Your AU Faculty

College of Health, Human Services, and Science

Barbara Philibert, PhD - Dean

Dr. Barbara Philibert is Dean of the College of Health, Human Services, and Sciences at Ashford University. She has been associated with Ashford University since 1993, teaching in the areas of healthcare administration, psychology, and social science. Barbara holds graduate degrees from the University of Iowa – a Master of Arts in Nursing and a PhD in Educational Psychology, Instruction Design, with cogent areas in educational psychology, health care administration, and health education. Dr. Philibert has been active in the design, development, and implementation of several of the Ashford University online and campus degree programs.

Prior to coming to Ashford, Dr. Philibert was in hospital administration, serving in various upper-level administration positions. Additionally, she has taught and held administrative positions in both nursing and allied health education. From a community perspective, Dr. Philibert was the project director/designer of a public community project providing comprehensive school-based health services for low-income children and families. She has also served as a board member for various community agencies in both healthcare and education, and has been a consultant for healthcare administration, health education, nursing education, education, and community health projects. In reflection upon education, Dr. Philibert states, “All of us are learners in life’s journey. It is truly a privilege to encourage and share the joy of learning with students.”
Email: barb.philibert@ashford.edu

Bruce Bradway, MA, MS

Bruce Bradway attended Wabash College and after four years and several track records, graduated with a Bachelor’s degree in English. The Vietnam War beckoned at that juncture and unable to resist the adventure, he spent twelve years bouncing around the world as a Medical Laboratory Technician. While in the service, he acquired several degrees: an AAS in Medical Laboratory Technology from the Community College of the Air Force, an MA in Psychology, Guidance and Counseling from the University of Northern Colorado, and an MS in International Relations from Troy State University. Professor Bradway is currently finishing a doctorate in Academic Psychology from Walden University.
Email: ted.eilders@ashford.edu

Aubrey Lee Cartwright, PhD

Dr. Lee Cartwright teaches Organic, Quantitative, Nuclear, and Environmental Chemistry and Biochemistry at the Ashford University campus. He is a native of North Carolina and came to Ashford University in 2009 after serving 18 years as Associate Professor at Texas A&M University in the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences. At Texas A&M, he was a member of the Graduate Faculties of Nutrition, Food Technology, Genetics, and Poultry Science. Before his tenure at Texas A&M. he was a Research Leader and Laboratory Director for the USDA, Agricultural Research Service, for eight years and a Research Physiologist with the ARS in Athens, Georgia for two years. Dr. Cartwright has numerous research publications in his areas of expertise and has received national and regional recognition for his work. He earned an Associate of Science degree from College of the Albemarle at Elizabeth City, North Carolina and a Bachelor of Science, Master of Science, and PhD from North Carolina State University at Raleigh. He also earned an MBA from Salisbury University in Maryland.
Email: aubrey.cartwright@ashford.edu

Joshua Eggenberger, PhD

Dr. Eggenberger attended Northern Illinois University, where he received a Bachelor of Science in Applied Mathematics (minor in Physics) in 2002, a Master of Science in Pure Mathematics in 2004, and a PhD in Mathematical Science in 2010. His research emphasis is in ordinary differential equations. In addition to teaching as a graduate instructor at NIU, Eggenberger has served on the faculty at Kishwaukee College and Anoka-Ramsey Community College. As a mathematics instructor at Ashford, he emphasizes exploration of problem solving and the application of mathematical techniques and ideas to students' individual interests.
Email: joshua.eggenberger@ashford.edu

Ted Eilders, PhD

Dr. Ted Eilders is a graduate of Concordia University Chicago, Wartburg Theological Seminary, and the University of Iowa. Eilders has worked in pastoral ministry, college counseling, and college teaching. He enjoys his work with students, faculty, and staff at Ashford University and finds them friendly and helpful. He currently teaches in the Sociology and Psychology areas on campus. Dr. Eilders sees Ashford University as a place where "learning for life" occurs.
Email: ted.eilders@ashford.edu

Sarah Gall, PhD

Originally from northeast Tennessee, Sarah Gall received her Bachelor of Science in Biology from Rhodes College in Memphis, Tennessee, in 1998. Six years later, she earned a PhD in Molecular Cell Biology from Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, Missouri. Gall began teaching in the Biology department at Ashford in the fall of 2004. Her primary teaching responsibilities include most of the upper-level biology classes for science and health care majors, including (but not limited to) Anatomy & Physiology, Cell Biology, Genetics & Immunology, and Microbiology. She has also directed several senior research projects for students. Additionally, Dr. Gall teaches a biology course for non-science majors, and has team-taught an interdisciplinary course on Science and Culture. Her hope for her students: "That they will learn to think in new ways and apply their knowledge to new situations."
Email: sarah.gall@ashford.edu

Amy Geier, MA

Amy Geier started full-time employment at Ashford University in August of 2011. She served as an adjunct instructor in the mathematics department for several years prior to that. She earned her undergraduate degree in Mathematics at California State University at Fresno, followed by a teaching credential from the same institution. She later earned her Master’s degree in Mathematics from California State University at Fullerton. She is delighted to be on campus in a full-time capacity and share her life-long enjoyment of mathematics with all of her students.
Email: amy.geier@ashford.edu

