Nina Barraco
Valerie Gleason
Kush Patel

 

Nina Barraco is a member of the MLB-Thayer Events Communication Team. She designs all print and digital materials for the multiple units the team supports: Asian Languages and Cultures, Romance Languages and Literatures, Near Eastern Studies, Slavic Languages and Literatures, German Languages and Literatures, Institute for the Humanities, and the Humanities Collaboratory.

Nina is a recent graduate from the Penny Stamps School of Art and Design and the University of Michigan.  Her studies at Stamps were concentrated in graphic design and printmaking.  Art has always been a part of her life, and she has experience in a plethora of artistic fields, from fine art to conservation to archaeology and art history.  Some artists whose work she currently admires are Rockwell Kent, Susan Goethel Campbell, and Henri Cartier-Bresson.

Valerie Gleason is the meetings and events coordinator for the MLB Thayer Events and Communication team. She works with faculty, staff, vendors, and community partners to orchestrate events for the Departments of Romance Languages and Literatures, Slavic Languages and Literatures, German Languages and Literatures, Near Eastern Studies, Asian Languages and Cultures, and the Institute for the Humanities. Valerie's event coordination experience originated with her event planning company, and expanded locally while working on fundraising events for area non-profit organizations.

Kush Patel develops and coordinates several academic initiatives related to the Institute's 2016-17 theme of "Humanities and Public Policy," including endowed lectures, public and digital humanities programming and training for students, and teaching. In his role, Kush also organizes the grant application process and recruitment activities of the Humanities Collaboratory, works with faculty coordinator and project manager on program assessment, and supports scholarship in the humanities by identifying and mobilizing campus-wide resources for collaborative research. Kush received his PhD in architecture from the University of Michigan, where he focused on issues of participatory politics and the social production of space in the radical French architectural works of the "post-68" period. Prior to joining the institute, Kush was a graduate student Public Humanities Fellow with Rackham's Arts of Citizenship program, and was most recently a Mellon Public Humanities Summer Fellow at the U-M Detroit Center. The commitment to engaged and collaborative education at the intersection of the humanities, arts, and design unite his academic and administrative work.