Alex Poppendorf
Positions
Graduate Research Assistant
Werklund School of Education, Specialization, Leadership
Technology Support Assistant
Werklund School of Education, Academic Support Offices
Contact information
Background
Credentials
Managing Emotions in Times of Uncertainty & Stress, Yale University, 2025
Leading for Equity, Diversity and Inclusion in Higher Education, University of Michigan, 2025
Assessment in Higher Education: Professional Development for Teachers, Erasmus University, 2025
safeTALK: Suicide Alertness for Everyone, Living Works, 2023
Restorative Practices, International Institute for Restorative Practices, 2022
Learning to Teach Online, University of New South Wales Online , 2020
Structured Learning Assistance Leader, College Reading and Learning Association , 2016
Academic Writing Tutor, College Reading and Learning Association , 2014
Educational Background
Master of Arts, Military History, Austin Peay State University, 2016
Bachelor of Arts, History, Austin Peay State University, 2014
Biography
I am an American, Southerner, and Appalachian scholar living in Canada, where I am pursuing a doctorate in Educational Leadership. My work is narrative, and in my dissertation, I am exploring Southern place through storytelling, an approach that weaves together culture, geography, and memory to reflect meaningfully on histories of oppression and the current vitriolic political divisions that have followed. Across all my research and projects, I believe that narrative is a powerful tool for making sense of the world and connecting people and their communities. Through sharing our stories as teachers and students, we can engage in the challenging work of unpacking complicated legacies and imagine futures where people are more deeply connected to their communities and places in ways that are empathetic, personal, and focused on healing. I try to ground my work in curiosity, care, and a commitment to meaningful connection.
As a passionate teacher and neurodivergent scholar, when I teach, I prioritize inclusive classrooms by applying Universal Design for Learning (UDL) principles. In 2024–2025, I served as Vice President Academic of the Graduate Students’ Association, advocating for graduate student rights at institutional, provincial, and federal levels.
Outside of academia, I enjoy cozy mysteries, especially Murder She Wrote and The Thursday Murder Club.
Research
Areas of Research
Projects
In the Play Design & Learn Group, we design and conduct game-based learning research projects in real-world learning settings to explore the emergent processes of learning and how different forms of learners' collaborative redesign, as structured but playful practices, could mediate these processes. We study how such learning projects, structured based on a game redesign approach, could provide possibilities of critical thinking and deeper engagement with complex disciplinary and interdisciplinary concepts.
Alex is a founding member and editor with the journal Peer Beyond, which was created by the Graduate Students' Association in 2025 to showcase and celebrate graduate student research. The Peer Beyond Graduate Research Conference (PBGRC) began in 2017 as a free graduate student conference hosted annually by the UCalgary Graduate Students' Association (GSA). Every year, graduate students from across disciplines gather and showcase their innovative work. In that spirit, PBGRC is an open-access publication dedicated to showcasing the innovative research conducted by emerging scholars at the University of Calgary. This interdisciplinary and transdisciplinary journal provides a platform for graduate researchers to share their work, promoting scholarly exchange and collaboration across diverse fields of study. Founded in 2025 by the Graduate Students' Association (GSA) Academic Events Committee—the journal represents a longstanding commitment to supporting academic excellence at the graduate level. Our inagural issue, conference proceedings for our 2025 event, became available Summer 2025.
In conjunction with the Centre for Artificial Intelligence, Ethics, Literacy, and Integrity (CAIELI) we planned a one-day transdisciplinary event featuring lightning talks about AI and co-working ideation sessions, hosted on June 12, 2025. Case studies written by participants were published in a Pressbook after the event:
AI in Higher Education Innovation Exchange brings together a dynamic collection of case studies from educators experimenting with Artificial Intelligence (AI) in higher education. Born out of a transdisciplinary event at the University of Calgary, this volume showcases real-world practices, bold ideas, and critical reflections on how AI is reshaping teaching and learning. Each case offers inspiration for ethical, responsible, and creative approaches to AI, while inviting readers to reflect, remix, and join a growing community of educators reimagining what’s possible.
