About the speakers

 

 

 

Ashley B. Stewart

Executive Coach, Leadership Development Practitioner, Racial Consciousness Consultant

Ashley B. Stewart creates customized leadership solutions to ensure personal and organizational success. He serves senior executives and emerging leaders in private and social sector organizations across multiple industries in North and South America, Africa, and the Caribbean.

Passionate about racial equity and inclusion, through Next Step Consulting, Ashley coaches leaders to name and grapple with their motivations, behaviors, and facets of their identity for conscious examination. Leveraging his 15+ years of expertise leading teams and driving large-scale transformations, his clients have included global brands such as American Express, Deloitte, Goldman Sachs, Howard Hughes Medical Institute, and USAID.

Ashley serves as the executive director of talent and organizational development for 11,000 staff of Baltimore City Public Schools to create the culture and sustain the conditions to eliminate the predictability of student outcomes by race. In prior roles with the Annie E. Casey Foundation, Johns Hopkins University, the U.S. Department of State, and the U.S. Department of Education, Ashley co-designed and launched national leadership capacity building programs and philanthropic initiatives focused on leadership development, public-private investments, healthcare systems, community development, land reform, and K-12 education reform.

Ashley holds a bachelor’s degree in psychology from Morehouse College, a master’s degree in public policy with a focus on leadership from Harvard University and is a graduate of the Georgetown University Certificate in Leadership Coaching program.

 

 

Tammy Dietzel

Associate Director, Talent Acquisition & Strategic Development, Human Resources, Diversity & Inclusion

Tammy Dietzel is the Associate Director, Talent Acquisition and Strategic Development at CSU Fullerton. She is passionate about the CSU’s ability to impact lives, change management, and strategic technology utilization. She began her career in health care patient advocacy and transitioned to higher education in 2016. She has a background in Human Resources Information Systems and IT Project Management from CSU San Bernardino. She then joined the Office of the Chancellor as an Implementation Manager where she successfully guided all 23 campuses recruiting teams into a single enterprise applicant tracking solution, known as CHRS Recruiting before finding her home here at CSU Fullerton.

Tammy is a graduate of CSU Long Beach with her Bachelors of Science in Health Care Administration. She earned a Master of Public Administration from CSU San Bernardino and is currently studying towards a Doctorate in Educational Leadership at CSU San Bernardino, with a dissertation focus in change management. She is also a certified PROSCI Change Manager.

 

 

 

 

Gloria Rodriguez

College Career Specialist for the College of Communications, Career Center

Gloria Rodriguez is the College Career Specialist for the College of Communications at CSUF’s Career Center. In her current role, Gloria assists undergraduate and graduate students with career exploration, planning, and preparation. As a first-generation college graduate Gloria has a passion for helping students become successful in their chosen  fields. Gloria is a proud CSUF alumnae who earned both her Bachelor's and Master's degrees in Sociology.  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Richard Kallan

Professor of Communication, Cal Poly Pomona

Richard Kallan (Ph.D., Northwestern University) is Professor of Communication at California State Polytechnic University, Pomona, where he previously served as department chair for twenty-five years, 1995-2020. He has taught writing and speaking at several colleges, including the University of Southern California (USC Marshall School of Business) and the University of California, Santa Barbara (Writing Program). Over the years, he has instructed courses spanning four disciplines: communication studies, journalism, English, and business.

In addition, Kallan has worked with corporations and government agencies by offering on-site workshops on professional writing and speaking. His clients have included automobile manufacturers; chemical, insurance, railroad, and utility companies; city and county governments; department stores; hospitals; hotels; law firms; and newspapers.

Kallan is the author of Punctuation Revisited: A Strategic Guide for Academics, Wordsmiths, and Obsessive Perfectionists (Routledge, 2020); Renovating Your Writing: Shaping Ideas and Arguments into Clear, Concise and Compelling Messages, 2nd ed. (Routledge, 2018); and Armed Gunmen, True Facts, and Other Ridiculous Nonsense: A Compiled Compendium of Repetitive Redundancies (Pantheon Books, 2005). He is the coauthor of How to Take the Fog Out of Business Writing (Dartnell, 1994).

