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Tara Cadenhead serves as the Instructor of the Practice in Entrepreneurship and Innovation, where she is also the Director of the Center for Innovative & Entrepreneurial Leadership (CIEL). A Gustavus alumna herself, Tara brings a unique blend of high-level corporate strategy and "maker" entrepreneurship to the Hill, providing students with a practical roadmap for turning creative ideas into sustainable ventures.

Tara’s teaching is informed by nearly two decades of leadership in the corporate sector. During her tenure at FICO, a leading provider of analytics and CRM software, she led talent management and organizational change initiatives, specializing in aligning human capital with strategic business goals. Later, at Target Corporation, she served as a key advisor to Supply Chain leadership, and then played a strategic communication and change leadership role in launching a new enterprise-wide talent system and related processes for a workforce of more than 70,000 users.

In addition to her corporate background, Tara is the founder of Marquess Studios, a creative venture based in Stillwater, Minnesota, that emphasizes intentional design and community-focused commerce. Experience as a small business owner allows her to mentor students with authentic insights into brand storytelling, lean product development, and the resilience required to launch a startup.

In the classroom, Tara emphasizes experiential learning and vocational discovery. She views entrepreneurship as a multidisciplinary mindset relevant to every major, from the fine arts to the hard sciences. Her courses function as laboratories where students are encouraged to iterate, take calculated risks, and solve complex problems through "failing forward."

As the Director of CIEL, Tara spearheads initiatives that foster a culture of innovation across the entire campus. She oversees the Gustie Cup, the college’s premier entrepreneurship competition which offers significant seed money prizes across "Scalable" and "Sustainable" categories. In this role, she mentors student founders through intensive Start-Up Labs and 1:1 consulting sessions, while engaging alumni and industry experts to enhance the viability of students' plans. Gustie Cup winners have advanced as semi-finalists in the statewide Minnesota Cup. Her service extends to the regional entrepreneurial ecosystem, where she builds bridges between Gustavus and Minnesota’s business leaders, alumni mentors, and economic organizations, and recently represented Gustavus on an International Economic Development trip to Ireland.

Outside of her work at the College, Tara is deeply committed to community-driven service and regional development. She is most interested in exploring public-private partnerships to maximize social and economic impact. Tara is a founding Board member for Connect Lake Elmo, where she helps guide initiatives that enhance local connectivity and economic vitality. Her dedication to service is further highlighted by her previous involvement with Rotary International, various non-profit organizations, and was recently nominated as "Volunteer of the Year" by the Stillwater Area Chamber of Commerce. When not mentoring the next generation of innovators and entrepreneurs, she enjoys traveling, cooking, gardening, and spending time with her family.  

Professor Pamela Kittelson enjoys collaborating with students and colleagues. Her teaching has focused on ecology, plant physiology, evolution and general biology. Over 35 undergraduates from her lab have examined how habitat fragmentation affects plant populations, specifically how genetic variation, herbivory and plant traits change with population size and isolation. Students in her lab have published or presented this work and built scientific skills in writing, experimental design and analysis. After graduation, her advisees and former research students excel in careers ranging from natural resource management to education, research, medicine, biotechnology, law, and scientific writing.

Dr. Kittelson is the director of the Gustavus Fellowships Office. She supports and encourages all undergraduates by helping them identify and apply for nationally competitive funding which furthers their goals while in college or as alumni. These organizations include the Fulbright U.S. Student Program, Critical Language Scholarship, National Science Foundation, and the Goldwater, Truman, Udall and Boren Scholarships.

She also serves as the Director of the Midstates Consortium for Math and Science, which is an organization that promotes excellence in STEM research and teaching. She organizes professional development programs for faculty and undergraduate students from ten liberal arts colleges and two research universities. Each year, she runs two undergraduate research conferences where Gustavus and other Consortium students present their research at the University of Chicago or Washington University in St. Louis.

As a first generation college graduate, Dr. Kittelson understands the importance of having a good mentor who encourages one’s education. She enjoys the advising and mentoring relationships she has built with Gusties over the years.

Pamela relishes opportunities to be in natural areas with students; she has led students on several travel and wilderness courses. In her spare time, she enjoys hiking, canoeing, going fast downhill on skis or a bike, and camping. She putters around in gardens, museums or while watching birds. Travel near and wide is treasured. She relaxes with good books or music and the company of friends.