Glen Just, ABD


Email: glen.just@ashford.edu

Devin Land, PhD

Devin Land received his PhD in Psychology from the University of Kansas in 2007. The emphasis of his graduate education was cognitive psychology, which is the study of basic brain processes such as perception, attention, memory, and language that underlie everyday cognition. His teaching experience and interests include cognitive psychology, biological psychology, and research methods and statistics for the behavioral sciences, among others. Dr. Land has conducted basic experimental research on the attention and memory processes involved in visual search and is also interested in studying how basic cognitive principles apply to areas such as human factors design, social and clinical psychology, and personality and individual differences.
Email: jaret.land@ashford.edu

Sofya Masharipova

Sofya Masharipova received her Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees in Pure Mathematics and Math Education at Tashkent State University (now National University of Uzbekistan) in 1985. Ten years later, she received a PhD in Pure Mathematics with an emphasis in Functional Analysis at the Uzbek Academy of Sciences, in Tashkent, Uzbekistan (formerly the Soviet Union). From 1985 to 2000, she taught math classes in Tashkent State University as an Assistant Professor of Mathematics. In 2001, she moved to the United States with her family, and in 2010 Sofya returned to teaching and started working at Ashford University, first as an Adjunct Professor and eventually as a full-time Visiting Assistant Professor teaching College Algebra, Pre-Calculus, and Linear Algebra. Dr. Masharipova lives in Clinton, IA and has a son in elementary school and a daughter in high school. She is currently researching Operator Algebras in Pontrjagin Spaces, with applications in Theoretical Physics.
Email: sofya.masharipova@ashford.edu

Karen Meade, PhD

Dr. Karen Meade teaches Ashford University's general chemistry and college physics courses. Meade came to Ashford University from Iowa Lakes Community College where she had been a science instructor since August 2007. She has also taught at Iowa Central Community College and Southeastern Community College, as well as at the junior and senior high school levels. Dr. Meade earned her Associate of Arts degree from Iowa Central Community College, Webster City, IA; her Bachelor of Science degree from the University of Iowa, Iowa City, IA; her Master of Arts degree from the University of Northern Iowa, Cedar Falls, Iowa; her Master of Science degree from the University of Northern Iowa, Cedar Falls, Iowa; and her PhD degree from the University of Iowa, Iowa City, IA.
Email: karen.meade@ashford.edu

Joshua Neely, PhD

After growing up in Southern California, Dr. Neely attended Humboldt State University where he studied environmental biology and botany. After completing his undergraduate program, he began graduate school in botany at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, where he later earned a Master of Science degree. Dr. Neely worked as an environmental scientist in the field of geotechnical engineering for two years before embarking upon a new graduate program in botany at Washington State University. He was awarded the Doctor of Philosophy degree in botany in 2006, and then went on to instruct biology and botany classes at Cypress and Golden West colleges in Orange County, California. Dr. Neely came to Ashford University in 2011, where he is currently Assistant Professor of Biology.
Email: joshua.neely@ashford.edu

Librado (Lee) Salazar, BS

Salazar serves as the Science Laboratory Supervisor and has been with Ashford University since 2007. Salazar has Bachelor of Science degrees in both Psychology (Northern Illinois University ’02) and Biology (Ashford University ’07), and is currently pursuing a Masters of Arts degree in Psychology from the University of the Rockies. In addition to overseeing daily laboratory activities, Salazar also supervises student laboratory assistants and helps to coordinate students’ senior thesis projects. In his time at Ashford, Salazar has also filled in as a laboratory instructor and is currently a member of the safety committee. His hope is that, “Students get the most out of their experience at Ashford and that they truly enjoy the time that they spend here.”
Email: lee.salazar@ashford.edu

Benjamin Sandler, PhD

Benjamin Sandler has had a lifelong interest in chemistry, ever since he built a chemistry lab in his basement as a teenager. He attended Brown University for his undergraduate studies, and as a PhD student at Cornell did research on the silkworm moth’s fantastically sensitive antennae, which can detect a single molecule of sex pheromone. For his PhD thesis he became the first person to determine the structure of an insect pheromone binding protein, and this work continues to serve as the basis of research on olfaction in the biochemistry community. As a postdoc at the University of California San Francisco, he performed research on prostate cancer and did a teaching internship at San Francisco State University. After teaching chemistry as an adjunct professor at the University of San Francisco, he taught biochemistry at Oklahoma State University while developing his “Math as a Second Language” teaching methodology. He now happily teaches general chemistry at Ashford University while pursuing his scholarship on teaching.
Email: benjamin.sandler@ashford.edu

Shukhrat Usmanov, PhD

Dr. Usmanov was born in Andijan, Uzbekistan (former Soviet Union), and received a PhD in Analysis from Tashkent State University in 1985. He moved to the United States in 1999, and earned a second PhD in Ergodic Theory from North Dakota State University in 2006. At Ashford, he currently teaches undergraduate courses in Combined Algebra, College Algebra, Linear Algebra, Pre-Calculus, Calculus Sequence and Managerial Calculus. His hobbies include reading, music, chess and hiking. His wife, Sofya, is also a mathematician and they have two children who are currently enrolled at Jefferson Elementary in Clinton.
Email: shukhrat.usmanov@ashford.edu

John Zimmerman, PhD

Dr. Zimmerman has an Associate of Arts from Northeastern Oklahoma A&M College, a Bachelor of Science and a Master of Science in Wildlife Ecology from Oklahoma State University, and a PhD in Zoology from North Carolina State University. He has been with Ashford University since the fall of 1995 teaching in the areas of Biology and Environmental Studies, and he currently serves as the Science Area Coordinator. His words of wisdom to students: "Remember the saying that you get out of something comparable to what you put in. So put effort into your education."
Email: john.zimmerman@ashford.edu

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