Kallan is currently completing a book on public speaking, Core Principles of Public Speaking: Creating Messages that Matter (SAGE Publishing 2023).

 

 

 

Negar Shekarabi

Coordinator, Faculty/Staff Support Services at UC Irvine

As the inaugural Coordinator of Faculty/Staff Support Services at UC Irvine Dr. Shekarabi provides oversight and coordination of mental health care resources and strategies enterprise wide for the employee population. Dr. Shekarabi, a licensed clinical psychologist, obtained her Master’s and Doctoral degrees at Pepperdine University where she focused her research on the intersection of culture and psychological assessment. She has worked in university settings providing mental health services since 2006, including UC Riverside Counseling Center, and most recently, the UCI Counseling Center, serving as a senior staff psychologist and outreach coordinator. Dr. Shekarabi coordinated the CalMHSA Mental Health Services grant from 2012-2014, where her work focused on mental health training and stigma reduction efforts. Dr. Shekarabi provides consultation to colleges and universities on mental health strategies and initiatives.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Marla Parker

Assistant Professor of Public Adminstration and Wellness Enthusiast

Marla A. Parker, Ph.d. has over 20 years of success in the public and private sectors. She is a valuable asset for small organizations and startups strategizing for launching, growth and pivoting. Her broad areas of expertise include organizational wellness (including team member self-care), management, social impact, entrepreneurship, innovation, learning and development, diversity and inclusion. In addition, she co-founded both the the Civic and Social Innovation Group and LEEAF at California State University-Los Angeles, both of which promote creative approaches to social impact and entrepreneurship. She earned her graduate degrees in public administration from the University of Illinois at Chicago with an emphasis in science, technology, engineering and math policy.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Noha Abdou

Director of Institutional Research, CSUF

Noha Abdou is the Director of Institutional Research at CSUF.  She is a proud alumna of CSUF, receiving her Ed.D. degree in educational leadership. She is a passionate advocate for data-driven decision making anfor diversity, equity, and inclusion in higher education. Her research interests include all areas of student success, in addition to faculty and staff analytics.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Yessica De La Torre Roman

Associate Director of Assessment, CSUF

Yessica is the Associate Director of Assessment at CSUF and leads the campus in assessment, campus-wide surveys, accreditation, and more. Yessica received her bachelor’s degree in Sociology and Linguistics from the University of California Santa Barbara, her Masters from CSUF in Higher Education, and her Doctorate from the University of Southern    California in Educational Leadership. Her research interests include culturally relevant and anti-racist curriculum and practices, closing the education debt, and Latinx student success.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Matt Badal

Associate Director of Innovation and Data Analytics, Information Technology, CSUF

Matthew Badal is the Associate Director of Innovation in Information Technology at CSUF. He has been a member of the Titan family as a staff member since 2014 and as a student since 2009. During his time at CSUF he has worked with multiple departments to implement technology to help with everything from day-to-day operations to complete workflow overhauls. He enjoys teaching others about the benefits of technology and does so for the College of Business and Economics where he teaches ISDS 351 - Principles of Information Systems.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Nicole Enrique

Licensed Psychologist, Counseling and Psychological Services, CSUF

Dr. Nicole Enrique is a licensed clinical psychologist at Counseling and Psychological Services (CAPS). She provides services to undergraduate and graduate students, supervises doctoral-level interns, and holds a liaisonship with Diversity Initiatives and Resource Centers (DIRC). Dr. Enrique identifies as a 1st gen student and is passionate about supporting 1st gen students in gaining the experiences they desire while in college. Her other interests include: APIDA mental health, healing while in community, and bonding over food. She has worked with college students in a variety of settings, including college campuses, community clinics, and hospitals.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Naji Shtayyeh

Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist, Licensed Professional Clinical Counselor, Counseling and Psychological Services, CSUF

Naji Shtayyeh is a licensed marriage and family therapist and licensed professional clinical counselor with the Counseling and Psychological Services (CAPS). Naji provides counseling and outreach services to CSUF students, as well as supervision to doctoral interns. Naji is also the liaison to the Male Success Initiative, a student organization aimed at supporting men of color succeed in college and beyond. He enjoys going to the movies, trying his best at karaoke, and watching the Dallas Cowboys with his family.