Theresa A. Donofrio

Project focus: The Fellow will lead the design, planning, and implementation of a project that builds capacity for science centers and museums to encourage a sense of active hope—the understanding that we all have roles to play in bringing about a healthier planet—and invite and inspire widespread participation in planetary health action.

Theresa A. Donofrio is a researcher, writer, and educator whose expertise sits at the intersection of communication, memory studies, and museum studies. Prior to joining the Seeding Action team at the Association of Science and Technology Centers, Theresa served as an Associate Professor of Communication Studies at Coe College, where she taught a wide variety of Communication Studies courses, including visual rhetoric, rhetorical criticism, and seminars on the rhetorics of atrocity. In her research, Theresa analyzes the discourses surrounding public tragedies, attending to the rhetorics utilized to define these events and shape how they are remembered. Her areas of interest also include community engaged pedagogy. While at Coe College, she was a Faculty Fellow for Community Engaged Pedagogy and was an Iowa Campus Compact Engaged Scholar Faculty Fellow. Theresa is a skilled collaborator with a strong record of working alongside interdisciplinary teams and experience designing initiatives to support the museum professionals with whom she has partnered.