Dr. Laura D. Triplett began her Gustavus career in 2008 with a faculty appointment in geology. Now established in the department of Environment, Geography and Earth Sciences, she teaches courses related to earth surface processes, environmental geochemistry, hydrogeology and climate change. She has authored multiple peer-reviewed publications on topics as varied as reconstructing past water quality conditions in lakes and rivers, quantifying impacts of invasive species on freshwater geochemical cycling, and creating state-wide landslide susceptibility maps. In all her research, Dr. Triplett seeks out collaborations with community stakeholders. And, Dr. Triplett has involved Gustavus students in almost all aspects of her research program from designing preliminary studies, to executing major multi-year projects funded by external foundations and government agencies, to presenting findings at national scientific conferences.

As a Professor in the Department of Environment, Geography, and Earth Sciences (EGE), Julie K. Bartley teaches courses in the Geology and Environmental Studies programs. With a background in chemistry and geology, Professor Bartley brings an interdisciplinary perspective to the study of the Earth’s past and present. As a teacher, she strives to know her students as individuals and to inspire interest in the Earth’s past and care for its future. She has also held significant leadership roles at Gustavus, including serving as chair of EGE, as the project director for the Inclusive Excellence Project, and as Associate Provost and Dean of Sciences and Education.

Professor Bartley’s expertise lies in interpreting ancient environments, with a particular focus on the Precambrian. Her research explores how microbial communities shaped and were shaped by the environments in which they lived. She and her students study the fossil record and the chemical signatures left by life hundreds of millions or even billions of years ago. At Gustavus, she actively involves students in this discovery process, supervising numerous undergraduate research projects that range from evaluating stromatolites in Minnesota to analyzing the Martian surface signs of habitability.

Students who collaborate with Professor Bartley might conduct fieldwork, perform laboratory analyses, analyze imagery, work with databases, or some combination of these. In the classroom, Professor Bartley teaches a wide array of courses taken by students across campus. Her teaching philosophy is characterized by a commitment to effective and inclusive instruction and a firm belief that every student is equipped to succeed. Whether a geology major, a general education student, or a first-semester Gustie, students can expect to take an active role in class, have many opportunities for hands-on experiences, and be challenged to grow as they learn. 

Beyond her teaching and research, Professor Bartley serves Gustavus and the broader scientific community in many ways. She recently served as the Faculty Shepherd for the Nobel Hall of Science renovation and addition project and has co-chaired the Nobel Conference. She is a trained facilitator for two national programs: the ADVANCEGeo Partnership, which aims to improve workplace climate in the geosciences, and the Traveling Workshop Program, whose workshops help strengthen geoscience departments.

As the curator of the Chester Johnson Geology Museum, Professor Bartley regularly shares her passion for geology with K-12 students and the public. Whether leading fossil collecting field trips or presenting to local community organizations, she enjoys helping others see the landscape as a "time machine." Her dedication to service was recently honored with the Gustavus Faculty Service Award.

Outside of her professional life, she has served as the chair of a local charter school board and remains an active member of several professional societies, including the Geological Society of America, the National Association of Geoscience Teachers, and the Association of Women Geoscientists.

Dr. Shu-Ling Wang is an associate professor of Economics. She joined Gustavus in 2016 after a two-year appointment at The College of Wooster. Her teaching interests include Intermediate Macroeconomics, Money and Banking, International Finance, Public Finance, and Principles of Economics. As an active instructor in an interactive and interdisciplinary liberal arts environment, she enjoys developing and experimenting with innovative pedagogies to enrich students’ learning experiences. She also values mentoring undergraduate research that fosters critical and independent thinking. At Wooster, she advised several year-long senior independent studies, and at Gustavus, she offers writing-in-the-discipline courses in economics and mentors class-based research projects. In October 2023, her Money and Banking students’ paper titled “The Asian Crisis of 1997” won third place in the Economic Communication category of the Minnesota Economic Association (MEA) Undergraduate Paper Contest. In 2025, Dr. Wang served as a faculty panelist at the MAYDAY! Peace Conference at Gustavus, participating in the teach-in model addressing issues of peace, human rights, and social justice. More recently, she served on the Nobel Conference '63 Planning Committee (theme: AI and Human Agency).