In 2024, we hosted the inaugural World Café Student Summit at the Barrier Lake Field Station in Kananaskis, Alberta, Canada. Designed as a transdisciplinary and dialogic gathering, the summit brought together over 30 graduate student participants for three free days of shared learning, communal meals, and relationship-building in the mountains. The event was sponsored by a Quality Money grant from the University of Calgary Graduate Students' Association.
Awards
- Eyes High Doctoral Scholarship, University of Calgary . 2024
- Alberta Graduate Excellence Scholarship, University of Calgary . 2023
- Alberta Graduate Excellence Scholarship, University of Calgary. 2022
- Robert W. Blake Memorial Social Justice Scholarship, 2022
- Alberta Graduate Excellence Scholarship, University of Calgary. 2021
- Outstanding Graduate Student in Military History Award, Austin Peay State University, Department of History and Philosophy. 2016
- Outstanding Academic Writing Tutor Award, Austin Peay State University, Office of Academic Support . 2014
- Fred Seip Jr. Memorial Scholarship in History, 2013
Publications
- Internal Orientalism and the Appalachian Mountains: Ethnography on the fringes of capitalism. Poppendorf, A. . Taboo: The Journal of Culture and Education. 74-81. (2025)
- Reshaping educational spaces: An emerging framework for place-making and belonging in higher education with practical considerations for the classroom. Poppendorf, A. . Emerging Perspectives: Interdisciplinary Graduate Research in Education and Psychology. (2025)
- Culturally Sustaining Game Redesign: Developing Criticality through Redesign of the Tabletop Game Forbidden Island. Poppendorf, A., Kim, B., Bastani, R., Gierus, B., & Clyde, J. . International Society of the Learning Sciences. 1219-1222. (2024)
- Redesigning Tabletop Games as a Culturally Sustaining Pedagogy in Canadian Middle School Classrooms. Kim, B., Bastani, R., Gierus, B., Clyde, J., & Poppendorf, A.. International Society of the Learning Sciences. 2163-2164. (2024)
More Information
Graduate Students’ Association Academic Events Committee (2024-2025), ex-officio.
Assessment Principles Group (2024-2025)
Associate Deans Research Council (2024-2025)
Graduate Students’ Association Awards Committee (2024-2025), ex-officio
External Teaching and Learning Awards Committee (2024-2025)
Faculty of Graduate Studies Council (2024-2025)
Faculty of Graduate Studies Policy Committee (2024-2025)
Federal Advocacy Week Delegate, Ottawa (November 2024)
General Faculties Council (2024-2025)
General Faculties Council Academic Program Subcommittee (2024-2025)
General Faculties Council Research and Scholarship Committee (2024-2025)
General Faculties Council Teaching and Learning Committee (2024-2025)
Graduate Academic Programs Subcommittee (2024-2025)
Graduate Representative Council (2023-2024)
Learning Technologies Advisory Committee (2024-2025)
Parents in Academia Support Circle (PASC) (2025)
Learning and Engagement for Non-thesis Students (LENS) (2025)
McCaig-Killiam Teaching Awards Adjudication Committee (2024-2025)
Graduate Programs in Education Council (2023-2024)
Graduate Programs in Education Students’ Association Bylaws Revision Committee (2023-2024)
Poppendorf, A. (2017). WWII through propaganda and advertising [Curatorial Exhibition of Artifacts]. Exhibited in the Mable Larson Gallery, Clarksville, Tennessee.
Poppendorf, A. (2016). Tennessee through our artifacts [Curatorial Exhibit of Artifacts], Exhibited at Austin Peay State University, Clarksville, Tennessee.
Poppendorf, A. (2012). Heaven as hell [Curatorial Exhibit of Artifacts], Mable Larson Gallery, Austin Peay State University, Clarksville, Tennessee.
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