Jess Parris Westbrook

About Jess Parris Westbrook

Dr. Jess Parris Westbrook (they/them) is a researcher, designer, creative, and tenured professor who loves complexity, systems, behavior, and the study of presence, interaction, learning, and change. Westbrook is an Associate Professor of Design in Chicago IL (2016) where they teach across UxD/HCI, Data Viz, Creative Coding, QUAL/QUANT, and Creative Methods areas. In previous years Westbrook was an Associate Professor of Contemporary Practices (surface, space, time) and Art and Technology Studies at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago (SAIC), Chicago, IL where they served as a Director. Their first academic appointment was at The University of Tennessee Chattanooga where they were Assistant Professor of Graphic Design and Photography and Media Art. Their earliest career phase was in interactive design and all things web development for NTT DOCOMO/Verio then interactive design for children\'s museums. Westbrook is credentialed in creativity assessment administration and scoring (Torrance Tests of Creative Thinking TTCT; U Georgia), and has spent most of their personal and professional life engaged in creative practices and creative technologies. Building on these experiences, Westbrook is interested in the meanings, measures, and analysis of learning outcomes that escape standards and normality, and support individual progress and agency. Westbrook earned a PhD in Education with a concentration in Higher Education Leadership. Motivated by the experience of learning, both human and non-human, Westbrook continues to expand their research orientations and practice toolkit(s). Several years of completed coursework included leadership themes, curriculum theory, educational research, and learning sciences. Their dissertation approach is a positionality-infused mixed methods framework prototype: \"My positionality describes my personal vulnerabilities and contexts – my disabled body, my Queer mind, my creative activity and my professional pathways, all of which are deeply intertwined.\"- Westbrook 2022\"Transdisciplinarity is described as a \'21st century research attitude\'(Davis & Sumara, 2008, p.35), combining \'transgression with problem solving\'(Bernstein, 2015, p.11), that enables researchers and practitioners access to wicked problems and complex phenomena (Guimarães, et al 2019).\" Westbrook 2022more:

Experience

1. Disability Lead Member

   Disability Lead

   Sep 2023 — Present · Chicago, IL, US

   Lead is a network of people with disabilities who use our power to create an equitable and inclusive society.

Education

• DePaul University-College of Education

  Doctor of Philosophy - PhD

  2017 — 2024

• Temple University Graduate School

  Master of Fine Arts - MFA, Tyler School of Art and Architecture

  1996 — 1998

• Valencia College

  Associate of Arts - AA

  1992 — 1994

• University of Central Florida

  Bachelor of Fine Arts - BFA, School of Visual Arts and Design

  1994 — 1996