OU names Rice as associate dean

The Howland native previously taught English at Lakeview in Ohio and at Mercer, Pa.

ATHENS, Ohio — Associate Professor Linda J. Rice has been named associate dean for Outreach and Undergraduate Studies in the College of Education at Ohio University.

Rice, a native of Howland, will assume her new responsibilities July 1, joining the College’s Academic Leadership Council, Administrative Team and Society of Alumni and Friends.

A faculty member in the Department of English at Ohio University since 2000, Rice’s responsibilities will focus primarily on providing undergraduate programs that prepare competent educators and expanding relationships with the wider community through outreach programs.

She is a National Board Certified Teacher and was named Outstanding High School English Language Arts Educator by the Ohio Council of Teachers of English Language Arts in 1998. In 2006-07 she was awarded the distinction of University Professor by the Center for Teaching Excellence at Ohio University, and she received the Arts Sciences Dean’s Outstanding Teacher Award for 2008-09.

Rice is the author of “What Was It Like? Teaching History and Culture through Young Adult Literature” (Teachers College Press, Columbia University, 2006) and “Exploring African Life and Literature: Novel Guides to Promote Socially-Responsive Learning” (International Reading Association, 2007). Her work has also been published in The ALAN Review, The Ohio Journal of English Language Arts, and SLATE (Support for the Learning and Teaching of English) newsletter, and she has authored eight chapters in four edited books.

Before coming to Ohio University, Rice taught high school English for seven years at Lakeview High School in Cortland and for three years at Mercer (Pa.) Area High School.

Rice earned her doctorate from Kent State University, her master’s from Westminster College in New Wilmington, Pa., and her bachelor’s from Grove City College. She is a 1988 graduate of Howland High School.