Graduate Alumni

These are some of our recent alumni who have agreed to share where they are now.

Emily Arcuri

Emily Arcuri is an Executive Communications Manager at Intel Corporation. She works with leaders and executives across the corporation to craft and deliver strategic internal messaging across mediums. Prior to her current role, Emily started at Intel as a Communications Intern supporting employee engagement and retention programs. Emily holds a Masters of Science in Communication from Portland State University, and BA from the University of Oregon in political science and journalism, with a minor in business administration. In her spare time, she sits on the board of the Women at Intel Network as the Marketing chair, as well as competing in triathlon and marathon races. She is a 2016 Ironman 140.6 finisher and a 2019 Boston & New York City Marathon qualifier.

Stacy Austin

Stacy Austin is a Customer Success Director at the fully-remote SaaS company, Sched. She manages smaller teams to help event organizers put their schedules online and in mobile apps for their attendees. At PSU, Stacy’s Master’s thesis was a study examining two groups (international and domestic students) in terms of their motivations to seek university-health services, and their satisfaction with university-health services. Following graduation, she taught public speaking and communication theory as an assistant professor at Kosin University in Busan, South Korea for two years. Stacy holds a Master of Science in Communication from Portland State, and Bachelor of Science in Political Science and Ethnic Studies from Oregon State. When in Portland, she enjoys volunteering at the Oregon Humane Society, but traveling is her passion. She’s been to 18 countries and counting. 

Alex Brehm

After completing his MA at Portland State, Alex began teaching communication classes at colleges and universities around the greater Portland area (including PCC, PSU, and Clark College). He is currently the Director of Forensics, Chair of the Performing and Visual Arts Department, and a tenured Communication Studies faculty member at Lower Columbia College in Longview, WA. In addition to teaching public speaking and interpersonal communication classes, Alex coaches LCC’s award-winning intercollegiate speech and debate team: The Fighting Smelt. Through this work, Alex focuses on building relationships with his students and fostering a sense of academic curiosity. When he isn’t working, Alex is probably tending to his plants, getting rowdy with the Timbers Army, or somewhere deep in the wilderness exploring with his wife.

Veronica Droser 

After graduating from Portland State University, Veronica Droser earned her PhD from the University of Denver, where she focused on Interpersonal and Family Communication. In 2019, she joined the faculty at SUNY Brockport where she teaches courses in Interpersonal Communication, Conflict Management, and Interviewing. She specializes in family communication, relational health, and critical communication pedagogy. She is particularly interested in exploring challenging moments in relational and familial life, and identifying the role of communication in effective coping and adjustment. Dr. Droser also served as a founding member of the Inclusion, Diversity, Equity, and Access Task Force for the Interpersonal Communication Division of the National Communication Association.

Katrina Graven

Katrina is an internal communications specialist and program manager at Intel Corporation, with a primary focus on organizational health and culture. After graduating from Pacific Lutheran University in 2015 with degrees in English and Anthropology, she attended Portland State University where she earned her Master of Science in Communication in 2017. During her time at Portland State, she joined Intel as an intern where she was immediately drawn to the excitement and challenges of working in tech. In her free time, Katrina enjoys traveling the world with her husband, exploring the Portland food scene, and watching Netflix with her cat Gatsby.

Jonas Hudnall

Upon completing his MS in Communication from PSU, Jonas worked alongside a few non-profits that focused on underserved youth in the Portland metro area; Blueprint Foundation and the Coalition of Black Men. Their focus on the environment, youth development, and the intersection of socioeconomic status perfectly aligned with his degree focus on culturally relevant environmental education for Black Americans. Also during his time at PSU, he worked alongside ASPSU, OSCC, and APANO to aid in creating a more equitable and diverse environment for students/marginalized people in Portland as well as the state of Oregon. 

Zoe Larson

Zoe earned her MS in Communication from PSU and now works as a Research Associate for OCHIN. In this position Zoe works on research studies that examine health equity and disparities within health centers across the country. Some recent studies she has worked on include examining the uptake of telehealth during the pandemic, and examining the impact of sanctuary policies on cardiovascular risk factor screening among immigrants. In her free time Zoe loves to paint, read, and spend time with her family.

