Paula McCabe
Associate Director
pmccabe@american.edu

American University alumna Paula McCabe brings a variety of academic and life experiences to her role in the Honors Program. She holds an M.A. in Communication (Journalism and Public Affairs) from AU’s School of Communication, where she has also been an adjunct professor. Her news media background includes stints at The Boston Globe, ABC News and WAMU/88.5 FM, AU’s National Public Radio affiliate. Paula McCabe spent her undergraduate years at Boston’s Emmanuel College, earning a B.A. in English and Sociology. She continued her studies at Northeastern University, where she was awarded an M.A. and Ph.D. in Sociology. The Boston native recently returned to the Washington, D.C., area after several years of living in Italy, where she was for a time editor of an English-language weekly.

Rachel Pleatman
Program Coordinator
pleatman@american.edu

 

Rachel Pleatman is a 2006 graduate of American University and a former Honors student. She is originally from Cincinnati, Ohio, and considered a variety of majors before deciding to double-major in Print Journalism and Women’s and Gender Studies. You can probably read her Capstone if you want to search through AU’s archives.

Before returning to AU in February 2008, Rachel worked in the press office of Public Citizen, a consumer-interest nonprofit in Washington, D.C.

Lynette Garrett
Senior Honors Counselor
HonorsCounselor1@american.edu

Lynette Garrett is the Senior Honors Counselor. Originally from Davenport, Iowa, she has been a member of the University Honors Program staff for three years. She is an Honors Program graduate from the University of Iowa, where she received a B.A. in History.

Lynette received her Master’s in History from AU in 2003 and is currently a PhD candidate in the History Department and her area of expertise is Nineteenth Century American History. She will soon defend her dissertation proposal that will examine the creation of Confederate nationalism in Arkansas, Louisiana, and Virginia during the Civil War to determine if nationalism differed according to geographic location. Feel free to encourage Lynette and ask her when you see her "How's the road to the PhD going?!!" Since she’s been at AU, Lynette has also served as an elected representative on the History Graduate Student Council and is a member of Phi Alpha Theta, the History Honors Society.

Lynette could best be described as a football junkie and loves supporting her teams, the Iowa Hawkeyes and the Indianapolis Colts. In addition to football, she enjoys reading mysteries, drinking vanilla lattes from the Davenport Coffee Lounge, traveling to new places, and hearing about students’ extracurricular interests during counseling sessions with Honors students, so be sure to share yours. It could wind up as a featured article in the Honors Newsletter, “Honorable Mentions”!! Although Lynette has been to the majority of the fifty states, she has never traveled out of the country, except to Canada. Once her PhD is finished, Lynette hopes to celebrate by going to Paris with friends.

Renee Loehndorf
Honors Counselor
HonorsCounselor2@american.edu

Renee Loehndorf is pursuing her M.A. in International Affairs through AU’s School of International Service. Her focus is Comparative and Regional Studies, with emphases in U.S.-China relations and global environmental policy. Renee is an Honors Program graduate of Michigan State University. There she earned her B.A. in Political Theory, with a specialization in Asian Studies, and was elected to Phi Beta Kappa. Having spent a semester at Beijing Foreign Studies University as an undergraduate, she especially looks forward to hearing about student experiences abroad. Before coming to AU, Renee worked in member relations for the Corporate Executive Board in Washington, D.C.