Dr. Wang’s research focuses on Macroeconomics, Monetary Economics, and International Finance. She studies fiscal and monetary policy issues—such as fiscal stimulus, public debt, tax policy, income distributional effects, and monetary policy, using dynamic stochastic general equilibrium (DSGE) models with representative or heterogeneous agents. Her papers have been published in the Journal of Macroeconomics, Review of International Economics, and Economic Modelling. She received the Mansergh Faculty Scientific Research Award at Gustavus in both 2022 and 2025. Her recent project examines the debt-financed stimulus effects in a high-debt economy without monetary independence, considering different schemes and speeds of debt adjustment in a two-sector New Keynesian model. Future projects will examine the redistribution effects between savers and hand-to-mouth agents of debt-financing policies. She regularly presents her work at the The Midwest Economics Association, Canadian Economics Association, Western Economics Association, and Liberal Arts Macroeconomics conferences.

In addition to her research, Dr. Wang actively contributes to professional service. She serves as a reviewer for the Journal of Macroeconomics, Economic Modelling, Contemporary Economic Policy, Cambridge University Press, and the Bulletin of Economic Research. She has also served on the steering and program committees for the Liberal Arts Macroeconomics Conference and was a member of the Board of the Minnesota Economic Association. In 2025 she served as a mentor and a panelist for junior women economists at the CeMENT workshop sponsored by the AEA at the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago.

Beyond academia, Dr. Wang is a mother of three children. She enjoys architecture, art, photography, and music. Her favorite architects include Frank Lloyd Wright, Louis Sullivan, and Zaha Hadid. She is also inspired by the works of Georgia O’Keeffe, Edward Hopper, and Claude Monet. A musician herself, she plays the piano, violin, and pipa (a Chinese lute). Her favorite composer is Johann Sebastian Bach of the Baroque period.

Kathy Lund Dean holds the Board of Trustees Distinguished Chair in Leadership and Ethics, a position uniquely designed to engage external stakeholders with students, faculty, and program opportunities. This role supports three main strategic focus areas:

1. Increase Gustavus’ national and international footprint through scholarship and high profile recognitions
2. Increase and broaden career readiness through alumni engagement
3. Increase and deepen opportunities for experiential learning for students across campus

Kathy explores experiential education’s impacts on students, learning outcomes, and teaching practice, especially links between student mental health and experiential learning. In managerial practice, she examines remote work and why managers and executives resist remote work so strongly. Last, her partnership with the City of St. Peter and City Council allows her research insights into how municipal leaders prioritize very different constituent issues and resolve serious conflict.

Her scholarship encompasses more than 100 journal articles, book chapters, and books. Books include “The Ethical Professor: A Practical Guide to Research, Teaching and Professional Life” (published both in English and Chinese); "Course Design and Assessment" (2022, Edward Elgar) and "How to Become an Effective Journal Editor in Business and Management A Guide to Developing Authors" (2024, Edward Elgar).

Getting Gustavus' brand recognized outside the United States is a key focus. She won a Fulbright Specialist role to assist institutions under-represented in academic scholarship, an editorial role she will be continuing with the Journal of Management Inquiry. She has worked with business school colleagues at Rikkyo University supported by a Fulbright award, creating an exchange agreement between Rikkyo College of Business and Gustavus. Kathy holds joint appointments at the University of Canterbury, New Zealand, and University of St. Andrews in Scotland.

Kathy is passionate about engaging students in learning about investing and markets. She advises student members on the Board of Trustees Investment Committee as well as the E. Terry Skone Investment Club on campus, where students work with large endowments and portfolios and make important decisions. The Skone Club won a Magnuson Leadership & Service Award for its long-term positive impact on learning, outreach, and philanthropy, donating more than $135,000 in scholarship money back to the College. 

Her conflict resolution practice takes many forms. As a certified mediator, a Minnesota Rule 114 qualified neutral, and faculty Ombuds, she helps others talk through and resolve complex issues from an impartial and non-judgmental perspective. At the Academy of Management, Kathy supports ethical practice and manages difficult situations as a member of the Ethics Adjudication Committee and the Ethics Education Committee. 

