Currently I am the Director of IMATS (Instructional Media and Academic Technologies Services) & the Sloate Media Center at Barnard College. Since joining Barnard in 2015, highlights include serving as Co-Interim Dean of the Barnard Library & Academic Information Services (BLAIS) for 20 months during the pandemic, during which I led the shift to online learning for 3+ semesters as well as upgrading all classroom spaces to be prepared for hybrid instruction. I also served as a key administrator for initial operations for the Sloate Media Center, Design Center (Makerspace), Computational Science Center, and Movement Lab at the Milstein Center for Teaching and Learning, inaugural centers that opened in Fall 2018. I’m experienced with management, team building, and hiring; academic technologies (LMS administration, technical infrastructure); and media production & arts administration. Before working at Barnard College, I was a Senior Media Producer at Columbia University, and worked in other media and education settings including teaching high school for two years in a rural Alaska Native Koyukon-Athabascan village only accessible by airplane.

I have published and presented in multiple platforms for different audiences, and my video work has screened at places including the Harlem International Film Festival, FLEX Fest, and the Center for Documentary Studies at Duke University. I've published in Educause Review, the Journal of Adolescent & Adult Literacy, the Journal of Online Interactive Learning, and authored book chapters related to social presence in online environments, video production in after-school programs, and VR/AR/360 media.

I received a doctorate in education (Ed.D.) from Teachers College, Columbia University in 2016. My dissertation research focused on student experiences with online instructional videos.

Contact: melanie.cecile@gmail.com

curriculum vitae video research + publications