About

A Web site written for storytellers should begin with a story and Digitalstoryteller.Com is no different.  My about page begins like the opening line of a joke shared with friends:

A graduate school professor, an award-wining producer, and a small farm rancher walk into a bar…

Only in this case, the three characters are one person and the bar is …. this blog.

I began working on the Internet in 1993 and began this domain as an experiment in 1997.  This blog is written for professional storytellers, the people who tell stories as part of their work.  If you create documentaries or present in the profession worlds of law, medicine or public health, or a college classroom, this Web site is for you.

My story both buttoned down and booted up.

My buttoned down, professional role is Educational Technology Strategist for Des Moines University in the College of Health Sciences. I divide my time between the Dean’s office and the Health Care Administration faculty where I teach in the Graduate programs for Health Care Administration and Public Health and supervise graduate capstone projects. My academic research focuses on learning preferences and the unique qualities and needs of social and solitary learners, primarily in graduate school.  I have presented on storytelling, learning and the Internet at national conferences, and I co produce – with Dr. Ann York — “Dispatches from the Graduate Classroom” a podcast and blog on technology, trends and higher education.

I teach mostly online, and when not on campus, my buttoned down world meets by booted up world.

I work from my small ranch, located between Kansas City and Des Moines.  After personally building the cabin that is my home, I continue to create a blended, on-grid off-grid life, actively restoring game bird habitat, and raising pheasants to be returned to the wild.    I blog my progress there at Small Farm Life.

As a digital storyteller, my media work is a four time winner of USA Today’s “Hot Site of the Day” award. I have twice been named one of the “Top 100 Producers” by AV Video/Multimedia Producer magazine, in 1998 and 2000. (The magazine is now named Studio Monthly). My resume of projects includes work in 12 countries. Nine of those trips were medical or surgical missions which provided reconstructive surgery, orthopedic surgery and pediatric cardiothoracic surgery. I am best known for my creative leadership and my role as producer on documentary work and new media projects and the award winning web documentary Behind the Viewfinder — A Year in the Life of Photojournalism.

Between 2000 and 2004, I was producer and co-founder of New Media for Non Profits. I collaborated with dozens of talented people, driven by a vision to provide interactive new media for people and organizations who educate, make safe, and take care of other people.