Laura Pipe

BIO

Laura M. Pipe, Ph.D., is the Interim Director of the University Teaching and Learning Commons (UTLC) overseeing campus-wide faculty development. Perviously, she directed the Teaching Innovations Office (TIO) (2015-2023) that served as the campus teaching and learning center until the UTLC was restructured in fall 2023. Laura also serves as the faculty advisor for UNCG’s Native American Student Association (NASA). In her role directing campus-wide faculty development since 2015, Laura established and continues to foster a teaching and learning culture at UNCG that is grounded in inclusive and culturally responsive praxis aimed at collaboration, innovation, and student success. As an Indigenous educator (Tuscarora/Haudenosaunee descent), her teaching/professional praxis is firmly centered in fostering reciprocal learning relationships that emphasize our shared curiosities and responsibilities as lifelong learners and seek to disrupt the colonizing eurocentricism of the academy. With more than a decade of experience developing academic Learning Communities and teaching that focus on integrated learning and interdisciplinary approaches, Laura offers significant experience in course development, program development, assessment, teaching methodologies and pedagogies, AAC&U’s High Impact Practices, student success and retention, and developing curiosity-centered spaces.

Currently, her scholarly interests and work are rooted in decolonial praxis and focus on the Indigenous pedagogies and epistemologies of the Woodland Peoples of the east coast of Turtle Island; action sports (bicycle motocross, skateboarding, stock car racing) and the construction/consumption of public/private space; and Native and Indigenous traditions in sport and health. Laura actively teaches within the areas of sports sociology, kinesiology, sports studies, sports management, health studies, and critical methodologies. She is the co-creator of the Toward a Liberated Learning Spirit (TALLS) model for developing critical consciousness and has an active Scholarship of Teaching and Learning (SoTL) research portfolio. Her most recent work, Ignite: A Decolonial Approach to Higher Education through Space, Place and Culture (Pipe & Stephens (Eds), 2023; Vernon Press), brings together theory, practice, and acts of tender resistance to challenge colonized concepts of learning. Laura is an alumnus of the North Carolina School of Science and Mathematics (NCSSM) and holds a B.S. in Journalism (Texas Christian University), an M.S. in Higher Postsecondary Education (Syracuse University), and a Ph.D. in Kinesiology (UNCG) with a post baccalaureate certificate in Teaching Sociology (UNCG).

AREAS OF EXPERTISE

• Decolonial Praxis
• Indigenous Pedagogies
• SoTL Methodologies
• Applied/Problem-Based Learning
• Collaborative Learning
• Inclusive/Culturally-Responsive Teaching
• Student Success

PROJECTS OF FOCUS

• Post Baccalaureate in College Teaching
• General Education Support (MAC)
• Mid-Semester Course Evaluations
• New Faculty Programs
• Department Head/Chair Programs
• Student Success Partnerships
• UTLC Central Leadership

COMMITTEE ASSIGNMENTS

• Co-Chair, Teaching Effectiveness Policy Workgroup
• Faculty Senate EDI Committee
• Innovative Learning Spaces Council

TEACHING ASSIGNMENTS

• KIN 220: Lifetime Wellness
• KIN 330: Critical Analyses for a Physically Active Society
• KIN 630: Sport & Society: Social Inequalities
• KIN 716: Mixed Methods in Kinesiology Research
• KIN 717: Qualitative Methods in Kinesiology
• RCO 185: Wellness on Turtle Island: Native Conceptions of Wellbeing
• RCO 215: Physical Activity in a Native World
• RCO 215: Critical Readings of Action Sports through Film
• Independent Study: Decolonial Praxis and Indigenous Methodologies

• MISM 520: Sociology and Sport (Guilford College, Masters in International Sports Management Program)
• SPST 232: Sociology of Sport & Exercise (Guilford College, Sports Studies)