Meet Our Staff
Dr. Foucar-Szocki is Professor and Coordinator of the Adult Education/Human Resource Development Undergraduate and Graduate Degree Program in the College of Education at James Madison University. She is also founder and director of Virginia’s Workforce Improvement Network, an initiative of the Virginia Department of Education to provide quality basic skills programs in the workplace.
From this work, and with funding from Verizon, Dr. Foucar-Szocki founded the Workfroce Development Campus (WDC) at James Madison University, an online certificate program to prepare adult educators, community college personnel and human resource professionals to provide quality workplace learning programs.
Dr. Foucar-Szocki earned her doctorate in Adult Education and Administration from Syracuse University in 1989. Diane is past chair and member of the Harrisonburg City School Board and the Massanutten Technical Center Executive Board and is currently Vice Chair of the Harrisonburg Education Foundation. She is author of several articles on learning and performance in the Workplace and serves on several national panels and review boards related to workplace learning and human resource development.
Pamela Greenhalgh Brown, the Associate Director of the Workforce Improvement Network, has a soft spot in her heart for stray cats and moose. The Massachusetts native is “mom” to three cats and “foster mom” to several farm cats. When not buying cat food or adding to her moose collection, she keeps busy with WIN tasks, including writing and editing WIN News and coordinating the Compass and ESOL Main Street projects.
Ms. Brown is a former elementary school teacher, journalist, and public relations specialist. She has published articles in numerous magazines, including the Southcoast Insider, International Figure Skating, the Bristol County Baby Journal, and Hopscotch. She received second place honors for feature writing from the New England Press Association (NEPA) in 1993 for an article on facilitated communication, and was recognized by the Council for the Advancement and Support of Education (CASE) for feature writing, along with her colleagues from JMU Media Relations.
She is an active member of the Harrisonburg chapter of the American Association of University Women (AAUW). She graduated from Connecticut College with a B.A. in English and earned her M.Ed. from Rhode Island College.
As a JMU Alumnus (‘02), John Vaughan is the Technical Coordinator for VAWIN. His extensive background includes video production and editing, graphic design, programming, network administration, consulting, and PC repair and maintenance. Outside of work he loves spending time with his wife Jennifer and three children. When not juggling careers and parenting, John and Jennifer are learning everything they wanted to know about home building and ownership. They have recently finished the upstairs of their new home, which they moved into last December. Jennifer now attends the Radiology program at Rockingham Memorial Hospital while John has started his own website and video production business, Digital Media Services.
Jennifer Ash is attending JMU as a senior communications major. Originally from Richmond, VA, Jennifer is involved on campus in her sorority, Alpha Phi, as well as with JMU Orientation and Homecoming. She hopes to go into Operations Consulting after graduation and to travel abroad.
Jennie Reed, the premiere Editorial Intern of Vertex, spent her first semester with WIN developing a public relations campaign for Vertex. She is pursuing a B.S. in Technical and Scientific Communication at JMU and has aspirations of becoming the editor of an entertainment and lifestyle magazine one day. Last summer she worked in JMU’s Orientation Office which led to a position as a freshman Resident Advisor. When she has spare time, she can be found relaxing with flavored coffee and a magazine at Barnes and Noble.
Andrew Jaswa is the new WIN technology student assistant. He replaced Justin Spradlin, who now works in Northern Virginia as a computer programmer. Andrew, who lives in Stephens City, Virginia, is a junior pre-media arts and design major. When he’s not studying, he enjoys reading, especially novels by Isaac Asimov, and playing video games.
