Dr. Brua received his Ph.D. in applied linguistics from Penn State in 2009. His dissertation focused on ways to improve medical communication between English-speaking doctors and Russian-speaking patients. He received his B.A. in English and M.A. in Teaching English as a Second Language at Penn State.
One of his duties at the Schreyer Institute for Teaching Excellence is to supervise and mentor the institute’s graduate assistants—a role that is rather familiar to him from his time as a GA at SITE from 2002 to 2006. During that previous time at the institute, he led the Course in College Teaching numerous times and consulted with faculty in disciplines ranging from linguistics to meteorology.
Dr. Brua has taught introductory linguistics, functional grammar for ESL instructors, academic writing for non-native speakers of English, and speaking and classroom communication skills for international teaching assistants.
