safety Technical Task Force at Harvard's Berkman Center for Internet & Society. Prior to Harvard, Jessica worked for more than a decade in Boston's youth development and education fields, developing programs, tools and resources for practitioners working in a wide range of settings. As NML Project Associate, Jessica manages the details behind the scenes at NML. She has an M.Ed in Cultural Diversity and Curriculum Reform from the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, and lives in Brookline with her two school-aged children.

Anna Van Someren
Anna van Someren
Creative Manager, New Media Literacies

Anna van Someren is creative manager for the MacArthur Foundation's New Media Literacies (NML) project. Prior to working at MIT, Anna was Youth Voice Collaborative Program Coordinator at the YWCA Boston, where she developed new media curriculum and taught multimedia production workshops. She has taught Digital Editing and Video Storytelling at the college level and is also an accomplished commerical editor and award-wining video artist. Anna is a graduate of Colgate University and has her Master of Fine Arts degree from Massachusetts College of Art.

Sara Verrelli
Sara Verrilli
Lead Producer, Singapore-MIT GAMBIT Game Lab
Sara Verrilli has spent her professional career in the videogame industry, starting with the day she walked out of MIT's Course V graduate studies and into a position as QA Lead at Looking Glass Technologies for System Shock. However, her game organizing endeavors started much earlier; she helped found a role-playing club at her high school by disguising it as a bridge group. Since then, she's been a game designer, a product manager, a producer, and a QA manager, in no particular order. A veteran of both Looking Glass Technologies and Irrational Games, she's worked on eight major published games, and several more that never made it out the door. As Lead Producer at GAMBIT, she looks forward to corralling, encouraging, and exploring the creative chaos that goes into making great games, and figuring out just the right amount of order to inject into the process. And, while she still doesn't understand bridge, she does enjoy whist.
Matthew Weise
Matthew Weise
Lead Game Designer, Singapore-MIT GAMBIT Game Lab
Matthew Weise is equal parts gamer and cinephile, having attended film school before segueing into game studies and then game development. Matt is Lead Game Designer for GAMBIT and a full-time gamer, which means he not only plays games on a variety of systems but he also completes (most of) them. Matthew did his undergrad at the University of Wisconsin in Milwaukee, where he studied film production before going rogue to design his own degree. He graduated in 2001 with a degree in Digital Arts, which included videogames (this was before Game Studies was a field). He continued his research at MIT’s Comparative Media Studies program, where he worked on Revolution with The Education Arcade. After leaving MIT in 2004 Matt worked in mobile game development for a few years, occassionally doing some consultancy work, before returning to work at GAMBIT.
Andrew Whitacre
Andrew Whitacre
Communications Manager for CMS and the Center for Future Civic Media

A native of Washington, DC, Andrew holds a B.A. in Communication from Wake Forest University and an M.F.A. in Creative Writing from Emerson College. He worked previously in higher education publishing at Houghton Mifflin and at the Feinstein International Center, a humanitarianism research center at Tufts University.

In his all-too spare time, he is the fiction editor for Identity Theory and maintains his blog at fungibleconvictions.com.

Sarah Wolozin
Sarah Wolozin
CMS Program Manager

As the program manager for CMS, Sarah Wolozin manages the financial, research, and personnel administration as well as development and outreach for the program. Before arriving at CMS, she produced documentaries and websites for PBS and cable for over ten years on topics ranging from African-American arts to the American healthcare system.