Susan Russell

Associate Professor of Theatre

Susan Russell, associate professor of theatre and director and co-founder of the Center for Pedagogy in Arts and Design (CPAD), teaches graduate and undergraduate literature/criticism and playwriting. She received her Ph.D. in theatre studies from Florida State University’s School of Theatre in 2007, her M.A. from Florida State University in 2003, and her B.A. in theatre from St. Andrews Presbyterian College in Laurinburg, N.C. in 1979. Between her education pursuits, she experienced a 25-year career as a professional actor on and off-Broadway.

In 2007, Dr. Russell created Cultural Conversations, a unique “community collaboration” that used music, theatre, dance, storytelling, and visual arts to help young people talk about the social issues of their time. Dr. Russell is the author of Body Language: Stop the Violence/Start the Conversation and Body Language: Cultural Conversations Reaching Out and Reaching In, which are supplied free-of-charge to school systems and community organizations. Russell served as Penn State Laureate in 2014-15, during which time she brought all the Penn State campuses together in an ongoing conversation about Dignity. In 2017, Dr. Russell was awarded a fellowship with Penn State Teaching and Learning with Technology (TLT), where she created The Moral Moments Project, which has found a research home in CPAD and an academic home in the College of Arts and Architecture. The course is taught across the Penn State system and is utilized by a diverse community of disciplines, students, and instructors.

Fast Fact

Professional actor on and off Broadway before entering academia