She is a Chicago native and has lived in seven U.S. states and two countries. Prior to joining the Gustavus faculty, Kathy was Professor of Management at Idaho State University for ten years. 
 

Dr. Betsy Bolint (she/her) is an Assistant Professor of Nursing who enjoys helping students prepare for nursing careers that are both skilled and compassionate. With a strong clinical background and a commitment to teaching, she brings real-world healthcare experience into the classroom within a Lutheran, faith-based liberal arts setting. While attending Maryville College in Maryville, Tennessee, she developed an appreciation for the liberal arts and whole-person learning—an approach that continues to shape how she teaches and supports students. Her advanced clinical training as a nurse practitioner informs her teaching and supports her goal of preparing students to enter clinical practice with confidence, competence, and professional integrity.

Dr. Bolint is committed to service and caring for underserved communities. Her clinical and service experiences have focused on improving access to healthcare and addressing health inequities. She encourages students to see service, advocacy, and compassion as essential parts of nursing and as values that align with the Lutheran tradition. Her scholarly interests include translational research, with a focus on bridging evidence-based research and clinical practice to improve patient outcomes and healthcare quality. She helps students understand that research is not just something done in academic settings—it is a practical tool nurses use to improve care and make informed decisions.

As an educator, Dr. Bolint works to create a supportive and inclusive learning environment where students are challenged, encouraged, and treated as individuals. She emphasizes clinical readiness, ethical decision-making, and building professional confidence. Helping students make connections between coursework and patient care is central to her teaching style. One of her favorite parts of teaching is working closely with students as they prepare for their future in nursing. She values mentoring students through both the challenges and successes of nursing school and enjoys watching them grow into capable, compassionate nurses who are ready to care for patients, families, and communities.

Grounded in Lutheran values of service, care for neighbors, and respect for the dignity of every person, Dr. Bolint views nursing education as both a profession and a calling. Through teaching, mentorship, service, and clinical application, she helps prepare nursing graduates to enter the profession with strong skills, confidence, and a clear sense of purpose.

Dr. Brandon Dean serves as the Jon and Anita Thomsen Young Distinguished Endowed Chair in Music and is the Conductor of the Gustavus Choir. In addition to his conducting duties, he teaches beginning and advanced conducting, and serves as music director for Christmas in Christ Chapel. Dr. Dean received the 2014 Swenson-Bunn Memorial Award for Teaching Excellence and the 2022 Faculty Service Award, the highest accolade a Gustavus faculty member can receive for distinguished service activities. Before his appointment at Gustavus in 2011, Dr. Dean completed the Doctor of Musical Arts degree in conducting from the University of Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music.

Jeff Jenson joined Gustavus in August 2007, bringing extensive experience in archives development, public service, and education. In his role, he is dedicated to building and strengthening archival collections, improving access to historical materials, and ensuring the long-term preservation of vital records. Deeply committed to public service and education, he works to connect communities with information resources and assists researchers in fostering meaningful engagement with archival materials. He also collaborates closely with faculty and students, developing instructional sessions that promote the effective use of primary sources and research tools in academic settings.

Embracing the diverse nature of the liberal arts tradition, Jenson’s research interests span a wide range of topics, with his most recent publications and presentations exploring the history of timber rattlesnakes in Minnesota. He is an active member of the archival and library communities, presenting or facilitating sessions at the Midwest Archives Conference, Twin Cities Archives Round Table (TCART), Brick & Click Academic Library Conference, and the ACRL Conference. In addition, Jeff serves as a researcher with the DNA Doe Project.

Beyond his professional affiliations, Jenson is heavily involved in institutional leadership at the College. He has served as Chair of the Library and Archives Department and actively contributes to the campus community through his service on numerous faculty committees. His campus involvement has included roles on the Faculty Senate, the Adjudication Board, Third-Year Review Committee, as a Liberal Arts Search Committee Representative for several searches, and as a faculty representative on the Conduct Board.

Thomas LoFaro is a Professor of Mathematics. He specializes in applications of dynamical systems to mathematical biology. He has had multiple cross-disciplinary scholarly collaborations in his career working with biologists, neuroscientists, and computer scientists. He is currently an Associate in the Institute for the Interdisciplinary Study of Decision Making at New York University. Thomas has recently co-authored the textbook Discovering Differential Equations Through Experiment & Inquiry with Professor Jeff Ford.

