Peg O’Connor is the author of the forthcoming book on addiction and recovery titled, Recovering Character: Knowing How to Belong to Yourself. She is the author of three other books on addiction including Higher and Friendly Powers: Transforming Addiction and Suffering (Wildhouse Publishing, 2022), Life on the Rocks: Finding Meaning in Addiction and Recovery (Central Recovery Press, 2016), and The SoberPhilosopher Workbook for Exploring Addiction and Creating Recovery (Wildhouse Publishing, 2023). 

O’Connor is the author of the popular blog series, Philosophy Stirred, Not Shaken. The title of the series is a wink and nod to martinis. She has written opinion pieces for The New York Times, The Minnesota Star Tribune, USA Today, The Daily Herald, and Dallas Morning Herald. O’Connor has appeared on numerous television, radio, and podcast programs and has been quoted as an expert in publications ranging from The New York Times to Cosmo.

Phala Tracy has been on the Gustavus Adolphus music faculty since 2004. In addition to teaching at Gustavus, Phala also teaches at Studio Fidicina in Minneapolis, MN and at summer Suzuki institutes across the U.S. and Canada as a clinician and Suzuki harp teacher trainer. She has developed a curriculum of Music Theory in Song and Rhyme as well as a collection of Songs for Sight Reading for harp students. She is an active arranger, composer, improviser and performer in the Twin Cities where she plays with Matt Wilson and His Orchestra, Follow the Firefly and The Dust of Suns. BM Oberlin Conservatory of Music, MFA California Institute of the Arts.

Phillip Voight is the Director of the Nobel Conference and teaches courses in new media, reality television, documentary film, argumentation studies, communication research methods and genocide studies. He is the former speech and debate coach and is a member of the Pi Kappa Delta Hall of Fame. He has also served on a number of non-profit Boards, including the GLCAC (Gay Lesbian Community Action Council, Philanthrofund, Outfront Minnesota, the South Saint Paul Educational Foundation, and Pi Kappa Delta.) He is also an avid traveler and has taken more than 175 trips abroad.

Priscilla Briggs is a professor of Art & Art History, the advisor for the Film & Media Arts major, and supports the Film & Media Studies interdisciplinary program. Priscilla teaches Digital Photography, Video Art, Graphic Design, the Zines for Sustainability challenge seminar, and the Arts Now professional practice seminar for junior art majors. 

She enjoys teaching within the liberal arts mission of Gustavus and guiding students in their experience of the visual arts as both an intuitive and intellectual process that contributes to well-being and supports our curiosity as human beings. She enjoys collaborating with students and has led multiple faculty/student summer research projects.

Priscilla is a practicing artist who investigates the intersections of capitalism, identity, social justice and the environment through photography, collage and book-making. Her research has been supported by numerous grants, most notably the McKnight Foundation, the Puffin Foundation, and the Minnesota State Arts Board. Her work has been exhibited internationally at venues such as the Saatchi Gallery in London, the Landskrona Photo Salon in Sweden, the National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art in Seoul, the National Gallery of Victoria in Melbourne, the Musei San Domenico in Forlì, Italy, and the Minneapolis Institute of Art. 

Her artist monograph, Impossible Is Nothing: China’s Theater of Consumerism, was published by Daylight Books. Many images from the book were created during artist residencies at the Chinese European Art Center in Xiamen and Art Channel in Beijing. Priscilla recently launched Rose Bramble Books, an artist zine/book platform. Her work has been featured in print and online publications such as European Photography Magazine, Newsweek Japan, Photo District News, Hyperallergic, L’oeil de la Photographie, Lenscratch, and F-Stop Magazine. Priscilla is a member of both Rosalux Gallery and the FotoMatter Collective.

Priscilla’s research has taken her near and far from the Badlands to China and India, but her travels began in her early twenties when she taught English in Tokyo and backpacked through Southeast Asia for two years. She has led travel courses in Thailand and Ireland. Wherever she goes, she looks for the nearest hiking trail.

Rachel Flynn joined the Gustavus faculty in her current role as the digital liberal arts librarian in 2023. Her research and teaching practices focus on student-centered, inclusive information literacy pedagogy; student learning assessment; and the incorporation of digital technologies in the library and classroom. Rachel has collaboratively published and presented scholarship that promotes the development of information literacy skills both within academic disciplines and in students’ daily and civic lives. She works collegially with other faculty and staff in the library to build the library’s collection to support the curricular and extra-curricular needs of the campus community.