Demian Lucas

Demian Lucas holds a Bachelor of Science degree in Communication and a Master of Science degree in Communication with a focus on organizational, diversity and interpersonal communication from Portland State University. Her parents and grandparents were very active in the civil rights movement, and she grew a passion for helping people and working towards equity and inclusion at a very early age. She is a proven, innovative people leader and has made a real difference in several organizations throughout her career including Legacy Health Systems, NW Natural, and Portland General Electric. She has held roles including Vice President of Talent, Talent Acquisition Manager, Senior Human Resource Business Partner, Lead Recruiter, and Benefit Analyst. She is currently the Executive of People and Culture at Stand; Demian leads human resources, engagement, diversity, equity, and inclusion and is a member of the executive team.

Sarah Martin

Sarah Martin is a Communications Specialist at Intel Corporation, responsible for advising senior executives on internal and external communications. Her professional passion is working with leaders on comprehensive programs to foster engagement and enrich the employee experience. Much of this work builds on research focused on the role of communication in fostering engagement, which Sarah explored while writing her master’s thesis at Portland State. She holds master’s and bachelor’s degrees in communication from Portland State University and Gonzaga University, respectively. In her free time, you can usually find Sarah adventuring with her family or tackling an ambitious DIY project at home.

Taylor Martin

Taylor Martin graduated with her Master of Science in Communication from Portland State in 2020. Inspired by her thesis work, Taylor has pursued a career in healthcare communications. Taylor has worked with physicians, pharmacists, insurance groups, and most recently works in healthcare policy as the communications coordinator for a healthcare trade association. Taylor currently resides in Richmond, Virginia, and daydreams about Portland icons like Salt & Straw and Powell's Books. 

Marisa Miller

Marisa Miller earned her M.S. in Communication from PSU in 2018. Much of her graduate school study focused on organizational communication and new employee experiences, so she is now the Internship Coordinator in Portland State University's Career Center. Every day she gets to use things she learned from her time in graduate school: leading workshops and presentations, creating materials to show students how to find an internship they'll actually want, giving employers the skills to offer quality internships, and ultimately acting as PSU's internship expert. She credits the Communication master's program with giving her a foundation of essential tools that she uses daily in her work to build confidence regarding internships in students, employers, and faculty alike. 

Kristella Montiegel

Kristella is a recipient of the Chancellor's Postdoctoral Fellowship for Diversity Program. She is a language and social interaction researcher who received her MS in Communication from Portland State University and her PhD in Sociology from the University of California, Los Angeles, in 2022. Her dissertation entailed a micro-analysis of social interactions in a deaf or hard-of-hearing oral preschool classroom to explore the ways in which educators, parents, and children themselves understand and reinforce certain ideological beliefs and attitudes about spoken language and its use in social life. She is currently interested in identifying communicative practices and patterns that support interactions of individuals with intellectual and developmental disabilities. Her primary research methods are conversation analysis and ethnography. 

Cara Olden

After earning her MS in Communication from PSU, Cara pursued a professional volleyball career, picking up life experience as she played in Europe. Currently, Cara is a firefighter in Pierce County, WA. She applies the skills she acquired in the Communication Department by researching Women Firefighter Health Issues and developing policy and standard operating guidelines for her department. Currently she is working on an SOG that will shape the way her department handles breast pumping for on duty firefighters. 

Bailey Pederson

Bailey Pederson graduated in 2018 with a Master of Science in Communication from Portland State University, specializing in social media and interpersonal communication.  She also earned a Bachelor of Arts in English with a minor in Media Studies from the University of Oregon in 2016. Today, she is the Analyst Operations Assistant Manager for Adpearance, a digital marketing agency in Portland, OR, where she manages a team of 20 communication analysts. She enjoys Star Trek, the Oxford Comma, and good books, which she plans on enjoying even more now that she has finished school. 

Aric Powell

After completing an MS in Communications from PSU, Aric Powell moved to Connecticut where he worked as a researcher for a mental health facility in New Haven Connecticut named Clifford Beers. While there he used the statistics skills he learned at PSU to conduct analysis on the efficacy of screeners and inventories used for evaluating depression in adolescents. Currently he works at Connecticut Eye Consultants in Danbury Connecticut as a clinical research coordinator. In his role as a CRC he conducts patient visits, drafts study materials and captures clinical data. His area of expertise is Glaucoma.