Professor LoFaro teaches a wide variety of mathematics courses in the MCS department but especially enjoys teaching any class with an applied mathematics focus. He has taught at Gustavus since 2000 and has served the College in many capacities including multiple terms chairing the MCS Department. In 2019 he was awarded the college's Faculty Service Award for exceptional service and dedication.

Daniel C. Moos (PhD) is a professor of Education where he teaches courses in developmental and educational psychology, educational technology, and the supervision of student teachers. His work centers on understanding how students learn, particularly through the lenses of motivation, metacognition, and self-regulated learning, and how these processes can be intentionally supported through instruction and assessment.

Dr. Moos’s scholarship focuses on self-regulated learning in classroom and technology-rich environments. His research examines how learners plan, monitor, and evaluate their thinking, and how instructional design, feedback, and classroom technology can foster deeper learning. He has published extensively in leading journals and edited volumes in educational psychology, learning sciences, and educational technology, and he has collaborated frequently with undergraduate students as research co-authors. His work is nationally and internationally recognized, including invited keynote and symposium presentations and service in leadership roles within professional organizations focused on self-regulated learning.

At Gustavus, he is deeply committed to teacher preparation and evidence-based teaching. He works closely with pre-service teachers as they learn to design instruction, integrate technology meaningfully, and use assessment to support student learning. His teaching philosophy emphasizes helping future educators become reflective practitioners who understand how students learn and who can adapt instruction to meet diverse learner needs. He is particularly interested in bridging theory and practice, ensuring that research on learning, motivation, and assessment is accessible and useful for teachers in real classrooms.

In addition to his teaching and research, Dr. Moos has held several institution-wide leadership and service roles at Gustavus. These include serving as department chair, college assessment director, faculty associate for teaching excellence, and assessment coordinator for the Education Department. Through this work, he has supported faculty development, program assessment, accreditation efforts, and conversations about effective teaching and learning across the college.

Dr. Moos also contributes extensively to the broader field of education through editorial board service, grant advisory work, external reviews, and mentoring early-career scholars. He is regularly involved in reviewing research for major journals and supporting national initiatives related to self-regulated learning and teacher education. Before entering higher education, Dr. Moos was an elementary and middle school teacher, an experience that continues to shape his teaching, research, and commitment to teacher education. Outside of Gustavus, he enjoys staying active, following youth and collegiate athletics, and spending time with his family. He values the close-knit academic community at Gustavus and especially enjoys working with students as they develop into thoughtful educators and lifelong learners.
 

Mr. Tengwall is a visiting professor in the Department of Business & Economics, where he engages students on a range of topics including Management & Leadership, Business Models & Growth Strategy, Sales & Marketing, and Supply Chain/Operations Management. He also serves on the Boards of two companies and provides management consulting services to a range of businesses.

Previously, Mr. Tengwall had a 12-year career with the Marmon Group, a Berkshire Hathaway Company. During this time he was President of EcoWater Systems LLC (2019 – 2024), a leading North American manufacturer and marketer of residential and light commercial water softening and filtration systems. Prior to that, he was president of Marmon Food & Beverage Solutions Group (2013 – 2019), which was comprised of two different businesses, Marmon Link and Marmon Renew. Marmon Link (previous dba 3Wire Group Inc) is a provider of parts, training and service for foodservice and beverage dispensing equipment. Marmon Renew is a re-manufacturer of commercial beverage dispensing and related foodservice equipment.

Prior to his executive leadership roles with Marmon/Berkshire Hathaway, he had a 17-year career with Ecolab (NYSE: ECL). There he held several progressively more responsible leadership roles in the Institutional and Food & Beverage operating divisions. He led the marketing function for both business segments and engaged in multiple acquisitions as part of the overall business growth strategy.

Mr. Tengwall began his career as a microbiologist in the Sterilization Technology & Process Control Validation group at The Upjohn Company (now Pfizer). He then pivoted into marketing and business development roles with IMI Cornelius Inc., a subsidiary (at the time) of IMI plc.