Stacy Barton

Associate Professor and Film Program Director

• Phone: 309-794-8007
• Email: stacybarton@augustana.edu
• Office: Sorensen 163

• RELATED: Faculty spotlight: Stacy Barton, associate professor and director of the film program
• RELATED: "Why This Midwest Professor Is Leading the Revolution in Virtual Production" (Bypass Hollywood)

Film artist Stacy Barton shot her first video in 1999, with a body of audiovisual work that includes short and feature-length narrative fiction ("Red Pearl" 2016), documentary ("In the Heart of Chile" 2007), non-fiction TV magazine ("Gumbo TV" 2004), 16mm experimental, video art and multimedia sculpture.

Barton has taught in higher education since 2004, holding positions at Syracuse University, the University of Colorado Denver, the University of West Georgia and Metropolitan State University of Denver. Ever grateful to have been given the chance to craft a dynamic new film program at Augustana, Barton is excited to help cultivate rich and bold student productions in the Quad Cities and beyond.

Andrea Guzman

Area Coordinator for Second-Year Experience

• Phone: 309-794-3863
• Email: andreaguzman@augustana.edu
• Office: Swanson Hall

Specializations: Residential Life

Amanda Sherrill

Professional Faculty, Assistant Professor, Staff Accompanist, Piano

• Phone: 309-794-7264
• Email: amandasherrill@augustana.edu
• Office: Bergendoff 161

Dr. Amanda Sherrill is a collaborative pianist, educator and vocal coach. Since fall of 2022 she has been assistant professor of piano and the professional faculty staff accompanist at Augustana College. There Sherrill teaches applied piano and regularly coaches and collaborates with a wide variety of music students and faculty. Before coming to Augustana, she spent eight years as adjunct faculty member at Chandler-Gilbert Community College in Chandler, Ariz., where she accompanied various music events and taught class piano, applied piano, aural perspectives and humanities courses. Sherrill has also served as staff pianist for Northern Arizona University, the Valley of the Sun chapter of NATS (National Association of Teachers of Singing) and the Sonoran Desert Chorale. In 2015 and 2016 she held the vocal coach position for the MasterWorks Festival in Lake Winona, Ind., and Cedarville, Ohio. Prior to her collegiate teaching experience she spent three years directing the choral program at Xavier College Preparatory in Phoenix, Ariz. In 2011 she led the top choir to their inaugural performance at Carnegie Hall.

Sherrill's recent engagements include work with the Quad City Symphony Orchestra as the rehearsal pianist for Two Remain, an opera by Jake Heggie, and serving as the audition pianist for Opera Quad Cities.

Sherrill holds a D.M.A. and M.M. in collaborative piano performance from Arizona State University, where she studied with Andrew Campbell, and a B.M. in both piano and clarinet performance from Stetson University.

Elizabeth Matera

Part-time Assistant Professor of Music, Clarinet

• Email: elizabethmatera@augustana.edu
• Office: Bergendoff 27

Dr. Elizabeth Matera began her musical career in the Quad City Symphony Orchestra and as a middle school band director in Maquoketa, Iowa. In 1990, she won a position in the clarinet section of the U.S. Marine Band, “The President’s Own.” She performed with the Marine Band for nearly 27 years in Washington, D.C., and throughout the United States and was very active in the organization’s educational outreach programs.

Since retiring from the U.S. Marine Corps in 2017, she has taught clarinet lessons in her home studio as well as in Pleasant Valley High School in Bettendorf, Iowa. In her free time, she enjoys spending time with her family and playing golf.
 

Sarah K. McDowell

Adjunct Assistant Professor of English

• Phone: 309-794-7848
• Email: SarahMcDowell@augustana.edu
• Office: Old Main 108

Sarah Kretz McDowell received her B.A. from Augustana in 1996 and her M.A. in English literature from the University of Wisconsin at Madison in 1998.

Her work focuses primarily on composition, but she teaches introductory literature classes as well. She has been at Augustana since 2001.

Specializations: Writing, Editing, Copy editing

Lucas Johnson

Project Manager, Communication and Marketing

• Phone: 309-794-7833
• Email: lucasjohnson@augustana.edu
• Office: Bahls CLC 201

Lucas graduated from Eastern Illinois University with a B.S. in Political Science, and since then has had a career in marketing at several companies in the Quad Cities and agencies across the U.S. He has worked as a project manager, writer, editor, SEO specialist, social manager and content creator in his nearly ten years in the marketing field.

At Augustana, Lucas is a project manager for the Office of Communication and Marketing helping to manage a fluctuating workload of over 300 projects each year in print and digital from initial intake, feasibility and timeline through tracking updates on design, estimation, vendor communications, arranging delivery and mailing, and invoicing.

Specializations: Communication and marketing

Benjamin Civiletti

Assistant Professor of Mathematics

• Email: benjaminciviletti@augustana.edu
• Office: Olin 214

Benjamin Civiletti researches applied mathematics, specifically the development and analysis of numerical methods for computational electromagnetics. Together with a research group from the University of Delaware and Penn State University, he is currently working on developing software to optimize the efficiency of thin-film solar cells.

His scholarship has been published in “The Journal for Computational and Applied Mathematics” and “Springer Nature.” In his free time, he enjoys cooking, traveling and hiking national parks with his wife, Megan

Paul Baumgardner

Assistant Professor of Political Science

• Email: paulbaumgardner@augustana.edu
• Office: Old Main 315

Although originally from Kansas, Dr. Paul Baumgardner traveled around quite a bit before arriving at Augustana. In the years before his move to the Quad Cities, Baumgardner benefitted from fellowships, scholarships, and teaching positions at Princeton University, the American Bar Foundation, Lewis University, the Rutgers Law School Institute for Law and Philosophy, the University of Buffalo Law School Baldy Center for Law & Social Policy, and Belmont University.
 
Baumgardner completed a joint Ph.D. in the Department of Politics and the Humanities Council at Princeton University in 2020. He is particularly interested in the historical interplay between law, ideology, and state development. Baumgardner’s recent research has explored the relationship between modern conservatism and the American political system, with an eye towards the institutional processes and historical contingencies that have shaped conservative campaigns to influence American laws and remake the legal profession since the 1970s. Through broad investigations of the presidency, state and federal judiciaries, law schools, and the U.S. Department of Justice, Baumgardner’s research has shown how lawyers, law professors, and social movements were mobilized within particular conservative legal campaigns and explained why some campaigns proved influential while others faded over time.
 
He is the author of "Critical Legal Studies and the Campaign for American Law Schools: A Revolution to Break the Liberal Consensus" (Palgrave Macmillan, 2021) and a coauthor of "Keywords; For Further Consideration and Particularly Relevant to Academic Life" (Princeton University Press, 2018). His scholarship also has appeared in journals such as Law & Social Inquiry, Annual Review of Law and Social Science, Presidential Studies Quarterly, and Law and History Review. 
 
Dr. Baumgardner believes in the transformative power of political science courses, not only because these courses help students make sense of past and present political phenomena, but also because they shine a light on areas where students can become politically engaged, apply their expertise, and make a difference. At Augustana, he teaches courses across the public law, American politics, and political theory subfields within the Department of Political Science.
 

Tobi Matter

Digital Content Strategist

• Phone: 309-794-7849
• Email: tobimatter@augustana.edu
• Office: Bahls CLC 208

A 2022 graduate of University of Iowa from Henry County, Ill., Tobi Matter was an intern with the University of Iowa Health Hospitals & Clinics before joining the Augustana team.

Specializations: Communication and marketing