Elizabeth (Tiffany) Prescott

Tiffany Prescott is the Research Operations Supervisor at OCHIN—currently leading a mighty team in the development and optimization of the resources, strategies, and infrastructure needed to support OCHIN’s growing Research portfolio. During her tenure at OCHIN, Tiffany has dedicated her time and efforts to sharing the transformative power of health equity research. She firmly believes effective communication of our learnings can have an impact on healthcare, policy, and the well-being of even the most vulnerable patients and that belief continues to drive her passion for research dissemination and communication. She holds an MS in Communication, a graduate certificate in Gender, Race and Nations, and a Bachelor of Science in Community Health Education from Portland State University (PSU). When she’s not on Zoom calls with her team, Tiffany can be found exploring Chicago with her toddler, partner, and dog.

Kyle Rush

After graduating from PSU, Kyle Rush put that education toward obtaining a law degree from UDC Law School. Since graduating during the heart of the COVID-19 Pandemic in May of 2020, he took the Washington, D.C. Bar Exam, and became licensed to practice law. He is now employed as a Staff Attorney at Legal Counsel for the Elderly, a Washington, D.C. Affiliate of AARP. He is involved in the Tenant Advocacy and Support Practice area, meaning that he does anti-eviction for senior citizen tenants within the District. He loves what he is doing, and one day hopes with his PSU and UDC Law experience, coupled with my professional experience to teach Communication/Law Courses.

Benjamin Smith

Benjamin K. Smith is an Assistant Professor of Communication at Cal State East Bay, and a Visiting Scholar in the College of Letters and Arts at Cal State San Bernardino. His research interests lie within the domains of public opinion, informal learning, and mass communication, with a focus on how issues, events, and actors are portrayed in news media, and the effects of these portrayals on the formation, updating and expression of beliefs, attitudes, and opinions. Dr. Smith earned his Ph.D. in Communication from the University of California, Santa Barbara in 2018, where he studied public opinion, media communication, and quantitative methods. He earned his M.S. in Communication from Portland State University, and his B.S. in Communication, with Concentration in Public Relations, from Southern Utah University. He has previously served as Research Director at the non-profit Institute for Methods Innovation, as a Visiting Scholar at the Orfalea Center for Global & International Studies, and was the co-founder and lead research analyst of a boutique public relations firm, Personal Branding Pros, LLC.

Duncan Stewart

Duncan Stewart graduated Portland State University with an MS in communication in 2017 and is a doctoral student at the University of Utah.  His research interests are broad but can be categorized into three distinct areas: media policy, environmental communication, and security studies. Currently he is studying how conspiracy theories inform popular American politics, how they operate argumentatively, and their intersection with the creation and understanding of national security. 

Jenna Tucker

Jenna completed her MS at Portland State University in 2014. Her thesis explored the potential impact of social media on well-being and romantic relationships. Her favorite classes at PSU explored various forms of media, but she also enjoyed Health Campaigns and thinks everyone should take it. Currently, Jenna lives in Sacramento and works as an On Air Talent at a country radio station. Aside from being on air, she also contributes to the station's digital assets including the website and various social media accounts.  Before returning to the airwaves, Jenna was with the National MS Society as a Communication Specialist where she wrote and edited copy for all digital and print materials in California. Outside of work, you'll most likely find Jenna volunteering at the animal shelter, eating pizza with her fiance or hanging out with her BFFs—her beagle, Timmy, or her pit bull mix, Little.

Hilary U'Ren

After earning her MS in Communication from PSU, Hilary joined Multnomah County Health Department's Public Health Division in an operations capacity. There, she's worked on projects with the county's syringe disposal program, the public health advisory board, the division's ethics committee, the community epidemiology services program, and the tri-county opioid summit. In communication-specific work, she's currently working on a bimonthly programmatic newsletter for both internal and external county stakeholders. 

Sue Wendell

After earning her M.S. in Communication at Portland State in 2016, Sue began teaching public speaking classes, and 1-on-1 public speaking coaching at Portland Community College through their Community Ed Program. She also started a public speaking coaching service for private clients. Sue volunteers and coaches members of a local speakers bureau, and works with other clients on a pro bono basis on their presentation skills. Underpinning Sue’s teaching and coaching methods is the belief that anyone can become a better communicator and public speaker by learning to manage speech anxiety, applying effective speech structures to presentations, and practicing effective delivery skills. In her spare time, Sue is a volunteer editor for a community newspaper, runs a weekly folk dance session, and serves on a variety of public service committees. In her spare-spare time, Sue enjoys the outdoors, travel, and watching saccharine rom-coms on TV.