Kari Brown-Herbst is the Director for the Center for Excellence in Teaching at Laramie County Community College (LCCC) in Cheyenne, Wyoming. She serves three key Passport roles: the Wyoming Passport State Facilitator, the state representative to the Passport Review Board and the Institutional Liaison for Laramie County Community College. Brown-Herbst has presented on behalf of Interstate Passport at national conferences including the League for Innovation, American Association of Community Colleges (AACC), and American Association of Collegiate Registrars. LCCC is an AACC Guided Pathways 2.0 institution engaged in intentional revision to better define curricular pathways that prepare students for future success.
Brown-Herbst’s responsibilities at LCCC include faculty development and support and oversight of the learning management system. She currently serves as faculty representative to the LCCC Foundation Board and is also a member of the Peer Review Corps of the Higher Learning Commission. Before arriving at LCCC, she received her Master’s in Education Technology from Marian University (Wisconsin) and her Bachelor’s in Sociology with an Education endorsement from Kalamazoo College (Michigan). Brown-Herbst has 18 years of K-12 teaching experience in Alaska and Wisconsin, and began her teaching career as a Peace Corps Volunteer in the Republic of Kiribati. She is currently studying for her doctorate in Instructional Technology at the University of Wyoming.
Brown-Herbst states that “with all of the curriculum review opportunities available to institutions it is possible for institutions to suffer from ‘initiative fatigue.’ LCCC has not found that to be the case with our General Education restructuring since it is linked directly to our Guided Pathways initiative. The Passport Learning Outcomes provide an excellent framework from which we are defining learning experiences that develop essential skills in key knowledge areas. By clearly defining these paths to proficiency for our students, we are creating avenues to success at LCCC as well as successful pathways for LCCC students to all institutions in the Interstate Passport Network. It has really been an example of efficiently using the two initiatives together: the PLO’s drive the Guided Pathways process to create the Passport Block.”